What are you working on? (8 Viewers)

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Just finished prepping a 2001 4Runner for my grandson. When I took it for state inspection it wouldn't pass because the upper rear shock mounts were holy with rust. I have it being repaired as I write this. It also needed new tires, front brakes, and I installed the new front and rear bumpers that came with it (I bought the truck from Crusha!). Anxious to get it back and inspected to see if it needs anything else. It ain't pretty but it seemed to run pretty well on the drive home from Crusha's place. Stay tuned.................
 
Life these last few months has been exciting to say the least...

This past April I finally got the rest of the carcass of my old 97' 4Runner out of the garage.
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It didn't go without a fight, funny enough I will now have a small scar under my 4Runner tattoo :rofl:
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I achieved this all with the thanks of a lot of sawzall blades, and probably inhales a lot of rust dust...
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I was hoping to do this throughout the summer, but a bad Monday morning put the project into high gear.
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Thankfully all parties involved are ok, there is a saga I will share later but needless to say this poor Rav4 keeps going through the ringer.
Since we are at fault and only had liability only on the vehicle this will be on me to fix.
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Mechanically I should be able to get it back to 100%, cosmetically at least 85-90%....
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So now my husband is using me daily (ES300) and I am driving my SC400 daily (gets somewhat better fuel economy than the tundra, but not by much :rofl: )

HOWEVER, this project has now been put on hold for another project... Back story, beginning of this month, my Brother-in-law ignored the need for a new radiator and severely over heated and blew the engine in his '08 Lexus RX350. I went to look at it, cranked it and it had zero compression, done. I advised him it would be best if he pursued a new form of transportation in that it would be some time before I could put an engine in it.

Then my husband had the idea (which I had pondered on the way home from my BILs) of putting a new, used engine in. I could do it cheaper and quicker than putting the Rav4 back together. So some time this week I will be getting that to my shop and slowly getting together all the things needed to get another engine in and just do a whole refresh on the vehicle before handing it over to my husband.

I still plan to fix the Rav4 and make it my daily and eventually off load my SC400 and ES300 and hopefully use the money from those to bank roll into my own trailer FINALLY.
 
Been busy spending alllllll of my money. The Mazda’s clutch hydraulics failed when the line to the slave cylinder rusted out and blew…

So instead of spending literally an hour replacing the slave cylinder and line I did the only practical thing and bought a 2020 Tundra.

The Mazda got a new clutch slave today so it’s back in business…

Oh and the FJ40 got a 4Plus 8274 winch bumper… now I just need to track down an 8274…

Anyone who knows me knows how ridiculously cheap I am, so I can say without question that the Tundra is the nicest vehicle I will likely ever own - and literally 2X the power of anything I’ve owned before. It’s definitely taking some getting used to.

Most importantly, it is NOT a Mini Van.

Take that @Cass007, @jamarquardt22, @YotaFun :flipoff2:

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YotaFun said:
Brother-in-law ignored the need for a new radiator and severely over heated and blew the engine
Click to expand...

Gotta love those people...

"Hey, get your vehicle to me so I can get a new radiator into it for you."
"Don't worry about it, I've got this."
Followed by...
"Ummm.... Can you get a new engine into it for me?"

BTDT...
(no offense intended toward your BIL)
 
PAToyota said:
Gotta love those people...

"Hey, get your vehicle to me so I can get a new radiator into it for you."
"Don't worry about it, I've got this."
Followed by...
"Ummm.... Can you get a new engine into it for me?"

BTDT...
(no offense intended toward your BIL)
Click to expand...

No offense taken 🤣
He doesn't notice or understand his vehicles well.

A couple of years ago, he wanted me to look the car over before he took it on a trip to see my MIL in Tennessee, he thought he was hear a noise in the rear... Brakes were metal to metal and front were getting close... I ordered everything to do the work the following weekend.

The day I pick it up from him to bring to my shop to do work it was pouring rain. First thing I noticed was his suspension was shot, after hitting the first speed bump right next to his house it felt as if I was on a boat in rough seas, completely blown suspension, I don't know how he drove the thing daily 🙄 second was his tires, that were just about bald... Made driving in a down pour fun.

I know he may feel like he is inconveniencing me by asking me to do regular maintenance on his vehicles, but I encourage it so I don't have to deal with the night mare.that becomes the "oops" of something failing from not doing maintenance.
 
YotaFun said:
He doesn't notice or understand his vehicles well.
Click to expand...
I hear you. It's unbelievable to me how far people will let things go. I used to listen to "Car Talk" on NPR until I started to realize what a danger some of these people were!

My neighbor came to me a few years back saying her car was making noises when she stopped and could I look at it for her?

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I always thought such images online were a joke and that someone turned the rotor down on a lathe until I saw it first hand!
 
The best one I remember is when I was replacing the clutch in my brother in law's 1995 Dodge truck with the five speed trans. Ordered all the parts, got the truck in the garage and apart, and when I looked at the flywheel I couldn't believe what I saw- the clutch disc was worn so bad the rivets on it had eaten sever deep =groves in the flywheel! I hear about people all the time getting their flywheels resurfaced and I used to do it when I was still working at the steel mill but never saw one this bad. Had to order a new flywheel from Rockauto!!!!!!
 
Have some maintenance and such to do before Not Coal Miner Classic in a few weeks.

First up, pads and rotors all around on the 2016 Expedition. Went with the power stop z34 or something HD Truck and Tow kit. Upgrades to drilled and slotted rotors at all 4 corners.

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shmukster said:
I hope you removed that washer before mounting the tire and wheel!!!!!
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Yep, just needed them to snug the rotor on while the caliper and bracket got mounted.

Was wondering how long it would take someone to call me out on it :)

Part II of maintenance was this afternoon, my DD 2005 Saab 9-5 needs a yea s fluid flush at 101k miles. So you do it 4 quarts at a time, drain, fill, drive, repeat for 3 cycles. First one was today, I’ll drive it for a week with new fluid washing the inside out and next weekend run through rounds 2 & 3.
 
Final project of the weekend - first step of better power steering in the 40. To make room for improvements (more on that later), the alternator needs to go from the drivers to passenger side. Being cheap, why buy a new bracket setup when you can unbolt what you have and flip it to the other side. But of course that’s never going to work without …….work. So out come the grinder and cutofff wheels and drill and welder and BAM you’ve got a new bracket that puts the thing where it needs to be. It still needs a bit of fine tuning and wiring relocation, but the belt lines up and it does clear the hoses and such. Now we have lots more room to get to the power steering pump and hopefully next weekends fun.

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FuglyYota said:
First up, pads and rotors all around on the 2016 Expedition. Went with the power stop z34 or something HD Truck and Tow kit. Upgrades to drilled and slotted rotors at all 4 corners.
Click to expand...

I did the same upgrade to the Tundra at my 50K Service interval. I am at 60K into the pads and the rears are are 5mm front are 8mm. I feel the stopping power was significantly improved over stock and they last a while!
 
I've had these pieces for the Fireball Tools DIY vise have been in a corner of my shop for awhile, so I drug them out and started welding them up.

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