Here is a picture of a pair of RF1A transfercases that I have in my storage. The transfer case on the left is from my 84. The one on the right is an original 23 spline turbo unit. With these two units I could put together a stacked transfer case is set up like the one pictured below from Marlin Crawler. I don’t anticipate becoming a hard core rock crawler, so I am wondering if I can justify it for a rig that is used mostly for trail duty.

 

I have some new fenders for the runner, but before I took the old rusty ones off I thoughtI might play around with cutting the wheel openings for extra clearance and possibly to try to design some new fender flares. At first I used a pencil freehand to draw a line that I thought would be good, but once I had it cut I didn’t like it. It was too round. I thought a better design would be more faithful to the original shape of the fender which is flatter on top. So I went to my scrap pile and grabbed a piece of sheet metal and roughly cut it to shape and then attached it to the fender with some Cleco pins. Then, using the fender liner as a guide, I trimmed the new sheet metal addition to the new line. Now I have to figure out what kind of shape will work to make the fender wider, to provide some splash protection, and how to finish it out so that it looks aesthetically pleasing. Any recommendations or suggestions would be welcome, especially if they include drawings or pictures.

 

These Bushwhacker flares for the jeep XJ are a lot like what I was imagining. The shape is right and the design looks like it would be pretty easy to replicate, which is important because my priorities Include keeping the cost down and making things myself whenever possible. Whether it will look right or not remains to be seen. The Jeep has very flat sides while the Toyota is a bit more curvy and has a built-in flare right in the sheet metal. Since I am not up on any of these computer aided design softwares, like Solidworks or Fusion 360 , if I want to see how it looks like I’ll just have to build it.

That bumper on the front of the XJ is pretty sweet too. Might be interesting to see if it could be retrofit it to the 4runner.

 

i have made several sets of flat flares like that out of lawn edging, take your time, cut the right places and apply heat. im a low buck guy too.

 

When you live in the rust belt it can be really difficult to keep the drum brakes on these old Toyota is in good working shape. One solution is to get rid of them entirely and replace them with a much simpler much more powerful disc brake set up. For years people have been using brackets made to mount up some old General Motors calipers and Chevy pick up truck rotors to replace the troublesome drum brake system. Unfortunately to make it work you have to get the rotors machined to clear the hub on the axle flange and you can’t get parking brakes unless you use some Cadillac Eldorado calipers with built-in p-brakes, which are getting more and more difficult to locate. And why not, they are made for vehicles that were introduced 40 years ago. I thought there must be a better solution. It turns out you can make a pretty good braking system by using fourth generation Toyota runner rear disks, which require no machining. For calipers you will want the rear calipers off of a 1998 to 2004 Mustang Cobra. These calibers have built-in parking brakes and are pretty plentiful and not too expensive at this time. Of course you will need some mounting brackets. I made mine out of some 3/8 steel. They don’t require any fancy bending to get the spacing right just one or two washers. Of course you will need some banjo fitting adapters for the hydraulic lines and you will have to do something to adapt the Toyota parking brake cables. I haven’t got that far yet, so I can’t provide an answer at this time. It looks like it will make a fine braking system and the volume of brake fluid needed to actuate these calipers is much less than the GM calipers and so I’m pretty sure that the Toyota master cylinder will be able to push enough brake fluid to make them work.

 

That is awesome info, I will likely go this route when I do a rear brake conversion. Looks really good.

 

i will be interested to see it all done too

 

All shimmed up and ready to go.

I misplaced all the shims when I took these heads apart last year. Luckily I had another set of heads that I could pull shims from. After some trial and error, I realized that most of the shims weren’t gonna work. So I picked one and used it as a standard which gave me a basis to calculate what the final thickness of the shim for each position would be. I ordered eight shims . I had to order them online because nobody had the ones I needed in stock. It took almost 2 weeks for them to get here because they didn't have them in stock at toyotapartsdeal.com either. I installed them and all was good except for one . I quickly calculated what the correct size should be and made a call to my local dealer and amazingly they have the shim I need in stock! 60 miles round-trip and I will have my shim tomorrow. When you live out in the country sometimes you got a cover some ground to get what you need. The shims pictured here are leftovers that didn't fit any of the spots. Notice that they are all either nominally 2.85 mm or 2.80 mm. The shims I needed were all closer to 2.60 mm, with one at 3.00 mm and one at 2.50 mm. Toyota offers the shims in 0.05 mm increments.

