Builds SteelArts BJ42 Landcruiser Build

[SteelArt]

SteelArts BJ42 Landcruiser Build, Links and Coil Overs - 4 Door !!

Hi Guys, I don't usually post buildups but I have spent so many hours reading others peoples and learning from them I thought it would be a good idea.

This story started many many yeras ago when I did my first ground up re-build on a BJ 42 Landcruiser. Body off bare metal, 3B with a turbo kit, 3" lift, twin lockers, cage etc etc. Ended up selling it many years later and regretted it ever since.

Spent a few years looking around for it, last I heard it was in Townsville on the Army Base.

1st 40 Series.

Anyway fast fwd about 10 years and the opportunity came about to buy another. I alway said I wanted to have a cool car to give my kid and with the birth of our 1st not to far away and me wanting to buy it before he was born, the hunt was on.

So I wnet searching and found another BJ 42 which was worth a look. It wasn't an LX but it was an 84 model and had power steering, 5 Speed and most of the LX stuff. It also had a nice little engine fitted in place of the 3B diesel, a 13BT.

The 13BT was a direct injection Turbo charged version of the 3B. Gave it much more punch and made it very nice to drive (well as nice as a stock 40 would drive)

So a deal was done and I became the proud owner of a BJ 42. I drove it around for a while and got busy so put it into storage ..

BJ42 Mk2 with 13BT.

Before I put it into storage I played around with a few spring packs, fitted 60 series leafs in the back and a new bull bar, cut the rear guards and fitted 35" tyres. Never really finished any of it though.

So fast forward to a month ago, work has settled down, kid is almost 2 and I decide it is time to get the 40 back on the road so out she came and up onto the hoist for a plan to be hatched....

Following on from some interesting ideas and information collection, some of you may have seen my posts on here, outers, Ih8mud, pirate etc I came up with the following specs. Time frame is to have it done by the end of the year.

The Plan

Fit Fox Coil Overs front and rear, 14" front, 12" rear
Radius Arms up front triangulated 4 link up back
35" MTZ on DC1 MT 15 x 10 mags with beadlocks
6 point family cage with rear seat and baby seat mounts
Gearmaster reduction gears
4.88 R&P (TBC)
ARB Air Lockers front and read
Custom Fuel tank - Stainless
Custom Water Tank - Stainless
Custom 3" Exhaust system - Stainless
Recaro's in front with a custom Stainless centre console
Custom rear seat
ARB front bar
Warn XD 9000 winch
Custom rear bar with receiver hitch
Handmade rear flares
Widened front guards to cover tyres.
Custom 3" stainless snorkel
few other minor mods.

One very important thing is that everything is to be 100 legal and blue plated, no interest in an illegal car.

So there it is, 4 months to go..... now as I am not silly enough to think I can do it all on my own in this time while still working I will be getting some help from a few people I have found who seem to be up to the task.

I won't lie I can be a PITA of a customer as I know exactly want I want, but I am also quite happy to pay for it so as long as they deliver what they promise in the time specified to the standard required I will be a very happy customer.

I will post details of things as they get done.... some of this has already happened. so will post some pics when I find them.

This is what I am out to achieve stance wise..

 

[henlan]

Nice project mate, I'll be following it with interest. Can I ask what you paid for the new BJ? Where abouts in Australia are you?
I too have bought an FJ45 ute that I intend to restore and pass on to my now 6 month old son in about 17.5 years time.
Good luck.

 

[SteelArt]

Nice project mate, I'll be following it with interest. Can I ask what you paid for the new BJ? Where abouts in Australia are you?
I too have bought an FJ45 ute that I intend to restore and pass on to my now 6 month old son in about 17.5 years time.
Good luck.

Sweet the 45's are a nice rig, not my style as I liek the shorties and need more leg room than the 45's offer.

I am in Brisbane, I bought the "new" BJ 42 for around $4k back in like Jan 2007. It has next to NO rust and I liked the 13BT which was a low km import.

