2016.. finally

So, things are finally rolling in 2016.

Here are some pics of the work done at Red Line...

Test fitting the body...

Note the exposed front frame rails like a 40

Nice custom bumper, 40 themed round taillights:

Full roll cage in cabin dash area, note transmission without doghouse installed:

Another view of the front

Left side rollcage, front door is same dimensions as a 40 so 3rd party (net/tub doors) should fit:

Front and Ream bumper prep: 

Gas tank- plate steel for the win.

Ah, a nice clean engine!

To be installed:

• new springs
• new shocks
• other new suspension bits front and rear

pics when ready!

Visting the Mothership

So, I spent a good day with Justin and Jay from Redline Land Cuisers today.  Note a bad view from his front door, Pike's Peak in the distance:

We were working out the details on some options decisions.  Before I get to that stuff in another post, here are some pics of Truck #1.

Armored Gas Tank, in the rearward former spare tire location on a stock 80:

Justin added a dash-box, just below the winshield and above the glove box door and gauge cluster.  A vendor who makes these for 40's was given the wider UTE dimensions and made it for Redline.  Looks nice, flip up locking lid.  I think I'll opt for it since the glove box is no longer functional thanks to the upgraded HVAC inside right side of the dash (terrible exposure, sorry):

Justin really sweats the details.  I hadn't noticed on the SEMA pics, but the front and rear side lights (required driving lights) are in the stock locations but much smaller than stock 3" x 1" lights, he's using 1/2" LEDs, amber up front, red in the back.  Here's the front passenger fender with amber light:

Another point in the picture above, note the battery:

• the location has been moved closer to the center of gravity of the truck
• a custom metal dual battery tray is bolted to the firewall, stronger than having a lot of battery weight at the stock location stressing the aluminium body
• Justin is running a dual battery system, which is out of my budget for now.  But I am adding the "dual battery tray" as an option, even if I'll only have one battery to start.  We measured and my wider Sears Platinum 31M will fit.
• No room for the legacy air-filter canister.

Justin showed me the new front bumper design.  Turns out the original, based on Redline's successful 40 series front bumper, wasn't sitting right with him.  The additional width to fit the UTE's stance was in the end, too wide aesthetically. And the whole unit stuck out too far from the front grill.  Here's the original:

This new one will be 2" closer to the front grill, and is angled back toward the wheels.  This makes it visually appealing and will improve the attack angle** on corner approaches.

** We took it wheeling!!!  And it handled very, very well.  We had no problem going through 40 degree up/down gullies and didn't catch the current bumper.  So, again, Justin is sweating the little things like a pro.

And away we go...

On an icy evening, the truck's ramps covered in snow and sleet, they hauled her away...

Inside, I packed a waterproof case with:

• A new front ABS kit, hoses, lines, plates, sensors - I damaged the one on my vehicle wheeling last year
• My Warn M12000 winch/ a fairlead/ my synthetic line, since I have no bumper to mount them on for now
• The 2nd row heater fan moter/blower (since I have no doors/windows I didn't want it to get wet)
• A new dash-based winch switch from 12Vguy, similar to the ones shown here.
• Wheel security lug nut "socket key"

The case is pad-locked on 2 corners and the whole thing chained to the body, hopefully it ends up in CO with the truck.  I wrapped the area under the drivers seat heavily with plastic in an effort to keep the ECU dry, and covered the fuse panel area as well.

A few items will come back east in this case (IPOR skid plate, MetricTLC wrapped steering wheel, instrument gauge cluster).

Break it on down...

Working indoors helps when January is upon us.  Here is our 1993 FZJ-80 loosing some of its skin:

Front got naked, too:

The undercoating put on by a previous owner definitely protected the fender underside, but made removing them a pain, as they were bonded to the inner fendor/engine bay panel.  Nothing a putty knife and rubber mallet couldn't gracefully solve.

Rear view:

Rear bumper is staying.  It's welded to the frame - and after thinking about it, I don't mind the bumper, I simply don't like the single large swing-out and the tire being on the rights side.  That can be changed by cutting off the existing nubs, and welding on a new left side half width swing-arm.  So the bumper and its attachments to the frame will stay, and it will go to Redline as it has been. I'll make those changes after its back.

Back in Black, er...

2015 First Update

So, I spoke to Justin yesterday and the new bodies should be at Redline in 3 weeks or so. He's having the supplier pre-fab holes based on his specs, so these bodies are specific to Redline and the FJ-UTEs, which is adding a little time.

