Project Hundy Build Thread - 2000 UZJ100 Land Cruiser

cruiseroutfit

Cruizah!
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Sandy, Ut
the 40 you're storing for me, you mean? :( hahahah I keep thinking I'm over it, until I see it again hahah Kidding aside, the 45 is sweet. I love how bare-bones it is, like a proper tool. I'm a huge fan of metal trucks-- no plasticky dashes!!!

Yeah, yeah... the 40 I'm storing. That said after I catch up on some maintenance on the others, its going to get a motor. Once it gets a motor its game on. We'll save that for another build thread.

My goal for the 45 is simple honest, keep it an honest & simple truck. Thusfar I've kept everything true to original and I don't plan to sway on that. Paint is my big hangup, I don't want (and can't afford) to give it the paint it deserves right now and I don't want to start replacing the weatherstipping it badly needs until I paint. I'm thinking of taking an auto-body class and I'll start priming and prepping the truck as well as address the dents and such. If I could get it near ready to paint I'd feel a lot better about paying to have it professionally shot and then spending the $500+ the w/s and trim is going to set me back, sadly I had a box full of it already, it melted :eek:

The 45 deserves its own build thread too but I'll post a picture so any others reading our drivel can follow along:

100_4529.jpg


This is my wifes truck ;), and we are slowly building it as a Sunday driver, road trip, Relic Runner, camp rig, trips to the hardware store, etc. One of these days I'll consolidate all my pics and such into its own build thread.
 

cruiseroutfit

Cruizah!
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Vendor
Location
Sandy, Ut
Loving the build. The second battery kit should be well worth it.

Its already been nice with the fridge and the lack of miles it sees. For instance its been parked since the FYTO and I just took the fridge out yesterday. Start battery was still 'normal', aux battery which had been running the fridge (not that the compressor was spinning in this cold :D) was still in the mid range.

Paint :ugh: It would have to rot out worse than the Rot Box to require a paint job. Right now its building character ;)

:D There was some serious talk about fixing the minor rust, pounding out the dents and priming and then rattle canning it all to match the current tan. I'm totally cool with that, I just hate the idea of gluing on a small fortune worth of weatherstripping if I'm going to have to pull it off again down the road. I guess when I really think about it the only stuff that is permanently glued on is the door w/s and I could salvage it or replace without too much loss?

Rot Box does have character, I don't think I want to aspire to that much character :D
 
Just want to say thanks for all the kind words on here. We really had fun working on this build with you guys and always enjoy any RME work we get. We always try to put our members first. Thanks so much for the local support!!! Jeff Swain. Armor Coatings.
 

Bart

Registered User
Location
Arm Utah
Definitely drooling over the 45 also. I think that's my favorite Toyota model of all time. Your idea of the auto body class is a good one, but be prepared for a long process. One night a week doesn't give you a lot of time, but if you supplement that with additional work at home, it goes much faster.
 

cruiseroutfit

Cruizah!
Moderator
Vendor
Location
Sandy, Ut
Just want to say thanks for all the kind words on here. We really had fun working on this build with you guys and always enjoy any RME work we get. We always try to put our members first. Thanks so much for the local support!!! Jeff Swain. Armor Coatings.

Thank you Jeff, you guys really did go above and beyond on this. :cool:
 

cruiseroutfit

Cruizah!
Moderator
Vendor
Location
Sandy, Ut
Definitely drooling over the 45 also. I think that's my favorite Toyota model of all time. Your idea of the auto body class is a good one, but be prepared for a long process. One night a week doesn't give you a lot of time, but if you supplement that with additional work at home, it goes much faster.