Looking at the prices now it was still good buying. Sold a heap of stuff it came with and at the end it owed me around $2k which will be the cheapest part of the build me thinks...

 

[SteelArt]

it begins

Ok so I have mocked up the 40 series with the 15 x 10's and the 35" MTZ. It has 60 series rear springs and some timber wedged under the front. What I am tryingg to do is get the look and feel I am after before I settle on a ride height and stance. The rear will be going up another inch or so to get it about level and then back another 8" (making 104" total)

At this moment the plan has evolved and I wl going to extend the wheelbase to around 102 - 104" and extended the tub to keeo the rear wheels about where the sit now.



The ARB Bull bar is on and I will decide if it stays or not once the ride height and wheel base has been set.



I also picked up some of these ..



They are 2.5's with 12" for the rear and 14" for the front.

This is what I will be doing to the tub to get the wheelbase to look correct.

 

[SteelArt]

mmm

Well it is official, my cruiser is now topless and about to go under the knife. A cutting location has been selected and a few other decisions have been made..(more to follow on those later)

So who can guess where the cut is gunna be ??

 

[Falco80]

Nice shorty mate, and with a 13BT already bolted between the rails...well you suck! It's sure to be a bit more traffic-friendly than my old faithful 'B' diesel.
I don't know if those stripes down the side are factory but i kind of dig em (apart from that swirly thing) and reckon it gives it a vintage look. Looking forward to watching your progress.

 

[SteelArt]

Nice shorty mate, and with a 13BT already bolted between the rails...well you suck! It's sure to be a bit more traffic-friendly than my old faithful 'B' diesel.
I don't know if those stripes down the side are factory but i kind of dig em (apart from that swirly thing) and reckon it gives it a vintage look. Looking forward to watching your progress.

Cheers, won't be to many stripes left shortly ....

Yeah the 13BT makes it much nicer to drive, although I reckon my old 3B with Turbo had more down low than the 13BT.

 

[SteelArt]

Well I won't bee needing these anymore

After spending way to many hours reading Iron Pgs thread on his 40 series I decided coils and a longer wheel base was a good idea.

bye bye -- to these



after I drove on to this --




Then had a chop chop to this --



Now just need to fit these



and do some metal glueing to get it back in one piece....


silly forums giving me all these ideas .

 

[mookie]

congratulations man, best thing you could do.....leafsprings are a tool of the devil

 

[Sputnik40]

Sweet! You keeping the rear frame? Subscribed .

 

[SteelArt]

Sweet! You keeping the rear frame? Subscribed .

Keeping, yes, moving backwards yes, it has been relocated 300mm.

I started a build thread over in the 40 series section but figured it would be more interest in here.

If any of the mods out there can help out by moving it here then that would be great and I will just add to it ..

more cut cut





Then figured it should go back on to hold the body where it was going ..




But wasn't real keen on it ever coming off again so had some plates added.



104" wheel base here I come

 

[Mace]

That rear axle at full stuff?

 

[SteelArt]

That rear axle at full stuff?

yeah give or take a little.

With the 35" tyres on it that is all she has. The tyre hits the top of and the inner side of the guard.

 

[SteelArt]

Ok, cheers to whoever put the threads together.
Update time, going back a little while it looked like I was never going to have the time to get the cruiser sorted by Christmas due to massive amounts of real work getting in the way of my hobby. So as a result I made the decision to outsource some of the more time consuming aspects such as fabricating, setting up and getting Department of Transport approvals on the suspension and chassis extension.
Luckily for me I found a top bloke named dale who runs a small business called 2DExtreme Fabrications on the south side of Brisbane (Home). Anyway after talking to him for more than a few hours a deal was done and he set about fabricating the 4 link rear and radius arm front with custom links, arms etc. Fox coil over were supplied and the rest was up to him.
Once he has finished and got it all approved I will get it back, get the cage sorted and weld the body back together, do the brakes, exhaust, re-wire, paint, rebuild the diffs etc etc and hopefully have it all on the road by early next year.
Anyway just wanted to give credit where credit is due.

