Surprise BJ42 strip down and rebuild!

[Pommy]

Sorry for the double post, I could only upload 5 pics at a time.

Finished product with plenty of copper paste on moving joints to hopefully keep them going strong!

New handbrake cable as the old one was stretched to the max and the good old PO had used about 8 nuts as large spacers to give it more stretch. You can also see the shiny new brake line on the left. Down the track I would like to upgrade the whole lot but its holding pressure for now which is good enough! You can also see the over sprayed paint from where the PO has just gone nuts under there with a rattle can of black to fix up the rust...

All in all the brakes took me a fair few weeks as I work on the car in my spare time, and with minimal equipment at home. It set me back about $300 in brake parts, machining, fluids etc so not too bad considering the time it took me. Having access to a bead blaster was a lifesaver for this, but could also be done with a wire wheel etc with more time and effort. If I had more time and money I would have done a full overhaul of the rear axle, bearings and diff while I had the brakes off, guess I will save that for another day.

 

[winnie]

nice attention to detail ... most of the work you've done (and money spent) is the not readily observable kind ... important nevertheless ... kinda surprised parts are hard to find there ... doesn't surprise me the cost ... looking forward to seeing the renewal progress ...

 

[Strategic1]

Is that typo ,or do you actually have a 43 series?
Yep43

 

[Strategic1]

Oh & Roscofj73: F800gs

 

[Pommy]

With the brakes all finally sorted I tried to do a quick fan belt change after they had arrived in the mail, should be a 10 min job... Next problem encountered! Idler pulley tensioner bolt had seized and been snapped off by PO inside the bracket.

Asked around a few wreckers, and searched online for an old 3B power steering idler without any luck. Back to the drawing board so I took the whole housing off the engine, took it apart cut the bolt close to the housing and drilled the old bolt out, re tapped the threads and installed a new long bolt. I also blasted and painted everything whilst it was off

Works better than it must have done for years, and now my belts aren't flexing several inches like they were before!

A few other minor details I started to address with a blast/fresh coat of paint:
Rear mirror arms and mirrors

I like the look of this satin black finish and will be using it for all hinges and side steps etc.

 

[Pommy]

I thought I would take a look at the oil leak from my front diff, once again a rounded nut from PO which was seized in the threads Managed to hammer a smaller size socket onto the nut, used a little heat and my rattle gun and got it loose, thankfully the threads were not damaged! That wasn't as bad an experience as the fluid that came out of it though!!

The smell of this stuff was bloody awful, and there must have been close to 4 1/2 litres of the stuff, not including the oil that had already been leaking so a fair amount of water trapped inside there. In the near future I will have to pull out the diff, cv's and bearings because they must have absorbed a bit of this too. Theres no suspect noises or anything, and the bearings feel relatively smooth and tight still so should be ok for now with some fresh oil. No more leaks so far.

Because of the time spent doing the work so far and not using the car much there were a few suspect looking areas around the body that were starting to flake off the paint and turn orange... yep that dreaded sight of rust!
I started to scrape and sand around to be confronted by just how bad it was in some areas, I haven't done rust repairs before so its the last thing I wanted to see!

Heres a couple of examples, as you will see later on they look worse after the paint is removed

Theres rust holes on the door side of the floor pan too which needs fixing, in the pic below you can see the carpet, dynamat and black tar that the PO had plastered over the top of it which I should have checked as its a common area for rust. However when I saw the insulating mat I assumed he had done a proper job and used the mat as heat and sound proofing the cabin...

It was at this point where I had a dilemma; I was facing an unnerving amount of rust with no prior experience fixing it and I couldn't possibly sell off the car for any kind of value with all this exposed. I have spent a lot of time and effort so far and didn't want to get rid of my truck. Yet at the same time I have no daily drive vehicle (currently car pooling with my missus as we work close by), I started a new traineeship so have absolutely no money to get professional help, and we live in a small townhouse with a tiny single car garage barely big enough to fit the truck in and work on. I would have to be crazy to keep the car and stick it out... and I am lol. Decision was made to continue on and remove panels, repair the rust and do a full closed door respray to improve the safety and looks of the car.