That was kinda my plan. I'm familiar enough with auto body to be dangerous, I've done some small dent repairs and have a small selection of tools, hammers, blocks, DA, things like that. I just want to get an actual legit foundation of repair rather than learn by beating some panels to death :D
 

cruiseroutfit

Cruizah!
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Sandy, Ut
Back from another road trip in the hundy. We had four adults and gear for a trip to King of the Hammers. We were serving as chase and pit support for Team Williams (John & Nate) in #4623 in the Every Man Challenge race. I finalized my HAM (Kenwood TM-D710 with MARS/CAP mod) prior to departing for the race and the setup proved 100% successful with communicating with their race radio as well as the race radio in the Raptor chase rig manned by Cody and Bryson. I ended up mounting the main unit to the drawer unit just behind the drivers side rear seat. All the wiring is under the carpet and trim with the face plate attached to a Panavise/Ram mount on the dash. We (Olly ;)) built a custom mic mount on the side of the center console, offers a real clean look when not in use and out of the way when in use.

We found one major need, more USB ports. I have two in the rear drawer side panels that were installed right next to the 12V outlet and fridge outlet, however when gear is stacked deep you can't have easy access to them. With 4 adults, i.e. phones, ipods, GPS's, etc... outlets become a premium and stretching cords from the front seat to the back seat is a pain and cluttery. I've got one more of the BlueSea USB twin outlet setups I had planned to install in the front dash somewhere but I think instead I'm going to install it in the back of the center console? Preferably in a fashion that doesn't interfere with the drink holders? I may play with that a bit tomorrow as I clean the funk out of the Cruiser.

Lastly, I'm still working on some build thread details for part# 4 of my formal write-up :D
 

cruiseroutfit

Cruizah!
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Sandy, Ut
Updates and lack of updates :D

Still working on the next installment of the build thread with pics but I did install some new HIR low range bulbs from Candlepower. A very noticeable improvement over the dismal bulbs I had in there previously.

Had a nice weekend with the 100 in Great Salt Lake Desert this last weekend with the crew from ExpedtionUtah. One word summary of trip = cold :D

20130217_155116 (Medium).jpg
 

cruiseroutfit

Cruizah!
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Sandy, Ut
Death Star Build Part# 4: Go Time, the Build Day!

Why a single weekend? Well I'd like to think I'm a pretty busy guy and free weekends come at a premium. Quite honestly I'd much rather be bouncing around the desert on a Saturday than working on my vehicles. While lightly discussing the 100 Series build idea with my ARB sales rep (TR Burrus) & Jason Goates, one of my part-time helpers here in the shop, the idea came up, "Why not in a single day?". (Pretty sure we all have Jason to blame for the idea ;)). The more I thought about it, why not? As I developed my Gaant chart and laid out the tasks in the build planning phase, it quickly became apparent that this wasn't going to be feasible in 24 hours proper, well not in the manner in which I wanted it installed that is. So instead we planned around a weekend, starting after we closed the shop and sent off our shipping on a Friday evening and culminating sometime on Sunday when everything was wrapped up and finalized.

friday_0.JPG

The Weekend Task List

The advantage of the Gantt chart was the ability to scale the project in any way we wanted. I knew we had approximately 150 man-hours of projects to complete, be it 15 guys working 10 hours each or 5 guys each working 30 hours. There is an obvious point of diminishing returns in terms of the number of people you can have practically working on one vehicle at one time, given that constraint we tried to plan not only the project timing but also the number of people on each project as well. Our 'staff' ranged from over a dozen people during the heat of things on Saturday to 3 people on Sunday afternoon. Practical for all? Perhaps not but plan some projects, buy some pizzas and you might be surprised not only how many show to help but how helpful they in fact are. Crucial for me was to not compromise the build quality in the name of getting it done in a weekend. By bringing in some 'ringers' that specialize in these projects I was able to ensure that the build quality was maintained throughout.

friday_1.jpg

Capturing the first items of the build - stock rear suspension removal & removing the stock front bumper

