Last night I removed the PHH and hard pipe sub-assembly (waiting on parts from phhkit.com and Toyota to re-install). As many on these forums have said, it's a heck of a job. When the hose finally came off of the pipe on the block, I triumphantly walked into the house covered in sweat and grime, holding the hard pipe with the PHH attached and asked my wife if she had ever been more proud of me (to which she replied, "I'm not sure how to interpret that question honey..."). I needed to share my victory with someone who understood, so I figured I'd post here.
Mud has been so helpful to me across two (ongoing) Cruiser projects that I thought I'd share my two cents for the others out there with long, skinny arms. (I'm ~6 with a wider wingspan than my height). I've only done this once, but can absolutely see how larger arms and hands would make it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to get at the lower rear bolt from the driver side wheel well.
(Also, if you have preventative maintenance to do, just follow post
#12 in this thread to make the job way easier. I had already done a lot of that preventative maintenance before, and this was part of a larger coolant system project, so I didn't want to remove the valve cover, etc.)
I'm not a fan of breaking things, so I wanted to give it a shot without using the "wiggle the pipe and break the tab" method. I was able to use the following steps to remove the lower rear bolt from underneath through the wheel well,
without having to do any major disassembly:
- Remove skirts from the driver-side wheel well (after removing the wheel, obviously)
- Remove bolts holding transmission dipstick so that it is not obstructing reach
- I also moved a few bits of the wiring harness that are in the way
- Use a short 1/4 in ratchet and place it on the rear lower bolt head by feel
- The ratchet I used was less than 6" long, which meant it had enough clearance to fully attach to the bolt and rotate
- Try 27 different ways to push on the ratchet until the bolt breaks loose

- This took a lot of trial and error, and I tried using both my left and right arms. I ended up finding a position using my right arm that had some good purchase, bracing myself against the ground with my other arm (my truck was on jack stands and I was sitting on the ground to work on it), and giving it all I had.
- In hindsight, I should have sprayed the bolt with penetrating oil from the top and let it sit overnight, but mine ended up breaking loose after some pushing. If I did it again. I would also wear long sleeves because my arm is pretty scratched up.
This was a pretty quick process for me for doing it the first time - I had everything off in 1-1.5 hours and I was taking it very slow and doing a lot of investigating with a flash light. Hopefully this helps someone with long skinny arms avoid more disassembly than necessary if you just want to change the PHH.
+1 to additional advice from this thread and others:
- Moving the transmission dipstick is an absolute must
- I would definitely move the knock sensor - way too easy to break and you'll be laying all over the engine bay
- Removing the harness and hoses at the top of the firewall is a big help, both for visibility/investigation, but also when working with the pipe from the top
Also, there's already a lot of information on actually removing the PHH itself, but here's my experience FWIW:
- I was able to get adjustable channel locks onto the block-side clamp, loosen it, and pull it as far forward as possible. These channel locks have more of a pointy nose, so they fit the bill for getting into that tight space.
- I used the same channel locks to bend the clamp on the pipe side to give myself more room to pull the block-side clamp out away from the block
- When the block-side clamp was as far forward as I was going to get it, I spent several minutes repeatedly pulling and twisting the pipe from the wheel well, and the hose slid off
- I removed the entire pipe, with the hose attached, from the bottom (though it would be just as easy, or maybe easier, to remove it from the top)