Builds Last of the BJs: 1989 GEN BJ60 restoration, 15B-T swap (1 Viewer)

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Joined
Sep 4, 2020
Threads
76
Messages
602
Location
Brunei Darussalam
Website
eurasiaoverland.com
Introduction

A little over two years ago I moved to Brunei Darussalam and set about looking for a vehicle. It had to be Japanese (preferably Toyota), rear- or four-wheel drive and have a manual transmission. I went to a nearby town with a friend and looked at an LN167 Hilux which I was frankly only half-interested in. I already own a restored LN105 Hilux in the UK and was not really looking for another. But parked across the owner's yard was a twin-square headlight 60 Series Landcruiser which caught my eye. I've always had a soft spot for the face-lifted 60s; in my opinion they are the best looking Landcruisers, closely followed by the heavy-duty 73/74 (though the mid wheel base size is rather less useful than a long wheel base station wagon).

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July 1989 built, General Market BJ60RG-KRC. Right-hand drive, delivered new to the owner in January 1990. The body was absolutely straight, no visible signs of structural rust, original bumpers. Lifted with oversized wheels, extended shackles, aftermarket wheel arch extensions and home-made side steps (all to be removed) but no signs of having been taken off-road (unlike 90% of Landcruisers here). Paint good from afar but far from good and showing a few rust bubbles - one scab on the left hand side of the roof, one on the front LH door, plus those graphics which need to be removed.




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Swing-out rear doors (I'm not sure if I prefer these to a tailgate, both have pros and cons in my opinion), worn interior (not surprising given it had clocked up 567,000 kilometres as a family car). A very low-spec vehicle, though the previous owner had made a few upgrades. Front drum brakes had been changed for factory vented discs, and the H41 had been upgraded to an H55F for highway driving. No tacho, no heater, no rear seatbelts. I took it for a drive. It drove nicely aside from having brakes which were bad even for an old Toyota. The A/C did not work, which hardly surprised me given its jury-rigged appearance.

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The engine. I was only vaguely familiar with the 3B engine from 40 Series 'Jeeps' in Pakistan - it seemed to be an ancient 4 cylinder tractor engine recognisable by its rounded valve cover. This sports a '3Bii', which was updated in 1988 when Toyota/Hino updated the design of the B series diesel. I've read a couple of accounts of people who have driven both and they remark that this 3Bii feels a good bit torquier, but it's still a 4 cylinder, 8 valve, indirect injection, naturally aspirated diesel. But, a 14B would be a straight swap; a 14B-T, 15B-F or 15B-FT would be a very easy swap. More on that later. Pretty much every point of the engine or transmission that could leak appeared to be slowly letting fluids past. A shoddily installed sound deadening sheet was peeling off the bonnet and the poorly painted engine bay showed at least two non-original paint jobs, with overspray. The A/C hoses, of questionable manufacture, were stuck through the bulkhead with a sheet of bitumen and ample silicone.

I waited a few days, then bought it. The owner gave me the original front bench seats (it had 70 Series 'Turbo' seats installed) and the original fold-down third-row jump seats.

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I drove it a few kilometres to work and to pick up some large household items, then parked it up in my open garage.

The rebuild begins.

EO
 
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A bit of background

I am at heart a traveller. I started off backpacking, then decided I had had enough of loathsome public transport and overcharging taxi drivers. I learned to drive specifically to make a long overland trip in my own vehicle. To do that, in 2005 I bought a 1993 LN105 Hilux, which between May 2007 and December 2011 took me on a true journey of a lifetime all around the Eurasian continent; through Central Asia down to Iran and the Indian subcontinent, across Afghanistan, all around the Former Soviet Union, Mongolia, and back.

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On the road to Skardu, Pakistan.

The car was kept stock and was not in perfect condition when I left, though I had done the essentials with my Father before leaving. As the trip progressed, I formed a real bond with the vehicle and naturally started to care more and more for it. By the time the trip ended it was pretty shabby in appearance but still worked pretty much perfectly. I had half promised myself to do a full restoration on it and pretty much fell into it when I had the time and money.

