Builds MAR's '76 Forty Refresh (14 Viewers)

[MAR FJ40]

Five years into my resto, I've finally decided to start a thread so I can quit spamming the "What have you done to your Land Cruiser this week?" thread.

MARFJ40 is a April '76 U.S. spec FJ40. Mar is what my dad goes by now. His name is Lamar, but my niece, first grandchild started calling him Mar and it stuck.

I'll start with a little background on its history (sorry in advance for all the lengthy story but its relevant to me) - I'll post up plenty of pics (i have >1,200 of them. ha)....

I'll never forget the day I got off the school bus in '77 ( I was in kindergarten) and there was this really cool "jeep" at the end of the road where my Mom or Dad would pick me up to take me the rest of the way home. To my surprise they both got out of it. My mom said I asked her "is this is ours?". When she said yes, I started jumping up and down. We have a cool "jeep"! Woo-hoo. Haha it was later in life that i realized that it was/is actually not a jeep at all, but in fact the seemingly indestructible, reliable iconic FJ40 4x4 that most all of the folks reading this thread will know and understand.

My dad drove the Forty daily until sometime around my senior year in HS when he decided it was time to get a new truck. I learned to drive in the Forty, well sort of. My dad had a tractor and I probably "learned" more driving it than the 40 with a "tractor" motor. I could sit in his lap on the tractor so understanding how to use a clutch and run through gears was mastered there. In any event it was the first road vehicle I ever drove. For many years after I graduated and moved to Knoxville for college (go Vols!), the Forty would only see days driving out to my grandmother's farm to work on the land, for a hunt and the occasional errands my Dad would run.

I bet I heard my mom say to my dad "get rid of that old jeep, it's just taking up space in the driveway" about 20 times over the years. When I heard it I always said, don't ever get rid of it, one day I'll have the means to "fix it up". Well sometime in the mid 90's I came home on school break and the Forty wasn't in the driveway. To my surprise, my dad had given it to my older sister and bro in law. Thank goodness it was still in the family! I told them if they ever decided to get rid of it to let me know first.

My bro n law changed a few things over the years; New wheels, rancho shocks, 2" lift and a hell for stout bumper. Most everything else remained OEM. I think I left out my dad replaced the OEM carb with a weber somewhere along the line. The trusty Forty remained reliable through those years. I am glad my niece and two nephews got to grow up with their grandad's Forty around.

Sometime around late 2019 I let them know I'd like to buy it from them and restore it. At that time, it was mainly just sitting in their driveway. They told me I could just have it, but I gave them some money for it. The way I figured it, they had put money into it so they shouldn't have to give it away. They did cut me the deal of the century .
Sometime right before the COVID fiasco really hit around March of 2020, I drove to TN (I'm in TX) and picked her up.

As she sat:

After a nice pressure washing, she was ready to head to TX - What's up with the upside down bezel?

She has arrived in TX!

As she sits today:

I plan to document the rest as I go with a lot more pics. I drove her "as is" thru the summer of 2020 and took her down to the frame in Oct of 2020. This forum and the vendors we all trust and know have been invaluable to me. Rarely does a day go by that I don't head to this section of mud and learn something new or see something that puts a smile on my face.

I need to head back out to the shop because she is calling me. My ultimate goal is to get her done, back on a trailer to TN and get my dad behind the wheel of his new old FJ40 while he still can. All for now...

Regards...Brian

 

[MAR FJ40]

Pretty sure uncle Toyota was laughing when they designed the interior door hinge mounts. I've conquered this before and I will again. Eventually.....!!!!!

 

[MAR FJ40]

Got off my back from the floorboard, turned up the Billy Strings playing in the background, a few deep breaths.. back to it. Success! One side loosely ready for door alignment once I get them ready. Progress is fun.

 

[Living in the Past]

I use to change those regularly during the 1990s. I was switching between hard doors and FST door hinges on my 68 FHT. My 73 FST had a 72 hard top and hard doors when I bought. Finally got around to switching those a few years ago. Not as easy having had wrist surgery on my left hand and arthritis in the other wrist, but did it. I couldn't imagine working on the assembly line and installed these all day. Hopefully they were loosely installed before the tub was assembled. Then only needed tightening for final adjustment.

