LJ70 Build Thread!

[Ben]

Frankenzuke back from the paint shop & MSA fridge slide install.

So Monday morning we went and picked Frankenzuke up from the paint shop.







It wont fit on the trailer with the 37" Treps on so had to have the 34"s on.



First job was to re-fit the roof rack.



The next job was fitting the snorkel that Safari kindly donated.





Flares next.



The widest we could get.









Got the 37" Treps down ready to go back on.





Front next.



The high tensile sprung wire that we've got for flares would help make them curvier.







Had to add some metal behind the back ones to fill in the gap.



The front ones were left long until I've finished designing and building the front bar.





Parked up next to my bosses old comp truck, which looks tiny in comparison, but is actually quite high compared to a standard one.



Today I did a bit more on the flares.











Started to look at the front bar that I need to design and build and we discovered that the outside of a Jimny's chassi rails is almost identical to the inside width of a Vitara's, meaning we could modify a Vitara one to fit.







The Hi-Lux Trail Gear bits I imported from the US for LJ and then discovered they wouldnt fit were sold to my boss and have now been fitted on the front of Frankenzuke.



I still love the duel cab 70's! We had another one in this week.





OK..................

Back to LJ!

I needed to bolt everything in place including the new MSA drop down fridge slide, But any bolts/nuts sticking through would interfere with my waffle board storage.



The solution.................

Bolts exactly the right length so as not to protrude through the ply, and some nuts to hammer into the underside of the ply.



I wanted some more Toyota bolt on tie down points like this as I could only find 2.



But the wreckers yard only had 1 from a 70 series, they had a few 80 series ones but I didnt like the look of them so I asked to look at the Patrol ones and left with 4 of those instead.



Not too bad once removed from the plastic surrounds.



The first job was to bolt the handle onto the fridge slide.





In position.





I wasnt impressed with the quality of the product as the paint was chipped, missing and scratched in places.







One of the lines of mounting holes fell above the 2" x 2" so I would be able to use some big wood screws along that line.



Got the fridge in place to check I'd allowed enough room.







Happy with the position I slid it forwards a bit so I could get a screw in one of the very back mounting holes to hold it down while I drilled through all the other mounting holes, through the ply below.







I also needed to drill down for the tie down points.



Positioned them where I thought best.





With all the holes drilled I could unscrew the angle alluminium trims.

I could then remove the rubber mat.



Followed by the ply.



Holes drilled to correct sizes and I was ready to hammer in the nuts.







One done.



And the other.



Screwed the ply back down.



2 sizes of bolts. Smaller M6 stainless ones for the fridge slide and bigger zinc coated M8 ones for the tie down points. (They didnt have any stainless M8's left)



Could fit the fridge slide next.



Wood screws down one edge.



Stainless bolts everywhere else.



Tie down points next.







I got some straps from work which are normally used with the fridge slides we make and sell.



The idea was to use them to help secure the water cans.









Decided I dont like that idea as its too awkward and fiddly to do with them in place in the back of the truck. So I'm now thinking I should go back to the original idea of making one out of aluminum and then come up with a more sophisticated latch mechanism.

Anyway back to the fridge slide.

Now what the instructions said next is wrong as it would make the next step very difficult! But I followed them as I didn't realize at the time.



Un-screwed the feet on my fridge.



Positioned them on the fridge slide.



Lifted the fridge back into place on top of the feet and used the longer bolts in the kit to screw through the fridge slide, feet and back into the fridge.





The next step would prove to be a hell of a lot easier had the fridge not been bolted in place.

Bolting the side bits on that the handle locks into.



As the fridge was in position on the slide it wasnt possible to hold the brackets in place and do the bolts up. So I had to guess where they needed to be, drop the fridge down, do the bolts up, lift the fridge back up and check, no still not right, drop the fridge back down and adjust them and so on.

The thing that I've spotted which has pissed me off the most is the fact theres 2 bolts sticking out which scrape there way down the side of the transit bag every time you lower/lift the fridge. Its only a matter of time till these wear through and ruin the bag.

I will have to get some countersunk headed bolts and remove the existing bolts, drill the metal with a countersink bit and then fit the new bolts, but frankly I shouldnt have to for the cost of the dam thing!









It said in the instructions that it will work best with some weight in the fridge.





