prerun94

Hey everyone,
I've posted once already but just thought I'd formally introduce myself and my background with Toyotas, sorry to write a novel btw. The name is Anthony, I'm located in San Diego/Imperial Valley. In total I've owned 4 yotas, not including 9 other makes. My first Toyota was a 1986 mk2 Supra. Got it at age 19, it was beat to hell cosmetically but was a 5spd with only about 118k miles and I got it for 900 bucks. Sadly however, I ended selling it not realizing what I had in my possession. Mainly because I got tired of it being called the Mad Max car by friends. Then I bought an '01 4runner at a stealership that took advantage of a kid going to a dealership by himself so after I realized I got screwed over, I returned it to the lot and walked away. It was a great ride, just not 18k dollars great.

Then Jan. of this year, after some research, I decided I wanted an older pickup to fix up for the desert since that's what I'm into. I bought my first '94 for 2700. Already had a body lift, brand new 31's, gaskets and chain replaced, flowmaster exhaust, made in Japan model with 166k original miles. It was a sweet ride but it had one serious problem, rust. Ironically the frame was fine, it was everything else on the body. The truck was kept by shore and previously had a camper that caused serious rust to accumulate on the roof and bed sides, as well as every nut/bolt on the body. so much so that a hole was already forming on top and I didn't want to invest into fixing it so I sold it and got my money back hoping I'd find a cleaner example. After no luck finding a decent condition truck at a decent price that wasn't beat to hell, I found a 93 with only 94k miles. It literally looked brand new but the guy wanted 4k and wouldn't take a dime less. I almost bought it but I'm glad my friend came along with me and talked me out of it. After that incident I gave up looking for another pickup and figured I'd keep saving for a Tacoma or something. Then one day I just randomly typed in a search for a pickup on craigslist and found a '94 advertised with 99k original miles for 3500. I saw this on a Monday and it was posted on a Saturday so I figured it was probably gone, but I called anyways and he still had it. I was able to talk him down to $3200. It's stock but has a quality hid kit, air-intake, aftermarket cruise control(never seen before) and brand new Goodyear eagle tires on eagle rims. So far I've done a tune-up(still had original wires and plugs!) installed a sliding window, put back the original back bumper, and a sub. Aside from my plans to beef up the suspension/bigger tires, everything else is exactly how I'd want it.

Mr_Random

Cute little thing! I read your novel, glad you got where you are now with it after all that! Wish you still had the supra though, that would be sweet.

Anyways, you mentioned desert racing, still have plans for that? I'm not much into "Go fast" offroading, at least not until I have a ton of extra income, but one of my best friends has a sweet 91 4wd p/u that he has pre-runner'd out. Yuma, as you probably already know, has a good following for desert races, and him and I would love to get involved with other young people (he is 21, I am 23) that love these old 'Yota's!

Anyways, I mainly ask, because him and I are working together to get a team going, he is a great welder and fabricator, and has an astute eye for detail. I am the mechanical and electrical know-it-all (ha) who can fix pretty much anything.

I can't speak for him right now, but I'd love to have a small 2wd platform to start building on, if you think that's a cool idea! We are gonna invest in a tube bender soon, and with that can start putting our dreams to work for us. We want to design and fabricate suspension, cages, tube frames, bumpers, and even get some paint and body experience.

Also might be cool to have an excuse to go to San Diego more often... gotta escape Yuma's heat somehow.