South American 1977 FJ40 build-up

[RammaJamma]

All --

I have been lurking on this board for the last year and wanted to share the evolution of my 1977 FJ40 re-build. I purchased this former government FJ40 in October of last year and have been working on it since then to try to get it back to as close to stock condition as I could

Along the way, I have learned a lot about:
-- the differences between South American and US FJ40s;
-- the interesting nature of trying to get good work done here;
-- the fact that FJ40 parts are scarce here;

and have been through a ton of pain...good pain...but still pain.

I did not snap a picture when I bought it, but the first pic here shows the tub and hardtop after being fully dissassembled and starting to be sanded down. A red cruiser was white, blue green and beige underneath!

What looked like a fairly rust free cruiser was full of bondo, welded on low-quality metal, etc.

The adventure begins!

 

[RammaJamma]

Shot from the rear...just starting

 

[PabloCruise]

Keep us posted, it will be interesting to learn the differences!

Thanks!

 

[RammaJamma]

Hadtop off

Once we got the hardtop off, and the tub off the frame, and all the running gear out, we saw what we were dealing with.

Pluses:
+ Frame was in great shape. No rust, real straight
+ Engine block
+ Glass was good
+ Came with a keychain.....

Minuses:
- both rear quarter panels were bondo/sheet metal messes
- driver side floor was rotting out
- oil, water pump were shot
- Master brake shot
- knuckles shot
- all window gaskets shot
- more to come.....

 

[RammaJamma]

Getting the body in shape

We had to replace the rear quarters, part of the hard top, the bottoms of the doors, and the driver side and passenger side floor.

The hood and fenders were in great shape though.



The rear quarter panels turned out great. The amazing thing about this build up is that, unlike the US, these guys operate with very little in terms of upgraded tools or technology. All the cuts, bends and metalwork were done by hand



They did a nice job rebuilding the passenger side floor

[img=http://img174.imageshack.us/img174/3253/img0010pd9.jpg]

 

[RammaJamma]

Floor pan

We had to cut out the driver side floor (a lot of rot). Using straight sheet metal, the metal worker rebuilt the floor and replicated the raised areas in the floor to match the rest of the cruiser. Very cool.



The bottoms of the passenger doors were both rotted out (ambulance doors were in good shape, however), so we cut off the bottoms and rebuilt them.

 

[RammaJamma]

Most of the body work on the tub is now done. We are putting it back together to see how everything fits.

Once we got it back together, we had to make some adjustments to get the right panel alignment between all the new sheet metal.

Specifically
- tire carrier did not sit exactly right on the back as the curve in the metal was a little to subtle
- bottom of driver door was off by 1/16 and was sitting low

Here is a couple of shots with the tub and doors back on and primed as we worked through the problems.







The rear quarter panels really turned out well.

 

[RammaJamma]

The passneger side hardtop was completely shot - too much rot to fix. We tried finding a replacement but everything down here (El Salvador) appeared to be in the same condition....so we made one.

Here is a good shot of the start of the rebuild.



This was the last piece of major bodywork that we had to do. From here, we started painting. Original color of the 40 was Dune Beige (a long time ago, and many repaints ago), so we decided to take it back to that color.

Started by hanging and painting the doors:







And the hood and the hardtop:





And the rear quarter panel (still looking great!!)

 

[RammaJamma]

Putting it back together....

We had all the pieces, rebuilt, sanded, primed and painted, now we had to get humpty dumpty back together again...

Is it a bad thing if you have a box of parts leftover......?

The tub is going back on the frame. Used new body mounts all around (thanks CCOT!)





And then the fenders, Bib.....

 

[RammaJamma]

The engine

The engine block was solid, but the rest was in rough shape. We replaced the Master Brake cylinder, water and oil pumps, distributer, condensor, points, spark plugs and wires, fuel filter, added a rebuilt 4 core radiator .

Also rebuilt the engine with new rings, head gasket, etc.

While we had it apart, we decided to add power steering (from a Toyota HiLux pick-up) and add another pulley so that I can add A/C later on if desired.

The 2F engine



New Master Brake Cylinder - the old was was a real mess.....




Power steering gear installed with a rebuilt rag joint.




Upgraded the pulley to handle the PS and also upgradable to A/C later. Problem here was that the pulley was to deep and was hitting the radiator. Had to machine everything back to get it to fit




Also rebuilt the knuckles with all new gaskets and races. That was one heck of a dirty job. Added new Brake lines (2 front, 1 back) while we were down there.

 

[RammaJamma]

The speedo on the instrument panel worked, but the odo, and all other gauges were non-functional. We were able to find the parts to fix each of the guages, but I could not find the gas sending unit and had to get one from the states.

The painter did a nice job prepping and finishing the instrument panel as it had been painted Red, with a brush and oil enamel paint, by the PO. Turned out well.



The new windshield and new seal went in at around the same time. The old was was scratched pretty badly at the top, and we also figured out that it was regular plate glass .... not a good thing in an accident. Had to get this one from Guatemala.

 

[RammaJamma]

Painting and wrenching

The top had to be refinishing twice due to cracks in the rain gutter, but in the end it looked good.



The reverse bezel issue is not just a US phenomena...this is how they installed it first.




Getting the tranny in

 

[RammaJamma]

Missing a few switches

Not sure why there are so many holes in this dash. There was only one switch with the FJ40 when I bought it (headlights) and it did not work.

Best I can tell based on my research, the South American 40s did not come with a heater, so there should be no "Warm Pull" knob, right?

I have added new switches for the wipers, cig lighter, etc, but have no clue what could have gone in the other holes. If anyone has any thoughts, I would love to hear them.

 

[RammaJamma]

The Bumpers

The bumpers were dented and cracked, and painted a strange shade of baby blue...not much to start with

We went with a color that was not quite as pewter as original, but they still truned out well.

This shot shows the driver read with the new lights, gaskets and rock guards installed.




Here is a better shot of the rear where you can see the whole bumper and the step.



Finally, the front. The driver side was caved in and down when we got it. Took a lot of bending and welding, but we got it back to stock (used a stock bumper as the guide.)

 

[RammaJamma]

Wishful Thinking

My son joined me one day at the shop and thought that we were ready to drive out (reasonable thought given that we were 5 months into the project .... )

Had to break the news that there were no seats, and the drivetrain was not in place.



Good shot of the refinished interior without the seats or roll bar in.



For comparison, this is what it looked like when we got the seats, roll bar, etc, in. I had a roll bar made here to fit the space as I could nor find a stock one.

 

[FM4WRob]

That resto is lookin awsome

 

[RammaJamma]

Finishing Touches

I went with unpainted stainless fastners for all exposed bolts. Not stock, but I like the look. This shot is from the driver door.



There was no headliner when I got the 40, so I bought one from CCOT and hauled it down here. It went in easy and looks great.



The 40 came stock with the 16" split rims. They are incredibly heavy. If I had to do it over, I would have put different rims on b/c of the weight, and the fact that these were in really rough shape and had to have a lot of work done on them (the tires were rusted to the rims). Anyway, put 31x8x5 skinny Hankook tires on.



The dash and interior are as done as they are gone to be for awhile. Got the shift plate on the glove box from Shane.

 

[RammaJamma]

"Finished Product

Not sure if this 40 will ever truly be "finished", but it is going to be like this for awhile...

All new badging all the way around the 40





Nice shot from the front. Hope I can keep the El Salvador plates when I take it back to the States.



Front 3/4 shot



Side Shot

 

[mustardfj40]

Wow! That's a beautiful truck!

 

[busiboy]

Nice work!