Builds New Guy Intro with an FZJ75 Troopy (1 Viewer)

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I ordered Planted seat brackets. One thing I noticed on the maiden voyage was how uncomfortable the seats are. It was so uncomfortable at one point that I didn't want to get an AUX gas tank for the truck anymore because I NEEDED to stop every 500KM/tankful in order to be a functioning human. After I get the planted seat brackets, I was thinking about getting Corbeau seats and some flat adjustment sliders to sandwich between the Planted bracket and the seat itself.

Keep in mind the Planted seat bases may not fit properly. They didn't fit in my Troopy and a few other guys with 75s and 77/76s as well.
 
 
Finally got around to messing with the laundry list of stuff I want to do to the Troopy. I've been sharing what auto-work time I have with helping my buddy rebuild his '85 pickup long bed (which I will eventually probably start a thread over in the mini-truck section as well).

Keep in mind the Planted seat bases may not fit properly. They didn't fit in my Troopy and a few other guys with 75s and 77/76s as well.

As expected the seat brackets don't fit. I'm honestly curious as to why they are so off in size though, and I'm going to reach out to Planted to see about adjusting their brackets for the future. Kind of ridiculous honestly. Probably going to be cutting the front right leg off of the bracket and re-welding it for the LH side, it's only about a 1/2" off.
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(Please ignore the dirty foam etc. I got bored of scrubbing away the sound deadening foam underneath and decided to mess with the seats)

The passenger side on the other hand is a total mystery. I'm not sure what holes do align or if I should just cut the legs off and redo them entirely. I'll also be doing the captive-bench-to-bucket-seat-bolt drill mod as well. Also if anybody has any photos of a modified planted bracket for the RH side, I'd love a photo to see for reference!

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Note that RH bracket has an upward slope in it's current "resting" position in comparison to the LH side.

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Lastly, in sad news my RH floor pan is rusted through. This is what it looks like after I took a grinder to it to see how deep it goes. It looked like the rubber adhesive stuff that Toyota painted/glued on trapped some moisture and salt between the metal and the floor and rusted it through. I ordered a new floor pan from Australia and hope to have it in a week or so to replace this one.
 
For seats I'm currently using some generic flat bottom race seats from NRG a friend had. They work, and they're more comfortable than the 25 year old vinyl benches.
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After my little RH floor scare I decided to rip everything out, stabbed everything with a screwdriver to make sure it didn't punch through on the underside and inside. Time to put in more elbow work to get all that gross adhesive off...
 
It looked like the rubber adhesive stuff that Toyota painted/glued on trapped some moisture and salt between the metal and the floor and rusted it through.


You most likely have a leaky windscreen seal or it had a leak previously. Anyone with a 7* should be checking the front floors once or twice a year for moisture.
 
Finally got around to messing with the laundry list of stuff I want to do to the Troopy. I've been sharing what auto-work time I have with helping my buddy rebuild his '85 pickup long bed (which I will eventually probably start a thread over in the mini-truck section as well).



As expected the seat brackets don't fit. I'm honestly curious as to why they are so off in size though, and I'm going to reach out to Planted to see about adjusting their brackets for the future. Kind of ridiculous honestly. Probably going to be cutting the front right leg off of the bracket and re-welding it for the LH side, it's only about a 1/2" off.
View attachment 2308263
View attachment 2308264
(Please ignore the dirty foam etc. I got bored of scrubbing away the sound deadening foam underneath and decided to mess with the seats)

The passenger side on the other hand is a total mystery. I'm not sure what holes do align or if I should just cut the legs off and redo them entirely. I'll also be doing the captive-bench-to-bucket-seat-bolt drill mod as well. Also if anybody has any photos of a modified planted bracket for the RH side, I'd love a photo to see for reference!

View attachment 2308294View attachment 2308295
Note that RH bracket has an upward slope in it's current "resting" position in comparison to the LH side.

View attachment 2308298
Lastly, in sad news my RH floor pan is rusted through. This is what it looks like after I took a grinder to it to see how deep it goes. It looked like the rubber adhesive stuff that Toyota painted/glued on trapped some moisture and salt between the metal and the floor and rusted it through. I ordered a new floor pan from Australia and hope to have it in a week or so to replace this one.
That's bad.. I had a lot of water and dust getting in through the gearbox cover, which was bent
 
Got the planted seat brackets modified today. Pretty much had to cut off about an inch of each. the FL was in the right spot, right alignment, but the leg was too long. The FR had to be shifted forward on top of being cut an inch.
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Got a bunch of good stuff from Cruiser Outfitters...
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Couldn't help to at least throw this bad larry on... Iconic duo that's second only to Oregon plates on Subaru's.
 
