**no particular order with this story**

I bought her in Jasper, Alabama with crisp Benji's, then drove her 200+ miles home to Lakeland, TN, where I live. Here's how she looked on eBay:

She didn't skip a beat the whole drive home. It was also the first time I'd ever even tried to drive a manual vehicle.. So the stop lights were interesting, to say the least. We made a stop in between Memphis and Jasper and noticed the engine oil was significantly low..so we topped her off, and kept on driving.

Obligatory speedo pic:

That number has to be within ~500 of the mileage when I bought it.
Got it home, sat and stared for a while, then went to bed.





(can you tell I'm a wide eyed teenager?)
The next day, I pulled the skid plate off and half a 5 gallon bucket's worth of goop fell out with it.. Some mud, some oil, some sticks, all neatly shoved into the crevice of the skid plate. Needless to say, this is what I was looking at that day...as well as for many days (months) after:



Mom being a super help rotating cardboard for the leak. Turns out, the crank seal was toast, the cam seals were on the way, and the oil pan was spitting oil from nearly every possible angle. Not to mention the rear main was also leaking (as I found out later on)



Lucky boy enjoying the new Toy


Drove it as is for a while, just steadily topping the oil off when I had to and enjoying my new truck.



One day, the power steering pulley decided to bite into the battery and spray sulfuric acid all over the place, eating spark plug wires, the under belly of the hood, as well as the paint on some accessory parts. No pics, sadly.
One day, my dad surprised me with this cool little limestone piece. The truck didn't have a tray underneath the radio, and his line of work happens to produce pretty neat keepsakes like this.



At some point, I removed the horrid push bar and rusting valence, added a Duke (last name, not school) license plate, for a cleaner look.



Got a hold on an SR5 cluster and swapped it in, though all I've got is this crappy pic.
Misc:

After an afternoon of minor wheeling, I ended up with a bent rear bumper.. an excuse to buy a tube one, right? NO! A mouthful from my mom. HA!



Got the stock clock working.. which was just unplugged. Step 1: Insert male plug into female receptor. Step 2: enjoy clock.

 

Replaced the brake pads:


A friend and I removed the time-machine-esque chrome tailgate cap:
Then we proceeded to play around in the stone yard:
One day, I got a killer deal on a rear sliding glass ($10) only to find it didn't fit because it came from a single cab.. Lesson learned, I suppose(also added a bed liner at some point):
What most Toyotas around here look like:
And another..

 

Celebrated her 148th birthday by going out to Covington Pike Bottoms with my friend..

Here she is loaded with my 400ex:
Here she is surrounded by goons:
Here she is next to a friend of mine's 88 Cruiser:

 

Added an Old Man Emu steering stabilizer one day:
Stock comparison:
Installed:
A 4Runner spotting:
Celebrations were in order:

Because she hit the big 150:
Decided to take out the 60/40 piece of garbage and insert a junkyard bucket(ish) from a 4Runner. Added the ammo can for a little storage action.

My first driver bucket idea:
Swapped out the handle my (w)hor(e)rid ex-gf broke:
I picked this up from the yard to replace the stock one that had been drilled into...but with nothing mounted in the holes. Total waste of the stock one!
Then I got a lead on a nice Smittybilt front bumper, the design of which I used to really like (until I realized their rampant structural integrity issues..) So off came the front bits!
Then we got a little snow right after mounting the Smittybilt. First snow in the truck!
America:
Should've entered this guy into a contest or something. Snowman crafting is an art indeed.
At some point, I put the lower valence back on(minus the rusty bits), painted over the grill to cover the flaking "chrome", and took some action shots with my friend.
To mend the busted AC switch, which only would blow air at the fullest level, threw one of these guys in there and it's worked ever since.

 

In spring of 2012, Bambi decided to slam into my truck when I was driving ~10mph, kinking the door and fender pretty badly.

Grabbed a decent fender from the yard:
Took the door off to make a little nest for my cat:
Threw a grey door on I got for $40 after buying 2 new ones through different aftermarket parts dealers. Neither of those aftermarket doors fit correctly.

Went on a roadtrip with my friend and we saw this relic hiding out in the woods. No idea how long it had been sitting there, but it sure was cool to see.

Rear sliding window replacement 2.0:

Shifter socket and seat:

Slave cylinder:

Found a set of keys and locks that included locks for the doors, gas door, and ignition cylinder with 2 stamped keys:

 

Great looking excab you have there. A good solid base to build from. Also looks very clean especially on the inside.

 

Where did you find the key set at?? Thats something I need to get a hold of.

 

Thank you, sir. I've got some bad luck with the exterior's appearance, but I try take meticulous care of my interior because every girl wants a guy with a hard exterior, but soft and squishy insides, eh?

For real, though.. I got that set on eBay. I don't remember or have a picture of the receipt or anything, but it was definitely from eBay and priced at about ~$100. I'm sure some will question the eBay quality, but they've held up pretty well for a year or so.

 

Thats good to know. I have to rekey my doors to the ignition since I replaced them with the manual crank ones. I will have to try and look that up on ebay. Thanks

 

You had to change locks based on how the window goes up and down? That doesn't sound right..

 

I swapped out sr5 doors that had pwr windows with new doors that had manual crank windows. Tumblers in doors are different. Causing me to have two different keys, one for door and one for ignition. Has nothing to do with window operation.

Sorry to hijack

 

Clean truck! How do you like the steering stabilizer? I have a stock 94 ext cab with 31s. Always wondered how much difference a steering stabilizer would make.

 

Also how hard was it to swap seats for 4runner seats? Direct bolt on to existing sliding rails? Thanks

 

Great write up so far! Gotta love the low miles.

I would challenge them goons any day on the trails with our trucks! Still funny to see though.

 

Oh, no problem. I just didn't think Toyota would go through the trouble of making two different tumblers. Seems a little excessive!

 

Thanks!

Honestly, I only noticed a difference at highway speeds. The new stabilizer cured the bit of steering shakes I got at 60mph+.

 

It was pretty much bolt out, bolt in. I think one of them took a little persuading, but they lined up well enough. I didn't mess with the rails at all. Rails of the 4Runner seat worked perfectly.

 

I'm very happy with the low miles. I know there's trucks out there with sub-100k mileage, but definitely not in these parts. Anything under 200k is a good deal. And those goons are all over the place!! Seriously, every 3 seconds there's a lifted domestic with big tires rumbling down the road. GAH!

 

Winter of 2012 was a very busy time for me and the truck.. Started with a clutch change, flywheel resurfacing, and master cylinder change. Only the best:

Nasty shifters:

Dropped the tranny with some help from my dad and a friend:


And on!

 

Next up was addressing this nasty shiiiz:



Nice tool we made to pop the crank bolt:



This guy was extremely seized:


Ending up having to drill into.. (broke the 1st!)


SUCCESS!


Looking tidy!