LFaub's 4x4 conversion/camper build

When are you doing the 4x4 conversion? What else do you still need? There’s someone on the 1st Gen Marketplace selling two sets of Manual Hub steering knuckles, and one set of ADD steering knuckles.

The hardest part for me to find, by far, was the front differential. I can’t trust junkyards after one sold me one saying it was 4.30 but it was actually 4.10. I actually had to count the teeth on the ring and pinion to confirm.

Also the front portion of the rear driveshaft. I could never find one in the correct length, I even bought the wrong driveshaft that was supposed to go on a Toyota pickup. You couldn’t tell by looking at it.

Do yourself a favor and bring your existing driveshaft to a driveline shop and just have them shorten it, and change the u joints while you’re there. $150 well spent.

I’m happy to answer any questions you have. I did the swap over two weeks in December after it took me six months to collect parts.

 

I still need the front half of the rear drive shaft, front diff, CVs, and I'm looking for manual hubs.

I have a guy in Phoenix who I've been buying parts from and he has an entire yard of IFS Toyota parts since he makes a living off of solid axle swapping them.

Currently he has all the parts I need, just a matter of saving up and buying them whenever I'm in town (hard doing this when I'm also going to college)

 

I have 4.10s and those are a lot easier to find so I'm not worried about that, so since I found the transmission and t-case the hardest part to find is going to be the manual hubs. I'll be losing my ABS by swapping those out but I planned on pulling the controller anyways to make room for an air compressor

 

You can always keep the ABS if you wanted, you just need to press the manual hubs out of the steering knuckles.

I did my swap over Christmas Break in my garage. I did this while I was in my second to last Semester of High School. I drove all over the PNW to collect parts the last couple weeks of Summer, and I waited until I had that two week period of time in December. Even then, I didn't finish on time.

 

Yeah I know I can. Just a lot of work considering I'll be getting rid of ABS anyways

 

You have a J-Shift t-case right?

 

Yeah I made a point to find a J-shift transfer case

 

Did you buy it mated to the transmission? I understand after 2000 Toyota started exclusively using 4WD on-the-fly instead of the J-Shift.

I ask because I always heard about the horror stories of people trying to mate the transfer case from a different truck onto the transmission and the transfer case ultimately not mating correctly, or mating and destroying something. Manual transmission t-cases have a straight shifter with no intermediate coupler, while automatics have a bent shifter and has an intermediate coupler.

 

I don't believe they exclusively used the push button shifters after 2000 but I could be wrong.

Either way this transmission that I have isn't the correct one as it has a mechanical throttle valve cable instead of electronic (they made that change in '03) so I'll need to do some part swapping between the two transmissions.

If your concern is the transfer case mounting up, the one I have is already mated to the transmission if that answers your question.

 

You’re right, I meant to say Toyota discontinued Manual Hubs in 2001. You’re saying that your transmission doesn’t have the electronic throttle system? ETCS-I

03/04 guys usually swap the output shaft from an A340F and use their existing transmission.

 

My new transmission does not have the electronic throttle system so I'll be swapping either the throttle solenoid or the output shaft (the former hasn't been done before but I'll be taking a look at that since just swapping the cable is a lot less invasive)

I figure I'll end up doing the tail housing and output shaft, though. Either way I'm confident in my skills as a mechanic to do it since I've taken apart my Camaro's turbo 300 transmission three too many times

 

Does anyone have a write-up on swapping the output shaft? Some transmissions are pretty easy but some you have to disassemble the whole rotating assembly to get to it, and I wanna know my game plan before I crack it open

 

I've seen one somewhere....can't remember where

 

Guess I'll have to do some snooping around, then

 

Sweet! Very helpful, thank you

 

New shocks are in


Assembled


And they're on!

 

Took them for a drive on a pretty washboard-y road to break them in and see how they do. Felt great and my rear doesn't hop all over the place like it used to!

 

Update on the conversion:



I figured I'd change the fluid in the transfer case because it's always kind of a crap shoot buying used like this. Lo and behold, the thing was filled with about a half pint of water plus a bit of residual gear oil.



Tried flushing it a couple times until it ran clear. No dice; it was rusted to hell and I kept getting more and more no matter how much cleaning fluid I was pouring through it.

The next day I let it soak with some low-weight motor oil to get everything loose and try to flush it a couple more times. Still no good.

So I just decided to open it up and take a look at the damage.



Ended the day with some pretty good progress. Wish I got a picture from after I cleaned the internals, but 4 cans of brake cleaner and countless blue shop towels did the trick and it was shining like a pearl when I was done! The rear bearing on the front output shaft was also so gritty it wouldn't even turn, so I'm very happy I cracked it open!

Anyways it's sitting in the shop with some RTV curing up overnight, and I'm gonna button it back up tomorrow after work

 

Little update: transfer case is all buttoned up and ready to go. Snapped a bolt so I had to look around town for a replacement and now she's all ready to go into the truck. Just gotta see if I can't borrow a transmission jack from someone named @erice