New adventure Toy(ota) in AZ

[Jrally]

Not a lot of big work on the car lately, but more adding to the comfort of driving it. I've been working on putting all the trim panels back in the car to give it an even more finished look and lower the interior noise. I found a decent interior out of an '83 at a local yard, to get the parts I was missing along with changing out the front panels, get rid of the 3 shades of brown cordaroy for a nice dark tan hairing-bone.
This week a decided to tackle a year plus long niose. The back suspension always sounded like a loose chain with every shift, bump turn w took. I always thought it was the limit straps, since I could tap them with my finger and get them to rattle against thier mounts. Turns out, it was an upper 4 link arms worn out hein joints, which is odd since they were all brand new and of the same construction. So, while ordering a few heims for my rally car's new tubular front arms, figured might as well drop a little extra on the Celica too. Amazing, what a difference it maked!! No more clunk on accel, gea shifts, bumps, jumps, corner turning, etc..

-Jon

[Jrally]

I'm reviving this old thread of mine, as a bit of rebuilding on the car is going to be going on. After our last trip up north, in April, the rear axle is giving up, old junk yard dog out of a Cressida wagon with unknown mileage. Did some looking at it over the weekend, while fixing other issues, broken door handles. Looks like the pinion bearings are shot, sounding a bit like a coffee grinder, which also means it's been chewing away at the ring and pinion teeth. Oh well, time to build a new axle. 3 years ago, when I started building this project, Cressidas were all over the yards, now it's been over a year since I saw a wagon, and the sedans I only see about every other trip. Back in the 80's, Toyota must have loved designing new axles, because it seems like very few vehicles have common axles in them. I've done some research and can't believe I didn't consider this new option before. The Vanwagon, predecessor to the Previa, has the F-code axle, like a light duty 2wd truck or the 1st gen Supra (also VERY rare). All the mounting brackets are wrong, but the spring perch seems to be in the right place, the width seems to be the same as the Cressida axle and what will save me the biggest headache, the lug pattern is still the 4x4.5". I was going to just buy a truck axle, but then that would have involved having the axles redrilled to the 4 lug pattern, drilling or coming up with new brakes, etc.. The first yard I checked at this weekend, had an online inventory, which said they got a Toyota van in about 5-6 weeks ago. I drove the 25 miles down there to find that the van was the rare version, 4wd, wrong parts again, 5 lug, but not the same as the pick-up. What a cool van though, I hear they even made a 5speed 4wd version, would make a great adventure van, if the parts weren't getting so hard to come by. The second yard I went to, first truck row I walked down, there it was, an '86, 5 speed (also kind of hard to come by), with an undamaged rear end. It took me about an hour to pull it out on my own, not bad, just bulky to lift onto the cart. This will be done the right way this time. All new bearings, all new seals, LSD from a 2nd gen Supra diff I have lying around (got it a few months ago), with Weir Performance goodies, like a sold pinion bearing spacer, instead of the factory crush sleeve, and the MaxGrip LSD kit to get more lock-up out of the diff. Both ring and pinion sets I have now are 4.10, which is what is currently in the car as well, so I'll probably just pick the one with the least amount of wear, likely the Supra, since it was behind an automatic, non-turbo drive-train.

-Jon

[corax]

Sweet! I'm really surprised I haven't heard about you running this in a local Rallycross or MaxAttack yet

[Rodicus]

As someone who loves both Toyota off roaders and Rally, I have to say you've done an awesome job combining the two. In an angular 80's shell no less. Keep it up! It's been fun watching the development of this car.

[Jrally]

I ran a rallycross last month, down in Tucson. Unfortunately, I was the only car in 2wd rally prep. I'm hoping to run Course Closing a couple of times this year, Gorman and Prescott, if the organizers let me. Maybe, better yet, Lead/Opening car. Only problem there is fitting in the car with helmets, kind of tight and uncomfortable.

-Jon

[Jrally]

A few pictures of the new axle, as it sits now, along with the Supra diff I'll be pulling the LSD out of.




and the Supra diff for the clutch plate limited slip differencial



-Jon

[Jrally]

Cut two of the five brackets off the axle and reassembled the drum brake on one side, before I forget how it goes together. The drums are 10" ID x 2" wide shoes. They should work for a while, until I get too frustrated with working on drum brakes...

-Jon

[corax]

If you're interested in a relatively cheap upgrade for the drums, I heard the 1" bore wheel cylinders from an FJ60 are a direct swap
(I'm sure you know the math on why that might be good, so I won't bother explaining)

[Jrally]

That's considered an upgrade for the 2wd pick-up trucks, or specifically for the Van? Sounds interesting, I like tinkering, and trying different things for sure. I'm hoping these brakes will give me a cheap brake bias that the car really needs. The front brakes are WAY too grabby, panic stops are down right scary. I have the parts to build a disc brake set-up, it's just a matter of time spent vs time back in the seat... I took some accurate width measurements tonight, the new Van axle is roughly 1/2" narrower than the Cressida axle that's currently in the car. This should give me just the right fender clearance, as it currently rubs slightly with full articulation.

-Jon

[corax]

That's considered an upgrade for the 2wd pick-up trucks, or specifically for the Van?

-Jon

I heard about it for the 4WD trucks, though it would real easy to measure the bore on the wheel cylinders in the axle you already have to see if it applies. I first heard of it from MarlinCrawler: http://www.marlincrawler.com/brake/w...wheel-cylinder. Does your master cylinder mount up with 2 bolts or 4? and what is the distance between mounting bolts on your caliper - if it's 3.5" center to center, you have a world of options for front calipers

(I'm kinda interested because I'm seriously considering picking up a '85 for slow build of my own)