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I like bright colors

138K views 709 replies 74 participants last post by  Provience 
#1 · (Edited)
and shiny objects. :grinpimp:

EDIT: I would like to start off by saying "Thank You" to RuffStuff Specialties, WFO Concepts, Davez Offroad Performance, Trail Gear, Trail-Worthy Fabrication, Marlin Crawler and all you fine folks at Pirate4x4.com for the great service and support that I have recieved :bounce: :beer:

I have been collecting parts for my little red truck for several years, got into the Army this year and will be shipping off to BCT in September so the wife told me to get the damn truck done so I don't waste all summer wrenching :laughing:

I have been spending a little more money buying parts instead of making everything, but here is the plan so far.

1987 std cab/short bed 4wd
SAS with 83 front end
Knuckle Gussets/trunion eliminators
Ifs hubs w/Taco rotors
RUF with 2 83 front springs added and overload removed for 5 leaf pack total
63 chevy rears/frenched hangers
dual 2.28 cases
5.29 spool rear/lockright front
Longfield birfields and hub gears
CV rear/u-joint front driveshafts
H1 takeoffs and 8 bolt rims

Standard shit, figured I might as well have a thread too :flipoff2:

At the end of december '10 I put in a rebuilt, .020" over 22r

Engine Vehicle Auto part Car


I started around the second week in June this year. First things First, remove the bed

Land vehicle Vehicle Car Automotive exterior Pickup truck


Turns out that the rearmost exhaust hanger also makes a great spot to hold the grinder

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Got the rear springs done, time to turn the truck around to work on the front

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Here you can see how much higher the rear sits vs. the front using chevy's and stock IFS. Notice the angle of the cab vs. my pos 4runner in background, both trucks on 31" all terrain tires.
 
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#2 · (Edited)
Pictures of the rear hangers, I sleeved the frame with .120 wall 2x3 sq tube, mounted into the frame instead of below to try and keep the height down, I plan on cutting the bed as needed to clear tire issues. I also moved the rear axle back a few inches, easier to see when the bed is back on.

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Front rear hanger

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Some people's welds you see and think "damn, that guy should be a professional"

I am obviously not one of those people...yet :p

Never fear, your tax dollars will improve that, going in as 91E Welder/Machinist :grinpimp:


Here is a comparison photo, all welds were done with 6011 rod, the vertical welds along the right were then covered with some ac7018 rod. For the life of me, I could not get it to run right, the temp was either too high or too cold going, also the rod was not properly stored nor dried prior to use. After this experimental period on the rear end, I decided to just run the 6011 rod for the front/everywhere else.

Bumper Auto part Automotive exterior Vehicle Rim
 
#3 · (Edited)
Working on the front, Painted the carrier, I don't have any other pictures of the gear install's though. I had a couple spare diffs that I set-up previously so that I could just drop them in when doing all this work.


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Pulled out the transmission to get the doubler set-up. Had to grind the locking ring off of one of the nuts in order to get it to fit, also just purchased and used trail gears crossmember to save some time

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I like rocking the bench seat, so I cut a hole about 6" deep into it so that I can still get 4-hi and my wife (5'2") can still drive the truck in 2wd

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When you cut the bench, you also cut the front support that runs along it, I welded a 1-1/4" piece of angle iron to the floor and it supports the center now so that the seat doesn't sag too bad.



Yes I had some burn through, everything was welded with my little ac220 tombstone, and I used up all my sheet metal rod on a different project :shaking: Whatever, there are a few things that "Mostly Kinda Work Good Enough"
 
#4 ·
Here is the axle painted up and freshly rebuilt. I am using the TG trunion eliminators, PSA if you are working late: it is entirely possible to put the bearing races in upside down and a Pain in the Ass to remove. Please Pay attention :laughing:

Plastic Helicopter Balloon Toy Games


Longfield parts, pricey but I hear good things :smokin:

Pipe Titanium Metal


I cut down the ears on the IFS hubs with a grinder with everything apart, very easy to do, here is a side by side of circumcised vs. natural

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Taco Hub slips so nicely that I am tempted to see if I can make this work on an IFS truck

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I didn't take any pictures of the front axle install, but you all already know how that goes.

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#5 ·
Everybody knows that the most important part to paint is the brake calipers. Purple removes ~25' in stopping distance.

