I've been building this truck for years now, so I figured I'd start a build thread for it. When it came to me, it had 278,000 miles on it and not much more than a spring lift, a bad paint job, and some bald street tires. The interior was nice though, and it was in good condition overall. I repainted it, threw some 63" chevy's in the back, swapped in some 4.88 gears, and mounted up my 33" mud terrains from my last pickup.


Here is a picture of it in baja not long after I bought it:




A year or so later, I built my own RUF spring pack and went to high steer. It worked well and I put a ton of miles on this setup.



In 2010, I lost my house and garage in a forest fire while I was camping, so my truck and camping gear was all I owned there for a few weeks. That's probably when I decided I would never sell this truck, just keep building it.



It then got some new 35's and a bunch more camping trips:



A year ago, it went into the garage for a heart transplant. I was ready for some more power, so what better way to do that than a turbo-charged 3.0L straight-6 from a Supra??

I'll throw a few pictures up here, but my full motor swap thread can be seen here:

https://www.yotatech.com/forums/f161...e-swap-255991/






Once that was running, I went about beefing up the rest of the drivetrain before it fell apart from the MASSIVE power increase. I dropped the gear ratio down to 4.56 from 4.88 to keep the rpm down a bit on the highway. While doing this, I also installed the Supra limited slip carrier. A locker would have been nice on the trail, but this motor makes so much power and a limited slip really helps it hook up on the street and gravel roads. Before with an open/unlocked diff, any time it started boosting on gravel, one tire would instantly start spinning. After the LSD install, it just hooks and GOES. The rear axle got the full float treatment from FROR:



I then switched to the R150f from a Tacoma with the 7m bellhousing and clutch mounted to the front of it and my newly rebuilt gear driven transfer case mounted to the back:



mmmmmmm.... new Toyota parts....:




Since the shifters were going to move with this new transmission, I decided to replace the old, nasty, 28 year old carpet. I also cut out the whole tunnel hump and moved it back 1.5" so that all the factory mounts would line up and I could retain the stock look of the interior:






I also made a short shifter for the new Tacoma transmission. I've driven with it a bit now, and I REALLY like having a short shifter.





While tackling this transmission situation, I figured I probably wasn't doing enough work on the truck, so I threw in a 3-link swap to make things more interesting. I went with the kit from Brian at 4wheelunderground. It turned out really nicely, although I'm still in the tuning phase right now:





The links for this setup are HUGE:


Had to bend my panhard to clear the oil pan and get all the up travel available:


Perfect!


New shocks, Radflo's with 4WU custom valving.


Checking clearances:



Welded on the upper link frame side mount



Fully welded axle:





Assembled!






Next up is to put some miles on this setup and do some tuning/work out all the kinks.

 

That's awesome! Great work so far

 

Niiice!

 

First off sorry for the loss of your house. The way you bounced back is a true inspiration.
Awesome Build!

 

Since the last update, I've replaced the TPS, rewired the knock sensors, and replaced the leaking EGR valve. It now idles smooth as butter and is much more responsive and powerful than it was before. On the suspension, I switched to 150/300 springs in the front and put new medium valved bilstein shocks and new bump stops in the back. It handles quite a bit better now, although when its loaded down, the medium valved bilsteins can't really keep up when running fast offroad.

I just took a 500+ mile light-offroad/camping trip around Colorado for Labor day. We went up and over Medano Pass to the Sand Dunes and camped, then hit up Hayden Pass the next day. Its pretty awesome being able to pass people while loaded down with camping gear... at whatever speed you want, haha. The truck got 20mpg on the highway doing 65-70 about everywhere, and around 15mpg with some 4low and sand driving mixed in. That's a ton better than the 22re that was in there and I was going much faster everywhere.

What I did discover though is that I need an anti-sway bar. I never really worried about it with the 22re, but the truck can just go so much faster now with so little effort. I find myself blasting past people up a pass, but then having to slow back down the 45-50mph for the slightest corners. A rear sway bar would be the easiest, but a front would be much more effective, so we'll see how much room I can find.

Also, I need more cooling power. At least some hood vents at a minimum and probably a bigger fan to replace the smaller of the two I'm currently running.

Here are some trip pics:

 

Nice pics and nice work. Thats a pretty ideal set up your running, bet she does well. Thumbs up bud!!

 

I bought my truck out of boulder come to think of it,.