 

[SteelArt]

That rear axle at full stuff?

ok that picture maybe a little deceptive as it wasn't actually "full stuff" it was full lift on the jack.

This might make it a little clearer.

 

[Mace]

why make the axle end upper so tall?

 

[SteelArt]

why make the axle end upper so tall?

I was under the impression that the further apart the better for control, is this not the case ?

 

[notaf-ingjeep]

From what I understand from the design I used, a inch or two higher can make a big difference. A difference in squat vs antisquat. Having the uppers mouted higher will increase the antisquat, lower increase squat. My design with my axle mount 8.5" of separation gives it like 80% squat. My are adjustable if I move it up to about 9.5" of separation from the lowers links at the axle I get 90-maybe 95% squat. I dont rember exactly those are just ball park numbers. How high yours look you will be in the anti squat. I am not sure your separation from lower links. ALso how close to level the axle upper mounts are to the frame upper mounts, could have a effect on squat vs anti. flater more level link will be closer to neutral. If your uppers on the axle are higher than on the frame and the link slanting down,axle high to frame low, antisquat. Slanted from the frame high to the axle low, squat. Your links will load up from tourqe and take weight off of the springs when antisquat is the factor. Maybe even causing the truck to lift in the rear when the throttle is down. I am pretty neutral, but still on the squat side of the spectrum and it will load the springs more than the links and cause the truck to squat. Squat as in the springs compressing from the tourqe of the engine. It may cause the truck to sink under power. 0-99% = squat 100% neutral
101%and up is anti squat. you want to be neutral or just below or just above depending on preference so adjustment is nice.

THis is what I understand but hopefully someone could correct me if there is any misinfo there

 

[SteelArt]

ok so in most cases you would want a little squat to give you better traction yeah ?

When you talk about seperation are you talking about from parallel ? So if your fronts are 8" apart and your back are 10" then you have 2" of seperation ?

I will get some measurements and put them in the 4 link calc

 

[Mace]

From what I understand from the design I used, a inch or two higher can make a big difference. A difference in squat vs antisquat. Having the uppers mouted higher will increase the antisquat, lower increase squat. My design with my axle mount 8.5" of separation gives it like 80% squat. My are adjustable if I move it up to about 9.5" of separation from the lowers links at the axle I get 90-maybe 95% squat. I dont rember exactly those are just ball park numbers. How high yours look you will be in the anti squat. I am not sure your separation from lower links. ALso how close to level the axle upper mounts are to the frame upper mounts, could have a effect on squat vs anti. flater more level link will be closer to neutral. If your uppers on the axle are higher than on the frame and the link slanting down,axle high to frame low, antisquat. Slanted from the frame high to the axle low, squat. Your links will load up from tourqe and take weight off of the springs when antisquat is the factor. Maybe even causing the truck to lift in the rear when the throttle is down. I am pretty neutral, but still on the squat side of the spectrum and it will load the springs more than the links and cause the truck to squat. Squat as in the springs compressing from the tourqe of the engine. It may cause the truck to sink under power. 0-99% = squat 100% neutral
101%and up is anti squat. you want to be neutral or just below or just above depending on preference so adjustment is nice.

THis is what I understand but hopefully someone could correct me if there is any misinfo there

Sort of, the vertical seperation between the uppers and lowers on the axle is just a single thing that helps define antisquat (and a slew of other suspension geometry aspects). As is not the end all be all of suspension design. I am not a huge fan of large amounts of vertical seperation at the axle end. It tends to cause more complications than anything else. The link orientation and frame side mounts have a significant amount to do with the design as well. YOu happen to run the numbers on that design in the 4 link calculator?
You have to remember that all of the numbers that you calculate are guesses.. Untill you actually start wheeling your truck, you will not have a good impression of how the truck behaves with the suspension you designed. Having an adjustable suspension is a very good thing.

People have been successfull with AS numbers from 60% to 250%. It all depends on the rig. I prefer a bit more neutral AS numbers myself, but that is also based on an estimated center of gravity.