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This is where I learned a lot more about car restoration and building, learned to weld and learned that restoring an old car is an incredible amount of work, obscenely, uneconomically expensive, but strangely compelling and rewarding. Besides, what else could I do with my former home and trusted travel partner? Once the rebuild was finished, far from keeping it in a dry garage, it was straight back on the road. Ten days after finishing the rebuild, we were in Kazakhstan, starting another 5½ month trip around Western Asia, adding Turkey, Armenia and Iraq to the long list of countries I'd toured in my Hilux on a 190,000 kilometre journey.

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In the sweltering lowlands of western Kazakhstan

By this time, I really needed to get back into employment and found a job in oil and gas. Although this involved living in the Netherlands, which was about the last place on the planet I wished to live, it gave me plenty of leave time. I started dreaming of a trip across Russia on winter roads/ice, visiting the world's coldest inhabited region. There was no way I was going to do this in a single cab, diesel Hilux.

For this adventure, I would need a petrol-engined vehicle, but I wanted to stick to my philosophy of simplicity: a 4 cylinder engine (with fuel injection and 16 valves) and of course a manual transmission - I detest automatics. Enter the RZN185 Toyota Hilux Surf. In the US, a manual 4-cylinder 4Runner would be easy to find, but in Europe, it is damn near impossible. Only Japanese grey-imports exist, but most are diesel (with the flakey 1KZ-T/-TE engine) and of the very few petrols, they are almost all autos. Yuck. When I saw one for sale cheaply in the UK, I jumped on it, but it was in a poor state, driven into the ground by a mindless owner. It blew up on me on the way back from North Wales to Kent, earning me my first ever ride in a recovery vehicle. In testament to the strength of this 3RZ-FE engine, all that was required was a radiator cap which held pressure and a new thermostat, and it drove without fault back to the Netherlands.

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Back in the Netherlands I spent every weekend in a damp garage bringing the Hilux Surf back to life. The engine had previously dropped a valve and been hastily repaired (I found valve stem in the downpipe), so I decided to go for a full rebuild with oversize pistons, brand new OEM head, and plenty more. I replaced all the suspension, and prepared the car for the cold with a cabin heater and cabin battery, insulation and the best synthetic oils I could find.

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On the very start (deceptively nice, it soon became highly arduous) of the 1200 kilometre Lena River Ice Road.

In August - October 2017 I drove the car right across the Eurasian continent to Magadan on the Sea of Okhotsk, put it in a warehouse, flew back to Europe, then flew back to Magadan in January 2018 to begin the winter trip. The car was utterly flawless on both legs of the 44,000 kilometre journey. With an Eberspacher cabin heater it was a snug, warm, wheeled living capsule which took me across Russia in the harshest of winters on thousands of kilometres of ice road, winter road, across the ice of Lake Baikal and up to the Arctic. I even drove it on the frozen Pacific Ocean. So perfect was the car, that about two weeks of redundancy in the schedule for 'technical issues' were mine to enjoy, so I picked up a friend in Moscow and drove with her down to Odesa in Ukraine, crossing the Black Sea by ferry to glorious springtime Istanbul before heading back to the Netherlands. I was massively impressed with the performance of the Hilux Surf, especially the 3RZ-FE engine which was truly perfect for the job.

Late last year, I flew back to Europe, rehabilitated the Hilux Surf, which had been sitting outdoors for two years thanks to the pandemic, and headed off to Turkey and Iraq. Though nothing like the cold of Siberia, it was once again a great winter tourer and once again performed flawlessly (though I reckon the W59 transmission is due for a rebuild).

So, when I look at this BJ60, I see a car for the next big trip, a long dreamed-of extended trip around Africa. The Hilux would be a bit cramped and underpowered, while the Hilux Surf, with its independent front suspension, might not be the best for thousands of kilometres of corrugated pistes. At least that's how I justify buying a third Toyota 4x4. In fact, back in the early 2000s when I was planning an Africa trip (which I switched to Eurasia mid-way through planning, with no regrets), I somehow came to associate 60 Series Landcruisers and the Sahara. So when I saw this one with its purring 4 cylinder engine, I had to have it. But to be a good desert vehicle, it will need a bit more power...

If you are interested more in the travels I briefly outline above, check my website, linked in my profile synopsis.

