Builds Last of the BJs: 1989 BJ60 restoration, 15B-T swap

[John Young]

I had a reaction when I saw you had gotten the heater box from AUS. I know from hard experience that there are significant differences between RHD and LHD heater boxes. Had to go back up to your first post to see that your truck is actually RHD.

Have you considered painting or treating the hold-down clips and other metal hardware? I've tended to do that but I really have not come up with a method that I'm happy with and I am about to do the same renovation on a heater box for my 95 70 series pickup.

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

I had a reaction when I saw you had gotten the heater box from AUS. I know from hard experience that there are significant differences between RHD and LHD heater boxes. Had to go back up to your first post to see that your truck is actually RHD.

Have you considered painting or treating the hold-down clips and other metal hardware? I've tended to do that but I really have not come up with a method that I'm happy with and I am about to do the same renovation on a heater box for my 95 70 series pickup.

Hi John

Yes thankfully I am living in a right-hand drive part of Asia. I am not doing a concours restoration on this car so was happy to use some cheap silver spray paint on the brackets and doors which Toyota left bare. I didn't fancy painting the spring-steel clips which hold the two halves of the heater box (and blower motor and evaporator box) together. For those I just cleaned them up in citric acid, dried them and wiped them with oil. Hopefully that delays the surface rust.

The best solution would probably be zinc electroplating and passivation, but I don't have access to that here. I've tried home plating before, I would not bother with it again as it was fiddly, frustrating and usually disappointing.

EO

 

[John Young]

Hi John

Yes thankfully I am living in a right-hand drive part of Asia. I am not doing a concours restoration on this car so was happy to use some cheap silver spray paint on the brackets and doors which Toyota left bare. I didn't fancy painting the spring-steel clips which hold the two halves of the heater box (and blower motor and evaporator box) together. For those I just cleaned them up in citric acid, dried them and wiped them with oil. Hopefully that delays the surface rust.

The best solution would probably be zinc electroplating and passivation, but I don't have access to that here. I've tried home plating before, I would not bother with it again as it was fiddly, frustrating and usually disappointing.

EO

On my last couple of boxes I tried using this after I had de-rusted with either a local product or evapo-rust:

It dries quickly and leaves a somewhat uneven mottled black coating behind. I have no idea whether it will be durable, but I did not want to put back a freshly de-rusted soft steel item uncoated with something. It looked nicer than paint too, I think. You can kinda see how it looks from this photo:

As you can see I did not bother with doing it to all the screws, although next time I probably will. And I have a heater box project for the pickup coming up.

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

On my last couple of boxes I tried using this after I had de-rusted with either a local product or evapo-rust:

It dries quickly and leaves a somewhat uneven mottled black coating behind. I have no idea whether it will be durable, but I did not want to put back a freshly de-rusted soft steel item uncoated with something. It looked nicer than paint too, I think. You can kinda see how it looks from this photo:

As you can see I did not bother with doing it to all the screws, although next time I probably will. And I have a heater box project for the pickup coming up.

That rust converter I would guess is a phosphoric acid type treatment which I believe reduces the red iron(III) oxide (aka rust) into a more stable black iron(II) oxide (ferrous oxide). It is however only an undercoat, and just as raw iron will oxidise to rust, so will the black ferrous oxide surface. It's not a long term exterior solution, but inside the cab, it may well work. A smear of oil/grease/petroleum jelly would probably be just as good.

 

[vega01]

HVAC - Heater box 6

Finished. (Actually sharp-eyed watchers will notice that some of the spring steel clips which hold the box together and clamp the cables in position are missing - I am still overthinking whether to clean them in acid or by electrolysis....).

I'm not so keen on the silver spray paint approach, bubt Toyota left these pieces in bare steel, so I need to improve on that. Zinc plating would be great, but it's not available here in Brunei and well, maybe a bit OTT for something that will rarely be seen.

View attachment 3223176

I've used silicone grease on the plastic moving parts. Not sure if that is a good long-term idea... any opinions? I wanted to avoid spray white grease for fear of making the plastic brittle over time, but the original factory grease was white and probably lithium/oil based...

View attachment 3223181

The new foot register:

View attachment 3223183

Heater core looks great. Far better than the A/C evaporator (coming soon).