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Here is an overhead shot of the front brakes set-up. the spaceing for the caliper needed to be .120" on my set-up, I was able to find some washers off the IFS parts that measured .123-.125" so I used those and it worked well. Drilled through the ears and caliper for 9/16" and ran a bolt and nut combo. Cheaper than buying 2 drill bits and a tap.

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Moved the steering box forward, cut out the body and mount from the front. Plenty of slip in the steering shaft.

Auto part Vehicle Car Automobile repair shop Suspension




Painted a strip on my driveshafts for easy reassembly in case they decide to have issues and come apart.

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#6 ·
Pulled out the old half doors that I made back in high school, added some 6x9" speakers to them.

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Tossed back on my old busted ass smitty built front bumper and pulled it outside. Here is how it sits compared to the stock 4runner

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Here is a shot of the other side. The front sits much higher than the rear, this picture exaggerates that a bit.

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#7 ·
Still don't have shocks or bumpstops on it, so I ran out to praire city real quick to see how everything would work and to measure for stops.

Front end up on a rock, front droop

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Front end up on a rock, rear droop

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Rear end up on a rock, front droop

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Turns out my front springs go flat 4" away from the frame, so that is where I want to set my stop up, negative arching doesn't do anybody any good. I wasn't able to get the rear springs to go completely flat, but 4.5" from the original bump stop pad seemed to be close enough to work.
 
#8 · (Edited)
Now I am waiting on tires and wheels, should be here in about another week. This has taken me right at a month to get done, still have some things to do.

Need:

Lower the front, I don't mind that it isn't flat, but it could stand to come down an inch or two. Going to try pulling out 1 of the thicker '83 leaves and see where it ends up.


Alignment, I set it initially with tires off and off of the rotors, it's a little darty on the road :laughing:

Shocks mounted
Bumpstops Mounted
Fenders trimmed where needed
Bed bobbed, not sure if I am going to narrow it or not also
Sliders
rear bumper-after bed bob
 
#9 ·
Interesting side note, with 31" tires and 5.29 gears, the speedometer will read right at 10 mph over, verified by 2 seperate CHP sign boards. Also, in 5th gear the engine is very happy to not go over 55 actual mph :laughing:
 
#11 ·
What transmission do you have? I have a w56, and I can cruise at 75mph with 30's on it. I usually run my 37" PBR's, but decided to use a set of cheap Sequoia rims I bought to drive to Moab (with the PBR's on a friends trailer when I got there) and could easily cruise 70-75 as read by a GPS unit with 5.29 gears.
 
#12 ·
Electric-Mayhem:13081188 said:
What transmission do you have? I have a w56, and I can cruise at 75mph with 30's on it. I usually run my 37" PBR's, but decided to use a set of cheap Sequoia rims I bought to drive to Moab (with the PBR's on a friends trailer when I got there) and could easily cruise 70-75 as read by a GPS unit with 5.29 gears.
G52 tranny, i am sure that it would go that speed, but dayum you must have been pulling some high rpms.

i checked it out on one of the gearing calculators, the result was 3600 rpm at 65 mph. i am looking forward to getting the bigger tires, i wouldnt mind driving to/running the rubicon on the 31s, but i would like to get down to dusy eshrim and that involves a bunch of highway.
 
#13 ·
laskt9:13081125 said:
you paint stuff just like me. lots of :rainbow: colors! :laughing: looks good so far
there once was a time when i painted everything black. the half doors, the body and paint damage, etc. started to look goofy on the red truck :flipoff2:

then i put the hood on that was a different red, and holy, and figured all was lost :D
 
#16 ·
c_me_roll:13081356 said:
whats with the hole in the hood ? you might wanna try a longer shackle in the rear since you put it through the frame like that.. flex doesnt look that good for rears/chevys but good start
yeah i have thought about doing longer shackles on the rear, seems like the front is moving more than the rear, but that also could have bee the rock i was on. i took it through the little rock garden they had there and it felt real stable, seemed to do good.

definately going to take some playing with to get it right, tomorrow i think i am going to measure and find out how much higher the front is right now.

i have asl been thinking about cutting off the frame at the rear so that the rear shackle can swing up a bit more before hitting.


the hole in the hood? its a combo of cold air intake and improved radiator cooling and me having a spare hood :laughing: i need a way to find my toyota in the crowd right :flipoff2:
 
