So I've been having difficulty starting the fj55 from dead cold. I had it starting with the crank arm, and somehow things got out of whack and I've been able to start it reliably by warming up the intake prior to cranking. Carb has been overhauled with a SOR kit and I didn't find anything off, it went together nicely, seems to work well. I believe my problems are mostly ignition related. Spark plugs are chocolatey brown and dry. Yesterday after some fun in the puddles I swamped my ignition several times on the return trip and fouled out my spark due to water being in everything. Once I got it home, I set out to figure out what I can do to "tune up" my ignition system. I had a bag from the dealership with points and a condenser which I picked up literally yesterday at Toyota. Come to find out the wire which feeds the ballast resistor had come loose, it was making intermittent contact. After playing with it on the car I took the coil off the car and determined with my fluke that the resistor was open, but would make contact if I held it just right. I pulled another ballast resistors and swapped it out. I also marked TDC position of the rotor in case I decided to pull the distributor, then I swapped out the condenser and gapped in the new points.
now it doesn't start at all, no spark, not even at the coil. Come to find out the condenser I bought from Toyota, it is dead short. It doesn't charge. It's brand new and defective right out of the box. Yippee.
At this point it's 10pm and there's nobody to complain to so I decide to continue...
I rummage for about 3 minutes and find a brand new condenser for a Ford tractor.
Swap it on and it works, then as I go to set timing I grab the distributor and the engine dies, no fumbling, just flat dead...
Upon closer inspection the terminal end of the condenser for the Ford is crimped over insulation, another brand new part that doesn't work. Yippee.
This time I soldered it up with my trusty Weller soldering iron and it now is better than anything available in any local store apparently... I got that put back and got the engine started and warm for timing. I disconnected my vacuum retard and set the timing to about 12° of base advance. I dialed the rpm to about 650, per the manual, checked timing again, then locked down the distributor at roughly 12° because it doesn't hesitate off idle at that advance. 12° of base timing is pretty bog standard in the automotive world. Seemed to run great. I then turned the mixture screws down until I heard the engine begin to starve, and backed it off by about 1/3 turn.
I've installed a number of pertronix kits, aftermarket distributors, aftermarket ignition boxes in my career as a mechanic. Those kits offer a much easier path for people who either can't or don't want to diagnose and fix what they already have. As you can tell by this story, there can be a lot of hoops to jump through to get to a working ignition. New parts arrive and they're junk. Old parts are intermittently open circuit. Other new parts are also defective... if I wasn't a professional who KNOWS how to diagnose, this would have been impossible.
I'm hoping tomorrow I can start it first crank. If I can, I'll wait a day and try the same routine but use the crank handle.
I think thats the ultimate original landcruiser flex... To pull out the crank arm and hand crank your engine...
If any of you old cruiserheads care to comment on what I did right or could have done better? It would be welcome. I've got no idea if it's going to start any easier tomorrow morning buy I'll give it a try and I'll let you know.
Photo is from the area where I got swamped in the puddles but from a different day.
now it doesn't start at all, no spark, not even at the coil. Come to find out the condenser I bought from Toyota, it is dead short. It doesn't charge. It's brand new and defective right out of the box. Yippee.
At this point it's 10pm and there's nobody to complain to so I decide to continue...
I rummage for about 3 minutes and find a brand new condenser for a Ford tractor.
Swap it on and it works, then as I go to set timing I grab the distributor and the engine dies, no fumbling, just flat dead...
Upon closer inspection the terminal end of the condenser for the Ford is crimped over insulation, another brand new part that doesn't work. Yippee.
This time I soldered it up with my trusty Weller soldering iron and it now is better than anything available in any local store apparently... I got that put back and got the engine started and warm for timing. I disconnected my vacuum retard and set the timing to about 12° of base advance. I dialed the rpm to about 650, per the manual, checked timing again, then locked down the distributor at roughly 12° because it doesn't hesitate off idle at that advance. 12° of base timing is pretty bog standard in the automotive world. Seemed to run great. I then turned the mixture screws down until I heard the engine begin to starve, and backed it off by about 1/3 turn.
I've installed a number of pertronix kits, aftermarket distributors, aftermarket ignition boxes in my career as a mechanic. Those kits offer a much easier path for people who either can't or don't want to diagnose and fix what they already have. As you can tell by this story, there can be a lot of hoops to jump through to get to a working ignition. New parts arrive and they're junk. Old parts are intermittently open circuit. Other new parts are also defective... if I wasn't a professional who KNOWS how to diagnose, this would have been impossible.
I'm hoping tomorrow I can start it first crank. If I can, I'll wait a day and try the same routine but use the crank handle.
I think thats the ultimate original landcruiser flex... To pull out the crank arm and hand crank your engine...
If any of you old cruiserheads care to comment on what I did right or could have done better? It would be welcome. I've got no idea if it's going to start any easier tomorrow morning buy I'll give it a try and I'll let you know.
Photo is from the area where I got swamped in the puddles but from a different day.
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. Also used Beer cans for Heat riser tubes on my V-dub bus
. Heat still sucked though 
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