Lake County Lot Lizard slow build thread

[Blenny]

Well, Ive done like one other build thread a long time ago on a 3rd gen 4runner I had that I really didnt do much with but I enjoyed working on that and when I was done I hardly had any progress to show when it was done. Same with my 1st gen pickup that I still have. Ive had my 1983 toyota pickup for around 12 years now, wheeled it a lot mostly rubicon, some fordyce but I drive it pretty nice I just enjoy going out with friends wheeling. Ill try and be better with this one. So, with kids in the works a single cab isn't going to work so well with getting the whole family out on the trail and I've been wanting something bigger. 2 years ago I did some work at a work vineyard and I noticed they had 2 landcruiser on the books (I noticed long before I worked at this property was just waiting for an opportunity) so when I did work there I went and checked them out. They used them for laborer work vehicles, there was a 100 series that was pretty hammered, and there was an 80 that was also pretty hammered. We had a 100 series last year, didnt have a lot of use for it but was a cool truck. I was really looking at the 80. I snuck a peak in the 80 window when the guys parked it and noticed the infamous dial to the left of the steering wheel and got pretty excited. Well, company made the decision to slow operations at this facility and we moved a lot of the equipment out. After a while of waiting I finally got the ok to purchase it for $500.

Here's how it looked before I was ever able to pick it up. Pretty hammered, check engine light but ran fine. Just enough dents for me. Full of vineyard irrigation parts, rat poop and random garbage. Crusty seats, crusty everything really.

I got the ok and headed up with my trailer maybe a day after the title showed up to transfer. She's greasy, old, but theres still something to like about her to keep her in business so ive started calling her the Lake County Lot Lizard. If you know anything about California's Lake County it'll make sense.

So my main goal here is to have a decent wheeler, it will live most its life on a trailer with some drives around town but no major travels planned. Adding photos off of my phone is getting difficult with this message length so I will conclude this as the first post for now.

 

[Blenny]

So truck ran, had a cel, was an o2 sensors. Im a child so before that I decided to swap the 37s off of my pickup on it without changing a thing to see what I really needed to clear them.

Wasn't as easy as id hoped. I was going for as low and tall tired as possible for crawling. Started doing more research, forums ain't what they used to be it really bums me out. Part of the reason im motivated to post this stuff! I used to get to much help from people on pirate and marlin and the 4runner forum I was on. Anyways, classic millennial focus, change i started working on the interior a bit just cleaning.

I scored some free factory matching seats from a member here (ill have to look back on his name) they were in such good shape everything works, it was meant to be.

I started working on the carpet a bit, I dont even have a finished product shot but I have one after a bit with an amazon drill brush and some chemical guys cleaner. Made a hug difference and now it doesnt smell like the mouse house it was. The center console, rear heater fan, all that full of rats nests.

 

[Blenny]

Got the carpets a good bit better, cleaned all the rat junk out. Ran an ozone machine in there for a while now all I can smell is the leather conditioner I cleaned all the seats with which is ideal!

The paint is rough, clear coats missing most everywhere and heavy mineral deposits on everything. So far ive done the hood and fenders and theyre coming out much better, good enough for a wheeler.

I knew where I wanted to start with this, ive rebuilt my toyota axle many times I used to just do it as regular maintenance every few years when I was using it more. This one's basically the same so I ordered the parts (Holy landcruiser tax on knuckle kits jeez) and black friday i ordered some dobinsons c97 146 and 147s. I ordered these because of the unsprung length and lower lift than some of the other options. I wanted to have minimal issues with springs popping out and minimal lift. I looked at omes but I didnt like the length no weight. I have yet to order shocks as I see different information on what works best. I will be taking measurements stuffed and drooped and ordering my own recipe. This week I rebuilt the front axle, added eimkeith control arm drops, built a truss for the front axle, all new ceramic brakes (got a good deal on marketplace was cheaper than napa), and installed the dobisons. Totally forgot about extended brake lines so those are on the way.

