so my lifted 2wd 89 toyota that iv owned for nearly 20 years has been sitting on the back burner for a very long time had a bad trans and then threw a rod threw the block. kinda got shoved off to the side to be a project for another day about 8-9 years ago.

well recently i came across a killer deal on a rusted out 86 4x4 with a seized engine so i bought it after a couple afternoons of tinkering got the engine freed up and running decent again.



after getting it running i pulled both trucks completely apart.

 

now the biggest issue was the donor truck was a long bed mine is a short bed so i had to shorten the frame under the cab 9 inches move the rear 2 cab mounts the cross member and front two bed mounts also had to move the short bed tank mounts and fuel tank over to the 86 frame.


after the frames matched i painted the rest of the frame and then started putting my 89 body on it


used all the brake lines ect from the orrigional frame started getting everything hooked up had to cut out the floor for the transfer case shifter


after all the nessisitys were hooked up was able to take it for a spin around the yard

 

after things were mostly sorted out i could set the bed back on


after the hood went back on it was actually starting to look like something again

first time on the highway

even drove it home for the first time in many years and got its 31's swapped over to the 4wd rims


swapped out the s10 bumper for the tube bumper that was on my truck before and then took it out and did a little wheeling


the rusty rims were bothering me so i had to clean them up and paint them


still a lot more to do to this truck, engine will probably have to come back out at some point to be freshened up. it was locked up a week ago after all...lol but its very enjoyable to have this truck derivable again after so long.

 

nice pic of your buddy taking a wizz.

 

lol it does almost look like it....he is actually picking up a piece of steel off the trailer that is behind my truck.

 

Dang you didn’t waste any time getting that done! Nice work. Had to convince myself I didn’t need that 86 haha. Cool that you got it running. If it had a title I probably woulda tried to pick it up.

 

yeah i almost passed on it when i went to look at it and couldn't bar the engine over. would have been worth more if it had a title although it didn't really make a difference to me. he was asking a good price for it but seems how the engine turned out to be seized and i was at least needing a engine that could be rebuilt it was kinda a crap shoot to me so i gave him a offer where i basically couldn't go wrong and he took it. came out a lot better on it than i thought i would. he was told when he got it that it had a blown headgasket and he never did anything with it.

so far i haven't seen any signs of a blown head gasket on it and iv put a few miles on it now. got a pretty bad leak at the collector (manifold outlet) and the valve train was noisy enough it could be mistaken for a diesel. i re set the valves today now that its had enough run time to knock any rust off the seats. some of the valves had more than .020 clearance now it sounds like any other 22r other than the exhaust leak. so i think i ended up getting pretty lucky on that dice roll. still needs to at least be re sealed and the truck had 113k miles on it so im sure its probably past due for a timing chain. if i can drive it around a bit this summer and pull the engine back out in the winter ill probably go ahead and give it a refresh shove it back in and fix up the body on my truck and give it a paint job. go threw some of the little stuff between now and then.

 

put up a video on what i described so far in this thread up to the point of getting it running and driving if anyone is interested

got some parts in from rock auto today for the truck so i can fix the exhaust leak and some other little issues im used to working on semi trucks most the time parts for this truck seem so inexpensive...lol a few other updates are hooked up a mechanical oil pressure gauge very happy with the readings about 75psi on cold start 50-55 driving down the highway warm and a little over 25 at hot idle might turn out to be a pretty good little engine after all.

 

been working my way threw some of the smaller issues. left remaining replaced the drivers side door window regulator. only vaguely remember it being messed up must have broke not long before it got parked completely forgot about it. until i got the truck running and driving again. fixed the exhaust leaks. the engine is sounding really good now. front wheel bearings had way too much play in them so pulled them apart inspected the bearings and they were fine re-packed them and put it back together. whoever was last in there i kinda wonder about...lol lock nut was only on finger tight and they had the tab bent over to the inner nut rather than the lock nut. the inner nut was probably 3/4 of a turn from finger tight. one of the manual locking hubs looked bran new inside but didn't have even a finger prints worth of grease on the inside of it. but the front end is all nice and tight now. ball joints tie rod ends everything feels really good. truck drives better with the wheel bearings set properly now.

 

my exhaust was pretty rotten patched it up when i threw the truck together but the tail pipe was now starting to rot out from the muffler and flop around. so i bought the cheapest cat back exhaust i could find online. its a stock replacement nothing fancy costs about $20 more than just the stock muffler from the auto parts store. came pre dented and miss aligned most likely courtesy of fed ex. after a little bit of well placed brute force it all lined up where it should and fit decent. its fairly quiet witch isn't a bad thing when you only have 96 furious horsepower



back story on the dented fender for anyone wondering. a long time ago the engine lost a timing chain guide and was parked for a little while needed to move it and a tire was flat so i threw a spare tire on it only needing to roll it a few feet and then up onto a trailer i thought "there is no need to torque the lug nuts plenty of time to do that after i move it and am working on it" yeah moved the truck rolled it off the trailer where it sat for another couple months then i the engine competently forgetting about the finger tight lug nuts took it on a test drive and the tire fell off smashing the fender. lets just say a lesson was learned that day...lol