 

[MAR FJ40]

I use to change those regularly during the 1990s. I was switching between hard doors and FST door hinges on my 68 FHT. My 73 FST had a 72 hard top and hard doors when I bought. Finally got around to switching those a few years ago. Not as easy having had wrist surgery on my left hand and arthritis in the other wrist, but did it. I couldn't imagine working on the assembly line and installed these all day. Hopefully they were loosely installed before the tub was assembled. Then only needed tightening for final adjustment.

Can't imagine how difficult post wrist surgery and with arthritis! My hands and fingers are tweeked from squishing and weird positions. Surely they had some special micro tools on the assembly line for those folks. Ain't no way I do this every day. Funny though, every step in this resto that has been a pain has been an enjoyable pain. I'm now looking at my hinge rubber seals. Not sure I oriented them correctly. If not, it's coming back off and on again. Time to search the web for an example. I'm still smiling as I do it tho.

 

[MAR FJ40]

After loosely mounting the door hinges, I got the door headers in place, new roof weather strips laid out and put the top roughly in place. Plan to run some hardware in tomorrow to confirm alignment. Hoping it only needs minor tweaking. I did most all of the top resto, aside from primer and paint. Sourced a new metal drip rail from CCOT and riveted it to the top with solid rivets and it turned out great. How great will be determined once I get some screws in....

The nardo gray really shows the blueish undertones in sunlight. You can see in the last pic. Front firewall getting sunlight vs rear in the florescent lighting.

 

[clrussell]

This is going to be a beautiful 40. Already is.

I love the Nardo gray.

 

[cbmontgo]

Great 40 and back story.

I used to live down the road from you in Copper Canyon.

 

[MAR FJ40]

This is going to be a beautiful 40. Already is.

I love the Nardo gray.

Thank you. I struggled on making my decision to either keep the OEM freeborn red or change it up. I ran it by Mar, my Dad, and he was good with the change. That's all I needed to hear. It's a resto mod after all since I'm adding a few modern comforts, so color change it is. It's not like I will ever sell it, so don't care if what I do to it impacts market value one way or the other.

 

[MAR FJ40]

Great 40 and back story.

I used to live down the road from you in Copper Canyon.

Thanks. We've been in Argyle since 2013, prior to that over in McKinney/Frisco. Had to get out of the coming concrete jungle. Crazy how the sprawl is now making its way to lil Argyle. I have a freshman in HS and once he's done, we are planning to head up your way somewhere in CO. The 29 yr old son lives in Denver. Imma wanna be trout bum so plan to spend later years driving this around in cold water fishery land. This is my trout mobile . I have a river quiver ready to mount when I need it. Still need to settle on a rack. Looks like I'll be following your migration path

 

[cbmontgo]

Thanks. We've been in Argyle since 2013, prior to that over in McKinney/Frisco. Had to get out of the coming concrete jungle. Crazy how the sprawl is now making its way to lil Argyle. I have a freshman in HS and once he's done, we are planning to head up your way somewhere in CO. The 29 yr old son lives in Denver. Imma wanna be trout bum so plan to spend later years driving this around in cold water fishery land. This is my trout mobile . I have a river quiver ready to mount when I need it. Still need to settle on a rack. Looks like I'll be following your migration path

Awesome. I left the Dallas corporate world in 2019 to get back to the mountains. I was down there a couple of months ago and was shocked at how much the area along 407 had grown. We had longhorns across from us, now it is hundreds of homes.

Cruising the outdoors in an FJ40 up here is hard to beat.

 

[MAR FJ40]

Awesome. I left the Dallas corporate world in 2019 to get back to the mountains. I was down there a couple of months ago and was shocked at how much the area along 407 had grown. We had longhorns across from us, now it is hundreds of homes.

Cruising the outdoors in an FJ40 up here is hard to beat.

Until I'm up there for good or get this one finished and up there for a spin around, I'll continue to live vicariously through Pikachu's pics and others on here as I have for several years!

