1987 Pickup 4x4 Xtracab 22re

I'm back and this time I've got truck worthy of being treated well. Found this beauty back in June of 2013 by way of a used car lot, just saw it poking it's head out over the fence from on high in the work truck earlier that day "Mine..mine mine mine. that truck will be mine." haha.

Anywho, here's what it looked like:





From what I can cypher out of the documents in the glove box, The truck came from California shipped at least part of the way here to Vermont in 2010. I was told that the engine was rebuilt at 175k. there were receipts for a head gasket job at 209k, and I purchased it at 210k miles. The doug thorley header was installed in 2009 and passed the cali sniff test!

It was resprayed from grey to this awesome (but unidentified) blue color. If I could figure out the paint code used for the respray I'd be thrilled.

Heres the best part: No Rust! well there is a tiny bit in the bed seams, but I plan to address that somehow in the very near future. The frame is CLEAN, hopefully this lasts me at least a few years in the salty north east.

While I'm posting a build thread, its not really a build yet. I need to focus on the daily driveablilty of the truck first and foremost. I do plan on turning it into a full time wheeler eventually. this should be a fun way of watching it grow.

here are a few more pics for the opening post, a few out stock wheeling too!










and a big thanks goes out to my buddy kai for his help..sorry the camera clearly couldn't cope with all of the flex

 

I'll post up any little projects as I continue to do them, but certainely wont put everything up here..because its a lot of work and I never remember to take pictures. I do have one photographed on the heater controls that I'll have to write up.
This thread will be used a lot for my own maintenance log.

1. Valve cover gaskets and valve adjustment, spark plugs, air filter @ 220k.

 

Now, being an '87, this truck had a metal heater control valve mounted on the firewall. Mine broke at the plunger piece inside the body of the valve. The arm still moved with the cable, but it always poured on the heat.
I got a junkyard one from a newer 22re truck which was made of plastic and mounted it in place. In the picture you can see the old mounting location and the new one I needed to use to maintain cable movement.


It's the blue cable that runs to the in-cab slider for h/c and the gromet behind it is where it enters the firewall


Now I had to adress the slider levers themselves and how they connected to the cables behind the dash. Since the truck was new to me, It seemed logical to tear it all apart and give it a good clean:



There are tons of little bolts and screws and electrical connecters in here and you just have to kind of feel where they are and be sure to get them all out. It took me a couple of hours but nothing got broken. It's a fairly simple job even though it looks a mess.
This is how far i tore it down, there is by no means any need to do this, but I have a wicked dust allergy and needed to give it all a good cleaning,


Now onto the fix: I used full on JB weld epoxy to secure the ends of the cables through the ends of the sliders, this is not perfect, but it was cheaper than a new assembly and it worked great all winter.
this one looks up towards the sky:

and this from the top:

Two of the sliders mount together in the back of the assembly, mine were broken so I used some plastic washers, a bolt and a nylock nut to secure them together again but still allow them to move:


This may be a slightly hack-way of doing it but there was not a single unit in good shape in the junkyard, and i could not find a replacement part any where. This works well, and has held up for 6 months now, so i figured I should share.

 

Whatever works!! Mine has a ziptie on it cause the plastic clip is broken on the defrost/vent/floor adjustment on the dash.

 

Nice work on the fix. This is something. I need to address as mine is broken at the controls in the dash. So I just always keep it open.

Great score on the truck. It's hard to find them let alone at a used car lot. Looks super clean.

 

Thanks, it is super clean, I'm lucky to have found it up here in the salty north east. I've hit the car wash religiously this winter getting the frame sprayed off/out every couple of weeks.
also, check out my junkyard steering wheel! still haven't worked out the turn signal cancel, but later 4runner wheels do fit old pickups. I'd like to utilize the steering wheel mounted buttons in some way, we will see how that goes.

 

Cool score on the wheel.

Would be neat to have those switches run lockers or something.

 

oooh they could run an e-locker. I was stuck on the radio controls, they could really do anything though, huh? the connection needs to be able to spin with the wheel, I picked up that whole assembly off the 2nd gen runner too.

 

The wheel looks sweet.

 

Note to self:
new inner and outer tie rods, steering damper, pitman and idler arms @ 220k.
33s went on @219.
Note to everyone else: 33x10.5 fit @ stock height, but limit articulation. Who cares though, they look sweet!

 

Truck looks very clean! Best of luck keeping the salt off it it!

 

Truck looks great!! I'm loving those 2nd gen excabs more and more