Taking apart the engine to get the cylinder heads off is next. I have completely disassembled three other 3VZE engines so it will be familiar territory.

 

The disassembly has begun.
- Remove the battery.
- Drain the radiator.
- Disconnect the transmission cooler lines.
- Remove the fan shroud . There are two little metal clips that hold a section of the bottom of the shroud onto the rest of the shroud. You can pop these off with you fingers. With that piece of the shroud removed, and two bolts removed from either side, which attach it to the radiator and you can lift the shroud up and out.
- Upper and lower radiator hose off. Then two bolts on either side of the radiator and out she comes.
- Next I attacked the engine fan . You have to get your hand in a tight spot between the fan and the engine but a regular open or box end wrench 10 mm wrench does the trick. Four bolts out and the fan is free.
- Next I took out the intake piping between the airflow meter and the throttlebody. If you don’t remove that stuff you can’t get...
- the distributor out, which was the next thing I did .
- Now you’ve got access to the alternator and the power steering pump, which have to come off because some of the bolts holding those things on are attached to the heads. The PS pump has two brackets that mount it to the front of the cylinder heads and the engine, and the alternator does as well.
- The timing belt cover was next and it was easy.
- The engine pulley/balancer was not easy. There is a big bolt that goes into the end of the crankshaft that holds the pulley on. It always requires some serious force to break loose. The last few times I used an air impact gun that made is easy. Right now I have nowhere to hook up my compressor, but I do have some new Milwaukee cordless impact guns, a 12 volt 3/8" and the Top Dog, that high torque (1400 ft/lbs breakaway) 1/2" gun, unfortunately the big gun is too big to fit in the space between the A/C condenser and the pulley that I need to remove, and the 3/8 gun is not powerful enough. So tomorrow I will need to find my crankshaft pulley holder and my big 3/4" drive breaker bar and do this the old-fashioned way.
That’s as far as I made it in a short afternoon.

Tomorrow should be a big day. It's always a pain to undo the hoses and EGR hardware that are all over heads and the upper intake manifold. And then there is the wiring harness. I don't remember how far it has to come off, but I do remember that there is a good chance that the fuel injector wiring connectors may break into many pieces when I try to take them off. We shall see...

 

Back at it again today. I put in about four hours and this is what I have to show for it. I have recently disassembled two 3VZE engines and another one a few years ago. It sure is a lot easier when they are out on an engine stand. Just to get to this point I am freaking amazed at how many parts and steps there are. And I still have the daunting task of getting the exhaust crossover pipe and the exhaust manifolds off, before I can get the heads off. The exhaust manifold removal is complicated by the dual EGR units which attach to the passenger side manifold and which have bolts that are seized. If I use a heavy hand or an impact wrench they will snap for sure. I think heating them is the answer, but I am out of acetylene at the moment. One really good thing is that my fuel injector plugs are not crispy.

I have made a big decision too. When I have the crossover pipe, the main exhaust pipe, and the heads off, it will be the perfect time to swap out the automatic transmission for a manual five speed. With the heads and the manifolds off I will have much improved access to the bellhousing bolts and better visibility for everything. I also have every part needed except for a clutch kit, including the correct instrument cluster for a manual first gen 4runner.

By the way, the dark blue car in the background of the second picture is a 2002 VW Jetta TDI. It's going to give up its Diesel engine for my '93 Xtra Cab. If I like TDI diesel power in the '93 as much as I like it in my 2005 VW Golf, the 4runner will get a VW diesel too. And that's not all, I have more projects to follow that will be much more exciting that messing around with the 3VZE.

 

By the way, all the grunge you see in the engine compartment, is Fluid Film, a rust preventative that the original owner sprayed on the painted surfaces. I am not going to be taking this 4runner on the road in winter ever again, so I will clean that up at some point in the process. Repainting it will have to wait until I lift the body off to install a new frame. Not that the current frame is failing, yet, but every one of theses frames that has been exposed to salt is a ticking time bomb, rotting from the inside out.