 

[Living in the Past]

Can't imagine how difficult post wrist surgery and with arthritis! My hands and fingers are tweeked from squishing and weird positions. Surely they had some special micro tools on the assembly line for those folks. Ain't no way I do this every day. Funny though, every step in this resto that has been a pain has been an enjoyable pain. I'm now looking at my hinge rubber seals. Not sure I oriented them correctly. If not, it's coming back off and on again. Time to search the web for an example. I'm still smiling as I do it tho.

My 73 FST door hinges did not have the rubber seals. The hinges that were on it for the 72 hard doors did. Those hinges were installed before I purchased it in 1994. The license plates that was on it expired in 1988. Hinges are OEM replacements not original to the red 72 doors. The nylon bushings should be replaced. For not being painted the hinges are in great shape which guessing were installed around forty years ago. Even the rubber seals are pliable.

For full disclosure when I removed the hinges a few years back I never installed the original FST hinges. Figure I would give the upper passenger side a shot this morning.

Even with surgery limiting my left wrist it wasn't that bad. I've always had good hand dexterity. Starting and turning the bolt between the index and middle fingers it wasn't that bad.

 

[MAR FJ40]

For full disclosure when I removed the hinges a few years back I never installed the original FST hinges. Figure I would give the upper passenger side a shot this morning.
View attachment 3972810
Even with surgery limiting my left wrist it wasn't that bad. I've always had good hand dexterity. Starting and turning the bolt between the index and middle fingers it wasn't that bad.

The floating screw plate is always a bugger for me. Ive tried different methods of getting it to stay in place where it's all lined up...screw hole in floating plate, hole in plate and hole in hinge then jamming the bolt in before it all moves. It's like I need three hands . I determined (not 100%, but close enough for horse shoes and hand grenades) that I had my rubber seals aligned properly so I only did it once this time.

 

[MAR FJ40]

Rewinding back to spring of 2020.....
After getting back to TX, I decided I'd drive it through the summer and wait on tear down in the fall. I wound up sourcing a new Webber carb and pulling the gas tank and took it to a radiator repair shop for chem dip and repaint. All just temp adjustments to enjoy it for very local driving. I didn't want to go too far as I knew I was going to take it down to the frame relatively soon.

Engine bay

New carb and filter plus temp gas tank fix

Popped the top, flipped the bezel and she was ready for a summer of weekend run arounds. I even got my best buddy in on the fun.

 

[MAR FJ40]

Around October, I decided it was time to start the tear down. I got an engine hoist from harbor freight and it was on...

Down to frame and off to blasting and powder coat and back....

 

[MAR FJ40]

I replaced all the bearings and seals in the tranny/transfer and gave it a new coat of paint.

The motor made its way to @FJ60Cam (Mosley Motors) for his super hi-po cop motor builds. This was the summer of 2022.

Looks at the beauties at home inside my 40!

!

Before and after:

 

[Living in the Past]

I always have a drawer with old ball point pens. Could use lower half of ball point pens to center the upper two holes in the floating plate. Then should being easier to get the lower two bolts started.


Being in Texas with no A/C might think about sourcing back sliding window or do what I did to a 73 hard top which is add the vent windows. Prior to the 77 model the back was a dead air space. 75 when the vent window in the front door went away it got worse. I lived in Flagstaff until 1979 when I moved to Phoenix. Early 1980s I sourced the posts and vent windows off a wrecked 78. The large glass got from Toyota which was cheap at the time.

 

[MAR FJ40]

I always have a drawer with old ball point pens. Could use lower half of ball point pens to center the upper two holes in the floating plate. Then should being easier to get the lower two bolts started.


Being in Texas with no A/C might think about sourcing back sliding window or do what I did to a 73 hard top which is add the vent windows. Prior to the 77 model the back was a dead air space. 75 when the vent window in the front door went away it got worse. I lived in Flagstaff until 1979 when I moved to Phoenix. Early 1980s I sourced the posts and vent windows off a wrecked 78. The large glass got from Toyota which was cheap at the time.

I have a vintage air unit waiting for me to install. You are right, it gets hot as hades down here.