A few in the queue ahead of us, we were originally chassis #6, are going to wait until hard tops are ready in the coming month(s?) so a few of us doing soft tops for now, are jumping ahead.  So, we may end up with chassis #3 or #4.  The hard top is supposed to fit, even if we buy it later, so that's the plan.  The idea is to add-on at a future date as budget allows but to get the truck going and in our hands as reasonably as possible.  A few other changes:

• Going to sell the double-DIN sized Pioneer head unit, I use my ipad in a Ram mount so much I don't need the large screen of the Pioneer and the idea of an occasional rain storm catching us off guard...
• Moving to a single DIN unit to be installed inside the supplied Tuffy center console.  Not sure of the make/model yet. So this will keep the dash looking very low tech while also adding a little bit of weather proofing and anti-theft-appeal for the head unit, being hidden from sight.
• The Pioneer is a pre/pro needing an external amp (it hooks up to the LC stock amp in the dash right now) but we'll be ditching that and simply going with the 15W (?) or whatever is in the starter head unit to start.  Here are the specs the new head unit will need:
• Some basic amp inside to power initial 2 speakers
• Pre-Outs, to later go with proper amp/subs**
• ipad input with control
• possibly a marine unit
• additional aux in for ham
• ** subs - ha! no really. The rear seat heater in the series 80 is being retained for the UTE but instead of being under the passenger seat it will go in/under the center console.  Justin has confirmed there is room under both front seats for slim subs, cool.  So the 'front face' of our drawer system may be countersunk to fit an amp/crossover.
• Thinking of doing the speakers up here:

I used to do fiberglass speaker boxes, subs, components, and figure a custom molded fiberglass enclosure for some high-passed components would be pretty cool.  

Some mechanical updates:

• Redline confirms 35" or 37" tires tuck fully into the wheel wells.  For 37" and up, they will be using slightly longer rear control arms, moving the rear axle back a bit.  This will keep it from hitting the front of the interior wheel well when fully articulated, and allows for a slightly longer than originally planned rear drive-shaft (recall, the engine/tranny/t-case are all being moved back several inches to fit the engine inside the smaller bonnet).  
• I'm considering doing a new lower low gear.  Now is the time since the truck will be apart...
• He thinks the J springs I have now will be too stiff in the rear.  The truck is > 1000 pounds lighter thanks to the aluminum body vs. the FZJ80.  But since I have a rear bumper, large tire out back, and I'm building drawers, I may want to see how it feels fully equipped before I swap out the springs.  For now the J springs may need to stay.
• I had Rancho adjustable shocks for many years, ruined them when I forgot to turn the dampening down from my highway ride to Rausch and ran the trails with them fully damped. I got some cheap procomp white things, they were worn out within a year, ah waste of money.  So we're going to price/consider the rebuildable RadFlows for the truck.  Radflow are making a set specific to the UTE thanks to the travel ability of the suspension.  Being rebuildable, custom is ok, since these should be the last shocks I buy, short of bending a shaft.

So, tear down begins this weekend.  So far we've sold the roof rack (Tradesman full size steel unit, very sturdy) and we will be posting updates on the available parts.  We are using www.car-part.com to price things out, quite a range and we're pricing at the low end of their range, trying to help the proces along.  All for now.

FJ-UTE at SEMA Show

Oh boy.  It's looking good:

The pics may be copyright by TCT Magazine, doesn't say but here's a link for reference.

Cool interior shot:

Loving the hood and front end:

So stoked!

Preparing the Donor

One of the attractions to this project is that we get to reuse our trusty 80's running gear and frame and suspension for our FJ-UTE.  We've owned it almost 5 years at this time.  The only unplanned maintenance issues have been:

• 2011 - Dead Starter (we replaced a cheap aftermarket unit with an OEM unit and all has been good since)
• 2012 - Power Steering (the face/flange at the pump's high pressure hose outlet turned out to be hacked to hell by a previous owner and then JB-welded, when it blew, I replaced the pump and high pressure hose both with OEM parts and we added a front-mounted fluid cooler and have been running great since.)
• Friday 10/17/2014 I failed my VA safety inspection since there was oil on my Drivers-Side-Rear brakes, seems my axle seals had blown.

Seeing as I needed it fixed and inspection passed in the next few days so I could comfortably take a road trip to our Fall Crawl this weekend, I called Ryan at On the Road Again Mobile Mechanic to see how soon he could fit me in. Turns out, a Sunday work day was in the cards as long as I came to him - deal!

Wheel off, ready to begin:

In reverse order, at the end of the parts swap we found that my rear axle's breather tube's, er, breather valve was all clogged up.  This was possibly the cause of the blow out since the extra pressure of the heated gear oil and air didn't have anywhere to go but out the seals.  Ryan also dropped some wisdom on me: if you have a full floating rear (which I do) and factory lockers (which I do) you MUST engage the rear locker before pulling the axle shafts or you'll drop the locking coupler in the diff and have pain and sadness in your life (ie: torch cutting comes next).

The drivers side axle splines shown here were in good shape:

The wheel bearings were both roller bearing type set at angles to each other. They were in great shape especially considering the truck is right at 300,000 miles on the odometer (and many of those are hard off road  miles)

After cleaning the bearings fully, we (and by 'we' I mean 'Ryan') repacked the bearings with his favorite German grease and after cleaning the disc brakes and parking brakes and spindle put it all back together.  Here is the spindle, also looking good, no thread problems and all cleaned up nicely. The drum style brake is the parking brake, the new "inner seal" is pressed just inside the spindle opening below (the outer seal is pressed into the hub):

So, on my follow up visit to the inspection station yielded the desired results: safety inspection passed.  I'll be sure to keep an eye on my breather valve and we shouldn't have to do this fix for a long time.