Im sure im forgetting some stuff and I will add as I remember and do more. Im back to the shop tomorrow to do some measurements for shocks and clean uo my mess!

 

[Blenny]

Just for fun, here's the other crawler

 

[GW Nugget]

NoICE!
500 bones, cant go wrong.
So you got the 2.5" VT lift. Did you get before after measurements?
Your frame height behind Tcase to floor should be about 20" to 21".
Mine is 21" on 2" suspension with 39"s.
Are those 15" reverse out wheels on 37s? Thats like 2.5" backspace, right?
26" to 28" extended shocks in front is about all the front will yield without major work.
By adding the emkieth front control arm drop brackets you will get 2" more drop at the tire than before. (The pivot point is lower)
Your next restriction in articulation will be control arm to axle bracket binding. You will need to do a bit of grinding on top to get more flex.
It looks like you cut fenders all ready, you didnt need to do that.
What year is the 80 the dash tells me 93-94
How many miles?

Welcome to the addiction.

 

[Marvelicious]

As far as large tire / low lift goes, it's going to take some trimming to get what you're after. A good example of one that's really well sorted for serious rock crawling is Broski's rig. He's got a very detailed thread on its evolution.

Honestly, this place has been around since way back when Pirate was still good, and there is a TON of really good tech buried in here, the trouble is that A) it's hard to search because forum search engines have never worked that well and google is garbage now and B) almost all the pictures in the old threads are dead now. You might also appreciate the Hardcore Corner section of the forum.

 

[Blenny]

As far as large tire / low lift goes, it's going to take some trimming to get what you're after. A good example of one that's really well sorted for serious rock crawling is Broski's rig. He's got a very detailed thread on its evolution.

Honestly, this place has been around since way back when Pirate was still good, and there is a TON of really good tech buried in here, the trouble is that A) it's hard to search because forum search engines have never worked that well and google is garbage now and B) almost all the pictures in the old threads are dead now. You might also appreciate the Hardcore Corner section of the forum.

Oh ive learned a lot here already but yeah searching is sifting a lot. Its the first place i look when i have a tech question. I think ill be good with the springs I got, the 37s tuck fine so far. Future maybe im going 40s but i have a brand new set of 37s and beadlocks for this truck, i jsut did a little test trip on them on the pickup because I just couldnt wait haha. Im not really scared to cut more. Its a triple locked stock 94 but it was pretty rough so I dont feel so bad hacking it up.

 

[Blenny]

NoICE!
500 bones, cant go wrong.
So you got the 2.5" VT lift. Did you get before after measurements?
Your frame height behind Tcase to floor should be about 20" to 21".
Mine is 21" on 2" suspension with 39"s.
Are those 15" reverse out wheels on 37s? Thats like 2.5" backspace, right?
26" to 28" extended shocks in front is about all the front will yield without major work.
By adding the emkieth front control arm drop brackets you will get 2" more drop at the tire than before. (The pivot point is lower)
Your next restriction in articulation will be control arm to axle bracket binding. You will need to do a bit of grinding on top to get more flex.
It looks like you cut fenders all ready, you didnt need to do that.
What year is the 80 the dash tells me 93-94
How many miles?

Welcome to the addiction.

94! 260k I didnt do any measurements it was fairly clapped out suspension stock. I did cut fenders, the flares were toast. Maybe im misled but I feel like everyone bumps to compensate body, id rather get the tuck than hit bump. The wheels are 17s, 2.5in bs iirc ive had them a while. I have 3.5bs raceline beadlocks I just need to switch over,so ill probably be running wheel spacers to make up this width.

 

[Blenny]

NoICE!
500 bones, cant go wrong.
So you got the 2.5" VT lift. Did you get before after measurements?
Your frame height behind Tcase to floor should be about 20" to 21".
Mine is 21" on 2" suspension with 39"s.
Are those 15" reverse out wheels on 37s? Thats like 2.5" backspace, right?
26" to 28" extended shocks in front is about all the front will yield without major work.
By adding the emkieth front control arm drop brackets you will get 2" more drop at the tire than before. (The pivot point is lower)
Your next restriction in articulation will be control arm to axle bracket binding. You will need to do a bit of grinding on top to get more flex.
It looks like you cut fenders all ready, you didnt need to do that.
What year is the 80 the dash tells me 93-94
How many miles?

