new life for a 98 land cruiser

[roma042987]

A couple of months ago while I was out of town for work a friend of mine notified me a cruiser that popped up for sale locally. It was a 98 model with factory rear e-locker and a bad engine that had locked up at 295k. The body looked relatively clean behind the ugly brush guard and tail light guards. I made a few calls and had another one of my friends secure it for me until I could get back home and to pick it up.

When I picked it up I was pleasantly surprised that it didn't have the factory rear spoiler. It was really clean with no rust and the driver seat wasn't even torn.
The first picture is the terrible because it was a screen grab my friend had initially sent me when he found it.
The recipient

As soon as I picked it up removed the ugly brush guards as well as the running boards.


I've owned one other 100 series in my long line of land cruiser owner ship and that one suffered a roll over about two and a half years ago. It barrel rolled twice and landed back on its wheels. I held onto to it with idea of finding one with a bad engine so, I have the perfect donor.

 

[05JLX470]

Good luck with your new project. Keep us posted along the way. I hope everyone was OK in that terrible roll over.

 

[vman07]

yea what were the details on that accident?

 

[roma042987]

The sliders, roof rack, and arb were all tweaked in the accident but the lift kit and power train didn't suffer any damage. The lift consisted of OME rear springs, BDS torsion bars, OME shocks, diff drop, and slee upper control arms. I also had a Doug Thorley cat back stainless steel exhaust on it. The engine will get a complete refresh prior to going into the recipient.

Maintenance items: all OEM or Denso Aisin when available

timing belt
water pump
fan clutch bracket
timing belt tensioner
timing belt idlers (x2)
drive belt
front main seal
rear main seal
cam seals
valve cover gaskets
spark plugs
thermostat and gasket
intake gaskets
cross over pipe gaskets
dip stick tube o-ring
heater tees
oil cooler hoses
radiator hoses

Also a new Denso radiator, Denso starter, new (not reman) OEM steering rack, and 555 tie rods just as a preventative measure as well.

The white truck fired right up after sitting for over two years with a jump start. I drove it down to a friends shop to pull the engine and transmission out of it.
Here it is loaded up in my hj61 and back at my place where I'm working on the black cruiser.

Here is what is left of the white one. I'm sure I'll rob more parts off it as the black one starts coming together. Both front cv axles I had just replaced with Toyota replacements and at 800 bucks they'll definitely find their way to the recipient.

 

[roma042987]

Good luck with your new project. Keep us posted along the way. I hope everyone was OK in that terrible roll over.

Thanks! I've been working on it last few days and will try to get everything up to speed on here. Walked away from the accident with no physical injuries.

yea what were the details on that accident?

Id rather not revisit that in this thread. There is a long discussion about it in my 75 thread in my signature

 

[roma042987]

Just as a little back ground The white cruiser had 214k at the time of the accident. I had purchased it with 176k. It belonged to the owner of the local Toyota dealer and has always been meticulously maintained. I changed the oil every 3k miles and the trans fluid every 6k miles. I literally wouldn't have hesitated to drive it anywhere and was actually driving to Moab when I had the accident in Oklahoma.

Getting ready to start prepping the new engine.

New rear main seal. The old one didn't appear to be leaking but I don't plan on going this deep into it again.

Installed flex plate and torqued to spec. 35 ft lbs plus 90 degrees and bolt threads sealed.

The old heater tees literally crumbled apart. Glad to be replacing them.

 

[05JLX470]

Looks like you're on the right path...........Great job and satisfying !!!!!!

 

[aging fleet]

Looking forward to seeing how this turns out.

 

[roma042987]

Starter is a pain in the ass even with the engine out. I removed the entire engine harness to pull the intake. I had initially removed the rear coolant cross over pipe thinking I might could sneak it out from the back but that was a no go.

Starter is in. Although I don't think it is necessary to replace the intake gaskets I figured it was cheap insurance while everything is apart.

8 new oe plugs

 

[roma042987]

Front side coming apart

easiest way to pull the cam seals without marring any surfaces was to run a small screw into each one and pull them with dikes.

new water pump installed

New cam seals in.

The front crank gear put up a little fight but finally got it pulled and the front seal replaced.

Going back together. New idlers, tensioner, and belt. Cam pulleys torqued to I believe 80 ft. lbs. is what the spec was.

 

[yotasavg]

Great project, sub'd for sure!

 

[roma042987]

I found the driver side engine mount isolator to be broken when I pulled the engine and replaced it. The driver side mount is the one that sees all the torque so I didn't replace the passenger side.

You can see in this picture where the dip stick tube o-ring was weeping so I replaced it. Along with the new oil cooler hose.

Two more new oil cooler hoses so that area is good for another 20 years.

New fan bracket and the front end is back together. Crank pulley torqued to 181 ft. lbs.

 

[bamabrock]

I think I sold you the arb and sliders off my old 100. Are you going to be able to reuse them on the new truck?

 

[roma042987]

New valve cover gaskets going on.

 

[roma042987]

I think I sold you the arb and sliders off my old 100. Are you going to be able to reuse them on the new truck?

Yep you sure did. The driver slider was bent in the roll and the ARB got tweaked a bit as well so I sold the ARB. I'm now looking for another one.

 

[roma042987]

Ran into a bit of a snag pulling the old engine. Since it was locked up I couldn't turn it over to unbolt the torque converter. I ended up pulling the engine with the converter attached. It wasn't too big a deal but I had to drive two hours to run down and grab the converter from the white truck. I will be keeping the trans/tcase from the white truck just as a spare.

When I set the bad engine down on the floor it lay down at a bit of an angle not quiet on its side. After a few minutes I noticed an oil puddle forming on the floor which surprised me a bit. I raised it back up with the hoist and found the source of the leak. This one isn't going to get rebuilt.

 

[roma042987]

New steering rack and outer tie rods. I had replaced the rack in my white truck before the roll. It wasn't much fun with the engine still in the truck. Was much easier this time around.

New exhaust gaskets.

Torque converter is in. I also went ahead and changed the front diff fluid since it was easy to fill with the engine out.

 

[sailor95]

Where did you source the rack? Also estimated cost and how many job?

 

[roma042987]

Where did you source the rack? Also estimated cost and how many job?

Rack is from Toyota $727.39 plus tax. That is list price. I get a discount because I buy in bulk . They are also available remanufactured for around 400 if I remember correctly. It's one with the engine out. Id say with the engine in. Hence the replacement at this time.

 

[roma042987]

I flushed the heater core and drained the block just so the coolant would be 100% changed. The pre 2004 coolant is designed to be diluted so i put two gallons of the Toyota stuff and about a gallon of water.

All back together minus a battery which I need to pick up. Also will need to top off the power steering fluid after it bleeds out.

I'm not a fan of the gold trim package so I swapped the grill badge with the white one and will try to swap the rear badging next.