Hello to all on the Forum. Been lurking around for a couple days, but finally registered.

Tomorrow I will be heading over to Milwaukee (I live in Madison, WI), to get my truck. I am super excited, because ever since I got rid of my 1985 pick up I have kind of regretted it, even though I don't really need to drive in Madison. It is very bicycle friendly here and take full advantage.

I found the truck on craigslist last week and umped on it before someone would sneak it out from under me. It is a short bed 1983, that has only been up in Wisconsin for a couple years. Here some a few bullet points on the truck

-little to no frame rust, which is like striking gold in the salt belt
-cab is pretty clean, surface rust, one small rusted hole on a door and a very small hole in the drivers floor
-the PO had sandbags in the bed, which held water and rusted out some of the bad, but the sides are pretty good, by wisconsin standards
-8,000 miles on the rebuilt(original) engine
-Owners says 200,000 on the truck, but the odometer was rolled back at the engine rebuild, so who really knows.
-taller springs and shackles, not sure exactly how much taller
-Broken top shock mount on the drivers side

There is lots more than that, but I don't want to bore anyone too much before I even get photos up(hopefully tomorrow).

My basic plan is to take it back to stock, thus the header that says "build down." He lifted it, put bigger tires on it, and changed the 3rd members, and I am basically going to undo all of that. He has lots of parts, including most if not all the parts he changed around, but I won't really know until tomorrow what I have to work with.

I will try to get some photos up ASAP. Thanks a lot for this forum, there is so much information that I plan to make good use of.

Zack

 

Well, I took the front wheels off to check out the brakes and found they needed replacing along with the rotors. Then noticed how much gunk was on the outside of the knuckles, then those came off. The ends of the axles are kind of pitted, so I put some JB weld on and smoothed it down on one side. That seems to work. No photos yet, I have gotten really carried away tearing stuff apart, plus I can't seem to find my camera. Hopefully tomorrow I will have something to show, otherwise this is going to be a really boring thread.

Thanks again for everyone who posts. There is no way I would have dug into the steering knuckles without all the great posts showing how to do that. Now I just have to wait for a bunch of parts before I can start putting the front end back together.

 

Finally a few photos. I get so into what I am doing that taking photos sometimes doesn't even cross my mind.



Crappy "fix" to the drivers side shock mount, that broke again. What a surprise.


What it looks like with bed off. The frame is totally solid all around, which I am super happy about. I have already wire brushed everything that I could get at and treated the metal and then put POR 15 on it.

Sky from the rust hole under the battery tray.


Bigger hole of the driveway through the larger hole after I cut the rust out.


And finally the bed.


So far I am still pleased with the truck and the condition that it is in, at least as far as I know now. I have a pile of parts waiting to go on, but I am just waiting for the knuckle rebuild kit before I can really get things started.

I paid $1500 for the truck with lots of spares. Luckily, I should be able to sell a lot of parts that I won't need. The front had an open 4.80 (88?), but I am going to put the stock 3rd back in there. The guy said the rear was a locking 4.80(8), but I have not gotten the back end off the ground to confirm. Hopefully he was confused or lying because I want the stock gears back there also. I am going to get stock tires, so I see no reason to keep the lower gears on there.

Would it be terrible if I ran a 4.10 in the back and a 4.88 in the front? That might be a stupid question, but I really don't want to have to buy another 4.10 3rd if that is not what is in the back.

Oh, one more photo. This is what the front clip looks like cleaned up with POR 15.


The truck was originally white, then the PO put some red doors on it and primered the whole thing. I am not really concerned with how it will look right now, I just want to clean everything and seal it all up so it doesn't rot away up here in Wisconsin will all the salt. I am very pleased to get such and old truck with so little rust (bed excluded) and I am not going to let it just waste away.

I promise to actually post photos, so this will be someone interesting for other people to look at.

 

You absolutely CANNOT run 2 different gear set-ups. In 4x4 you're drivetrain will bind like crazy!

That being said, if you are interested in selling the 4.88's im interested in buying.

 

When I thought about having different gears the problems seemed obvious, but I am by no means a 4x4 expert, so I figured that I would ask. Once I get the rear off the ground to see what I am working with I will know what I have to sell. The truck came with a 3rd with a locker on it, but the guy said that his son dropped it and sheared off a bolt on each side. It seems unlikely that he dropped it and snapped 2 bolts, but who knows.

I really have no reason to run lower than stock gears once I get new tires, when I had my 1985 with stock tires that was still more capable than I needed and I was living in Colorado. I am not much for wheeling, but I like having a 4x4 for driving up north to go skiing.

 

Subscribed. Interesting direction you're going with this, but I think it will be neat to see. Good luck!

 

Got some quality time in with the truck today and I am finally starting to put some stuff back together, even though I am still taking more stuff apart.

I got the drive side knuckle all rebuilt and got the rotor back on. I was having a hell of a time with the rotor though. I got the inner seal pressed in and the bearing all greased up, but when I put the whole thing on the spindle it just wasn't going back all the way and I didn't have enough threads for both lock nuts. I was racking my brain trying to figure out what was binding up behind there. I finally tried with the other hub and it was fine. Long story short, I didn't have the bearing race driven in all the way. Fixed that, put in a new seal (destroyed the first one pressing it in with the race in the wrong place), and then everything went fine. The funny thing is that I had already bought 2 inner seals, but returned them earlier today when I realized that my knuckle rebuild kit came with seals. Now I have to go back to the store to re-buy a seal a retuned today. Oh well. The upside is that I had to buy a new torque wrench and when I went to sears the one I wanted was on sale.

I also dug into the rear brakes and they are totally shot, as are the bearings, so I need to compile a new parts list.