Next I needed to bolt on the tie down points at the front of the fridge.







Rear straps on.



The instructions advice you to keep the fridge slide locker when driving and they give you keys on a little key strap.



I've tucked the keys in front fo the fridge where they will probably rattle and annoy the hell out of me.



The instructions are very vagueabout how to run the wires for the fridge power. They mention cable tieing it to the runners of the fridge slide, and had they added a few strateigly placed holes then this would have been fine, but they havent.

I found its impossible to run the wires neatly, and so they have enough slack for when it slides out and drops down.









OK so as you can probably tell I'm not overly impressed with the MSA fridge slide!

-The paint finish is poor!

-The instructions are crap.

-Certain aspects of the design are terrible, particularly the bolts that destroy transit bags. The operation of it how it drops down and picks up isnt as smooth and easy as I'd hoped for.

-The power cable issue clearly wasnt thought through at the design/development stage.

But what has pissed me off the most was I thought I was buying a quality Australian made product, keeping Australians in work, supporting my economy, buying from Michelle Sacks Australia (MSA) so what do I find when I open the box................

Made in China!





OK Rant over!

After my last spare wheel bag got destroyed on my last trip, the company kindly replaced it for me free of charge.

(Note to self dont put 10 liters of used engine oil in this one! )





Tha standard temp gauge stopped working when I was out the other day and I thought maybe the connector had come off the sender on the engine.

Out with the factory service manual to find where abouts on the engine it is.



Found it and discovered that the single wire going to the connector on the sensor had snapped off.





Fortunatly I still had the wiring loom from under the bonnet of the 4-Runner which I got the engine from.



And I soon found the correct connector for the temp sender.



I cut it off the loom allowng myself plenty of wire to connect it to my loom. I then twisted the wires together to make a solid connection, and then soldered them together.


Soldered and ready for me to slide the heat shrink along and heat.



I ran the engine for a while and the standard gauge started to move as it should, so all fixed.

Next job.....................

For a long time the fire extinguisher has been rattling around in the passenger foot well, so I decided to do something about that.











I fitted the Engel power socket to the back of the water can holder for now.



And connected it up under the bonnet and then checked the fridge was working OK.



So LJ is virtually ready for this weekends 3 day Hight Country trip, just need to sort the camping gear out.

 

[Jon Wildsmith]

Interesting to read your thoughts on your fridge slide Ben. The main reason I didn't buy another one of those fridge slides is the weight of them.

 

[Ben]

Yeah the weight is huge but thats been some what over shadowed by the other issues.

I don't regret buying it but I am disappointed with it.

 

[Chris]

Great stuff there Ben. Glad you were inspired. I'd like a drop slide too actually and if I can work them out I shall make one as prices are too daft to laugh at.

Incidentally, on the flexi Zook arches when I did mone and was looking for some wire to stiffen them, I found that MIG welder liner worked fantastically well. It's spiral wound, super flexi and springy too. Bounced back every time. Dirt cheap too. I didn't have any old ones around.

 

[Ben]

Thanks Chris.

Thankfully cost price was a good few hundred dollars cheaper than the retail price, but still expensive for what it is.

Looking at Chris (FNB's) thread I like how hes got his fridge on a normal slide on the floor of his 80, and has 2 drawers one on top of the other to the side with a false floor above the lot. Doing it that way means you still get 2 drawers, but the fridge is kept low so you don't need a drop down slide.

Nice idea with the flares too, thanks.

 

[Chris]

The only drawback to that set up Ben is that when you are cooking (more than a Pot Noodle) and you want to be in and out of the fridge, you have to have half of the rear tailgate clear so that you can open the slider. I have the cooker on there, plates, utensils, beer, a beer, some beer, more beer, well you get the idea. Whereas on top of the drawers the slide goes over the top of your beer, more beer, a beer, well you see the point.

 

[TonyS]

Underneath Chris's fridge is a large pull out table, room enough for the whole kitchen, larder and beer!

 

[Jon Wildsmith]

I think fridge on the floor works well for a dedicated tourer where it's always fitted but if you have full width drawers on the bottom instead you still have a good storage space when the fridge isn't fitted. I'm thinking rocker drop slide when I get round to it instead of a full lever drop like the MSA and trying to keep the weight down.