So on I went starting with the fibreglass roof, which would need a sand down, and some resin repairs for the several cracks that I could see. It was here that the rust started to make sense because PO had not installed any kind of rubber seal he had siliconed all over the roof and top of the cab, so water had been gathering here and rotting away the metal. The seals aren't cheap but I know that Toyota must have designed them specifically to allow water to move not sit and rust away.

A few close ups to show how crusty and worn the roof was;

 

[Pommy]

Starting the sanding process which already made a big difference, batteries kept running out on my cordless sander which was frustrating!

Epoxy filled in all the cracks of the roof, then added body filler and sanded down to smooth it all out for paint.

Even got my missus involved in the action which was awesome

Finally gave it a prime, paint then clear coat. I used rattle cans for this and I'm generally not over the moon about how it turned out. With the effort of all the sanding and epoxy I should have waited and done a more thorough job. A bit of a lesson for the other panels I will soon be attempting. That being said when I see the pics of how bad it was I guess its certainly an improvement nonetheless.

 

[Strategic1]

Hey Pommy, how's it going? Any new developments. Cheers

 

[Pommy]

Hey Pommy, how's it going? Any new developments. Cheers

Hi mate, Currently have all panels off and halfway through grinding everything back to metal, cutting out rust etc. will have some pics and updates on the way as soon as I can.

 

[Strategic1]

Hi mate, just noticed when looking at your bonnet pics, do they have rubber under them to separate metal from metal??
Only thinking of it as I have just been to clark rubber to cut mine out for all the hinges

 

[Pommy]

Hi mate, just noticed when looking at your bonnet pics, do they have rubber under them to separate metal from metal??
Only thinking of it as I have just been to clark rubber to cut mine out for all the hinges

Good eyes mate! No rubber on them as it was mainly a test fit to see how the colour looked next to the grey (changing the colour with a respray anyway now)
Do Clark rubber sell rubber sheet to use as a good base for the hinges? That would make things a lot cheaper for me. I have already eyed up new Bailey channel rubber from there, and looks like I can make a decent roof seal from there too. Awesome shop! Beats the Toyota genuine price tag that's for sure!

 

[Strategic1]

You can get different widths by the meter, the one I'm using is 1.5mm x 75mm wide. Just plonk the hinges on top mark with a white grease pencil easy to cut with a stencil knife Oh yeah pre drill holes. Tried shoving bolt through & took a min or two to relise that I had skipped that step

 

[Pommy]

Finally have a few moments to upload some more progress/problems

With the roof off the car and a few suspect areas around the top of the cab side panels I thought it would be quicker and easier to fix them up off the car also. So I took off the better looking panel first to see how bad it was. From what I could see with the paint on I was hoping it was mainly surface rust under there... Guess not.

This was the 'good' panel its in relatively good shape except around the top which looks like this most of the way around. Its been horribly patched up, it was so heavily covered in body filler and the previous owner had wedged paper behind the larger holes to act as some form of structure for the stuff.
Pretty annoying to say the least and for the effort of actually laying down that much bog and then sanding it down to look exactly like the rest of the panel they could have just properly patched it up with new metal. Lazy, dangerous and is now making the prospect of getting the car roadworthy increasingly harder!
So all panels were taken off and doors ready to grind down too. I hadn't planned to go this far with it and as you can see my tiny garden is filling up fast (the mrs made sure I didn't leave it looking like that for long!)

Due to the amount of welding I will need to do I needed to remove the rear windows so they don't get damaged. I don't have the budget to buy a full new set right now, definitely will look into it down the line but for now I wanted to get the windows out with the aim of reusing the seals. If you are in a similar situation its easy, just use an old flat head screwdriver (needs to be very blunt so it doesn't cut into the rubber) to push the seal back over the lip and work your way along whilst keeping pressure on the window with your other hand. It helps to wipe down with a bit of dishwashing liquid or something and make sure the rubber is warm and malleable.