Welcome to the addiction.

Funny I also just realized I was looking at your thread while installing the drop brackets. Have you wheeled them hard? Only after install did I think about how much it extended the leverage on that area.

 

[GW Nugget]

The emkieth brackets are a great improvement is what Im trying to say.
Mine are 30mm forward, I told Kieth to do 25mm for his production sets.
I want to bolt a set of Super flex arms to them. This is what I would say is as close to a 3link one could get without welding in a 3link.
Super Flex not the Hyper Flex cuz the hydro assist needs to be on driver side behind axle.
I have the 3L Delta arms now & like those also, I didnt cut the emkieth off, they are still there.
You will find that the 3.5" BS wheel will tuck better in the rear than the 2.5" BS wheels.
You will also find the new coils wont compress all the way to the stock bumpstops in the front unless you slam them hard. And if you decide to go with a 28" shock in front you will need a approx. a 2" bumpstop to protect them from bottoming out. See Suspension spec thread for the recommended bumpstop for you shock of choice. I have equivalent to 1.75" bumps for my 28.7" Ironman foamcell shocks.

As far as searching I find Google works better if you search your words then add ih8mud at the end. It does well for me.

 

[100kiwi]

Nice find. Was it at Snows Lake?

 

[tmxmotorsports]

Can't go wrong on that for 500.00.

 

[Blenny]

Nice find. Was it at Snows Lake?

Never would have guessed someone knew where it was from yes, story i heard was it was the original owners personal vehicle and when they bought a new car they just had the workers use it.

 

[100kiwi]

Never would have guessed someone knew where it was from yes, story i heard was it was the original owners personal vehicle and when they bought a new car they just had the workers use it.

Never would have guessed someone knew where it was from yes, story i heard was it was the original owners personal vehicle and when they bought a new car they just had the workers use it.

I'm local, and have been farming vineyards up here for 20 years so know most of the vineyards.
That must have been the original owners before Gallo purchased it.

 

[Blenny]

I'm local, and have been farming vineyards up here for 20 years so know most of the vineyards.
That must have been the original owners before Gallo purchased it.

I figured you had to have some intimate knowledge of the industry in the area to call out that property. Yeah the original owners is what I heard. Thankful they bought one with lockers back then haha.

 

[Blenny]

Went and stuffed it out some to figure out bumps and shocks. Surprised with how much flex it had. For rear i got 32.5d/31.5p full droop and 20/20.5 full stuff. Looked like a 3in bump ext would be what i need Anything I should know before I order a 12in travel shock for the rear to fit these dimensions?

For the front, I got around 27 extended 20 compressed on both sides within a half inch. Also looked like a 3in bump ext would be around what I need. I won't be ordering them for a few weeks, have some more parts showing up, she will probably sit for a few weeks until I get some free time again.

Also threw on a tg winch plate and 12k badlands apex i got on sale for like 370. Haven't wired it yet as when the time ill do all electrical together. I thought I would like the winch plate a lot more but it still leaves a lot to be desired as far as approach angle. Considering doing some modifications to it to sink the winch back in to the grill more and shorten the front.

 

[pv40]

Way cool build. Where in lake county is snow lake?? I know lake county fairly well never heard of it.

 

[Blenny]

Way cool build. Where in lake county is snow lake?? I know lake county fairly well never heard of it.

Thanks! Its getting there! Lower lake, its nothing publicly accessible and as far as I know it was just an old vineyard name for the property.

 

[pv40]

Ahhh. I was more curious because my buddy was running equipment on a big job in lake county and there was a big lake in the vineyard but I don’t know the name of it.

 

[pv40]

His job was out long ranch road. Lol. Nice rig.