EO
 
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very very kool story and archive of your adventures !

i am looking for some inspiration for my new to me 10/88 FJ62LG-PNEK w/ MTM conversion and a 86 FJ60 Front end conversion to ramble 2 main reasons it became mine less then month ago or so ........


would you be so kind as to post a few good general photos of your complete dash area and maybe some close ups of anything NON-USA kool , like indicator lights , or

anything un-common or un-0known to me potentially ...

i recently installed a FJ60 steering wheel and ditched the 10/88 AIR-BAG looking one ,

so if its a period correct sorta era JAD market feature i would love to see it please


here is a sample of where i am going , with the total end game theme , i did all the finite detail scroll work by hand with a traditional Quill and some SUMMIT racing speed-o needle paint they offer


thanks for sharing and thanks in advance for any kool rare options dash and interior photos


kindly ,
matt :)


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:clap:

Nice life and adventures.

Looking forward to the build.

👊👊

Thanks Onur :)

very very kool story and archive of your adventures !

i am looking for some inspiration for my new to me 10/88 FJ62LG-PNEK w/ MTM conversion and a 86 FJ60 Front end conversion to ramble 2 main reasons it became mine less then month ago or so ........


would you be so kind as to post a few good general photos of your complete dash area and maybe some close ups of anything NON-USA kool , like indicator lights , or

anything un-common or un-0known to me potentially ...

i recently installed a FJ60 steering wheel and ditched the 10/88 AIR-BAG looking one ,

so if its a period correct sorta era JAD market feature i would love to see it please


here is a sample of where i am going , with the total end game theme , i did all the finite detail scroll work by hand with a traditional Quill and some SUMMIT racing speed-o needle paint they offer


thanks for sharing and thanks in advance for any kool rare options dash and interior photos


kindly ,
matt :)

Hi Matt

Thanks for your reply - I admire your passion and craft!

But I'm afraid that regarding my BJ, you may be disappointed. Whilst the Japanese market seems to expect a lot of (in my opinion often useless) accessories and features, this General Market model was aimed at the exact opposite. This was a work truck, aimed I think at mines and oil companies and it would be fair to say that if Toyota could leave it off this model, they did. I will post pics of the dashboard in the near future, but the only thing unusual about it will be what it does not have; blanked-off tacho port in the instrument binnacle, blanked-off cigar lighter socket, no headlamp adjustment, no heater or A/C controls (so no red bar on the fan control unit), no passenger grab bar. This thing is basic!

The one interior feature unique to this model is a buzzer (in addition to the usual light) to indicate that the water trap in the fuel filter housing needs draining. It comes with this nice sticker (P/N 23923-56010) on the driver's side window and a buzzer (P/N 86650-90A00) mounted on one of the dashboard braces, right next to the wiper control relay. No other Toyota model had these! I guess this tells you about the quality of diesel storage in SE Asia :D

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I can't think of anything else really, though no doubt you'll spot things which were not US market supplied as we go along.

Cheers,

EO
 
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The B series diesel and BJs

EDIT: updated 13B information - thanks FJBen for the details from your 1989 BJ74.

There are users far more expert than myself on the history of the Landcruiser on this website, so I stand to be corrected (please do!) on what follows, but here goes.

The first thing that could be called a Landcruiser made by Toyota was the 'BJ' Jeep in the early 1950s. Although a BJ, the 'B' in this case referred to a six cylinder petrol engine wholly unrelated to the later B series of diesel engines. The 'J' stood for 'Jeep'.

The first BJs in the 'modern' sense arrived in 1974 with the 'B' engine, a 3.0 litre, four-cylinder, 8 valve, indirect injection diesel. This through the late 1970s was bored out into the 2B (3.2 l) and then the very popular 3B (3.4 l) in 1980, launched in the BJ45/46 and BJ60.

In 1984, the 3B evolved into the direct injection 13B (never fitted to Landcruisers) and in 1985 the 13B-T, which alongside the 12H-T was the first direct-injection diesel to be put into a Landcruiser, in the BJ71 and BJ74. Also in 1985, the original B evolved into the direct injection 11B (never fitted to Landcruisers). The 11B is the only direct injection B engine which was not developed into a turbocharged unit (there is no 11B-T).

