My New/Wrecked 07 LX470 Build Project v.Conversion?? (1 Viewer)

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Sep 16, 2009
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I've been looking to find myself a long term high miles driver for a while, to keep the miles off of my other cars, and had been focusing on the 80/100 Series LC/LX for a little while. Last week, I had ran into an insurance auction of a LX that didn't look too bad, and rolled the dice and picked it up.

Carfax shows that it slid against a concrete barrier, and judging by the crappy tires on it, and the date of the accident, I do believe that it's likely rain played a factor. I had seen it had quite a bit of a service history, and contacted one of the service centers who had sent me invoices of a LKQ REBUILT long block, and in total $9k worth of work on just the new motor 20,000 miles ago. It also looks to have the air suspension bypassed and has a strutmaster kit on it.

On to the damage. It had an ARB Deluxe bumper on it which the crumple box took the majority of the impact. I don't think I am going to be able to get the bumper perfectly straight again so I suppose I will be in the market for another one :( The worst of the damage looks to be the inner driver fender structure that did kink a little bit, and the small LH side of radiator support, but should not be too big of a deal.

This puts me down to one good fender on the front. I need a hood, LH fender, trim under the headlights, headlights, etc.

If I were to go the path of the retro headlights from say LandCruiserGrilles.com , does anyone know what the Land Cruiser front conversion involves other than the fenders, headlights, and hood ? Is the front radiator support the same piece?

No airbags deployed during this accident, and it drives straight as can be, BUT the steering wheel is a little bit turned. I did a quick google because I have dash lights of AirBag, and VGRS. Could it be that this didn't have any battery for many months, and when I hooked it up, the steering wheel was slightly turned, or would it have just calibrated sideways and the light stayed off? I haven't driven it but a few miles either, so I didn't know if maybe the light just could go off after a period of time? Also, can I simply unhook the battery with the steering wheel straight and hook it back up after a few minutes to zero it, or does it now require a special cal tool? Not sure of airbag light yet.

If I wanted to see more picture of the LandCruiserGrilles.com style front ends, is there a good term to search for the retro look? It's such a generic term searching LCGrilles, I can't find many more pictures than their site and it's only the very front of the grills so I can't get a full on look of the vehicles.

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In my ignorant opinion these thick gauge heavy bumpers like ARB and TJM will protect your car from minor fender bender but in a serious collision these bumper totally destroys the frame of the car which is more hard to repair and calibrate. And I am sure because of this bumper the inner fender wall crumpled up and I recommend you should check the frame before you start throwiing money and repairing this cruiser. Otherwise it will cost you more than the price of car like this which has never been in accident.
 
In my ignorant opinion these thick gauge heavy bumpers like ARB and TJM will protect your car from minor fender bender but in a serious collision these bumper totally destroys the frame of the car which is more hard to repair and calibrate. And I am sure because of this bumper the inner fender wall crumpled up and I recommend you should check the frame before you start throwiing money and repairing this cruiser. Otherwise it will cost you more than the price of car like this which has never been in accident.

I agree with you on a lot of these low produced/ Low R&D bumpers but the ARB has a crumple box in it's bumper that saved this one by taking a lot of the energy. The frame rails are perfect. The damage to the inner fender was from the corner of the bumper tube folding over and into the corner of the fender. I am really impressed with the design of this bumper vs heavy steel with no weak points that I have seen completely tweak a frame before.
 
You'll need to source a new radiator support to get your headlights, fender, corner marker and such to all fit up nicely. Same part as the landcruiser, maybe there is one tab that is different. You'll see how it all fits together and what you'll need once you take it apart and look at the diagrams. You'll need the lower filler panel.
This thread will be an excellent resource. Looks like the LC grille uses a center support bracket that attaches to the radiator support structure that differs from LX in order to mount the LC grill.
 
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I'd swing it by a collision shop before pulling things apart. They may be able to pull on the bumper and straighten it out some. These bumpers are pricey now so could be worth the time and the crumple zone can be removed and replaced. The panel looks to be a replacement. The LC front end conversion is pretty well documented here but I'd first see what you can find at your local salvage yards whether LX or LC to source parts before going for the facelift.

Those tires as you referenced already are an abomination on a vehicle with over $3-4k on bumpers/winch/etc and absolutely a factor in whatever happened here. But looks like plenty of factors just on the setup that could have added to the vehicle having bad road manners.

