First post from a long time reader. I'm planning a full engine rebuild and frame off, mostly stock restoration for my new to me '83 truck. I drove an '83 long bed through college that my parents bought new when I was 3yrs old.

that's me on the bottom left in front of my old truck

Unfortunately, I didn't have them money to keep it going, and after a few accidents, and a bunch of Florida rust I had to let it go. I've been searching for a truck in decent shape, but they have been hard to come by down here, so I found this one, and shipped it cross country.


Minimal rust along the bedrail, stock sunroof, original chrome rims including the spare!

It started up first crank, and had decent power, but it smoked like a locomotive when you popped off the oil fill cap, and it had leaks everywhere, so I knew we would need to pull the motor. So after 2 days of scraping oil/clay off of every bolt I finally was able to start pulling the motor/trans out.


Gotta love those harbor freight hoists!



I finally got her on the stand!



cracked piston, worn out rings. It was already bored 20 over in the past.

Hopefully I can get the bed off this week, send out the gas tank, and start disassembling the cab. This is my first time restoring a Toyota, so please feel free to tell me if I'm doing anything stupid. All advice is much appreciated!

 

Sweet truck! Are you planning to rebuild this motor or try and do something different?
Keep us updated on the progress.

 

I was thinking about a swap, but I want to try and keep costs down and save my money for paint and body work. So we will be rebuilding this motor. I'm planning to clean up the original carb since it was running pretty good before I tore the engine apart.

I was able to get the bed off, gas tank off, bench seat out and pretty much everything out of the engine bay yesterday.



I got some help from my little guy yesterday

still need to get the brake booster off, but otherwise it's looking pretty good.

He doesn't realize it yet, but this will be his first car for sure!

Next up is getting all of the dash/interior out

parts pile!

 

Congrats. I'll be watching. Some day I'll be doing this on our '80. Best of luck!

 

A few updates. I should be getting the cab on the rotisserie this week, and hopefully should get the block back from the machine shop so that we can order parts for the rebuild.

Got a few parts back from the powder coat guys today!! That wrinkle finish makes me drool.

Finally got everything out of the cab, I'm gonna send the dash for powder coating next.

Disassembled the speedo today and cleaned it up, has anyone put LEDs in these to brighten it up??

Cleaned up some parts today, finally got my spare tire hoist working again

The wife wasn't too happy about me cleaning parts in the kitchen!!

 

They never are happy about that. LOL

 

There are a few threads about replacing the dash lights with LEDs and how to get the correct colors for the various warning/indicator lights.

 

From the "terrain" I see in the background you must be in central to north Florida. I'm down in Broward County, completely flat down here. I absolutely love that crinkle finish on your valve cover.

 

Good eye! We are on the west coast of Florida. I have been slacking on posting updates, but I've still been busting my butt working on the truck. I got the full rebuild kit in from LCE, I'm gonna try to start that today. Waiting on the OME lift kit to arrive.

Got the cab off, its crazy how much surface rust formed in the 2 months that its been here in Florida

Bolted her down to the rotisserie

Bare frame ready for sandblasting and powder coating.

Breaking these axles down is the part that I'm not looking forward too

Got the dash back from podwercoating. It looks brand new!

I'm planning on taking the dash to an upholstery shop so that it will look factory, but I can't decide where I should mount the inclinometer, what do you guys think?

I wanted to put a wireless cell phone charger in the center. So this way looks better to me. I'm also doing the same retro sound radio unit that KawaZX636 put in his dash, just waiting on it to arrive.

 

Just as I posted the other pictures I got an update from the sandblasting guys. It looks brand spanking new!

 

Inspirational for sure! Fantastic progress. I will be coming back to this thread someday when I start the resto of our '80. While not a big fan of the bulky inclinometer, if you are going to put it up there, I think over the glovebox is the place to put it. JMPO. I'm curious, what is the OEM lift kit. How big a lift? I assume it is a body lift. Do you have a link? Thx.

 

I meant to type OME for Old Man Emu. Just doing the 2in. In all honesty I would rather keep it at the stock height, but the only stock height springs that I could find online were ridiculously expensive. I might remove a leaf if it looks too high. I would really love to get away with 31x10.5 tires. I had a crappy 3in lift with 33's on my old Toyota and it really affected the on road handling.

 

Got the frame back from powder coating, and got it into my buddy's shop.

Looks brand new!!

I also did some work on the dash. I have seen a few posts about these old toyota CBs, but so far I have not seen any pictures of the mounts. I had to fabricate my own, but it wasn't too tough. I still need to make a small bezel to fill in the gaps on either side since it is a bit narrower than the opening.

For the mounts, I just used 2 pieces of right angle aluminum, and drilled holes accordingly.

right side

left side

this is a view from behind the dash. Radio on the bottom, CB on top. The mounting bolts aren't centered, but they do form a straight line up to the screw that holds the defrost vent in. So I put in a longer screw with a nut to secure it, and it lines up perfectly.

I went with the retrosound unit that KawaZX636 installed. I had to cut the bracket on the left so that the ashtray could still fit. I also decided to bolt it straight to the metal supports so that it wouldn't only rely on the plastic dash for support. I took quite a few test fits to get it in the right place. I had to drill some small holes in the mount to get it to line up.

I must admit that I didn't read the write up that KawaZX636 did closely. He is absolutely right that the knobs that he chose are the only ones that are small enough to fit inside of the stock recesses. Like an idiot I just picked the knobs that I thought looked most period appropriate. So to make it work I extended the posts out as far as they would go, the rear knobs sit on top of the openings, and they slightly overlap the face of the radio. Overall I think it looks ok though.

I found the threads about swapping out the light in the gauges for some new LEDs. There is an empty spot in the lower left side of the speedometer cluster. I might try to add a signal down there to indicate when the E-Locker is engaged.

 

Wow. I had no idea that there were Toyota-branded CBs. Who was the manufactuer?

 

The one I have is made by Fujitsu. There is another one made by Panasonic. There is a great write up on IH8MUD that is helping me a lot with the wiring. I'll try to post the link below.
CB40F

 

Trying to get everything organized before we start

Spent a good amount time polishing....

I love that mirror finish!!

I got some help from my kiddos. I should have made them do some of the sanding!!

We spent some time porting the head. It's crazy how you can take a 40 year old head and make those intake and exhaust ports shine like they are brand new. We are going to balance the rods, but I'm waiting on a new scale since our old one broke, hopefully should be be here in the next few days. Next week I will be dropping off the cab/bed to get sandblasted and primed. I just gotta finish getting that damn tar off the floor. I'm gonna try the dry ice trick and see because the torch/scrapper method sucks!!