RMP&O's 1984 FJ60, v8, lockers and more!

[SNLC]

Tossed a battery in the FJ62 yesterday afternoon. Everything looks pretty good. Power windows all work! Power door locks need some work though. Pretty much everything else in the electricals works! Stoked!!

 

[topaw84]

If you ever need a hand I'm in Jackson and would be willing to help anytime. Send me a PM if you need some help or want to go wheeling sometime.

 

[e30fj62]

that's one mean looking cruiser... and with a 350 Ram jet to boot

 

[SNLC]

If you ever need a hand I'm in Jackson and would be willing to help anytime. Send me a PM if you need some help or want to go wheeling sometime.

PM sent!

 

[SNLC]

Started the new suspension install about 6pm last night. Worked on it until about 2am. The front is almost done and is the difficult part. Doing a Man-A-Fre shackle reversal so had to cut off the old front leaf hangers. Also had to cut the gnarly rivets through the frame for the horns that the bumper mounts to. Pretty much all went drama free and no siezed pins. Still a bit of a pita to cut stuff off the frame and then clean up, paint, ect. I am really liking the look of things though, truck should come up a couple inches or so by the looks of things. Got some pictures I will post later and should have this wrapped up by tonight. Can't wait to drive it!!

 

[isbj60]

You are going to love that suspension setup. Back when my truck was running I actually looked for speed bumps! The only goofy thing about it is how low the front hangers sit. I didn't like the exposure the front bolts had to damage, so I welded on some short lengths of pipe, similar to the protection the diff drain plugs enjoy.

 

[SNLC]

Well the new suspension is done!! For the most part anyways, it is a done deal. I need to do a few last little things such as get new shocks and longer rear shackles.

Here are pictures....


To fit the Man-A-Fre shackle reversal kit the front leaf hangers have to be cut off.

The front mostly all installed....

Wheels back on and front completed....

Getting ready to do the rear....

All done.....

front shackle angle....

The front came up a lot from my old suspension. We forgot to measure the front before the new stuff went in so I don't have numbers to compare before and after. It is definately a fair share higher in the front though. I have two issues right now, #1 my shocks are to short, most noticeable in the front and #2 my rear shackles need to be a touch longer. My old suspension was supposed to be a 4" lift and my old shocks are not toast. So I decided to not buy shocks and see how it went. In the front now with the S/R and new springs my shocks are maxed out with the truck just parked. Down the road this causes it to be a bit bouncy since it won't droop. Besides this the front end rides and handles very nice. After a bunch of measuring and so forth it turns out I am a touch higher in the front. The rear is also a little bit softer then I would like. It is looking like I am 1/2" or so lower in the rear. Last thing is my u-bolts are a touch to short and also a bit old and worn out. Good news is my front sway bar is fine and no need to mess with it, it already had 4" extensions before the new lift went in.

So I need to buy new shocks, new u-bolts and longer rear shackles. I have not decided on shocks yet, plan to take the shocks out and flex it up to take measurements. I have some Ford shocks towers for the front but not sure I will use them just yet. My rear shckels are a 4 1/2" spread so need at least 5", maybe 5 1/2" would be best. The front prop shaft is definately at a steep angle plus the slip joint is about 1/4" more seperated from before. I will deal with this if required but not until the suspension is all done with new shocks, ect. I have OME add a leaves for all four corners so I think I may add them to the rear to stiffen it up a touch. It is not bad in the rear as is now but I also have not loaded the truck up, ie it's empty. The front needs nothing other then shocks.

Overall I am really happy with it. It handles much much better then before in everyway. I have no weird noises, clunks or squeeks!

Now what do I think about the MAF S/R kit. First off, it is a pain in the ass to fit it! We installed it by bolting on only because I am swapping frames in the future. Welding this kit on would be much better then bolting on. Bolting it is just a real pita. Once I swap frames we will weld on the S/R kit. With an ARB bumper it is even more of a pain to install and I had to cut about 1/4" off both side of a mounting bracket for the ARB bumper. The kit also increases front prop shaft angle a lot. Right now with my set up and if I had the right shocks....well off-road I think I could easily seperate the front prop shaft in a big droop. That is lame. I also don't like the wedges supplied with the kit as a way to help fix the prop shaft angle. In the future I think I am going to cut and turn mine to fix the angle. Also the MAF kit does not come with the small bolts for retaining the front pins in the shackle hangers. On the rest of the truck the stock pins are a 6mm but the MAF S/R kit is a smaller bolt. I went and bought 6mm to use in the MAF kit only to find out it needs a smaller bolt. This is just plain lame, minor but lame. If I was doing all this to my truck for off-roading, well the MAF S/R kit has a couple of down sides. The springs/shackles are pretty low behind the axle, the front MAF hangers are also low. The whole issue with the prop shaft angle is a big thing to think about too if using this kit for off-road improvements.

