Nighthawks Garage - 08' Taco/ 86' Runner

The 1990 Toyota pickup in the above post is up for sale. Will post a Craigslist link soon. If anyone is interested PM me, price is $1500 OBO. I've decided to get a first gen 4 runner to restore.

***EDIT: SOLD (9/29)***

 

Picked up an 86' 4Runner this weekend. Anyone else think this is the best body style Toyota ever made?

 

My 4runner has the "blower's full of shit" mod. Pretty cheap and easy mod, all you have to do is neglect it for years.




Random shit alert: Saw this in my hood

 

Picture dump





My brothers 94



EV turned up way too f***ing high



Merica



Idiot drives truck up bank to nowhere




Result: Doors wont close.

 

Update on the 4Runner:



Got the FSM from a magical link on the computer a few weeks back, 1500 pages, worth its weight in gold.



After trying to use a 2 ft breaker bar and applying what I can only assume was well over 200 ft-lbs of torque, I ended up having to use the starter bump trick to get the crank bolt out. Took 2 seconds, could have saved a lot of time if I went this route from the start.



Card board cut out of the timing chain cover with bolt locations, this is absolutely necessary to organize these bolts as they all vary in length.



A little background on what you are looking at. I bought this 4 runner knowing it had a broken timing chain. This was of course before I knew that the 22RE was an interference engine. Meaning if the crank gets out of sync with the cam shaft, the pistons can collide with the valves and pretty much ruin your day. After seeing that EVERY tooth on the crank shaft timing chain sprocket was had been sheared off, I was pretty certain it was gonna be time to pull the head. However I ran a compression test by manually turning the crank and ended up getting 30 psi out of each cylinder. I also ran a borescope down each spark plug hole to inspect the face of the pistons. To my surprise not a single piston had dings on the face. I can only assume that the cam shaft stopped in a location where the valves were all retracted enough not to collide with the pistons.



The most difficult part of this job so far has been trying to get this damn oil pan off. Its gotta come out so I can recover the ancient remains of the timing chain sprocket teeth. I know it would have been easier had I just bought a cherry picker and pulled the engine up a bit, but I decided I could drop the diff and get enough clearance to get it out. Wrong. The half axles hit my LCA's before the diff is low enough. If anyone has any great tips on this your input would be appreciated. The only thing I can think of at this point is popping out some of the ball joints on my steering assembly and trying to get all that shit out of the way. FML.

EDIT: For anyone else who performs this in the future and pulls the oil pan. The best way to get the oil pan off is to:

1) Jack up the front and get it on jack stands, this will allow the LCA's to drop lower which lets your half axles drop down lower.

2) Unbolt the front drive shaft from the front differential, do this BEFORE you unbolt the front differential from its 3 mounting points. Zip tie the shaft to something to keep it out of your way.

3) Support the front differential with a floor jack. Remove the three bolts holding the front differential in place. Slowly lower the jack until the oil pan will clear. Pull the oil pan out BACKWARDS towards the transmission.

I hope this saves someone some trouble in the future.

 

A few pics along the way as I started bolting on the new stuff and putting everything back together.

New sprockets, chain, chain tensioner, and guides.




Timing cover on, use RTV where the cover meets the head, DO IT. Some people claim they have to put the cover in the freezer a few hours prior to installation in order for it to fit. This was not my experience, it fit perfectly at room temp. Keep that option in mind if yours puts up any fight. You really don't want to have to fight it at all because you could damage the exposed part of the head gasket and this will just make it more likely to leak from that stubborn area.





Water pump and oil pump installed. Don't forget to pour a little oil in the oil pump so it will prime.





I am still wondering what this spring is. It was in the handful of hardware that the previous owner gave me with the distributor. It looks like a mangled piece of garbage. Everything went back together fine without it so it couldn't have been too important I guess.





First time I drove it I found out that the power steering doesn't work. Flushed the system out, I'm pretty sure this ATF (probably not only ATF), is from 1986. The pump is toast anyway so I installed a new one.





Got bored and decided to reupholster the rear seats. Used some vinyl backed polyester because I want these things to be more durable. They should also be waterproof which will be nice if it happens to catch some rain and the top is off.





I think they turned out pretty good for $25. Cant decide if I want to do the front ones the same way or just get some new seats, they are pretty tired.

 

Lil Blue

 

Couple shots of the Yotas playing in the snow over Christmas.

 

Finally got the correct replacement heater core for the 4runner. Ordered cores from both NAPA and Oreillys and they both had the wrong one listed for the 1986 Toyota 4runner. I ended up having to order the heater core listed under "1989 Toyota Pickup" on Rock Auto, which also had the wrong core listed for the 1st gen runner. This one did end up working thankfully. This is a bigger job than it initially seems like so if anyone needs any tips hit me up. Make sure and pull your evap core out while you are in the dash and either blow it out or remove it if your AC is shot. Mine was so full of garbage that it was severely limiting airflow to the vents. Blows like a 5th street hooker now.







Also picked up an old grill with the copper logo from a local here in Casper who has a few parts 4Runners.

 

Got the front bumper for the 4Runner, should be painted this weekend and on early next week.




Also got the rear window working last week. By-passed all of the built in "safeties" by doing a bit of soldering on the relay.