$9k on long block and motor work? That is crazy. You can buy a running 2UZFE with reasonable miles for $1500-2000 and swap cost is about same.

Strutmaster suspension is very low quality - highly recommend swapping something decent in with the money saved. Check the T-bars to see what you have in there - the strutmaster kits don't always come with new T-Bars and with that bumper and winch this thing is going to be slammed (which it sure looks like it is). Also the strutmaster rear springs will likely not be up for the task of handling the bumper weight from the ARB. At least they put the tire on the passenger side so it somewhat offsets the weight of the gas tank.

This seems to be a combination of wrong suspension setup, lots of bolted on weight, bad alignment, terrible tires, and a shop that had no idea what they were doing. All resulting in (hopefully) you getting a great deal on something you can fix up.

What years is this LX? Will help with some of the steering wheel stuff. My impression is that I wouldn't work on the wheel alignment until you get everything else sorted. This could easily be the fact the suspension was never aligned properly based on the setup of the rest of the vehicle.
 
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I believe that’s a NW Arkansas rig. I’ll ask around and see if I can get more of a backstory on it.
Searcy catfish farmers son. I believe it did have some time in Fayetteville when maybe he was in school.
 
I'd swing it by a collision shop before pulling things apart. They may be able to pull on the bumper and straighten it out some. These bumpers are pricey now so could be worth the time and the crumple zone can be removed and replaced. The panel looks to be a replacement. The LC front end conversion is pretty well documented here but I'd first see what you can find at your local salvage yards whether LX or LC to source parts before going for the facelift.

Those tires as you referenced already are an abomination on a vehicle with over $3-4k on bumpers/winch/etc and absolutely a factor in whatever happened here. But looks like plenty of factors just on the setup that could have added to the vehicle having bad road manners.

$9k on long block and motor work? That is crazy. You can buy a running 2UZFE with reasonable miles for $1500-2000 and swap cost is about same.

Strutmaster suspension is very low quality - highly recommend swapping something decent in with the money saved. Check the T-bars to see what you have in there - the strutmaster kits don't always come with new T-Bars and with that bumper and winch this thing is going to be slammed (which it sure looks like it is). Also the strutmaster rear springs will likely not be up for the task of handling the bumper weight from the ARB. At least they put the tire on the passenger side so it somewhat offsets the weight of the gas tank.

This seems to be a combination of wrong suspension setup, lots of bolted on weight, bad alignment, terrible tires, and a shop that had no idea what they were doing. All resulting in (hopefully) you getting a great deal on something you can fix up.

What years is this LX? Will help with some of the steering wheel stuff. My impression is that I wouldn't work on the wheel alignment until you get everything else sorted. This could easily be the fact the suspension was never aligned properly based on the setup of the rest of the vehicle.

I hadn't dove into the suspension yet, but I will definitely fix that with replacement of a higher end kit, I wasn't aware of that and I don't want to have some cheesy stuff on here.

I'm going to give the bumper a shot on one of our larger press brakes before I burry it, I can't really do much straightening on the vehicle without having another good crumple box, but I can weld up a frame rail jig to hold it on pretty quick and tinker with it before calling it.

The reason I had even considered the LC conversion is because sourcing the matching 1E9 parts had became a challenge nationwide with only a hood able to match. If I am going to have to paint it, and order some new panels, I do get a Toyota employee discount and can't get Lexus hood or fender through them. Also, my track record of having a pull off hood shipped has been fair.

You're right, the kinked panel is a somewhat easy replacement with only basic components just sheet metal screwed to the fender structure, not like having to deal with a vehicle that has a strut tower built into it.

This is a 2007 with 187k miles on it. I was only going to mess with the wheel alignment this early on if it were possible it's just a computer zero issue from being a dead battery and then getting 12V while it was turned.
 
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In my ignorant opinion these thick gauge heavy bumpers like ARB and TJM will protect your car from minor fender bender but in a serious collision these bumper totally destroys the frame of the car which is more hard to repair and calibrate. And I am sure because of this bumper the inner fender wall crumpled up and I recommend you should check the frame before you start throwiing money and repairing this cruiser. Otherwise it will cost you more than the price of car like this which has never been in accident.
Can't speak for all bumpers but the ARB for the 100 series has a crumple zone built into the mount that will buckle under hard impact. Or at least it should.
 

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