Dude... ARB's look so good on Troopies... so hard to resist.
You throwing a winch on there?

I eventually will. The goal of this build for me is to be more of a 4x4 tourer than an offroad build, and the likelihood of me getting one in the immediate future will be unlikely since the likelihood of me using it will be unlikely. In terms of offroad terrain, the places that I would be stuck as well are deep sand and deep snow, and I think I will be getting Maxtrax before a winch. Historically I just used those way more. Having said all of this... The winch certainly will improve my driver confidence when venturing out to the more remote places.

In other news, I finally got my seat pan from Australia (Floor Pan Link)
Came out to $73US + $50 in shipping. Kinda pricey for what it is but (as you guys probably saw in the previous post) the floor was not salvageable, and I'm honestly just glad that these trucks have OE and 3rd party parts readily available online. I thought about buying the full OE floor pan from drivers side to passengers, but I just decided against it since it really is only one spot that is needing it. Still cool to see that the full floor pan is available from Toyota to this day though.

One thing to note about the 3rd party floor pan (or at least the one I got ) is that the lips that go to the door and bend 90 degrees up to the door seam pinch weld, is nonexistent. I'd recommend looking for a manufacturer that might have the full width and bend to the door seam pinch weld if anybody has to deal with the same issue.

Note that there still is a gap between floor pan and transmission hump. I've got 18 and 20 gauge steel to close the gap between the two, and plan is to weld it all together tomorrow (Currently held together with self tapping screws).

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Really hoping this all works out pretty smoothly. I've still got a lot of interior to clean, stereo and speakers to hook up, and brake jobs to tend to. I figured start with the hard part and hopefully everything else will seem like a walk in the park.
 
Threw some self-etching primer over the welds and the pan both under and in the foot well. I've lately been debating on white raptor lining the floor, or just painting it white. I've seen a lot of people put sound deadener on the floors, and I've been rather reluctant to put sound deadener on the higher-wear areas, or places more prone to rust... Anyways, still figuring out what I want to do with the floors to prevent premature rust issues again since I will be using this truck to go to snowy areas.
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I sometimes just hate cleaning up the interior and getting all the glue off, so I also started working on the front axle. As soon as I jacked it up, I noticed that my radiator was leaking ever so slightly :(
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You can see just a dribble of green blue coolant. Looked quickly online to see what's available in for 1FZ powered 70's cruisers, and came across this: Gowe Radiator Aluminum. $575 bones... I feel like at that cost I can find one from a more well known reputable dealer. If anybody has any pointers for replacement radiators (or if I should repair the current one, I have read somewhere that they are designed to be repaired but maybe that's for 1HZ radiators), let me know.

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Also got carried away with a brake job late this afternoon since my brake pads and rotors have seen better days. I had a knuckle rebuild in hand and after seeing some oil where there shouldn't really be oil, and an unusually wobbly birfield sticking out of the knuckle, I had to just tear it all apart. I apologize for the lower quality phone photos... I do take some pride in taking good photos, but hey that's what happens when a brake job gets out of hand.

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Also note this weird white grease. I've never really seen this color, but I do doubt that it's got that Molybdenum good good. So overall glad I just took it all apart.
 
Hello,

1FZ and 1HZ engines use the same radiator. And yes, it is intended to be repaired.

In old age the core and/or the top tank rupture and leak. Your local radiator shop can handle it. Ask me how I know.

Shop guy will try to convince you to buy a new one, though.

New radiators are still available.

Hope this helps.





Juan
 
Hello,
1FZ and 1HZ engines use the same radiator. And yes, it is intended to be repaired.
In old age the core and/or the top tank rupture and leak. Your local radiator shop can handle it. Ask me how I know.
Shop guy will try to convince you to buy a new one, though.
New radiators are still available.
Hope this helps.
Juan

Hey Juan, thanks for the input. Probably going to pull the radiator out tomorrow and take it to a local shop to see what it would cost me.
I do wonder about the 1FZ and 1HZ being the same radiator though. I was looking up the OEM part number, and they're not the same (unless i'm just searching the wrong HZJ75, I just put in a generic "HZJ75-MNQ"). I also crossed the parts #'s to other Toyota that may have had the 1FZ radiator on ToyoDIY and the FZJ75's were the only thing the part was associated with.

