I am new to the off-road vehicle scene although I have spent plenty of time in the sand and trails with bikes, buggies and quads. I am looking at buy a used FJ ‘07-’08 and will immediately take it to All Pro to turn it into a true crawler. What I need to know is… What should I make sure my used FJ has vs what would be better off to install as a modification. For example do I find one with locking rear diff or put my own lockers on after I buy? I am leaning towards buying as stock as possible and building from there. My concern is that an FJ with off-road modification is also an FJ that has been beat up a bit. Is this a legitimate concern or will the used parts hold up?
Thanks for any advice you can give.

 

When I bought my 07 FJ it "didn't come" with the locker per the paperwork. However all I had to do was buy a $40 switch to bring it to life. If you want to find out everthing about the FJ, check into http://www.fjcruiserforums.com/. It is an excellent forum with a lot of great people. Terry at AllPro is a good guy and has a nice FJ, he will give you the pros and cons of different things for the FJ. The only limit you'll have on things for the FJ is how much $$ do you want to spend. Good luck

 

I know it will all cost but, is it better to spend the money (and maybe save a bit) by buying one with the mods or buy cheap and pay for the mods at AllPro. I have not met the guys at AllPro but have heard good things and have friends that are close to both Jon and Terry, so plan to spend time there before I buy. I just want to make sure I do my homework before going as I am sure they will want as much to be done at their store as possible.

 

Dont have any advice on the sitch, but welcome to YT, and if you get the F let me know, im in t-land too and we can wheel !!

 

If i were gonna turn a used fj into a "true crawler" then i'd buy it bare bones. no locker, no upgraded suspension. IMO an fj as a "true crawler" has d44 or d60 front and rear, 4link, dual tcases, things like that, so the extra money you would spend for locker, etc would be waisted cause you're gonna upgrade way past the potenial to use those parts, make sense?

But i dont know what your plans are? is this fj a DD or strictly for Trails. Toyota OEM parts are good up to a point and worth it, but what (i think) you're planning sounds like it could excede the capiblities of those stock parts. (rambling done)

 

I agree as to what is needed for a true rock crawler and would want to spend the money on adding those items. You do bring a good point regarding it being a DD. It would not be my only vehicle but it would be the one I commute in most of the time (about 30 miles each way), so this leads to another question. How much can I do to it and still be DD? Would bigger axels (D44s or D60s) be ridiculous to commute in?