View attachment 3223185

New resistor:

View attachment 3223189

Somehow I have dedicated six posts to the heater box...

EO

Great series, thanks for posting!
I've been doing the same stuff with my KZJ70's heater and blower recently as a part of full cleaning and restoring of dashboard, electrics, trim and whatever I have time and money for.
Did you use any kind of air filter foam or just a standard one when replacing the old one? I noticed in my case that at least in one place the foam is a bit stiffer than the standard one, on the blower flap that switches the circulation, I think between internal and external.

 

[vega01]

First thing was to dismantle the heater box, clean the plastic and renew all the flaking foam on the paddle doors. The foam can be scraped off, but the glue would not budge with anything weaker than dichloromethane (methylene chloride).

I tested isopropanol, dichloromethane and a universal solvent, but it all required much effort in my case to remove the glue even partially. I think I've got an even better way. I put the paddle doors in vinegar for night and in the morning it took me 30 seconds to remove the glue and remains of foam - it just peeled off like a skin and left a clean surface. The main goal of removing rust was also of course achieved. Cheap and you don't have to do it in a ventilated room, if you don't care it smells a bit.

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

Great series, thanks for posting!
I've been doing the same stuff with my KZJ70's heater and blower recently as a part of full cleaning and restoring of dashboard, electrics, trim and whatever I have time and money for.
Did you use any kind of air filter foam or just a standard one when replacing the old one? I noticed in my case that at least in one place the foam is a bit stiffer than the standard one, on the blower flap that switches the circulation, I think between internal and external.

Sorry for the slow reply. I used open cell foam from the Toyota interior noise elimination kit: 08231-00801, though it's hugely overpriced for what it is. I also had some foam sheets left over from my Hilux restoration which I did in 2013/4. It is all of the stiffer type if I compare the different foams used on the doors and pipe ends.

There is one more rubberised, closed cell foam which goes on the seals of the A/C evaporator box which I can't find, I am ordering various things from ALiExpress and seeing what turns up.

I tested isopropanol, dichloromethane and a universal solvent, but it all required much effort in my case to remove the glue even partially. I think I've got an even better way. I put the paddle doors in vinegar for night and in the morning it took me 30 seconds to remove the glue and remains of foam - it just peeled off like a skin and left a clean surface. The main goal of removing rust was also of course achieved. Cheap and you don't have to do it in a ventilated room, if you don't care it smells a bit.

Dichloromethane should shift it with no problems at all. If you are in Europe though, you may be getting a very watered down version. I remember going into a Dutch hardware store looking for paint thinner and got sold some green eco crap which was probably mouthwash. Here in Asia I can get DCM which burns the skin if a little flicks onto it - and it lifts that adhesive off immediately.

Good if vinegar works, ammonia should work too, and doesn't risk leaving residual acid in the metal.

You say you are replacing trim - I had a ery hard time getting baked-on adhesive strips off the trim of my Hilux Surf - I was eventually recommended 3M special sticky stuff remover, which is pretty expensive. I read the MSDS and basically made my own out of xylene and naptha, which worked (though still required scrubbing).

 

[vs11]

Great Work !

 

[vega01]

Sorry for the slow reply. I used open cell foam from the Toyota interior noise elimination kit: 08231-00801, though it's hugely overpriced for what it is. I also had some foam sheets left over from my Hilux restoration which I did in 2013/4. It is all of the stiffer type if I compare the different foams used on the doors and pipe ends.

No worries! Thanks for all the valuable information.
I'm using foams from aliexpress or locally acquired ones, they are of the same stiffness as the ones on plastic air ducts ends. I hope they will last, I'm only a bit worried about the adhesive quality, but let's see.

There is one more rubberised, closed cell foam which goes on the seals of the A/C evaporator box which I can't find, I am ordering various things from ALiExpress and seeing what turns up.



Dichloromethane should shift it with no problems at all. If you are in Europe though, you may be getting a very watered down version. I remember going into a Dutch hardware store looking for paint thinner and got sold some green eco crap which was probably mouthwash. Here in Asia I can get DCM which burns the skin if a little flicks onto it - and it lifts that adhesive off immediately.

The dichloromethane I used was from a laboratory, for sure not watered down, so I don't know why it didn't work. It burned skin immediately.