Here's the FZJ part diagram (16400-66020)
Screenshot 2020-06-26 09.10.03.png


And here's the 1HZ radiator (16400-17070)
Screenshot 2020-06-26 09.10.44.png


The 1HZ radiator also looks a lot shorter. If anybody could measure out the length of their 1HZ radiator to see how it compares to the length of my 1FZ one, that'd be great. The dedicated aftermarket aluminum 1FZ radiators (that's readily available to ship within US) are like twice as expensive as the 1HZ ones... I think I'm going to just order an aluminum 1HZ from GPI and see how that rolls and fix the 1FZ factory one as as spare.

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Besides that though, I found out just how heavy a LC E-Locker diff is when I dropped it straight on my hip. I was expecting it to be only a little heavier than a 8" non-locker diff... nope.
 
I thought I had found in my research that the 1FZ and 1HZ radiators differed in their cores. I thought the 1HZ was maybe a 3 core and 1FZ a 4 core. Or maybe 2 and 3. I may be dreaming.
 
Hey Juan, thanks for the input. Probably going to pull the radiator out tomorrow and take it to a local shop to see what it would cost me.
I do wonder about the 1FZ and 1HZ being the same radiator though. I was looking up the OEM part number, and they're not the same (unless i'm just searching the wrong HZJ75, I just put in a generic "HZJ75-MNQ"). I also crossed the parts #'s to other Toyota that may have had the 1FZ radiator on ToyoDIY and the FZJ75's were the only thing the part was associated with.

Here's the FZJ part diagram (16400-66020)
View attachment 2352338

And here's the 1HZ radiator (16400-17070)
View attachment 2352339


The 1HZ radiator also looks a lot shorter. If anybody could measure out the length of their 1HZ radiator to see how it compares to the length of my 1FZ one, that'd be great. The dedicated aftermarket aluminum 1FZ radiators (that's readily available to ship within US) are like twice as expensive as the 1HZ ones... I think I'm going to just order an aluminum 1HZ from GPI and see how that rolls and fix the 1FZ factory one as as spare.

View attachment 2352364
Besides that though, I found out just how heavy a LC E-Locker diff is when I dropped it straight on my hip. I was expecting it to be only a little heavier than a 8" non-locker diff... nope.
Hi. Here's a picture of my hzj75 radiator (factory) 23 inch tall and 22in. wide

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I thought I had found in my research that the 1FZ and 1HZ radiators differed in their cores. I thought the 1HZ was maybe a 3 core and 1FZ a 4 core. Or maybe 2 and 3. I may be dreaming.
I believe it's 1FZ = 2 core but taller at 56cm. 1HZ = 3 core but a little shorter at 52cm.

Thanks for the input and measuring out your radiator Wagchio... I dug around and it seems like the radiators are actually interchangeable, BUT the fan shrouds will not line up. Seems like it's also not worth the trouble trying to modify the shroud either... Looks like my dilemma has been resolved - 1FZ radiator it is.
 
Pulled the axle out while i'm waiting for parts to come in. Two of the lower knuckle stud bolts were just "screwed in" versus having a headless stud + cone washer combo. Looking at part numbers, the studs shared the same parts as any US FJ80, so I opted for replacements by Marlin Crawler among new cone washers etc. Still not in yet...
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Before:
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Currently:
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The rust wasn't too bad. Basically just used 100/320/400 grit sand paper, Scotch Brite scouring pads, POR15's cleaner and metal prep, and a whole brisket smoking worth of time and elbow grease to take care of it. I did not use POR15's rust-stop undercoating, just their rattle-can top coat. Previously, I've put POR15's rust stop on axles, but for the amount of rust this axle had, I didn't think it was necessary. It's sort of tricky to apply in both spray and foam brush form (ideal for frames and easy to paint surfaces). We'll see in a few years how just the top coat from POR-15 holds up on it's own.
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Cleaned up and painted some knuckle parts too...
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And hopefully this brisket tastes good!

Question:
Does anybody know if there are sway bar end links available for 75 series trucks? I'm guessing I can size one up and find one that works, but if someone here makes one that would save me a lot of time.

Got a bunch of stuff coming down the line... Mostly just maintenance and bringing the truck to specs of the 21st century in the creature comfort department.
 

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