Builds Let's Baseline my new to me 1993 Land Cruiser (1 Viewer)

[PNWTreeOctopus]

I’m doing a little bit of puzzling over how to mount up a pole mounted work light. The homemade variety made from a painters pole and a led light. There are lots of pieces to this puzzle, but my 315 spare tire makes space challenging. If I move my sparetire away from my truck at full extension of the labs mount, then I have some room to work with. However I’m worried that I will put undue stress on the spindle since I’ve increased the leverage of the spare tire mount.

This is my current idea:

I’m not a welder so I was thinking of buying some 2” mild steel, drilling holes in, it to bending it in my vise to shape the brackets. But I’m going to spend some time driving around like this to see home much it shakes.

 

[PNWTreeOctopus]

Took my rig up to mountains on Thursday and noticed a pulsing on braking comin got a stop at a couple of stop lights. So last night I checked the wheel bearings on a hunch and sure enough there was a little play in the 12 and 6 o’clock movement. So I dug in this morning and re did the bearing preload, but I tightened up the preload to 30 and the lock nut to 47 as recommended by the venerable tools r us. Pics to prove it.

I changed out the flange gaskets while I opened them up, I figured they would be damaged when I tore things apart. Fortunately the Bellingham Toyota stealership had 2 and they were only $4.00. I figured they would charge 15 a piece or something outrageous. Anyhow done and done. I’ll take it for a test drive this afternoon and see if this pulsing is gone.

 

[LINUS]

@PNWTreeOctopus - you run up & down HWY 20 between Burlington & Anacortes, maybe take the roundabout past the golf course out toward NAS Whidbey / Oak Harbor?

I keep seeing a white 80 / some mods on that flat stretch of 20, but I’m always in my Tundra if I’m over in Anacortes, so you wouldn‘t take a 2nd look my way.

 

[FMC80]

Took my rig up to mountains on Thursday and noticed a pulsing on braking comin got a stop at a couple of stop lights. So last night I checked the wheel bearings on a hunch and sure enough there was a little play in the 12 and 6 o’clock movement. So I dug in this morning and re did the bearing preload, but I tightened up the preload to 30 and the lock nut to 47 as recommended by the venerable tools r us. Pics to prove it.View attachment 2598057
I changed out the flange gaskets while I opened them up, I figured they would be damaged when I tore things apart. Fortunately the Bellingham Toyota stealership had 2 and they were only $4.00. I figured they would charge 15 a piece or something outrageous. Anyhow done and done. I’ll take it for a test drive this afternoon and see if this pulsing is gone.

Let us know how she does. How do you think they loosened to begin with? IIRC, you did your axels a while back.

 

[PNWTreeOctopus]

@PNWTreeOctopus - you run up & down HWY 20 between Burlington & Anacortes, maybe take the roundabout past the golf course out toward NAS Whidbey / Oak Harbor?

I keep seeing a white 80 / some mods on that flat stretch of 20, but I’m always in my Tundra if I’m over in Anacortes, so you wouldn‘t take a 2nd look my way.

Not me! There is a very similar white 80 up here in Bellingham, but i don’t know who it belongs to. Maybe that’s the one heading south out to Whidbey.

 

[PNWTreeOctopus]

Let us know how she does. How do you think they loosened to begin with? IIRC, you did your axels a while back.

The pulse seems to be gone, but moreover it was nice to not feel that play after putting it back together. Why did it loosen? When I rebuilt the axle in the winter of 2018 I followed the FSM fishscale technique and I think the 35” tires are the culprit. So I followed the advice given elsewhere in the forum from ToolsRUs, and others have mentioned that this can be an issue. I’m sure the deeply knowledgeable folks could chime in and add more but that’s my best guess.

Now I have a squeaking rear brake I need to look into. Endless fun!

 

[PNWTreeOctopus]

Just threw down for for silver star. Thank you Mud for being a helpful place. Long overdue.

 

[FMC80]

Interesting. I have 285s so not sure if this applies to me but since I just did mine, I’ll BOLO for it. Thanks for the info.

 

[PNWTreeOctopus]

Ok, updates here. My LC developed a weird squeaking when I put it in reverse to pull out of the driveway. I did some digging around here on the forum and found numerous posts about dry or seizing u-joints that begin their failure by sqee king in reverse. So my 7 year old and I got under the truck and pumped grease in the u-joints and driveshAft zerk fittings. He’s not terribly interested in workin gin the truck, though he does rally like riding in it. I hate to admit it, but I haven’t been keeping up on lubing those. The squeaking resolved after driving it around for a day, but returned. So I rolled underneath again and pumped a bunch more grease in the joints. I ran a few errands and the squeak is not happening.