 

[SNLC]

Oh and I also got a new steering wheel wrap!

 

[Kurtis]

Those shims aren't for your pinion angle. They are to get the correct steering castor. They may in turn help your pinion angle as it looks like with the kit you have increased caster more than a couple degrees. I have found 2-3 degrees positive to be the happiest position for caster on a 60. After some tests with different variables I found out while 6 degrees will give the wheel a slightly harder feel, if you have any other issues with your system to much can exaggerate wobble. 2-3 degrees even with worn out steering parts will track nicely. Obviously if your box is tight, you knuckles are tight and rod ends are tight with a steering stabilizer you'll never notice. I've got a SOA FIV8 4l60e 60 as well so I've tested it at all kinds of speeds 5-96mph and that s what worked the best for me.
The 60 looks great Btw.

 

[Tapage]

I would wait until your spring are set in a couple of months before move to longer rear shackles ..

 

[SNLC]

Those shims aren't for your pinion angle. They are to get the correct steering castor. They may in turn help your pinion angle as it looks like with the kit you have increased caster more than a couple degrees. I have found 2-3 degrees positive to be the happiest position for caster on a 60. After some tests with different variables I found out while 6 degrees will give the wheel a slightly harder feel, if you have any other issues with your system to much can exaggerate wobble. 2-3 degrees even with worn out steering parts will track nicely. Obviously if your box is tight, you knuckles are tight and rod ends are tight with a steering stabilizer you'll never notice. I've got a SOA FIV8 4l60e 60 as well so I've tested it at all kinds of speeds 5-96mph and that s what worked the best for me.
The 60 looks great Btw.

I knew they are for castor I was just being dense after a couple of long days working on the truck. My pinion angle is bad now, so bad my front prop shaft is loose at the slip joint. I am just going to do a cut and turn to get things set up right and be done with it for good. Not sure when that will be though....

It tracks better now then it did before. Yet, looking like my tie rods and draglink could use a rebuild. Plus I am thinking my steering box needs a rebuild too! None of the steering is horrible but it is certainly not tight.

 

[SNLC]

I would wait until your spring are set in a couple of months before move to longer rear shackles ..

What is bothering me more then the rear being 1/2" lower then the front is I have Cruiser lean bad! My rear RHS is 1 1/2" lower then my front LHS! I had it before lift and now have it as bad if not worse after new OME suspension! Going to try adding a leaf to the sagging side and maybe put in a plate too as per the Toyota fix. My engine is at least 300lbs lighter than the stock engine which is maybe why my front came up so much. Going to get new shocks and fix the Cruiser lean before doing longer rear shackles. Yes I know suspension will settle, I have 4 1/2" spread shackles now, MAF sells 5" and 6" spread. So it should be no problem to level up the truck but new shocks and fixing the Cruiser lean is more important to me right now. Oh and I can't off-road the truck until I either get my front prop shaft lengthened or do a cut & turn.

 

[StevoJonesFJ60]

Did you put the springs on the right side? I believe those OME kits have one spring which compensates for cruiser lean.

 

[SNLC]

Yeah I did.....A = drivers or LHS as per instructions from MAF. From what I have read, even if I had them wrong and swapped the springs if would just lean the other way. Also from what I have read it is a weight distribution issue. OEM springs have different spring rates to compensate. T-case is off-set, engine is offset, driver, steering wheel and so forth is on the LHS...hence the distribution issue. You would think OME would have this all worked out but since it is such a common problem especially with OME springs it seems they do not have it all worked out.

Cruiser lean is also a problem on FJ40s and FJ55s. I read a Toyota service bulletin from like 1978 on the fix in an FJ40. It is a plate similar to an overload spring that is installed in the leaf pack. Toyota even sells the plate or used to. Since I have add a leaves around we are going to try that first, install an extra leaf in the sagging side. If it doesn't work I will do the plate as per Toyotas recomendations. If that fails only thing I can think of left to try would be a longer shackle on that side.

I called my buddy who can fab like a mad man....he thinks we can do the cut and turn for about $200 and do it over a weekend. I am ordering new shocks this week and new u-bolts. Holding off on new longer rear shackles until the rest of this stuff gets worked out.

Did you put the springs on the right side? I believe those OME kits have one spring which compensates for cruiser lean.

