Builds Kid-safe 1975 FJ40 build in Washington DC

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Impressive, for sure!
 
Getting the steering column ready, still need to clean up and inspect the manual steering box. Disassembled and cleaned all the old grease from the bearing. Blasted everything and finished with epoxy. Next up, the steering wheel

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Lots of cracks, some chunks missing as well. Birdman’s thread was really helpful. Degreased, lightly sanded with 120. Used epoxy to fill the cracks, squeezed it in the best I could. Sanded again with 120, filled any low spots with epoxy again. Sanded with 120, 220 and up until smooth, applied epoxy primer and finished with SEM gloss black trim paint. It looks better in person, I’m really happy with the way it turned out, may wet sand and buff one day, but good enough for now.

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Nice job on the wheel, looks great. Jealous of all your shiny powder coat parts too!
 
Been busy, moved again. Ineeded to get everything put together as I will not have a garage at the new place until I build one. For now the 40 will be staying at a garage too far away to work on routinely. I did not take as many pics as I should have but I’ll post up what I have.
Installed the steering wheel and other dash items

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Built new hard lines to the carb. Was not hard to bend, but I did not have the originals for templates and getting it just right was tough, there are a lot of things in the way. I used a 12g copper wire to make the initial template, made it much easier. The bsp fittings were not as hard to come by as I thought they would be.

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Started on the seat restoration. Was strait forward enough, but it was challenging to figure out what hardware when where, there are lots of specialized washers and bolts involved. I should have filled out the foam a bit more, I’m hoping it will smooth out a bit in the sun. Covers are from cruiser corps, and are good quality. Foam was ordered on Amazon and contoured with an electric turkey carver. Looks good enough, I may redo the foam one day though.

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Same treatment for the passenger seat and jump seats. Installed a new gas tank from ccot - their repro galvanized steel one. New rubber and clamps all around. New oem radiator installed from @cityracer.

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Lots of work on electrical. Harness want too bad, re wrapped some of it and replaced some bad wires with properly color coded wire. Installed a gear reduction starter, kept blowing a fuse. Tore th whole thing apart trying to figure it out… just wired wrong at the alternator. New fusible link and fuse box.

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New headlight harness and rear harness, all lights work as the should now. Added a bunch of dedicated grounds which really solved a lot of problems.

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Doors on, driver side fits great, passenger side door does not - the door had its lower quarter repaired, and it doesn’t meet the jamb exactly. It is fine for now and not obvious, but I’ll probably replace it one day. It’s the only part of the truck that has more than a thin film of filler.

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Build an exhaust system pretty close to the original, I’ll replace it eventually but needed something to drive it to the new garage. Ran rough at first, but after adjusting the carb float it fired right up and idles really smoothly. Still need to install some glass and have hundreds of little things left, but almost ready to start driving it around. Waiting on antique plates.

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Next time I’m at the garage I’ll take some more pics . Next project is the charcoal canister. I don’t have one, and the tank is pressuring. The check valve down stream of the separator works fine and is installed in the right direction, I can suck air through it easily - maybe it needs a vacuum through the charcoal filter from the air cleaner to clear the pressure?
 

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