Oh no! I missed so many welcoming replies! I feel bad now
Thank you everyone for such a welcome. At last I have the chance to write
I'm keeping a worklog of all the jobs I've done - I'm amazed how they add up! I am lucky if I can do one, maybe two days work per week on the Cruiser - I have to do the work at my parents' house as I have no drive or workshop
But somehow, since late September, my job log is approaching 100 lines!
In retrospect I think my truck has not always had the best attention, maybe I should have held out (and stumped up more £££), but 100s don't come up too often and I was anxious to get one before the winter so that I would have the winter to get it ready for summer trips. But instead I see it as a chance to systematically go through as many points as possible, getting them back to good shape. That means that when I finally make some trips I'll not only have some confidence that the important things have been attended to, but that I also have practical experience of working on the vehicle, and understand how it's put together. That counts for a lot in my book.
The main things I've done so far are the CTEK dual charge system and auxiliary power distribution, new fluids all round (except transmission, still to do), all belts, water pump, alternator, decent stereo, amp and sub, decent bulbs, epoxy-mastic rear floor (love that stuff), optima battery, interior valet, fix / replace broken trim bits etc, wheel alignment...
These last two weekends I have replaced the rear shocks and rear springs, and three of the four AHC spheres. Oh god, getting those shocks off is a total ******! I must admit I lost a lot of my latent respect for Japanese engineering during that episode!
) How in hell's name anyone is expected to get those top bolts on and off when they are siezed is just beyond belief, when all it would take would be an access hole in the floor above to make it ten times easier. In the end I did what everyone else seems to do - used a holesaw in the floor panel to allow access from above. Even then it's key-hole surgery! Still it's done now - the only problem is that one of the AHC spheres is totally stuck on, so I've only been able to fit three so far
Not sure how I'm going to get it off!
@Scott - I'm ahead of you - I fully intend to take the truck to Rustbusters once my major work underneath is done. The underneath is quite rusty, but I think/hope that most of it is fairly supperficial and doesn't affect the integrity of the car too much. But nevertheless I want it dealt with! They do Dinitrol for £5-600, but I am tempted to splash out for the full epoxy-mastic process - that stuff is awesome. I used it in the load bay, but I don't have the patience or equipment to do a full underbody clean and treatment.
I had a terrible time getting all the underbody panels off - virtually every bolt was ridiculously tight and just sheared off! It took me an entire weekend to repair them all
( The Japanese seem to favour rubber bolts! I fit stainless repacements as a matter of course....
I must also find a way to get the spare wheel off - I don't have the security key for the wire crane
Any workarounds?? Once that's off I can get the chassis treated, and I can get access underneath the loadbay for mounting the drawer system I am building
Oh and I need to find out why the rear diff lock appears not to be working.... :/
I haven't organised my pics, but here are a couple I have here on my computer...
Thanks again everyone, for the warm welcome - I have a feeling I will be calling on you for advice before long!
Simon