 

[Olazz]

Ben thats a shame about the MSA slide, don't know why you bought one of those. They have clearly changed the design of the slide from its original and its now obviously not made in Australia.

Funnily enough Black Widow have brought out their version of a drop slide. Made in Aus etc etc... If it's anything like their drawers systems and other kit I have, it will be first class !

Hope you take it up with MSA.

 

[hairyguy4]

Agree.

No I havent but I will!

Michael's 80 should have been back from being serviced today, and I could have compared, but when they drained the front diff oil they found a tooth! So now its going to be away for a few more days as its got to obviously have a new ring and pinion.

You say youve 3 linked your rear but arnt they 3 link as standard? 2 x trailing arms and a panhard rod?



I will get some pics when I lift it up with the forklift at work, it really doesn't flex well and the bushes bind up quite quickly/badly.

80's flex beautifully!

Not that I'm envious or anything!

I think the 80's axles are about 8" wider than ours so this forces a lot more flex out of the front radius arms, should have said 3 link + panhard on mine, essentially this set up



that's a bit of an arse with the fridge slide, why do companies always try to bleed as much profit out of items by getting them made in china

 

[Ben]

Thanks guys.

If I could have seen/felt the MSA fridge slide in the flesh then I wouldn't have bought one, but no where locally had any on display. Even ARB who recommended it as they don't do a drop down slide, didn't have one on display.

I will try and find some where/some one, with the black widow drop down slide so I can see it in the flesh.

I can always sell the MSA one and I shouldn't loose any money on it.

LJ is just a weekend toy and not a tourer but I need to be able to comfortably live out of it for the trips I go on which are usually 2-3 days away camping. Obviously I'm doing the big Simpson trip in September and I also want to get down to Tassie in it and up to the Kimberlys and the Cape, so I need to try and make it also comfortable for bigger trips.

Its all a learning curve and hearing different ideas and seeing different setups is great! At some point I will have an 80/dual cab 70/76 wagon and that will be setup purely for touring, so all these ideas will come in useful when the time comes to build that.

Ideally I will have LJ for hard trips and the other cruiser for the bigger trips where the extra space and comfort will be much appreciated.

The other day when I took LJ to Toolangi was the first time I've driven it for 10 weeks.

Id forgotten how much I love driving her! I drive the Astra and I feel nothing! Its just a car to get me from A to B. But LJ puts a smile on my face every time I jump in.

So I'm going to drive her to and from work for the rest of the week!

OK its only a 3 minute drive but thats 3 minutes of smiles!

 

[Gav Peter]

My sentiment zigackly dude; driving Muxley or Oiley turns a mundane drive into an event every time

Bummer on the slide; I have JW's old one & it takes up so much space I wonder if I want to build it into Muxley...

Hey ho, keep it coming dude

Sent from my SM-T310 using Tapatalk

 

[Paddler Ed]

I'm looking at building a fridge slide for our esky; at the moment it sits on the floor of the 4Runner, and angled so that it can be opened by just dropping the window, and reaching in for beer or food. The problem we encounter is that when we get set up and Delz is trying to get into it once the tail gate is dropped is a bit difficult! If I could slide it out to the end of the tailgate then it would be great for her. I can't lift it more than a couple of cm's (especially if I fit the 2" lift King Springs I've been offered for $60) off the floor because the lid won't open inside the car, nor will she reach in!


The fact that so much product that is thought to be made in Australia isn't is a shame; what is pretty impressive though is that there is still pride in buying something made by the Australians (especially when you see the little 'roo symbol on everything)

 

[Ben]

Yeah I love the pride the Aussies have Ed. You see lots of adverts/labels on products saying proudly made in Australia. And people being encouraged to keep Aussies employed and to buy Australian.

When was the last time you saw something with made in Great Britain on it? All made in China now.

I love the fact we get Monday off work as its a public holiday to celebrate Australia day!

Means I get an extra day of 4wding in the beautiful Victorian High Country!

OK update time...........................

This morning I carried on with building the front bar for the Jimny.



Cut some pieces of box section to use as crush tubes inside the chassis rails.







Welded them in.



Cut and drilled some end plates.



Welded some nuts on one side.



Welded them onto the ends of the chassis.





Cut a piece of angle and jacked it up into place using the trolley jack and piece of wood.





