JT's 88 4 Runner Build

[jtaco1]

Here is the brief build of my 88 4 Runner thus far, been building it the last year to replace the Tacoma. I am building it around 35's with no lift other than a rear shackle to level it out and a 1" body lift so I can lift the drivetrain a little.

Here is what we started with

Pulled the truck into the garage and pulled the old engine that had 280K on it


Next we prepped the new engine to go in

We pulled the old tranny and transfer case and pushed the truck out into the yard. We then began to tear the tranny and t-cases apart


used the original case as the crawl box since it was in worse shape than the other t-case I had for the swap. Tore the donor case apart


Installed new tranny output seal in tranny

Assembled dual transfer case and tranny, yes it is oily, haven't pressure washed anythign yet.

After the tranny and t-cases were assembled, we rolled the truck back into the shop and put the engine back in

Then installed the tranny and transfer cases.
Completed Engine compartment

Dual cases and shifters

Interior stripped and ready for bedliner coating, which will happen when it warms up

I then cut the firewall and rear fenders back, approx 2-2.5" in the rear to fit 35's with no lift.
Then put 35's on the front


And then the rear after I got the 5" shackle installed and rear u-bolt flip



Well we went to Rausch the other weekend for EC4RJ and had a blast. Truck wheeled great and having a trailer is so nice. Here are some pictures from the weekend.








Who knew stock springs could droop that much

Well I finally have the 4 Runner ready to go again from when I blew the rear brake hard line. Whne I blew the line I also blew the master cylinder and booster. So I replaced both with units out of a V6 4 Runner.

I also beat the hell out of the stock skid plate on Trail 20, so I built a new one from a skid plate that Skid Row makes for a Nissan Xterra. I modified it a good bit, but it is good to go now and is made from 3/16" steel.



While I was at it I also pulled the rear t-case and had 4.7 gears put in it by Kajo Built. He did a great job and got it done fast. i also installed a set of Trail Gear Twin Sticks. It is great idleing along at 175:1

Finally here are what my Corbeau Baja SS suspension seats look like mounted to the stock sliders with a piece of angle.



I have sold the 35" Goodyear MT/Rs and am now putting 37" PitBull Rockers on.

[jtaco1]

Here are the new to me 37" PB Rockers ready to be mounted up this week.

[jtaco1]

Well I finally got the 37" PitBull Rockers installed on the 4 Runner. They have about 20-25psi in them right now and I will need to trim a bit in the front to get full steering, but they measure out to around 36" and dig through the snow great.

[jtaco1]

Well I was done early today. We started out in the comp course and the 4 Runner walked right up the Gauntlet. So we headed down to Jotters Way hill climb on the right. On my second attempt I stalled, at which point the truck rolled back down the climb 50-75' as I tried to miss trees as we went, I clipped the last one with my drivers rear tire and ended up like this.

Luckily no one was hurt.

We rolled it back over and let it sit. Fired it up and took it back up to the trailer. I would have kept wheeling, but when I hit the tree, I bent the drovers side spring pack to hell and lost a good bit of head room, but we were able to bend that back out with the HI Lift.


So far I like the Pitbull Rockers, but I hope to get a bit more use out of them next time. Right now I am going to try to bend and beat the cab back into some sort of shape and get a cage put in it.

[jtaco1]

Here is what my 4 Runner looked like after I cut the top off from the roll.

So I took Friday off to get this cage mostly knocked out. The cage kit is from 4xInnovations and is the passenger length DOM version. The kit arrived in 3 packages and looked like this once unwrapped.

First thing you have to do is weld up the b-pillar since it is cut in half for shipping. An 8" long DOM slug is included with the kit and slips into the connection. I also drilled 4 plug weld holes in the b-pillar for added strength. I had a slight issue getting the slug all the way in on one side, but I trimmed it down and it all went together.

I then went through and put the floor plates in and tacked the b-pillar into place. I did have to use a ratchet strap to close since it was a little wide at the bottom from welding and the tweaked body. I then tacked in the a-pillar tubes and front cross bar and center bar.


I decided not to install the rear portion of the kit like it is designed and retain the factory roll bar. I have cut down the rear bars to tie right into rear bar at the main node. I don't have pictures yet since I have three more tubes to install along with the gussets and dash bar and harness bar that I need to bend up yet.

Overall the kit is nice, but you definately need two people to do the install, I did it solo and it was a pain doing the a-pillar to b-pillar at times. Also some of the notches seamed to be off slightly for all of the tubes to fit together up front. To keep the notches tight at the b-pillar, I had to put heavy tacks at that joint and then use my hi-lift jack to spread the front part apart to get the cross bar in, but it is in and works. The other thing that I'm not a huge fan of is the height of the cage, it seems like it is very low up front, but that could be because I don't have a roof and that my seats may be a bit high. I will be building a sub-frame for the seats and lowering them at the same time so I have headroom.

I have the remaining tube to install then I am taking it to my cousins to do the final welding with a larger welder, then paint and wheeling at EC4RJ at the end of June.

[jtaco1]

Here are a couple more pictures of what I got done today, the dash bar and rear center bar. I am thinking about somehow tying the three rear bars together somehow, but haven't come up with it yet. I also need to install the two down bars from teh top of the cage to the dash bar.

[jtaco1]

Gussets done and the cage has the first coat of paint on it. Colin likes it too and has plenty of head room.

