Resurrection of a 1976 FJ40 that was saved from becoming a rock crawler

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FJDonny

FJDonny

Joined
Dec 2, 2019
Threads
24
Messages
166
Location
Collegeville, PA
Hi everyone - recently joined the site and the world of FJ40 restoration. Back in the early 90's I rented a guest house on a property that also had a large separate 4-car garage. A neighbor stored FJ40s that he was flipping at that time and I really thought it would be nice to have one some day. Well, that day finally arrived about two weeks ago. I purchased a 1976 40 that had been parked in a basement garage since 2012 and had not been out of that garage in at least 5 years. I knew it needed a lot of work. The first car my son and I restored was a 1970 Corvette. We did about 30% of the work. It's a queen now and I take it to shows. This time, we wanted something that we could do 70-80% of the work and then drive and enjoy. Enter my "some day" car. I've decided to document our trials, tribulations and success with the build. Here is a link to the site. Feel free to comment back on this build thread. I hope to update the site once a week or so.

https://sites.google.com/view/fjdonny/home
 
Hi all - tub is off and I found lots of interesting things bolted or welded to frame. Good news is frame looks good. Head to the site to take a look at more trials, tribulations and success....
 
That truck has a lot of potential - good work so far!
 
I read your blog.. looking good, we are in the same stage.. what tub are you going to use? Aqualu?
 
Hi- I’m still up in the air about it. Either aluminum or a steel 3/4 from Land Cruiser Heaven. Those are made in Argentina and shipped in. They are about 3 hours from me and I can drive down and pick up the tub.
 
Your build blog is a hoot. I loved all the pants soiling comments and the comments about those on MUD who seem to be able to criticize anything and everything was spot on. MUD does have some excellent advisors and those with tons of experience and it is those people you should listen to. You will learn who they are after a while.

About the air compressor. When I was self-employed I had almost that same model and it ran the entire shop, from air tools to the wide belt sander. My only complain was the drain under the tank. very hard to get to and hard to open and close. So I installed a right angle fitting, then about 8" of threaded pipe then a ball valve and INSTANTLY draining was much easier and the condensate accumulated in the pipe instead of staying on the inside of the lower tank.

Keep the updates coming, we all want to see another 40 saved and enjoyed.
 
thanks for the comments. Having fun with the build and that is what it's all about. You are right about the drain plug on compressor. Nearly have to lay down on the ground to get to it.
 
Ha - I love that name. May also call the Frankenstein. Just found out that the cowl is not original to the 40. The 76 year had a vent in the center of the top of the cowl and mine does not. Looks to be a cowl from a 77. Tons of different things bolted together.....
 
Nice build! The one thing I’ve found about Toyota is that they are very similar to fender guitars. Sometimes different year/month shows up on the wrong year vehicles. Fender would slap necks from one year on bodies to others just because that’s where they were in the parts bin.

Toyota seems to be similar. Not sure if you have evidence of the cowl being replaced, or it’s just the fact of vent vs non. What month is the VIN tag?
I have an 88 BJ74 with the 13BT diesel. I rebuilt it but it took 3 times to find the right cam bearings though Toyota. The correct fit was cam bearings for a 14BT per Toyota part numbers. Not like this was an end year model or anything so :hmm: Who knows. Even has 13BT stamped on the block.

Nice work, keep updating.
 
The VIN tag shows it at November 1975 build. The engine stamp shows the 2F number as a motor from 11 or 12 1975. So those two items jive. I have no real evidence of the cowl being replaced. With them not building a cowl with no vent until a year later, not sure how something potentially not yet designed showed up one year early. There are also two different colors on the cowl. Green and sky blue. I'm going to sand down a fender or part of the hood to see if I can find the green as well. This might help me to validate. If other parts do not have the green, then that would potentially tell me that the cowl is a replacement. Will update my findings later today.
 
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