In 1988, Toyota redesigned the B series (specifically the B, 3B and 11B) with some improvements - monoblock (no liners), onboard, gear driven vacuum pump (and later steering pump), larger cam with roller lifters, no pushrod inspection covers, 8 bolt flywheel, PCV hose (bye-bye stink pipe) and other small changes. They also said goodbye to the inline diesel pump (in the 3B) with its leather diaphragm and EDIC (good riddance in my opinion) for the simpler, Bosch-clone rotary (VE) injection pump (Japanese BJ61s had had rotary pumps since 1982, but bolted onto the old-style 3B). The updated '3Bii', aka 'blue block 3B' carries all these changes and although it was not put into a Landcruiser after December 1989, it was still used in some Coaster buses until at least 1999.

In 1988 Toyota was about to drop the 13B/13B-T so did not fully upgrade the engine in-line with the B, 3B and 11B, but there is a 'blue block' version of the 13B/13B-T which can be found in the last (08/88-12/89) BJ71/74s. This engine has an 8 bolt crank and larger camshaft, but retains cylinder liners, inline injection pump, external vacuum pump etc so is really very similar to a red-block 13B/13B-T.


Toyota would keep developing the B series - at the same point in 1988 the 3B was stroked to a 3.7 l, and given direct injection as the 14B and in 1989 the 14B-T. Sometime circa 1994, the 14B-T was bored out to a 4.1 l as an interim 15B-T (an engine only sold to the Japanese military, never to the public), then in 1995 given 16 valves as a 15B-F, 15B-FT and from 1999 the 15B-FTE with (horror) electrically controlled fuel injection. Also in 1999 there was the curious, Japan-only devolution of the 14B into an indirect injection 4B. But none of these was fitted as stock to a Landcruiser (possibly excepting Brazilian 'Bandeirantes' with the 14B). The 14B remains in production today, as does a spark-ignition, LPG burning version of the 15B-F*.

So in total, we have the B, 2B, 3B, 13B, 11B, 13B-T, Bii, 3Bii, 11Bii, 14B, 14B-T, 15B-T, 15B-F, 15B-FT, 4B, 15B-FTE.

There is no such engine as an 11B-T, 12B, 13Bii, 5B or 15B.

Now, by late 1988 when the B engine redesign took place, the BJ6* had been dropped in Japanese, European and North American markets. It was only being sold on the General market as a single, right-hand drive model (left hand drive production ended in early 1988). And that is mine. Hence the title. 'Last of the BJs'. I reckon that had this model been sold on the Japanese or European market, in light of the engine change, it would have been a BJ62, (after all, the BJ61 differed only from the BJ60 by virtue of having a rotary injection pump) but it is not. It should be said that the BJ70, 73 and 75 were being sold with this same, updated 3B engine in General and European markets, but production of all BJs ceased in December 1989, just five months after mine was made.

Here is my venerable 3B, unofficially known as a 3Bii, or blue-block 3B. Not bad given her 567,000 kilometre service (original engine, matching numbers).

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The block of this engine is identical to the block of a 14B (same for the valve cover). You can see in the first photo where '14B' has been machined off. '3B' is cast into the block but obscured by the diesel delivery lines.

But we are getting ahead of ourselves. Let's go back to the initial dismantling....

EO
 
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The philosophy

Actually let's wait just a little more on the deconstruction pictures - I would like to explain the philosophy behind this rebuild. After all, everyone has different tastes and requirements.

Travel
We've established that the vehicle will be used for travelling. This is not a concours rebuild for something which is going to be kept under a silk cover in a termperature-controlled garage. This thing is going to get used, and I expect it to run faultlessly for long periods with only minimal servicing. That is why, after all, I chose a Toyota. On a long overland journey through countries which may not have much spare part availability (let's face it, some 60 parts are hard to find no matter how globablised your supply base is), the last thing I want to do is spend some of my precious time (perhaps on a ticking visa which can't be extended) in a country where the mechanics use only hammers, where I can hardly speak the language, or where getting a foreign part through customs is a bureaucratic ordeal.