#19 ·
Savage100:13081450 said:
Haha hey man, it's Brian from brake class. I didn't notice it was your truck until i got to the axle picture and was like hey... i've seen that before. Looks good!
howdy, hope your truck is not acting up so much now, imma gonna have to get ahold of you soon to go wheelin!

figured between the hood and axle that she would be easy to spot, looks like it works :flipoff2: :laughing:
 
#21 ·
EricT:13082272 said:
Shooooooooooot you ever get to Ft.Campbell,hit me up. I'm on the 160th SOAR side of house so wont be working for me,but I know a few fellow 91E's on post and through out the green weeinie.
right on, yeah i still have your number. i wont be out of ft lee until the end of next april, so i will probably be getting ahold of you before/around then.
 
#23 ·
welp i musta done something wrong earlier on the calculator.

the speedo, at 40 on the speedo the chp sign showed 30 and at 50 on the speedo the chp sign showed 40. both in 5th gear. yes, it is going to vary, but 10 is close enough to have an idea of where to drive and not get pulled over :flipoff2:

regardless, 31 and 5.29 are not the ideal highway combo.
 
#25 ·
Little hint on your welding, your metal needs to be shiny clean before you start welding. Use a 80 grit flap wheel on all the surfaces that need to be welded, take it down to bare shiny metal, even new metal has a coating of mill scale on it, you want to remove it. Your welds will come out easier and will look better. Key to good welds is clean metal and practice, practice and more practice. Good to see some people still use stick welders.
 
#26 ·
i will have to try out the flap wheel on the next go 'round for prep. mostly i was just using wire wheels, grinding or flap wheels was only for fitup issues.

i enjoy stick welding, just need to get more gooder at it :flipoff2:
 
#27 ·
Alright, gave a try at leveling it out a touch.

Here is the frame height under the door stock before everything, 19" just for a reference

Auto part Rim Floor Wheel


Here is the frame height in front of the rear front hanger on the flat part of the frame

Pipe Floor Rust


Here is the frame height behind the rear front hanger, tried to keep measurments to the flat(est) part of the frame.

Automotive exterior Bumper


Did some bumper math, came up with 1" rise over 33" (distance between my 2 meauring points) to get a slope number, multiplied that by 109" for the new wheelbase and got 3.31" height difference front to rear.

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Pulled out the shorter of the 2 front '83 leaves and measured again

Bumper


Looked to be 1/4" lower than before
 
#28 ·
Did some more math and came up with (.75"/33")109 and got 2.5" height difference

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Rolled it back outside to try and get a photo similiar to one of the above, the 3/4" difference in height is definately noticable and the truck appears much more level, not sure if that translates over to the pictures :laughing:

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Measurement of the new wheelbase, factory was 102.9" (from FAQ) and now at ~109.25"

Tape measure



Adjusted the steering for a slight toe-in and centered the steering wheel, drives much better now.

The 4pack of leaves is significantly softer than the 5pack was. Once I get my bumpstops made up and in place, I should have right at 4" of uptravel still, so I will give them a whirl to see if they are too soft. If needed I can always add in the other leaf :p

Looks like I will be picking up some longer shackles for the rear. Currently at a 5" shackle, if I can get the front/rear to be within 2" of each other that would be just dandy.


If I had mounted them under the frame in the standard postion instead of through the frame, the mount would have been 3" lower so that is always an option if it bothers me too much.
 
#30 ·
Yeah going to a 7" shackle instead of the 5" in the rear will hopefully net me up an inch. Should be close enough to work.

Once I get the height mostly adjusted then I will be able to rotate my rear pinion so that will be nice to get done.
 
#32 · (Edited)
Thanks, hopefully I don't break it before the end of Summer :laughing:


Stopped by RuffStuff and picked up a set of BAMFS (Big-Ass-Mother-Fucking-Shackles) to see how much closer I could get it without moving the mounts.

Here is a shot of the 5" shackle

Muffler Metal


Here is the BAMFS installed (7"), the new angle doesn't piss me off or anything. If I decide to do this again and go a smiliar route, I would start off with the BAMFS and set the angle a touch better (attempt to anyway :p)

Metal


And another photo of it for reference with all the adjustments, it is definately acceptable level at this point.

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#33 ·
And here is the math...

Rear frame height

Pipe


Front height

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Bumper math, came up with ~1-1/4" total height difference from front to rear :smokin:

Pipe Auto part Bumper Automotive exterior Exhaust system
 
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