Here is a glimpse of the other panel too, much worse and really bad around the seatbelt bolt mounting plate which makes me glad I found this out! Just a heads up to anyone out there who is considering using silicon instead of a rubber roof seal, this happens so don't do it! Another win for the PO.

 

[Pommy]

With the side panels needing considerable repair work this project has spiralled past the point of no return and rather than fix up sections and keep it the same S@%# paint job I have decided to hit it all with the grinder, find out where any rust is to be repaired and then give it a fresh coat of paint. Im not going for a perfect finish by any means and I am going into this with absolutely no panel beating experience so I doubt it will come out very good but overall it will be better and safer than it currently is and thats my goal!
With the doors and panels off it made sense to start on the cab body itself so that I can finish that first then start putting it all back together.

Here we go, even have the missus helping grinding parts to get it done quicker. Several long days in the heat and lungs full of bog dust and the cab is mostly done. This picture also shows how small my garage is and how cramped it is in there, certainly doesn't make the task any easier!

Surprise surprise there were a lot of rusty sections and dented uneven surfaces lying underneath the many layers of paint and bog. I would have preferred to do proper restoration patches and replace whole panels for a flawless finish welding along the factory seams but beggars can't be choosers so I went about cutting the rusted sections out and making new patches as best as I could. I didn't take pics of all the rust repair I did but here is a few examples. Some of you may be appalled by my handiwork here but hey I figure its better than just laying an inch of bog over it!

Yep thats galvanised steel sheet too, not exactly the best material to be working with but I got hold of it cheaper than any other steel sheet I could find.

One section after a quick grind to look for any holes before putting a coat of body filler on it.

 

[Pommy]

I gave the car a quick coat of primer after a little body filler and sanding over all my welding repairs. This isn't the finished prime coat its just a lot easier to see the imperfections and low spots etc with the primer on there. Still a long way to go but its already looking better I reckon!

I also did a quick repair on the headlight surround after sandblasting it showed up this rot!

All patched up just needs new holes drilled for the bonnet rubbers (which I have recently discovered as they weren't on there when I bought it)

I blasted and painted the bonnet latch whilst the headlight surround was off the car, I had to straighten the hooks out as they were rooted. I also need to make up a cable so that the latch can be pulled from inside the cabin, I may need to do a trip to a wreckers or similar for that.

My windscreen hinges were seized and rusted out so I managed to get hold of a set from Paul in North Brisbane who is a legend and has many bits and pieces for 40 series cruisers at very reasonable prices! I blasted and painted them and they came up awesome! I doubt its the last time I will be asking for parts from him, very keen to take a trip up to have a look around what he has up there!

Once the cab is sanded and primed I will get stuck into the rear panels which is looking to be quite the job, looks like I'm in this for the long haul now!

 

[Strategic1]

Doing really well As for the patches way better than I can do & a patch is better than rust. Looking good mate

 

[Pommy]

Doing really well As for the patches way better than I can do & a patch is better than rust. Looking good mate

Cheers mate! Hard time of year to be putting the long hours in but getting keen on finishing this as soon as possible!

 

[Strategic1]

Don't rush it, did a few things twice over cause I rushed. Just took longer your doing great, you will get a great deal of satisfaction in knowing you did it right Cheers

 

[VANNERS]

Hey mate,it sorta reminds me of my first 40 series build.Never had i even held a welder let alone use one.Well done,your doing the best you can.Patience is a key!
In time when its done you will have a nice clean rust free 40!

 

[Strategic1]

Hey Pommy, while your in the bits every where stage check your rag joint. Just did mine & made a great difference for the steering
not nearly as much play as it had. Cheers