Those 'Pakistani mechanics' are famous on YT for fixing things in ingenious ways but believe me (I lived there briefly), they are utter cowboys. The reason they have to repair stuff all the time is because they fix one thing but break three others on the way in and out. I have watched a Pakistani delivery boy throw a Hiace engine block off the back of a rickshaw onto the street outside a machine shop (where I got my 2L engine rebored for about $10) and snap off one of the mounting wings which go onto the clutch housing. Or there was the time I had to put some money in the pocket of an Uzbekistani customs agent to avoid horrendous import duties getting a leaf spring pack out of the customs yard at Tashkent airport. Great yarns but not things I want to have to deal with very often.


The slick American marketers seem to have made 'overlanding' a buzz-word aiming to sell expensive accessories to people who spend a couple of nights in a tent on the roof of their shiny new SUV out on the trail. That, in my opinion, is not overlanding. Overlanding also has little to do with off-roading (unless that is your specific aim). In my opinion and experience, an overland vehicle should be sturdy, have good ground clearance and be reliable. Four-wheel drive is nice to have, but rear wheel drive (maybe with diff lock or a good LSD) will, I think manage 95 % of the time. People were overlanding in the '60s and '70s in VW Kombis with barely enough power to pull the skin off a rice pudding.

Now, I think a 60 Series Landcruiser could fairly be called a pretty decent off-road vehicle, and I do imagine long periods of needing its 4WD ability, but the point is that I am not trying to build the 'ultimate overlander'. I look at this vehicle as something very sturdy that will take me most places I could wish to go, and be utterly dependable.

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Sometime's you're just stuck, and no amount of off-road paraphernalia will help (here at the beginning of a steep learning curve in winter wilderness driving in northern Mongolia). Better to get stuck in something not too heavy to recover, and that won't be damaged in the process.

(Almost) no modification
Toyota have decades of experience and have rightly earned a reputation for making some of the world's finest vehicles, certainly from the point of view of reliability. I am not a car manufacturer, and I am not going to modify this masterpiece of Japanese engineering (beyond adding uprated suspension and improving woeful rust protection).

There is another point to this: I much prefer to travel in a stock-looking vehicle. I crossed Afghanistan in my dusty, tatty Hilux, dressed in local clothes and with my license plate, let's say rearranged a bit to look like it came from neighbouring Pakistan (it still carried the correct number). Nobody looked twice at me. Would that have been the same in an orange painted 'overland' vehicle with roof tent, stickers, spot-lights, strapped on high-lift jack, winch etc? Maybe not. But even in countries where security is not a concern, having a stock vehicle helps deflect attention from officials who might be out to get something from me, or tell me that I can't go somewhere because I'm a foreigner.

Now with the intention of doing an engine swap a bit down the line, maybe this sounds a bit contradictory, but much of the draw of buying this BJ60 is that I can put a later iteration of the B series engine in, with direct injection and a turbo, with no modifications to the chassis or transmission (only a heavier clutch and re-routing of some pipework).

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Nothing to see here - a stock, dusty Hilux in central Afghanistan

One thing that will have to change of course is the interior arrangement - the second row bench and rear fold-down jump seats will be taken out, and I will make some sort of bed / storage unit. But that is a long way down the line.

Genuine / OEM parts
We all love genuine parts! Toyota's are great not just because of their design, but because of the quality of components used. A Land Rover is quite a well deisgned vehicle (let's face it, better suspension than a 60), but the dreadful compnent quality means they are turds. It's just not worth using anything other than genuine parts in my opinion. I probably take this a little too far (even genuine fuses), but frankly why take the risk with something probably made in China?

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Here is my genuine part horde. On the right, the four compartments are ordered according to sections of the EPC.

-Engine/fuel - new water pump, cooling system hoses and reservoir, bits for the starter, vacuum pump, alternator, diesel injection pump etc
-Powertrain/chassis - everything for the H55F, bearings for diffs and wheel hubs, suspension shackles and bolts, all brake hoses, brake master cylinder, handbrake cable, cluch master and slave cylinder etc
-Body - new bumper ends, door handles, body mounts, grab handles, door knobs, driver's window winder etc
-Electrical - remanufactured A/C compressor and other parts of the system, speedo cable, new H1 headlights, interior lights, rear view mirror, various sensors and clips and clamps for the wiring loom.