Good if vinegar works, ammonia should work too, and doesn't risk leaving residual acid in the metal.

I used vinegar to remove rust from the metal parts. My plan is to clean it with extraction naphtha and paint with a zink coating spray. Do you think it's a good idea? Or is there a better and cheap/not sophisticated way of protecting the metal parts of heater/blower from corrosion? I'm a bit worried now about the residual acid from vinegar, that you mentioned.

BTW, where do you source your parts from in Japan? I was looking for a heater/blower resistor as well, but I couldn't find the price you mentioned (for your resistor type).

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

Differentials - tools

The car came with standard, 9.5" open differentials front and rear, both of which needed attention.

The front differential had, it seemed, hardly been used. I believe the car was parked up for many years, making occasional trips and I assume never in 4WD. The front differential, while showing practically zero wear, had been left standing and had rust on the internal surfaces of the housing (axle and third member). The bearings were notched slightly from being held in one place and had surface rust. The carrier also had some light surface rust. Luckily, the ring gear and pinion shaft are perfect. Rebuild scope - new bearings and seals.

The rear differential was a different story. It's a high mileage car (567,000 km) so some wear is guaranteed, but sadly the previous owner had failed to address the warning sign of a leaking differential flange and that led to zero pre-load on the pinion shaft bearings. The outer pinion shaft bearing had significant wear on the outer thrst face from turning and had been worn to a loose fit on the pinion shaft. The pinion shaft splines were severely worn and the splines in te drive flange were almost gone. The carrier had also spun a bearing. Thanks to this neglect, everything apart from the differential housing (which was entombed in a thick layer of oil-soaked dirt) was junk. Rebuild scope - totally new internals (this would be quite an adventure).

I have never rebuilt a differential and it's a skill I am keen to learn. Firstly though, I need to make a couple of tools.

I have no work-stand or fixed vise where I currently live, so I thought about the issue of holding the differential firmly in the different positions required to set the backlash and pre-load, tighten the ring gear nuts and set the pinion pre-load. I also needed a way to keep the flange locked at various stages, aparticularly the final torquing of the pinion shaft nut, which requires a hefty 300-400 Nm of torque. I came up with the idea of a cubic stand, and welded it up from 3 mm angle:

The diff housing is held by up to 6 bolt holes in one end of the cube.

When the cube is flipped so that the housing opening is facing upwards, the flange is just off the floor.

This shaped, drilled and gusseted piece of angle locks against the cube and gives a hands-free method of locking the flange.

I also made a tool to turn the differential carrier bearing adjusting washers:

I didn't much like the design of the Toyota SST, so I took a cheap 8 mm 1/2" drive socket, welded it into a small piece of 4 mm steel.

For the pins, I tapped two M8 holes in the steel plate, threaded in two high-tensile bolts, welded them at the back and cut and shaped them at the front. The tool fits and works perfectly.

Now we're ready to tackle the differentials.

EO

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

Front differential

Here is what it looked like when it came out of the car. Lots of surface rust and oil emulsion.

Luckily, the gear surfaces look fine.

I don't have any pictures of the clean-up (only for the rear differential, to follow). so it's striaght ot the rebuild. I totally dismantled the differential unit, took the ring gear off the carrier and cleaned the rust off the carrier in an electrolysis tank.

First thing was to check the backlash in the spider gears. Given that the gears, thrust washers and carrier have virtually no wear, I was expecting these to be within factory spec. The thrust washers are 1.90 mm thick, which is one size down from the thickest (this came as a bit of a surprise), but it was the same both sides, and both front and rear diffs - all 1.90 mm.

I measured backlash values of between about 0.05 and 0.22 mm.

I tried putting in the thickest side gear thrust washers (2.05 mm) and that got the highest backlash value down to about 0.15 mm, but it left spots where there was zero backlash. I therefore decided to run with the originals.

EO

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

Front differential 2

Time to effect a hydraulic press. I used a 6 tonne bottle jack, old Hilux split rim and my house!

Firstly, I pressed on the new inner pinion shaft bearing, with the original 1.30 mm shim.

Then the side carrier bearings. Ring gear side.

Then the other side.

Rotating hardware looking good.

Now time to re-fit the ring gear, in its original position. The FSM advises to use an oil bath, then clean off the oil and quickly fit it. Seems like a daft idea to me, so I put it in the oven and heated it on the lowest setting until it was too hot to touch.

