turbdees

Circle,
Nice write up and pictures. I've got the same kit from Brian at TDswaps for my 1990 yota pickup, V6, IFS. I'm still working on it, but have the engine in and transmission mounted to a 22R tranny crossmember. I noticed some minor interference with the oil pan and tie rod, until I bolted on the transmission. The added weight on the back of the engine lifted the oil pan clear of the tie rod. Hope this helps.

turbdees

In response to your engine/hood/tranny clearance issue. I've got the same kit from TDswaps for my 1990 V6 truck. I didn't have a lift and thus tried to "convince" the floor pan to make room for the tranny with a BFH. It may have worked if I kept going, but figured it was easier to go with the 2" body lift kit by Performance Accessories. I've installed the cab spacers only so far, now there's plenty of room for the tranny, and it makes the heater lines through the firewall easier to access/route too. I think there would have been an issue with the hood hitting the engine too, but with the lift kit it looks like it will clear now. With the lift you need to install the supplied steering shaft extension and firewall plate, extend the shift levers, and for the bed lift I'll still need to make sure the fuel filler hose reaches, and watch out for anything else connected in the engine compartment. I noticed the fuel lines on the right hand side of engine bay were stretched a bit during the lift, not damaged, but they still look good/usable.

inskeep

The only way mine would fit with the tdswap mounts is a 2" body lift and renotching oil pan and turned pickup 90 degrees. There is a picture in my photos.

Circle

Thanks for the input guys. I think I'm getting close to figuring most of this out now. I'm just curious about 2 things.

Do most of you also have the 2 AC condenser setup? Do you understand why it's necessary, and could it be converted to a 1 condenser setup? And possibly relocated? Thanks to Dmarsh for the idea of relocating the condenser.

Ok, now this may sound like a really stupid question for those of you who are educated about mechanics, but I'm just throwing this question out there anyways. If I have to do a 2" body lift to clear the hood, could I just use the body lift in the front and use a suspension lift of 2" in the back to even it up? Would that help in keeping my overall center of gravity lower? Or is that just a bad idea?

Thanks again everyone.

Circle

Well, I just got my work visa for Australia, so I'll be getting on a plane in a few days. I'm sad that I won't be around while the final issues get worked out on this conversion. It will be difficult to update this thread with pictures since I'll be half way around the world, but I'll do my best. I've gone through every relevant conversion thread I could find on this forum and compiled a list of common problems, along with pictures and brief descriptions. It isn't a step by step instruction list (which I would prefer), it is more just like an overall collection of important info. If anyone wants a copy of that PDF file, please let me know. It's on my google drive account, so I may be able to provide a link directly to it, but if that doesn't work, I can email them to people. I will also be able to document the financial aspects of this conversion, so if anyone cares to research what a turn-key style conversion would cost, I can help with that too. Yeah, yeah, I know that takes away a lot of street cred from the wrenchers out there, but I am who I am. Everybody has things they exceed at. Mechanics just is not my strong suit. But I still know what I want for transportation. And this is the only way to get it.

Circle

I know I've stated this before but it's worth repeating. I ordered the full conversion kit from Brian at TDswaps about 3 months ago. He is very nice and personable and convinced me that he had worked out all the issues with the conversion to the R150. He assured me that if we had any questions, he would answer them right away. So I paid over $1800 for his kit. He told me the kit was in stock. Some of the parts shipped a week later, and some took just under 8 weeks to arrive. I know that Brian has health issues. Everybody has issues or deals with family issues. We either do what we promise or we make excuses. If Brian had done the things he told me he would, the conversion would have been finished a month ago. Now I'm leaving the country for a job and won't get to see the conversion get finished. I hope it all works out well. But take this for what it is, Brian does not do what he says he will. I'm even questioning the quality of his machine work, but I may be jumping ahead of myself there.

Brian, if you're reading this, I'd like to return my notched oil pan, and possibly my motor mounts too. And if the adapter plate is off (as another forum member said his was), I'd like the return that too. I don't want to kill my transmission with an adapter plate that's not aligned correctly.Tell us Brian, are you a man of your word or are you not?

waltt

While ur down under check and c if u can get sum half cuts of some Toyota diesel trucks. if u could get a container full of them to north america. thay would sell!! have fun in Australia.

Circle

I'm currently working on a document that covers most of the commonly faced issues involved with this swap. I'm making it to help the mechanic who is performing the swap for me, cause the easier I make it on him, the cheaper and quicker I can get this done.

With that in mind, I'm going to try and share this document. Right now I've got a PDF version, a webpage version, and a Mac .rtf version. They are all about 4.5MB. The webpage version and the Mac version look the best. For some reason the photos look distorted in the PDF file.