On the left are larger items - A/C condenser, steering damper, weatherstrips, belts (one Pitwork Nissan OEM). A few parts here are non-OEM I must say (CityRacer windscreen surround and rear opening weatherstrip, Joint Fuji propeller shaft parts). Bottom left is the transfer case ready to go onto the transmission, once I complete that.

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Midway through an H55F build, these are the parts which are still to go on (I need to make a tool... more later)

Do everything... yourself.
There's no point doing a half rebuild, while I have the resources. The BJ is 33 years old with 567,000 km. Everything warrants inspection and rebuild. The last thing I want is to have that one thing I thought looked OK fail, or leak oil over my nice clean engine or transmission. And out-sourcing work? No thanks! Nobody (none that I know around here at least) is going to take the care and attention to do a job on my car like I will. Maybe I will make a mess and have to start again (I remember once having to pull out a brand new diff oil seal because I'd forgotten to put the oil slinger behind it :doh:) but that's how I have learned! I am loath to even let someone else put fuel in my car. People are stupid!

Obviously some things, like calibrating a diesel injection pump or wheel alignment are out of reach of a home mechanic.... those are times I have to sweat it.

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Here is my living room table (can you tell I live alone??). I'm waiting on a part for the injection pump (ironically for a diesel, I could only find this part in the US), steering pump rebuild done, alternator still in parts as I made a 'discovery' as I was about to reassemble it...

So that's the rebuild philosophy. Trying to make this as much as possible the same as it left the factory, with very few changes. I chose this vehicle because it was pretty much good to go from the showroom floor. It's not a blank canvas for my modification experiments. Sorry for the huge text. And I promise the next post will be the start of the rebuild!

EO
 
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The B series diesel and BJs

There are users far more expert than myself on the history of the Landcruiser on this website, so I stand to be corrected (please do!) on what follows, but here goes.

Superb information, a thoroughly enjoyable and enlightening read! Thank you.
 
The dismantling begins

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I think this is the only picture I have of the car 'out and about' - in the office car park.

The car is too high (extended shackles), the wheels are too large and wide, rims require spacers on the wheels. Those are fibreglass arch extensions bolted onto the originally non-flared arch body. All this has to go! I love the lines of the non-flared arch 60 and think the later factory wheel arch extensions look awful. These aftermarket ones are just as bad!

Interior is worn and looks horrible.

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This driver's grab handle is nasty and starting to disintegrate.

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This absolutely basic scpec of BJ60 comes with 40 Series style grab handles, though this one has expired. Sadly only black ones are available now, brown are NLA :(

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These bits have seen better days...

Luckily, Australia, a great market for 60 parts, is relatively nearby and I have a colleague coming with a whole container to himself....
 
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Air conditioning 1

We are practically on the equator here. I love the climate, it's never cold and never hot, but it is humid. I don't generally like air conditioning but have to concede that it is pretty much essential here. Not so much for comfort, but to stop stuff getting mouldy.

The previous owner (in good faith) told me that the car had A/C from factory and I did not look too closely at it. For all I know, it might indeed have been fitted by the dealer.

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The first sign that something is not right, aside from the system not working (ignore my glowing hand) are the controls. There is no A/C button on the HVAC controls, only a rotary switch similar to that found on some 70 Series Cruisers that I have seen. This however is clearly aftermarket. OK, so I need the correct A/C switch. Maybe it had burned out... Notice the lack of a red bar on the heater controls (no heater from factory). The very sharp-eyed will notice that there is no lower foot-level vent on the heater box, and no asociated foot-level position on the directional selector slider. The cigar lighter is also blanked off. Curiously, it does still have rear window heaters! Unknown push button switch in the hole where a choke would be on an FJ60/(3F) 62. Previous owner's son thought it might have been a horn. Not a glowplug switch.

Let's take a look at the bulkhead...

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They love adapters here! The 'seal' here is made up from a piece of sticky bitumen, stuck down with the favourite product of local mechanics: clear silicone bathroom sealant. OK, I need a new rubber gaiter.