 

[Kurtis]

Cut and turns really don't cost much of anything it just depends what you go through and rebuild when you do it. You could do it for free if you reused everything and managed to get the old perches off clean. Its pretty hard to save those old perches after you cut them off. It you'll probably be better off just making news ones in a spring under application to get them close enough. Ruff Stuff sells SOA ones you could use though if you didn't want to make them It will be a little weird on a SUA truck because you'll have to move the top u bolt catch and the bottom perch. Might be easier to redo it entirely and go with normal u bolts. Never seen a SUA cut and turn before its going to be kinda interesting. So many ways to go with these things.
I would really consider moving the rear shackle mount on your front axle before you did the cut and turn. Its super common with that specific kit to move the hanger to get a better shackle angle since the ome springs are kinda short. That will lower your height slightly as well.

 

[SNLC]

Hey Kurtis thanks for the good info and for your input! My fab buddy said the same thing, use the RuffStuff spring perches to make it that much easier. So I ordered them up today. Here is a link for anyone interested....

FJ40 / FJ60 Diff Cut Spring Perch, New Style - RuffStuff Specialties

The front prop shaft angle is just to extreme so that is what makes me want to do the cut & turn. It will also allow us to set castor at factory specs when the C&T is done. I like how high the front end is now, my objective is to clear 35's with no rub. At this time I don't want to do any welding or mods to the frame since I am doing a frame swap in the not so distant future. Perhaps once the frame swap is done we will drill, sleeve and raise the S/R, right now the angle on the shackle is not ideal. As Tapage mentioned though I need to give things time to settle. I also do not want the truck any lower. I would go SOA but it just puts things to high for my uses of this truck, I don't want to be that tall for trips down to Latin America. Also the FJ60 is not my off-roader, it is my overland truck and DD. Thus it will see only light to medium wheeling and most of the time it will be on pavement.

I got some new u-bolts coming from a local guy. Also got him to order me some Bilstien 5125s. So that will take care of those issues.

Cut and turns really don't cost much of anything it just depends what you go through and rebuild when you do it. You could do it for free if you reused everything and managed to get the old perches off clean. Its pretty hard to save those old perches after you cut them off. It you'll probably be better off just making news ones in a spring under application to get them close enough. Ruff Stuff sells SOA ones you could use though if you didn't want to make them It will be a little weird on a SUA truck because you'll have to move the top u bolt catch and the bottom perch. Might be easier to redo it entirely and go with normal u bolts. Never seen a SUA cut and turn before its going to be kinda interesting. So many ways to go with these things.
I would really consider moving the rear shackle mount on your front axle before you did the cut and turn. Its super common with that specific kit to move the hanger to get a better shackle angle since the ome springs are kinda short. That will lower your height slightly as well.

 

[SNLC]

Just had a fairly big weekend on the Cruisers....

Spent Saturday swapping my rear FJ60 seat to the FJ62 seat. Main reason for the swap was that the grey trim off the FJ62 seat didn't match up just right when I tried to put it on my FJ60 seat. So I decided to swap the seat covers, keeping my vinyl. All up it took me about 6hrs to swap the covers over and remount the seat, that was with time to pull the FJ62 seat too. Kind of a pain to re-use all the little hooks for the covers but I got it done. Then yesterday, Sunday, I spent most of the day tearing down the FJ62. Got almost all the interior gutted. Parts I want to sell cleaned up and so forth. The FJ62 is super clean and I am stoked on that!

This weekend is going to be a bigger weekend spent on the truck. Oh and some time on it in the evenings this week. I got a RuffStuff diff cut kit, basically just new perches. Pulled out my front prop shaft as it fell apart when I flexed up the truck checking for shock lengths. I have got some Bilstein 5150s due here any day. Went with a 12" in front and 10" in rear, mostly due to the shock lengths I needed compressed and extended. Meaning, I do not have that much travel but needed specific shock lengths. Got a new u-bolt kit sitting here too, grade 8 all around. Also picked up some F350 shock towers as I am going eye/eye on my front shocks. Today I ordered up a Marlin Crawler front diff kit so we can rebuild the knuckles and such this weekend when we do the C&T. Also went ahead and bought a Marlin high steer kit.

The other day I noticed a huge leak between my tranny and the Ranger box. To make sure that was where the leak is I cleaned it all up and took it for a drive. Got the boxes hot and brought it home. Sure enough leak appears to be between Ranger box and 4spd. It dumps about a cup of oil on the ground once parked. So I ordered up a new seal for the Ranger box today, should have that tomorrow. Tonight we start tearing out the tranny and also will toss add a leaves in the rear now that I have new u-bolts.

Pictures and more to come!

 

[isbj60]

Sure enough leak appears to be between Ranger box and 4spd. It dumps about a cup of oil on the ground once parked.