Marked, drilled and bolted on.





Cut some triangles out of 6mm.







Tacked them in place.





Other side.



Drilled through the holes in the chassis.



Cut some more 6mm plates.



Clamped them in place with a piece of 2mm stainless behind to space them out from the chassis slightly to give some clearance when fitting/removing the bar.



Tacked in place.



Other side.





Drilled through the 2 holes through the new plate.









Got it on the bench to fully weld it.





Decided to fill in the gap with lattice work to match the sliders.









I think it will look better/stand out more once weve painted the bar black and put some perforated stainless steel sheet behind the lattice.





Started to look at modifying the sides of the Vitara bar to make it wide enough for the Jimny.







Last night I removed all of the pieces of pipe work for the vacuum system on LJ which works the 4wd system and the brakes.



Since fitting the 1KZ-T engine it had never looked neat because it wasnt designed for this engine/radiator.

I ran a meter of new vacuum hose in + all these bits.



And got it looking a lot neater. The other thing is if any of these hoses had split on me on a 4wd trip I would loose drive to the front axle, so it was worth doing for reliability.





This evening weve been to look at an 80 series that Michael found on facebook.

1995, auto, petrol. OME suspension, bullbar, snorkel, and worn out mud tyres. $3000!

We went up in LJ as we thought we may have to jump start it as its been sat for 6 months.





We checked everything! Removed filler plugs on diffs to inspect oil which looked good. Transmission oil looked and smelt good, engine oil OK, no oil leaks anywhere, swivel hubs looked good, etc.

Only slight issue was the rad took 4 liters of water as it was practically empty. But it started up ok and sounded good and wasnt smokey.



So were going back tomorrow to pick it up.

This is going to be Michaels toy and will replace the Vitara. His white 80 series owes him far too much money to use hard off road, and every time he does he ends up paying a fortune to get it all looking nice again.

So the white one will have the body work repaired and will be for touring, like his Kimberlys trip hes doing in a few months, and this new one will be set up for the hardcore weekend trips.

Hes already got the longfield CV's and shafts to go on it, and the 37" Treps.

All we really need to do apart from clean it is make a new comp style front bar and rock sliders, and cut the hell out of the guards to make the tyres fit oh and fit lockers.

Having lived in Australia for the last 19 years its avoided salt covered roads and so is nice and rust free, its also got the twin fuel tanks that all the 80's over here got.

LJ drove there and back faultlessly and didnt overheat at all despite me driving hard and getting 130kmh at one point.

If anything shes running a bit cool, so I may put the thermostat back in.

 

[grantw]

Awesome news re the over heating Ben! I bet that one is a load off the mind.

 

[Chris]

Ben if you ever reach the point that you aren't enjoying thise anymore, drop me a line and I'll be on the first Quantas out of Heathrow and come and stand in for you for a bit.

I know it's not always beer and skittles, but doing what we do for a hobby - for a living? In a proper workshop, with proper tools and it's sunny? Don't you ever dare complain!!!!

 

[Doodle]

It's a double edged sword IME, with a risk of ruining it for you.

Doing what was a hobby as a professional job meant that when things at work didn't go well, it impacted on my own time for it. Spending all week dealing with unreasonable customers, abused kit etc etc etc made me resentful and in the end I just didn't want to be anywhere near it. If your management are good and your customers aren't idiots then it's not so bad.

10 years later I'm starting to think about picking it up again, but still have my reservations.

 

[Maverick]

Ben, I love the the material that you have used for the arches/flares on FrankenSuki - where can i source some from, and how did you fix them to the inner/arches/body work please?

 

[Chris]

Dood, it wasn't actually meant as a serious comment you know.

I shoot as a hobby, but thought of doing it as a job, turning out in all weathers dealing with idiots - nah. Grass is always greener. I'm not that naive.

But I find increasingly that there is less and less time left for me after the working day is done. Not having a job at all is the real key then it's hobbies and Hobnobs all day long. Close on the Lotto last week. Only 6 numbers out from a winner!

 

[Doodle]

Lol, I know

Tried the no job thing too. After a while my brain started to do very funny things. Nearly bought a Land Rover. Had to go back to work for my own sanity (well...sanity-ish)

6 numbers would do nicely though. You can't possibly get bored working out how to spend it.