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But what are these blanked-off A/C hoses on the left-hand side of the engine..?

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Actually several metres of hose, carefully routed to the back of the car....

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To this aftermarket rear A/C unit, which looks OK but has of course caused the head lining to be ruined (it's stained and nasty anyway) during installation. So I need a new head lining. Note that this ultra-basic spec has no plastic trim on the rear pillars and window surrounds, a bonus in my view.

Here you can start to see where this build is going. Literally anything that local mechanics have touched is a mess and needs relocating to a dumpster!
 
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Air conditioning 2

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The A/C dryer on my Hilux Surf is mounted just here (though not with a twisted shelf-bracket), but in a 60 it should be above the front left wheel arch. So I need an original dryer bracket...

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Dryer and high-pressure line. More nice pipework...

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Taking the low pressure return hose off (note the additional hose on its way to the back of the car), I see the evaporator lines have been soldered. So I need new evaporator lines...
 
Air conditioning 3

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Speaking of evaporator, let's take a look down there... Oh dear. So I need a new evaporator box.

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Well there's something! Whoever installed this mess at least put in a thermal cut out! (but no low-pressure cut-out switch). I guess that rules out the chance of having a hard-to-find A/C control board. Add that to the long list.

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Peeling off the silicone and stuck-down sheet, a clean evaporator coil, but not original.

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Just to make my life harder, these bodgers have jammed the vent shut in the blower motor housing, covered it with a tin and foam sheet, and sawn part of it off to fit their Frankenstein evaporator unit. The logic being that you always have the A/C running, so don't ever want fresh air. Nice. So I need a new blower motor unit.

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I'm still foolishly hoping that the A/C compressor and virtually impossible-to-find compressor bracket are original. But no, there's some Sanden unit on there with a home-made A/C compressor bracket. And to add insult to injury it's held on by some stupid bolt size, 15 mm or similar, meaning I have to go and borrow a socket from someone with a full set. So I need a new compressor, a bracket, and a tensioner bracket and pulley.

Conclusion: this car did not come with A/C.

The previous owner told me that one of the reasons that he wanted rid of this car was that the A/C had never worked satisfactorily. No sh*t!!

EO
 
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Where is my 'Boost Ventilator'?

Take a look at this fan control fascia:
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Pretty simple. No heater, no airflow to the feet, no AC. I guess it's a good thing that the windows wind down!

Boost ventilator.JPG

It took me quite a lot of time and thought to imagine what a 'Boost Ventilator' might be, where it is shown in the pictures, and where I might find it. After far too long it dawned on me that 'Boost Ventilator' is Toyota-speak for the fan, when not combined with a heater! What the 'Boost Ventilator variant does come with is a variable resistor on the temperature slider which I think must modulate the thermal cut-off temperature of the A/C system. Models with a heater do not have this.

Resistance.JPG

'Resistance'. Does anyone know for sure what this does?

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There's the factory blanking grommet in the bulkhead. There is of course no heater piping or heater valve, though interestingly (you can see them in the engine picture in my first post), the two M6 bolts in the cowl were there...

Now, I'm all for keeping this original, but I need it to be usable. A/C is pretty essential here in the tropics, and if, as I plan to, I export this vehicle to Europe, it will certainly need a heater for demisting. So, I need heater controls and cable, heater cable grommet, a heater matrix, heater hoses and pipe, heater valve, pipe grommet and the unions which screw into the water pump and cylinder head. More stuff to find in Autralian 60 forums and ebay.com.au

EO
 
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Interior body

With the HVAC stuff out, time to go deeper into stripping the interior.

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Out with this really nasty Made In China LED light. Thankfully, whoever fitted it spliced into the original wiring rather than chop off the factory plug. Toyota still sells the original light units, so that goes on the list.

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Out with the aftermarket rear AC unit. Yes, that is household three-core cable.

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Brake pedal is bare, the clutch pedal has a wrong-shaped Hilux pedal rubber glued on top of the worn out original...

