Vel's "Slow" 1976 FJ40 "restomod"

Well figured I'd make a build thread here. I have one on another site but figured there might be some interest here.

I call this my slow build since I am pretty much trying to do it just on overtime money. So between other hobbies and this money isnt always there.

And if you dont know a resto mod is basically restoring to a OEM condition but upgrading certain things for safety (like disc brakes, a dual cylinder master cylinder, LED lights, ect)

Anyways I've actually had this since June of 2016. I saw a guy post it as a non-running FJ40 about 2 hours from me for a price I was more than happy with. I drove down the day after he posted it and bought it. Supposedly it had been sitting for the last 5+ years What I bought was a

-1976 FJ40
-Swapped in a SBC 283
-TH350 automatic transmission
-Everything else was pretty much stock.

She looks rough but didnt seem to be in terrible shape....


(i have the rear doors they just werent installed




Well after getting her home and starting the tear down things werent as promising. The positives were a bit of carb cleaner and she started up even with ~5 year old gas. The bad....she had ZERO brakes. Brake lines had rusted through in multiple places. Then even trying to move her with under her own powered was a bit sketchy. The transmission and t-case just felt funky and not like they were engaging. But i got her moved (slowly) under here own power and into her garage. Upon which the disassembly things went downhill a bit. The tub ended up being in way worse shape than i though. Bondo and fiberglass cloth all over and when peeled away left this.....



Plus a ton more elsewhere. Well luckily I found a nice guy selling a "good shape" tub in Sacramento. I bought it and had it shipped up to me. Not much rust and what is there is pretty simple to fix.



With the body off I got to work on the frame and axles.


The frame had a ton of extra brackets and old exhaust hangers still on it. So lots of grinding, welding holes, and general metal work to get it back into the shape i wanted.

One thing i hated was a shackle reversal.

Then came the front shocks. I decided to go with Ford F250/350 shock. So i cut and straightened them out. I mocked them up with the FJ60 power steering pump. Ill have to modify the fender a bit to make everything fit but it should be just fine! Plus Ill be able to fit a 33" tire and have 14" shocks.



I also fully rebuilt the front and rear axles. New seals, gaskets, bearings, brake pads, brake wheel cylinders, brake calipers, new rotors well everything but the axle housing lol.



Bit out of order but sort of between rebuilding things the frame has been getting work done to it. So this post and the pictures are slightly out of order.

That also almost catches us up! The last thing is i wanted a manual transmission. A FJ40 NEEDS a manual IMO. So i kept an eye on craigslist for a few weeks and a stock FJ40 4 speed transmission popped up for a price i would pay! And it ended up being in great shape! The PO said he rebuilt it in 2002 and drove it MAYBE 10k miles then it sat. I have no reason to no believe him! I opened it up and it looks in great shape!




Well that is where i stand now! Lots of work to go but slowly moving along.

If theres interest Ill keep updating the thread. If not...itll be slow updates

 

Subd

 

Interested in watching the progress

 

it'll be slow progress I would like to have it done by summer but that depends on money. overtime gives me the money but takes away the time to do anything lol.

 

Subd. Love me some FJ40.

 

So the last couple weeks I spent tearing the toyota 4 speed transmission and transfer case apart. Not a full build but I knew the transfer case had been leaking. So a general inspection, clean up, and then replaced all the seals and gaskets. Got it mostly put back together. Also got the parking brake assembly all rebuilt. New pads and hardware.

One fun part was having to make a spacer for the transmission output shaft. I dont know if i straight up lost it or if the TH350 adapter didnt need it. But picked up some DOM tubing and cut it to the size i need. Only crappy part is the shaft has a OD of ~1.260-1.270". The DOM i got had a ID of ~1.250". Nothing a couple minutes with a die grinder couldnt fix.

Also used the wrong spacer on the output shaft (the small one currently there was actually for the parking brake shaft) but luckily caught it before the nut torqued down

Almost done and ready to put these in storage till i need them. Waiting on a hose, the right oil (its a GL4 90 weight which is hard to find these days), and a few pieces the PO discarded on the transfer case linkage (werent needed with the TH350).



Just some other funky things the PO did. The entire exhaust system was welded together. No way remove it without cutting. The hangers were welded, all the piping, and the headers to the piping were welded. So i took the saw-z-all to it since i didnt really care for it anyways (both the routing and the sound of it)

The other thing the PO did that i found to actually be a bit dangerous (at the time i got the 40) was to use wheel spacers. The PO used a different toyota wheel (lexus maybe?) that didnt fit int he front and rubbed the steering arms. Im sure it was fine ~30 years ago when they did that but by the time i got it....not so much....



The PO actually ran TWO spacers on each side in the front. Both being ~3/8" thick. The white one....yeah it was metal at one point but when i took a wire wheel to it chunks were flinging off. Basically disintegrating around the edges. The other one wasnt TOO bad. It was solid but had some serious pitting in it when i cleaned it up. The other scary part (again IMO) was the PO left the OEM wheel studs for this. Which only let the lug nuts has 3-4 threads of engagement.


Thats it for now!

 

Been awhile. Sadly nothing all that great has happened as of now. Busy with life and work...and need money lol. Also had some other projects to get done around the house.

But ive got the SBC 283 torn apart and am in the process of repainting it. It was a blue motor to start its life and then painted orange over that so it was looking a bit rough. The chrome valve covers and air filter were also starting to rust. So going ot teat ir mostly all the way apart and replace all the gaskets other than head gaskets and oilpan. Hopefully will have it all done and put back together in the next two weeks or so.

Also discovered i didnt press in one of the wheel studs all the way on the rear axle. How did i find out? The streak of gear oil running from it down the garage floor. (the wheel studs create a seal with the backing plate and gasket) So a do'h moment there but be easy to fix at least.