I will get some photos up tomorrow when it is light. The POR-15 on the frame turned out pretty well and I just hope that and washing the underside will keep the rust at bay until I can really tear the whole truck down to nothing, but that won't be for a long time.

I keep being amazed at how much info is on this forum. All the stuff that I am doing I know I can do, in theory, but seeing other peoples' write ups really helps break though that fear factor that I am going to screw something up and helps me to just dig right in.

A good example is some guy close to here was selling some wheels and tires for cheap off a 1993 4x4, but I remembered seeing something about backspacing in a thread and when I looked into it, all the info was there to tell me those wheels just would not work. So that saved me a 2 hours drive and the headache of having wheels that would not work.

 

Nothing really exciting to report. I finally got the stock 3rds in and put back together most of the front end, I am just waiting on some brakes hoses. I have tried all I cam think of to get the ends off the drag link, but they are not budging. I made a tool, used heat, used penetrating oil, nothing has worked. I really don't want to have to cut it off and get a new/used one, but that might be the only thing to do. Unless I can find a cheap used one I am just going to leave it as is and get the truck on the road and see how it feels, then figure out if I really want to dig into it. If anyone has a draglink, I would be happy to take it off their hands.

I have also been practicing gas welding in preparation for fixing my battery tray, doing some bed work, and fixing the horribly welded front bumper. I thought about looking into a MIG, but I figured I have a oxy-fuel setup and I may as well see how I do with that. I forgot how much I like using a torch and I will be able to do what I need with what I have. It is nice not to have to spend a bunch of money on a welder, but I do like buying new tools. I do have to bend some brake lines, so maybe getting a bender and flare tool will hold me over for a bit.

I am going up north for a week, so I won't be getting any work done, but when I get back I will have all the parts I need to get the truck back on wheels and on the road, so hopefully I can make some good progress.

 

Let's see some more pictures!!

 

Nothing super exciting to see here. I got the rear brakes apart. They were all gummed up with sand and dirt, but there were no fluid leaks and the shoes were actually in pretty good shape although I already ordered all new parts, which just be a whole lot easier than having to clean up all the old stuff. I was very happy to have the adjusters come loose without too much of a fight. I broke both adjusting screws off of the e-brake adjuster, but there was no way those bolts were going to come out.

Backing plates are both in overall good shape, they need some wire brushing and paint, but no holes that shouldn't be there.



The passenger side bearing sounds terrible and looks just as bad. It looks like it heated up pretty good and started to bubble up the seal. Or maybe that is from something else?



This is what both of the parts to the e-brake looked like. Those rubber boots were packed tight with sand. Amazingly one of them actually moved. The rubber on both is still in good shape.



New rotors, pads, calipers, rebuilt knuckles, new wheels bearing seals, drive side tie-rod end(not pictured), and rebuilt hubs.





I just need to get the brake hoses on and get some longer bolts for the sway bar ends and do a driveway alignment and the front is all ready to go.

Back of the frame in POR 15.



Anyone have the chain for the spare tire carrier? I also need to get my hands on a small jack and bar to turn the spare carrier.





That is all I have for now. I am going up north for all of next week, but I will have a pile of parts to put on when I get back. I need to find a shop that will press off my rear wheel bearings so I can get that all back together. I also will start on a patch for the battery tray. Then I need to figure out an inexpensive exhaust setup. There is a muffler place a few blocks from my house and I am going to see what they would charge to put something on to get rid of the cat, new muffler and pipe out the back. Depending on what they would charge it might be worth it to have them do it instead of me doing it, but I also might just try to piece together some pipes from the auto parts store and weld it myself.

 

You sir can have my entire spare tire assembly,not free-youll have to answer some of my newb brake questions in exchange . I took mine off of my 83
http://toyotaoff-road.com/threads/80...ration-The-SOB
Pm me.

 

Sweet little first gen! It makes me happy to see you bringing her back to life, gotta keep them on the road.

 

This is going to be a quick one. I have to get to a BBQ.

Slow progress. Was out of town for a week, then catching up with work last week, but got a little done today.

Old draglink that I had to grind off.






One side of the new(to me) draglink




New tie rod end. It is not torqued down yet, thus no pin.



The real work of the day was realizing that I had to build a tool to get the rear wheel bearing off. I tried a couple shops around town and no one seemed confident that they could do it and neither toyota dealer was very receptive to helping me. One never called me back. This was made from some stuff I had around the garage, it took way longer than I wanted it too, but it was good practice gas welding, which I really need.







Some of the welds at the bottom are crap, but should have no issues holding. I was really happy with how much easier the welding was as I went through putting the whole thing together. I had not had much torch time in the last year, so I am happy that things seem to be coming back fairly quickly.

Now I just have to see if I know anyone with a press, otherwise I will go back to the machine shop where the guy was really nice and very receptive to the idea of helping if he had the tool for it.

 

I also realized that the new flexible brake lines for the front and back are a couple inches too short, which I should have thought about before I ordered parts. Now I have to try to get longer brake hoses or maybe try to find some short brake hoses and double them up. Does that sound like a terrible idea? I can not return the hoses I already have, but I did find a really good parts store in town that has extremely helpful people in there. I am really happy about that because the chain stores around here have only a couple knowledgeable people between them and you never know when they will be there.

 

Just so you know, you can get vented rotors from a landcruiser and larger calipers from an IFS Toyota next time around on the brakes for cheap. It gives a significant upgrade to the brakes.

 

Keep it up, you'll have her lookin like a beauty in no time

 

What store is that? I stopped counting the number of blank stares I've got in the chain stores around town when I ask them a question.

 

GTC Auto Parts
2200 Pennsylvania Avenue, Madison, WI
(608) 244-5615

I happened upon that place totally on accident. I wish I had found it sooner.

 

ill be watching this one!!