[jtaco1]

I guess I need to update this. Cage done, wheels great. Next up I might build a tube sub frame for the seats and throw a little tube at the rear. Here are some recent pictures.

[jtaco1]

Quick update on this build. I have been working on building a FJ60/62 front axle to go in intsead of a mini truck axle. I will be using IFS hub bodies to widen it out to about 61.5" to match the Tacoma rear axle. Here is the axle with redone spring perches and truss along with the RuffStuff diff cover I will be using.


And just in case I don't like the Toyota axles, here are another set that I will be working on

[jtaco1]

Alright, here are the pictures of the FJ60 axle pretty much complete, just need to install the Longfield HD Knuckle Wipers.


Here is the RuffStuff FJ40 diff cover that I welded on. Stupid beefy 3/8" plate

Here is the frenched in passenger side spring perch.

IFS hub bodies with Tacoma rotors. The V6 brake calipers will be mounted on the outside of the knuckle ears. ARP knuckles studs used on the hy steer arms.

And finally, here are the FJ80 drive flanges installed with ARP hub studs.

Going to be redoing my front seat mounts this weekend so that they sit lower and give better clearance to the roll cage.

[jtaco1]

When I originally built my cage, I was in a hurry since EC4RJ was a day or two away, so I made some compromises with the rear section of the cage and tied it into the stock bar. I never liked it so it is time to change it up. Thanks to Jordan for hooking me up with some 1.75" DOM, I am now ready to start. Last night I started with this.

Two hours later I ended the night with this.

Doesn't look like I did much, but I also have my cage foot plates installed and am ready to start the mockup.

Got the tubing bent up and finished up the frame mounting plates and started to set the tubes in place. Got the main structure tacked in as well. One issue I am running into is that my original cage is made from .120" wall tubing, but the tube I am using for the new section is .125" wall so I can't use the same inner tube sleeve that I normally use, which would be 1.5" DOM.

I have some 1.5" x .25" DOM left over from my steering linkage that I am going to have half turned down to fit in the 1.75" x .125" DOM that I am using. Once I get them turned down, I can fully weld everything out. I have about 7-8 more tubes to install, but this is how I left it at the end of the day yesterday.





I got some 1.5" x 0.25" tubing turned down to fit as a slug between the two sections of tubing and installed them with plug welds. Added a few more tubes, two of which took a decent amount of time to get just right. Also notched and re-bent the original tube in the middle to intersect with the new horizontal bar of the C-pillar. Three to five more tubes and it is done. Here are the pictures.





Where I placed my C-pillar on the inner fenders there was a bump that located the stock roll bar that made it a PITA to have a level area for a foot plate. Little bit of work with the plasma and some plating and I had a flat area to work with. I had Kris at After Midnight Fabrication locally cut me some nice foot plates. Got those bolted in and bent up the C-pillar and welded it out. Rolled it out of the shop to get a beter look at what I had - if the cage looks lopsided, don't worry it is not, I parked on a hill and suck at taking pictures




All that is left is to tie the rear portion of the cage into the frame, install a few gussets at the C-pillar like I have on the B-pillar, C-pillar and C-pillar to D-pillar braces, and a flip up storage/gear rack once some of the parts come in from RuffStuff.

The cage is all welded out and bolted in. Got the rear rack built and installed. I put it on poly bushings at the one end so that I can lift the tailgate side up to access underneath for tools and straps. The top has the HiLift and will be getting an Artec TrailCrate, CO2 Tank Mount, and cooler mount - all done, just not mounted yet.



Also started on cross-bracing the B-pillar. Three more tubes under the harnes bar and that is done too.

[jtaco1]

Worked on getting the roof section cut up for install, thank god I have a plasma cutter. The passenger side is being a pain, but I should be able to get it mostly lined up. It's not going to look like new when I am done, but it will work. Downside is the sunroof latch hits the center overhead tube big time and maybe the B-pillar, so I have to figure out what I am going to do with those. Probably could have gotten it welded up last night, but my plasma cutter decided it didn't want to play anymore Closest service place is an hour away - hopefully I didn't blow the board, which I don't think I did since everything else functions correctly, just the pilot arc does not start.

Anyway here are pictures so far.

[jtaco1]

Wow, haven't updated this in quite some time.

Finished the roof


Also redid the timing chain and associated parts, runs great now and has plenty of power, had it up to 60-65 on the local road and it did quite well for having 4.10 gears and heavy 37's.

Took it out a few times this summer with my daughter



In preparation of the SAS, I decided against going with the leaf spring setup I had and sold it off to start collecting parts to do a 3-link front setup. What caused this was winning 6 of these at a local event from Terra Flex, 3 left and 3 right with jam nuts.

DOM link and panhard material came in the other day as well.

Will be ordering my brackets from RuffStuff or Barnes 4wd in the next month or two. Plans are to keep the front suspension at a similar height to what it is now or just a touch more to have uptravel, but keep it nice and low. For the rear, I am goign to throw a few more leaves in the stock springs and mount the shocks vertically through the bed area.

Been busy in the shop doing a drivetrain and power steering swap on our 1971 FJ40 Land Cruiser

[jtaco1]

3 Link brackets showed up from RuffStuff.


Still need coil overs, limit straps, and bump stops.

The FJ40 swap has been taking up most of my time along with a new little guy added to teh family. Hoping the have the FJ40 wrapped up in the next month or two.