And thats it for now.

 

Subba dub dubbed, I grew up in FJ40s. I would love to rebuild one.

 

I'm interested to see where this goes. Looks fun but frustrating!

 

Its not that frustrating. Well the work isnt. Only the stuff the previous owner hid is frustrating! But i love working on stuff so its fun to tear it all apart.

Now if it was more modern with a complex electrical system then it would be frustrating! I hate electrical

 

Engine teardown, cleanup, and repainting is going along pretty smoothly. Everything but the block is painted pretty much at this point. New exhaust manifold order (ram style) so its just a matter of finishing things up and putting it back together.

I got the timing cover, water pump neck, and the intake manifold cleaned up and painted. I tried POR Engine paint (in chevy orange obviously). I both like it and dislike it. I applied regular POR15 to parts for the primer basically (per directions of the engine paint). The engine paint is alot different then the regular por. Its thicker. The good thing is it smoothes out as it dries. But any excess and the brushes get "gummy" and dont spread out so care has to be take to not leave excess. I also just used a new brush for every coat. Overall I am happy with it. Takes long than spray painting it but is nice since you dont have to cover everything in tape prior to painting.

Its definitely not show quality paint job but i wasnt going for that anyways. More of a "looks good at 5 feet" type painting for the engine

 

Got a bit more done. Started putting the engine back together and painting her.

Only the first coat of the "chevy orange" so will look better after another couple coats.


Then had an opps. Was going to take the water pump apart to make painting it easier. Wellll i dropped it. Id be considering just replacing it anyways while it was off and guess that made up my mind lol.


Hopefully have it all painted and most of it put back together by next weekend. Then to build a dolly for the body and possibly start working a bit on that

 

Well a new puppy and working at 4am slowed things down a bit (as did needing money) but i finally got some work done!

The engine is like 75% done. I want to rebuild the carb (be a first), need to install the distributor, and replace some fasteners. O and new spark plugs. You always hear how its not the big stuff that kills projects but rather all the little stuff. I can see that now Tons of small stuff that indivdually only takes 5-10 minutes but all added up is hours and hours of stuff.

But got the dolly built for the body. Its nothing fancy and is actually version 2.0 (version 1 had 2x4 legs which were a bit...sketchy to say the least). Itll work just fine for most of what i want to do. The frame is also wide enough (hence why its bigger than the body) to fit over the frame to save room in the garage.


Once it was in the garage i wanted to look at see how bad some of the known rust spots were. I didnt check them all but checked the main ones (rockers, quarters, gas tank area, and bed). Also gave me a chance to check out some Benchmark 4.5" paint removal discs i picked up. It took one pretty much to do what I did. So not really an option to do the whole body but i planned to have it blasted anyways. They are nice as they are not that aggressive and dont heat up the metal very much at all. They remove paint great but bondo or rust is slower and definitely eats up the disc faster.



The bed is a bit questionable. Lots of pitting, some random holes Ill have to plug weld, and its not all flat. I only say questionable since ill have to decide if i fix it and live with it (its not THAT bad really), replace it with a new piece, or see if the bed on the original body could be used (or patch the bad spots with)



Hopefully more will get done now that Im back to normal work hours. The frame is pretty dang close to being done for now so hope to finish it up. Same i need to remove a rounded fill plug in the transfer case.

 

Enjoy watching rebuilds for these, seeing them come back to life. I'll be popping popcorn....

 

Not a real update other than a "life" update more than anything. Preface...im 3- 9.2% beers on an empty stomach into things

First off....this guy has been taking up some of my time and will be taking up money. I want to build a fenced in backyard which in turn means fixing a shitty drainage ditch which means $$ for it all. But the face just screams worth it. And he is. Even with the coming home to pee on the floor and sometime poop too. (never yell at him...10-14 hours of no bathroom and id do the same)


But i found a leak in my recently "rebuilt" rear axle. I messed up. 100% on me and didnt get a wheel stud in all the way which forms a seal for the gear oil. I tried tightening the stud but the leak path has been established. So i ordered a new seal. Also i decided to do things right. The pinon seal leaks when facing down (ie not on the vehicle). Id organically thought f it why fix a problem that when driving isnt a problem? Well wise me said "your a moron" so when i ordered the new gasket and a new backing plate i ordered a new pinon seal, deflector, nut, and well everything to fix it. Bummer to redo it but better to do things when its easy vs on the vehicle.

Speaking of which I pulled the grinder out again to find the spot welds on the rear sill. After about 2 seconds i realized just how....bad the benchmark paint removal grinder discs are. Not bad in a "doesnt remove paint" way. But rather holy crap they make a fine dust. I have a respirator and stopped. Wont be using them without the respirator on again.


Sadly Im in the actually do real work phase of work so time to work on this might be a bit limited. But I hope to do little by little.

 

This looks promising, sub'd

 

Thanks! Should be some actual updates coming in the next couple weeks. once I get the frame blasted and painted

 

Love these old FJs. I'd kill for one to swap a small block chevy into and make it a daily driver

 

Project took the back seat a lot longer than I wanted. But i got to the point I decided it was time to put other projects on hold to get things done on the FJ40. Theres quite a bit of stuff i need to do outside and a bunch of the projects i have left are indoor projects it makes sense to switch gears a bit.

So i picked up a 110lb HF sand blaster. Pulled the frame out of the garage. Then set up a blasting area in front of the garage. The hopeful plan is to be able to recover some of the media, filter it, and reuse it once or twice. I did a test but it was really enough of a test to get the blaster dialed in. It shoots media all over the place and didnt want to get to dirty so stopped pretty quick.

With t he next few days being close to 100 degrees....it might be a bit longer before I actually do the blasting though.