Land Cruiser Reborn
She's aliiive!! 🧟♂️ You may recall I bought this '72 Toyota Land Cruiser FJ40 back in 2022, which has always been a dream vehicle for me. It was my weekend driver around LA for about 6 months, and when I hit the road in the BMW it got shipped to St. Louis and put into storage for the time being. Well I've been in town this past winter, and have been having an absolute blast finally getting to do some serious wrenching on it. Now that things have thawed out a little bit here in the midwest, I've been able to take her out for some shakedown runs. So far so good! Awesome to be out driving around in it again.
Here's everything I did over the last 3 months:
**Full new leaf spring & shock suspension from Old Man Emu, 2" lift
**Front disc brake conversion with all Toyota parts from a '76 FJ40
**Upgraded brake master cylinder & dual diaphragm booster from 80 series Land Cruiser
**New clutch master & slave cylinders
**Complete rear drum brake rebuild and all new SS flex lines
**Parking brake rebuild
**5x 16" steel rims from Japan, and 235/85R-16 BFGoodrich All-Terrain T/A KO2 tires
**Carb rebuild and undoing some of the previous owners linkage hackery
**Ignitor upgraded to PerTronix, new coil, all new spark plugs and vacuum lines
**Installed shoulder belts and headrests out of a 60 series Land Cruiser
It feels great to have that first major milestone out of the way. The stopping power of front disc brakes and upgraded booster is like NIGHT AND DAY compared to the all drum setup. It's got so much bite I'm still working on retraining my muscle memory on the brake pedal. Suspension feels great too, especially with these taller walled tires.
There's still a TON of stuff on the to-do list though, and I have 1 month left until I leave town:
--Full new fuel system including tank, pump, lines, filter, and carb junction
--New alternator and voltage regulator
--Cut and weld a new exhaust pipe segment (currently has one of those temp flex pipes, and lots of leaks)
--Fix leaky rusted through hole in roof
--Install a tachometer
--Locate and fix a few rattles
--Improve driving position - modify seat rails and angle
--Dial the front end alignment
