The Blue Bomber (1 Viewer)

[laguna80]

Felt like it was time to make a thread for my ride. 74 FJ55 all stock aside from the tires. The truck has some serious rust in all the wrong places. Frame is still really good. Tailgate is horrible. Rockers are even worse. Floorpan is bad as well, doors too. The roof is probably the worst of all. I bought this the day it was posted on craigslist (I had been looking forever). I have no welding experience, but am a fast learner. Hopefully that will all work out. College has been getting in the way. Here's some preliminary shots.

 

[laguna80]

Rust now. underside of the rocker.

The roof.

More to come later.

 

[laguna80]

Oh yeah, naturally I'm having problems with the rear window. The front switch doesn't work at all, but the tailgate switch works partially. I have power to the panel. The circuit breaker and relay are fine. I don't have the window hooked up because I'm trying to figure out how to get the thing to work. Also, the channel is totally rusted out. Anyways, I think the tailgate key switch is partially bad. I can get it to operate up and when I switch the wires, the thing operates down. I'm thinking that the down wire is possibly grounded out somewhere or that it's not properly connected to the switch. Hopefully, I'll figure it out soon.

 

[n2666s]

check the tailgate motor gear........they are almost always cracked and need to be replaced........the tailgates I have seen with problems.......always ended up with finding a cracked plastic gear............"Schumkster" did a very nice writeup on Toyota trails a cpl. of years ago on tailgate trouble shooting;

Lou

 

[laguna80]

check the tailgate motor gear........they are almost always cracked and need to be replaced........the tailgates I have seen with problems.......always ended up with finding a cracked plastic gear............"Schumkster" did a very nice writeup on Toyota trails a cpl. of years ago on tailgate trouble shooting;

Lou

Thanks for the tip. I bought all replacement stuff from one of the members here. The mechanical stuff is in good shape. When I turn the key to make it go down I get nothing except a click. But it responds really well when I make it go up. I was really thinking of buying one of those brass gears that were being made, but didn't because I didn't have all the equipment yet. Figured I'd just wait. I've seen that writeup mentioned in almost every thread that's about tailgate problems. It must be very good. I should probably become a TLCA member and try to get the back issue.

 

[n2666s]

Lance at IPOR recently made up several sets of awsome rockers; you might give him a call and see if he has any left.......about twice or more the thickness of the originals!

Lou

 

[UGA LEE]

Thats the May/June 2004 issue with that write up on the rear window. Just got done reading it............... again.

Hope you get it worked out.

 

[n2666s]

did you inspect the gear visually?, trollhole and eventhough walked me through it, I was about ready to beat my head in with frustration at trying to get mine to work!

Lou

 

[laguna80]

Yep, I checked out the gear and it's still solid as plastic can be. I've taken out the tailgate key switch and inspected inside. There was a lot of crud built up inside and the contacts looked a little worn, so I cleaned it up a bit and filed the contacts a little. Still no luck. I'm almost 100% sure that either the wire going to the tailgate key switch is bad or the tumbler mechanism thingy isn't working right. I'm leaning toward wire based purely on previous experience. I feel that it has to be the wire or tumbler because if I switch wires on the little circuitboard, then the window will go down and if I switch them back it can go up. Only when I turn the key counterclockwise does it not do anything.

 

[laguna80]

Success! Turns out the contacts inside the tailgate key switch needed to be filed down some more. The mechanism works now, although I can't attach the glass because the tabs came off of the window channel.

 

[laguna80]

Jeebus, I really need to get to work on this thing. Unfortunately, finals is getting in the way for now. However, Christmas break (sorry I meant WINTER break) will be a nice time for me to work in addition to studying for the MCATs. Wheel cylinder is leaking in the front and if I can find a minitruck or LC front end, then I will probably do disk brakes in the front this winter. I hope to get some rust repair done too.

 

[LC_Hamma]

Good score, well kinda, it's a :shrug:
Is the roof like that all the way around? You gonna chop it off & build it up or stay stock like 99% of the "builds" on here ?

 

[laguna80]

Ya the roof is like that all the way around except for the rear. I really have no idea what I will do with it. To be perfectly honest, I think it rains to much here in Hawaii to chop the roof off. I'd end up getting wet on a weekly basis.

 

[LC_Hamma]

You could do a targa top - cut it off right behind the rear seats. Fab up a cage & yer good to go crawlin on the lava rock Or, you could just put a canopy top on there for the Fantasy Island look

 

[laguna80]

Got a bunch of zero rust heading my way and bought some H3PO4 today. I really need to get out to a junkyard and find me some disk brake parts. These wheel cylinders are killing me.

 

[laguna80]

I've got a lead on a minitruck axle that I can use for a disk brake swap and I just bought a Hobart Handler 125 on Amazon for 300.00 (Our house doesn't have 220v) I liked this one because I can upgrade to gas if I wanted, but it's really windy where I live a lot of the time so I figured flux cored would be better. I can't wait till that stuff gets here.

 

[PabloCruise]

Got a bunch of zero rust heading my way and bought some H3PO4 today. I really need to get out to a junkyard and find me some disk brake parts. These wheel cylinders are killing me.

Or look up Lavarunner out your way. He found a disc brake Pig and then it sounded like he was getting out of Cruisers...

 

[laguna80]

Thanks, I'll look him up. Out of curiosity how bad is shipping for a front axle to Hawaii. I have no idea how much one weighs, but if anyone has shipped anything like that, then I'd like to know. Cruiserparts.net might be a possible source.

 

[laguna80]

I'm going to start prepping the body for painting and paint some of it using the "roller" technique. The zero rust arrived really fast. I'm really just using this to fill up the time till my welder arrives and/or I'm able to get disc brake parts. Hopefully, I can get that taken care of before classes start again.

 

[laguna80]

The welder should be here on the fourth. Here's a pic of a small portion of the truck prepped and ready for paint.

I messed up the first coat because I didn't stir the paint properly. I decided to paint the whole rear end of the truck. The coat I put on one side was entirely too thick. I didn't get any orange peel so I just left it like that. Today, I did it properly. The paint was mixed well and the paint went on thin just how it's supposed to. Hopefully, the rest will turn out well too.