I've gathered lots of pictures from previous build threads in this document, so if you want me to remove any of your own pictures due to copyrights and all, please just let me know and don't be a dick about it. I'll be happy to share this document with anyone, but it is far from being a complete authoritative source. What I would really like to do is try to share it in a way that certain members can add to and modify certain sections they are the most informed about. Sort of like wikipedia. It should be a collaborative effort and would go much more easily and result in a better finished product. I'm not sure how I'll do that, because I'm using a Mac and I know most of you guys are probably using PC. The PDF files I create do not seem to be editable. I'm not even good at working with PDF files, nor do I have a lot of extra time at the moment. I need to do more research on certain subjects. I'd like to figure out how to easily resize the photos so everything fits nicely together under each topic. But like I said, it's a work in progress.

So if any one wants of copy of my document in its current state, please PM your email address, and tell me which version you want. I would suggest the webpage version for most of you, unless you use Apple computers.

Circle

Ok, I've been working to try and make this a document that is easily available to everyone through the Google drive website. You can leave comments about any changes that should be made, and at your request, I may allow you to contribute to editing the document or become an administrator. Let's just see how this works out for now. Here is the link:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...it?usp=sharing

Please give me feedback! Thank you!

Circle

Also keep in mind, this was originally written for the machine shop doing the swap for me, so some of the info is specific to them. As the finish my swap, I will do away with those notes and try to make everything as universal and step by step as possible. Thanks to anyone willing to contribute to this project.

6.8spc

I want to keep my ac as well and it looks like Dmarsh4x4 is using a flex-lite mechanical fan no clutch so that is the way I will go. I am waiting for my kit from Brian and hope it gets to me soon as its been awhile. I knew it would be awhile when I ordered. Great write up by the way

waltt

Great job that reads like an actual manual. For the flywheel i wouldnt plug weld the stock holes again. it would b much better to use a piece of a bolt or something like that to plug the bolt hole then tack weld the plug on the top and bottom only. I think that is the reason why the holes i drilled ended up a little off. I used two pusher fans from orileys one 10" & 12" thay fit pretty good. for the filler i used a chisel to cut out the insert so a diesel nozel could fit. I used the stock fuel sender, but i deleted the stock fuel pump and replaced it with a piece of pipe for the pickup .@again great job this is gonna help a bunch of people out.

inskeep

Circle,
Pm me for the good bad and ugly plus I have pics you may want to use. I dont want to start any trouble with TDswaps. My opinions on what may have been done differently. Opinions are like assholes everyone has one.
I have worked around problems that I had and all in all its turning out nicely. Maybe a little bit over engineered, but thats me.
Thanks
Ken
Adapt, improvise, overcome

Circle

I agree with you completely. I knew once I said anything negative about my experience with my TDswaps kit, I would never get any more help from Brian. But the thing is, he wasn't being helpful anyway. So I just need answers now and I am out of time. I can't rely on his help. If you click on the link above, you can leave comments on the google drive document. Or if you want, I'll make you an editor of the document. I don't want to piss Brian off. I just want to avoid these headaches for future swaps. This swap has been done so many times, it just makes sense to make a complete document of it. Most people can't spend days without sleep trying to piece all the little suggestions from hundreds of forums together to make sense of it all. I'm not a mechanic. I just want to make a single document that an average mechanic could understand how to perform this swap.

Circle

Also Inskeep,
When I actually spoke with Brian on the phone a couple of times, and I got the feeling he was a really solid guy. I still hope he is or will be again in the future. I know that he has some health issues, but we all have issues. That's why we communicate. Brian doesn't honestly communicate when he will do things. He promised me that he had all the issues resolved for my v6 swap and he was only a call or a text away whenever we had questions. Since then he has gone completely AWOL, but he some how has the time to log on to this forum every day or two.

I wish I was a mechanic, but I'm not. So I'm paying $75/hour for the machine shop to figure out the answers Brian promised me he already had. He convinced me to spend over $1800 on his full kit, and now I have to re-fab most of the parts. There is no excuse for that. I may not be a mechanic, but I'm not some rich, stupid asshole either. I'm just an average dude that wants a mid-size diesel SUV. I'm actually just a specialized auto body worker. I repair hail damaged vehicles for a living. I just want to be treated fairly and honestly. I'm not looking for favors. I just want to make this thing work smoothly, and there's no reason that it shouldn't. So anybody that has input on my google drive document, don't hesitate to do so.

Circle

FYI, I put the link for the collaborative OM617-4Runner conversion document in my signature, so you won't have to dig far for it whenever you have an idea that needs adding.

jb451

Circle, you talk of using a Taurus or village fan in the doc. Just fYI, you need a "pusher" fan, the taurus fan is a "puller", as in if you mount it to the radiator as is, it will be pulling the air away from the radiator and engine.

Nice to see another mac user btw.