I had forgotten to mark the orientation of the ring gear with the carrier, luckily with the open-type carruier, it's easy to read from the mating pattern where the ring gear used to sit.

It dropped on effortlessly.

EO

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

Front differential 3

Time to mount the carrier on new bearings

Then check the runout on the ring-gear. The limit in the 60 series FSM if 0.10 mm, which seems pretty large to me, but mine is at about 0.02 mm.

Next, mounting the pinion shaft. Contrary to some people's experience, the outer pinion shaft bearing should be a light interference fit on the shaft. Here, the previous neglect of the rear differential has a silver lining - I have an outer pinion shaft bearing which has been worn to an oversize and slips over the shaft freely. Great for this set up stage where the outer bearing is fitted without the crush sleeve to set the ring gear backlash and carrier bearing pre-load. as I don't need to find a way to pull the bearing off the shaft when it is in the differential housing.

Torque down the pinion nut gently until the pre-load is set, here I got about 2.2 Nm of pre-load (after tightenting the nut of course).

I'm using this tiny deflection bar torque wrench. It's a 1/4" drive with a 1/2" adapter going into the 30 mm socket for the pinion nut.

EO

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

Front differential 4

Setting the ring gear backlash and carrier bearing pre-load. I got the backlash to about 0.17 mm (spec: 0.15-0.20 mm). For the pre-load, I went a touch higher than spec (0.4-0.6 Nm) at about 0.8 Nm as these are new bearings and my philosophy with tapered roller bearings is to go a touch higher on pre-load. Bearings are cheap, differential carriers (front axle spindles, rear axle housings, transfer output shafts etc) are not!

Time to run a pattern. There are expensive little packets of 'differential gear marking compound' for sale in the US which get very expensive once shipped halfway around the world. So I am using some yellow-ochre oil paint. I would guess it is the same stuff.

The concave side (drive side on a front low-pinion differential):

Convex side (coast):

Pinion shaft teeth

That all looks good - not surprising given that everything is factory spec and barely broken in.

(One lesson for myself here is on use of the paint - I put way too much on and let it dry out a bit before cleaning. Next time I will be more sparing and wipe it off once I have read the pattern and taken pictures...)

EO

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

Front differential 5

Almost done. Time for some more nice new pieces. New crush sleeve, the new outer pinion bearing, original oil slinger, new oil seal (made in Vietnam...) and new pinion nut.

Crush sleeve resting on the inner pinioon bearing, almost ready to feel some pressure...

Outer pinion bearing. This gets pressed onto the shaft by the flange when tightenting the nut.

Oil slinger

Drive in a new oil seal and put some grease on the lip.

EO

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

Front differential 6

There's no mention of this in the FSM, but I put a little silicone RTV at the top of the flange splines (don't put it on the shaft splines as this will get worked down by the flange) to stop oil creeping past the lock nut.

I have nothing that measures 300-400 Nm of torque, but for the torquing of the pinion nut I used a roughly metre long piece of box section on a breaker bar, and it still needed a good push. Here you can see a length of angle bolted to the botom of my 'diff cube' so it doesn't turn over when crushing the sleeve. The designed worked perfectly.

Then stake the nut. This is much thicker than the transmission nuts which stake nicely with a punch. Here I used a small chisel to cut the nut flange at each side of the groove in the pinion shaft, then knocked it down with a punch.

The final step is to torque the side bearing adjusting washer locking tabs, and the differential is done.

I ended up with about 3.2 Nm pre-load on the pinion shaft - that's 2.4 Nm on the pinion shaft bearings (at the top end of the range for new bearings) and 0.8 Nm for the carrier bearings.

EO

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

It has been far too long since I last updated this, apologies for that. I've been working on various sub-sections of the build - lots of wiring harness repair, getting the lights in order. I've also started painting various structural components (such axles) and am close to having a rolling chassis. Other small sub-assemblies have also been worked on. In real-time however, I am doing engine work, so I thought I'd bring the thread up to date on that as it has mostly been transmission and drivetrain stuff so far.