Mine did that, and I ended up having to drill the Ranger box to accept the dowel pins that originally went between the transmission and the bellhousing. I replaced that gasket several times, but the torque going through that joint broke it loose. Even silicone wouldn't hold. Since I pinned it, I've had no problems. I can give you the details for the pinning if you are interested.

 

[SNLC]

Mine did that, and I ended up having to drill the Ranger box to accept the dowel pins that originally went between the transmission and the bellhousing. I replaced that gasket several times, but the torque going through that joint broke it loose. Even silicone wouldn't hold. Since I pinned it, I've had no problems. I can give you the details for the pinning if you are interested.

Yes please!! Pm box is full but here for info works fine or email me....

Tranny is on the floor. Ranger box is seperated. Seal looks ok but the plate between Ranger and 4spd was super loose. 1/8" of play in it when it came out, bolts removed by hand!! Fluid dirty in all boxes, odd as it was all clean when clutch went in about 6 weeks ago, no off-roading in those 6 weeks. Ranger box is low on fluid, tranny is also low, t-case was overfull. I thought the usual was bad seal between t-case and tranny causing tranny to over fill not the opposite? Good news is, input shaft & bearings on tranny and Ranger box look good. Will check mating surfaces to try an see if warpage has occured. Not much else to do short of rebuild. Will flush before re-installing and flush again in 300-500 miles. Bearings and the like are dirty, hence the wanting to flush all the boxes.

Ya' know what they say....3 times is a charm! This is removal #2 of the tranny since I have had the truck, may just take 3x to get it right!!

Oh and have got to get the engine mounts dialed in and re-done. I just have this gut feeling engine mounts are playing a role in these leaks and dramas in the drivetrain!

 

[isbj60]

One thing I will need from somebody in the know is what diameter the locating pins are on the bell housing, or the diameter of the pin bores in the transmission. That way I can assist in providing tolerances for proper fit.

I did this work almost 12 years ago, so some of the particulars are a bit fuzzy. I cannot remember, for example, if both pins are able to be used. They might interfere with the bolt pattern holding the back plate on the Ranger OD. I know I got at least one in there, and the end product does not leak. That much I can guarantee. As always, I take no offense if someone chimes in with a better way of doing things, or if you choose not to do this. It is your truck, so don’t do anything on it unless you are comfortable, since you have to live with the results. That being said...

The design of the Ranger OD is such that the main case is particular to the bell housing, and the back plate is swappable depending on the transmission that is to be used. AA does have teardown instructions on their website. That back plate is quite thick and does not cause bearings or parts to eject when removed, so that is nice. What isn’t nice is AA does not put the locating pins in the plate. It may be possible to talk with them for resolution, possibly send the back plate to them for work. They might be willing to help out in exchange for product development. That should be the first option tried, as it does not hurt to ask. You do have history of others with this problem (and the fact that the locating pins fix it), and I can back you if they need it. For some reason I didn’t talk to them (shy high school kid, I guess) and it since slipped my mind to tell them about it. Until now.

The goal is to transfer the location of the pin bores in the front of the H42 to the adapter plate on the Ranger. I did this by using two dummy pins that were ground to a point and shortened such that they barely stuck out from the face of the H42. Obviously they need to be a slip fit otherwise you will never get them back out. Once the two units are bolted together, the dummy pins serve as a center punch and will indent the soft aluminum indicating the proper center location for the pin bores. Once this is complete, the back plate of the Ranger OD may be unbolted and sent to a machine shop with the proper pin stock and target dimensions. Again, I can assist with those dimensions provided I know what size the stock pins/pin bores are.

You might be able to use some sort of marking compound on the face of the H42 around the pin bores and transfer the pattern that way. I think the end result will be more accurate with the center punch method, but the marking compound would be a lot easier.

IIRC, I missed on the first attempt to drill the pin bores in the back plate of the Ranger, as the drill walked. The recovery was simply to plug the holes in the rear plate with aluminum round stock and try again. This area is not critical for strength and has been holding up fine to my heavy foot and 400 Ford. This misstep is why I recommend biting the bullet and taking it to a machine shop. It’s cleaner that way.

A good source of pin material is McMaster Carr. Check out their on-line catalog under raw materials. You might find ground dowel pins elsewhere on the site, so do some looking around. In addition, check out MSC Industrial and Grainger. You do not need to be a business to start an account with them. When asked on forms for my business name, I always put down Ind. (contraction for independent) and have never been bothered.

If you are ordering gaskets from AA get one for the back plate-to-Ranger case body as well (if it has one. I cannot remember that detail well. I always use silicone of some sort unless the gasket thickness determines bearing preload).

I hope this helps. I have subscribed to this thread so I can assist where I can.