Step one was to get the 100 in the shop and start tearing things off like mad men. Our first victim would be the front bumper and while one crew (Jake, Jason & Dan) was dismantling the factory front bumper a second crew (Johnny & Stephen) were pulling the suspension off the rear axle. With the stock coils and shocks removed, it was time to install the new Old Man Emu rear suspension components. Meanwhile, assembly on the front ARB bumper was underway and the front bumper crew installed the chassis mount, Warn winch, and buffers in preparation for mounting the bar to the chassis. With the front bumper installed and finalized, we could start the rear bumper/swing installation which needed to happen before the drawers could go on, seeing the trend here? Like pieces of a puzzle, we had to jump around to keep out of the way of the simultaneous projects all the while having projects completed before the next started. All part of the fun. :D

Build Pictures from Friday Evening:

friday_2.JPG

OME rear suspension installation

friday_3.jpg

Prepping the front end for the ARB winchbar

friday_4.jpg

Assembling the ARB rear swings - fuel & tire carrier

friday_5.jpg

Assembling the ARB rear bumper main bar

friday_6.JPG

Installing the carriers on the rear bumper

friday_7.JPG

Front bumper complete, the shop getting messy!

friday_8.jpg

Rear end suspension complete, front bumper complete, snorkel holes drilled

friday_9.JPG

Making progress!

By Friday night the winch was installed in the front bumper and the bumper was finish mounted. Now we could rock out the front suspension and start on the rear bumper as the rear suspension was finalized. Working through the night we finished up the bulk of the rear bumper and swings and the front suspension as well. Bouncing in between front and back tasks I started on the snorkel, we let the paint dry on the fender holes and grabbed some early morning brekky.

To Do List By End of Day 1 (Friday 6PM - Saturday 5AM):

Inventory Parts
Break wheel lug nuts
Rear End on Jack Stands
Remove Rear Tires
Rear Stock Shocks & Coils Removed
Rear OME Suspension Installation
Rear Tires Mounted
Rear End Lowered & Rear Tires Torqued
Remove Front Bumper
LandTank Fan Clutch Installation
Front End on Jack Stands
Stock Skid Plate Removed
Stock Shocks Removed
Stock Torsion Bars Removed
OME Shocks & Torsion Bars Installed
Slee Diff Drop Kit Installed
OME Torsion Bars Adjusted
Front Tires Mounted
Front End Lowered & Front Tires Torqued
Stock Trans Cross Member Removed
Slee Skid Plates Installed
Install ARB Front Bumper
Warn Winch Installed in Bumper
IPF Lights on Bumper
Remove Stock Roof Rack
Remove Stock Rear Bumper
Install ARB Rear Bumper
Assemble & Install ARB Wheel Carrier
Assemble & Install ARB Jerry Can Holder
Rough Electrical to Rear
Rear 3rd Row Seats & Seatbelts Removed
Outback Drawer System Installed
Finalize ARB Fridge Wiring & Aux power outlets
Install ARB Fridge
Remove Stock Battery
Install Slee Dual Battery Tray
Install Optima Battery's
National Luna Dual Battery System Installation
Remove Factory Running Boards
Install ARB Side Steps & Side Rails
Install Eezi-Awn K9 Roof Rack
Safari Snorkel Installation
Helton Hot Shower System Installation
 
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cruiseroutfit

Cruizah!
Moderator
Vendor
Location
Sandy, Ut
A few more Friday build shots:

friday_10.JPG

The hardest install of all

friday_11.JPG

Organizing the rear bumper hardware

friday_12.jpg

Blacking out the body underneath the rear bumper

friday_13.jpg

Snorkel template in place, ready for holes!
 

Tacoma

Et incurventur ante non
Location
far enough away
let's not forget the 2nd hardest install: the REAR floormats. They should have arrows marked "FRONT". hahahah

I can say without reservation that the Death Falc..Star is the most comfortably capable rig I've had the pleasure to pilot and ride in. With the addition of more power outlets, as per Kurt's KOH trip, I can't think of anything else it would really need. Any other upgrades would be very minor.
 
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