So, as a refresh, the vehicle has its original factory engine, a 3Bii. Sifting through the 3Bii threads on MUD, I see a lot of confusion and misinformation about them, probably because they were never sold in North America as far as I know, and were only used in BJ60s, 70s, 73s and 75s from 08/1988 to 12/1989 - 17 months. They did however go on to be used in Coaster buses for ten more years, so there are plenty of them out there. I have very limited experience driving 3Bs; but that, and the testimony I can find online from people who have drive both 3Bs suggest that the 3Bii has much more low end power and pick-up. It felt like I remember an HJ60 to drive, though without that slow straight 6 purr.

Regardless, it's an indirect injection diesel (so unsuited to turbocharging in my opinion) and has the inherent weakness of pre-combustion chambers, so I would prefer to replace it with something with direct injection and a turbocharger. I initially wanted to drop in a 15B-FT but legal constraints where I live mean I can only run with an engine which was originally sold in the model - so besides the 3B, a 2H, 12H-T, 2F or 3F - none of which I want.

So here it is, hosed down. 567,000 kms, original engine.

Obvious differences from a 3Bi - flat top 1HZ/1HD/1PZ style valve cover, no pushrod inspection window cover (the later B engines such as this use roller lifters and have pairs of bolts, visible in the picture to act as detents. Remove the bolts and the lifters drop out of the engine), and a 10 bolt exhaust manifold.

Obvious differences from a 3B - gear driven vacuum pump (below the injection pump). All 3Biis have rotary pumps, but some 3Bs also had the rotary pump, so that is not a distinguishing factor.

With intake manifold and injection pump removed, a very stout block casting is revealed. I believe the 3Bii block is significantly stronger than a 3B, though I have not had them side by side. You can see '3B' cast up behind the injection lines. Look to the right and you see a machined area - that's where they machine off '14B' from the block when they decide whether to make a block casting a 3B or a 14B. That gives me an idea... Now it could be that the subsequent machining of the 3B and 14B blocks makes them into truly different items, but I have a sneaking suspicion that it doesn't.

I bought a 3Bii engine gasket kit which comes with a head gasket, 11115-58081 (t=1.50 mm; the only size officially available for the 3B, though you can use thicker gaskets from the 4B). I then ordered a 14B* head gasket, 11115-58070.

Above is the 3Bii (and 4B) gasket, below is the 14B* gasket. Aside from the obvious contours (barely visible on this phone picture I'm afraid) on the 3Bii gasket to go around the pre-combustion chambers, they look functionally identical.

As an aside, the 14B* gasket has a softer finish and looks to be a better quality item. It is made from 5 stainless steel sheets, while the 3Bii gasket is made from only 3 (whilst being the same thickness of 1.50 mm). Also, the bulb-shaped opening on the right of the gasket where an oil orifice sits next to a head bolt gets a rubber O-ring on the 14B* gasket, while on the 3Bii it is a pressed ridge).

Stack the gaskets (here 14B* on top of 3Bii) and it's clear that the bolt hole, oil and coolant gallery pattern is identical.

Well, that is interesting...

EO

 

[AussieHJCruza]

Can you get a 13BT head, rotating assembly, fuel pump etc and fit them? Engine number is gonna stay the same

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

Can you get a 13BT head, rotating assembly, fuel pump etc and fit them? Engine number is gonna stay the same

No. The 13B-T never received the full evolution that the 3B (and B, 11B) received. I believe it uses the same external architecture as the 3B (84-88 model), and i know that it does not have the same architecture as the 3Bii/14B. You can see that the blocks are quite different. For sure the head from an 85-88 13B-T would not fit. The 89 model I am not sure, but I doubt it. Also, I believe all 13B-Ts were inline pump from factory and I don't want an inline pump.

 

[Eurasiaoverland]

Engine disassembly 1

Taking the front timing cover off, I checked the backlash in the timing gears. I borrowed a magnetic dial indicator base and was too lazy to swap my DTI onto it. I thought I was getting outlandishly small readings until I realised the thing was in inches. Still, when converted to metric the backlash was well withing spec.

The missing drive gear is from the injection pump which runs on a small roller bearing in the front timing cover.

The timing idler gear (which runs on a bronze bushing) pulls off by hand. A puller is needed to pull off the crankshaft timing gear.

Just the camshaft drive gear left, which I pulled out with the entire camshaft

After cleaning up, the front timing gear cover gets a new oil seal.

EO