What I can’t determine is if I have really solved this issues, or if this is just a temporary fix. I also don’t have the specific u-joint isolated. What would you do? I’m considering ordering a new Toyota u-joint preemptively, so I’m not waiting on parts.

In other news I was farting around doing moisture control in the rear of the vehicle. The belting below the DS sliding window has a small leak and it drips into my jack holder. My poor Toyota jack is getting a rusty patina. I drilled another drain hole in the jack holder and hopefully I can keep the rusty pool of wate to a minimum until I can replace or try to repair again the leak.

I also discovered that there was a nut loose that was holding my flares on. So I tighter that up and think I eliminated a rattle that has been bothering my since I drove it back from Eugene the day I purchased it. Very satisfying!

Lastly I happily discover my rifle fits in the nook behind my second row seat and the drawers. It’s a perfect fit and totally out of sight from prying eyes, yet easily accessible a nice discovery.

I‘m not a big firearm guy, but it’s nice to have a place to stash one. My marlin 336 is fairly short and it slips in and out of that cheap case easily.

 

[baldilocks]

You can get high quality Matsuba Ujoints from Cruiseroutfitters for under $40 each.

 

[FMC80]

Have you had your rear tires off recently? I recently had a squeaking and scraping sound only when in reverse and found that the “dust boot protector” was rubbing my wheel. I bent it back using a screwdriver for leverage and the squeak is gone.

 

[PNWTreeOctopus]

@baldilocks, that’s a great lead. Thank you. I’ll wrangle up one of those.
@FMC80 I did have most of my wheels off and I was thinking the same thing. I’m wondering if I somehow bent a dust shroud. I have some more brake work ahead of me. I’d like to bleed the system again and see if bleeding my lspv again, improves my brake feel.

 

[PNWTreeOctopus]

Road Trip

After much discussion Mrs. TreeOctopus and I are taking the kids to Eastern Oregon next week for spring break. Our plans to head to Utah were disrupted by a number of factors, but my kids can finally attend school in-person (still on a limited basis) and my 7 year old is bored to tears of worksheets and zoom meetings. So we cant justify him missing some real school and skipping down to UT for 2-3 weeks. So were scaling back and heading down to some favorite spots of ours in Oregon where both my wife and I went to school. So I’ve been deep into research and lost down memory lane of trips past. All of my Toyota 4WD’s have explored the bumpy tracks of SE Oregon because it‘s one of my favorite places.

But first a rant...

If you’re just here to read about my PAINFULLY slow baseline project skip this section. I’m just going to whine a bit for my own ego...

So way back in 2000, I was attending class at Lewis & Clark College where I got my degree in history. My professor and advisor Dr. Stephen Dow Beckham taught a very popular course on Pacific Northwest History and early in his class there was a slide show...with an actual slide projector. In this lecture I learned about many amazing places off the beaten path that my professor had explored while doing research on various emigrant routes, and military roads across the state. I think that this one lecture with chalk on a board and actual slides changed my life forever. Now I have visited many of these places and been unable to find others ( A cabin in the Guano Valley that had been roofed in tin from Coleman fuel can shingles). Many of these places have been beloved for folks in Oregon and beyond for a long time. Unfortunately, things change and Social Media platforms of all striped have made it way to easy to discover these places.

Let me acknowledge that I am a visitor to these public lands and the knowledge was in essence handed to me. I treat information like this like a gift. I am, as many of you are are, sad to see how many places like these have been forced to change because of the massive influx of visitors, many of whom are not very appreciative of access to these places (public lands and private). The amount of toilet paper and human feces I encounter in Whatcom County is pretty bad. And it still astounds me how many people can‘t seem to pick up after themselves. Nobody goes to places like Eastern Oregon to feel like they are surrounded by hordes of people, so why on earth do they leave a huge wake of trash and poop as a monument of their passing? I cant wait until these folks stuck in their sprinter vans can go back to taking Disney cruises...

Anyhow, no instagram for me, I dont really want to share...with the exception of the mud community. Rant Off.

Back to Land Cruisers

I bought a couple of new tools for my cruiser that I’ve been meaning to for a while.