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Front floor pan - in this climate at least, cars rust from the inside out. It's not visible here in the pictures but both front corners of the floor pan are rusted . The left side has a plate repair, the right is ready to go through. Not huge areas, but will need welding. Also a patch of surface rust behind the transmission hump which should be easy to correct. In the left hand foot well is some of the metres and metres of superfluous wiring I pulled out of the car from various bodges speaker installs and an old aftermarket central locking system for which there is no obvious key or button. Not to mention that nice household cable running to the rear AC unit.

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Rear floor looks great, here we can see parts of the original white colour, the yellow respray which was done quite well, and the bodged appliance-white respray which is more recent. Signs of rust deformation around the fifth body mounts (behind the arches).

EO
 
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Underside of body

Even more than the 3Bii engine, it was the preserved bodywork on the underside of this car - straight and very near perfect, which attracted me to it. I would subsequently find a few rust issues (around the 5th body mounts in a terribly designed rust trap by Totota, corners of floor pans and rear wheel arches, but overall for a 33 year old car in a humid climate, this thing is very, very good.

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Inner sill

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Behind the fuel tank pipes.

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Three shots of the rear underside. The chassis is perfect. The green paint was put on by the owner very early in the vehicle's life when he lived right at the beach. It's some marine protective paint and it has done an amazing job. The car has also clearly been well looked after, aside from the bodged modifications. This thing definitely deserves saving.

EO
 
Rebuild scope

I bought this vehicle thinking I would tidy it up and swap in a much uprated B series engine - a 15B-FT (4.1 litre, 16 valve, direct injection turbo diesel) which would be a very straightforward engine swap. I was in contact with a seller in Japan, but BT Forwarding, our local freight handler, was so incompetent and disinterested in personal business, that by the time I found an alternative shipping agent, the engines were gone. Later, I was to learn that I would need to keep the original engine (or at least the original engine number...) in the vehicle in order to export it. So the engine swap has been put on the 'future' list.

From inspecting the car, it's clear that in essence I am looking at a very well looked after, unmolested example with almost all the factory bodywork in good shape. It was starting to rust in places and had a botched paint job, so it's at a turning point where it could either be properly restored to near perfect order, or could slowly deteriorate. Naturally, I have to follow the first option - a full rebuild.

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So here is what I need to cover:

  • Full body-off restoration and respray.
  • Full rebuild of transmission and transfer.
  • Full rebuild of driveline. Upgrade of semi-floating rear axle to full-floating rear axle.
  • Re-seal 3BII and rebuild all ancillaries (any 14B* / 15B-F* is likely to be 24V so I will use the originals to keep the vehicle 12V).
  • Remove and discard lift shackles, wheel spacers, wheel arch extensions and greatly oversized wheels.
  • Replace the really bad interior parts.
  • Add original heater, original air conditioning.
  • Restore front bench seats.
  • Upgrade some of the ultra-basic factory spec equipment - add original tachometer, cigar lighter, clock.
  • Replace sealed beam headlights with Koito Halogen units, tidy up wiring.
This is going to be a big job...

EO
 
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Hello,

A thousand-mile journey begins with a single step...

Climate has not affected the truck much.

Household wire aside, the PO did not mess it up much.

Keep up the good work.





Juan
 
Dismantling body

The front end of a 60 handily comes off with undoing a few bolts. No welds to cut through, just seam sealer.

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Some lovely work here - the original sound insulation is long gone, and a piece of felt material had been stuck on with some brush-on adhesive with some silicone snot for good measure. That's over the yellow paint job but under the latest white one. This hideous mess will take quite some effort to get right I fear. Toyota still sell the original sound deadening sheet, so add that to the list.

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The rubber aprons are amazingly still mostly present, but hard and brittle and held on with zip ties and wire. Add those to the list. Note to self - the steering box is not leaking... don't rebuild it...

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Off with everything at the front end. The radiator support panel is like the Berlin wall - we have original factory primer, original white paint, overspray from both the yello and white resprays, and some matt black, most likely from a rattle can. What workmanship. Chassis and body are perfectly straight.


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Off with the inner and outer wings. A touch of surface rust under the battery but otherwise all good, even in the top of the outer wing where they are very prone to rusting.

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I love how far back the engine sits, completely behind the front axle, something Ferrari, AMG etc go to great lengths to achieve!

Next, removing the engine and transmission.

EO
 
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