I picked up a Viair 400P compressor and a knockoff ARB deflator. I tested both out and they work so nicely! The guage on the deflator was reasonably accurate and the compressor took my spare from 0 psi to 35 very quickly! 2.5 minutes or so. I‘m excited to air down on our gravel exploration, and depending on weather we may even head west to the coast and lumber across the sound dunes. The small gauge on the right is for my MTB—I used it to double check all the other tire gauges. It all fits nicely in my drawer, which is so sweet!

The truck has been running better since the exhaust repairs. The Idle speed is better, but still a little low somewhere around 550-600. So after the trip I’ll sequence the next phase of repairs Including, but not limited to replacing the vacuum hoses. My squeek upon reversing is still there, but the grease helped a lot.

Hopefully when I get back I can find my courage and attack the oil leaks that are obviously not going away, the Vaccum hoses, the leaking and squeezing power steering system, and the most frightening of all the castor correction. We are planning a trip to Minnesota in August and we would like to use the Land Cruiser, but I’d like to sort out the rest of the remining baseline repairs/ maintenance before a 3500 mile trip.

 

[FMC80]

Happy Friday and great share, I agree that people need to be more considerate of nature and should never leave a trail of their existence in places like ones you describe.

Hope you get your cruiser up to snuff to instill the confidence you require to take it on adventures. You’re doing well thus far and I feel working on our cruisers is much like any obstacle in life; once you dive in, you find it wasn’t as challenging as your mind made it to be. Keep up the great work and entertaining posts!

 

[baldilocks]

Today’s post was very interesting. Your rare writing style of actually using multi syllable words and punctuation makes for an easy and fun read. I can’t make it through most lengthy posts. Haha

Nothing about the LC should be daunting, but, rather fun and exciting even if it represents a black hole that money disappears into.

What form of castor correction are you leaning toward?

 

[PNWTreeOctopus]

@FMC80, Your advice is well put and I appreciate it. So far every time I’ve actually stopped crying and started the project it’s been so much less daunting...and usually pretty fun. ITs just the sheer number of little things that tend to weigh on me, then I remember I didn’t buy a 2021 200 series, but rather a 1993 80 series so its all appropriate.

@baldilocks, that’s a good way to look at it. It also means a lot from you as I reflect upon the scale of your project and the massive amount of time and no doubt cash that it took to accomplish. It’s good to have y’all cheering me on!

Now as far as caster, I had an e-mail exchange with the folks at Torfab down in Everett, and they recommended plates or radius arms. I can’t really tell if this is a project I can tackle on my own. I’m leaning towards plates since they much more economical, but there is no doubt that the delta radius arms wold be an excellent solution. I only have some old alignment data from the limited records the PO provided for me, I’ve never had it checked out. I realize that getting some numbers is step 1. Ive looked at the Ironman plates, the Dobinson’s, and the land tank plates. I was thinking that process would roughly be something like taking of the radius arms and having new bushings pressed in, then installing the castor plates into the radius arms with the fresh Toyota bushings. I’m not a welder, so I think for all these solutions I would need someone to finish the plate install with a little bit of welding. It seems like there are huge amounts of forces that could be applied to this part of the vehicle so getting it right seems critical.

Improving highway manners is a top priority so that Mrs. TreeOctopus can drive it without me being worried on the 3500 mile trip.

Thanks for the encouragement folks, I’ll try and keep things entertaining.

 

[baldilocks]

Went back the beginning of this thread and is looks like you brought it already lifted about 3”. Castor correction was never accomplished?

 

[PNWTreeOctopus]

Correct, I according to the limited receipts I have from the PO, lift is an ome with heavy springs, but no castor correction-bushings are just regular ones.

 

[LINUS]

Haha, @PNWTreeOctopus - I see the same in rural Whatcom too.

Hopefully they are ‘learning’ eco-nuts & learn to pack a shovel.

I esp refuse to leave the 80 in any trailhead anymore - cars get tapped like kegs.

I can easily replace the Tundra, but I’d get un-rational hunting any meth /dope monkey who screws w/ the 80.

 

[Fj80oregon]

Great thread... just got my first 80 and I’m going through the same process. Can we compare rear window rust spots? I’m wondering if this is a common problem and if so, what is the cause. Here’s mine:

View attachment 1649749

Not trying to hihack, but thought we could help each other solve a mutual problem.

Good luck brother, I’ll be following your progress.

The window seal is going bad it is common all along the back bottom, just happens pull window seal and window fix and re install not that bad. Especially if you have a good glass guy and body guy. It only gets worse if not addressed.