87Warrior

I was amazed at how hot it had to of burned. I suspect 70 year old timbers are pretty dry. A family member had been burning pasture around the barn earlier in the day. I suspect there was grass that had grown up around around the wood timbers near the sliding doors that started smoldering after the pasture burn. Nobody was hurt, so that is a good thing. The Ag insurance doesn't cover a material loss like this and the barn had been fully depreciated for some time. I did get a check from the family member who was burning that day for my estimated value of the parts lost. While I was happy with the settlement, I was more bummed about the 10 years worth of parts collecting that disappeared. After all, the loss was just stuff. But dang it, it was 'stuff' I worked hard to preserve for these old trucks.

It was just over a year ago I lost many MJ parts due to a barn fire at the family farm. I received the call from my father at 11pm. Shortly before that he received a call from the neighboring farm who said, "The sky is glowing and the big barn is engulfed. There is no point in calling the fire department." I struggled to rest before making the 1.5 hour drive to the family farm. Here you can see what the barn used to look like. It wasn't pretty, but it was pretty water tight. Arriving onsite, the morning after the fire. The tin was still hot and some of the lumber was still smoldering, but I couldn't wait to attempt some recovery. What I found was disheartening. I'll let the pictures do the talking: Ugh. 3 bench seats, 2 interiors, 4 dashboards, 3 fuel tanks, two XJ's worth of interior bits, a 4.0L, and AX-5 are gone.

While not impossible, it's not really feasible. The camshaft position sensor functions very different than a distributor. You could do it, but you would need to gut the engine bay and replace all wiring and computer with parts from a TJ with a distributor. Kind of like going from Renix to HO in the MJ.

Not much has changed with this old truck. I do have some work to do. It has been sitting for 3 months with a blown brake line, but it will probably be spring before I have the shop space to start the work. - Needs a new rear brake line. The one on the truck rusted through. - Needs a new fuel tank. A rock put a pinhole in the bottom of the tank. - Needs a new speedometer cable. Speedometer has been intermittent to not working the last 2 years. - I have a 231 ready to go to replace the 207 transfer case. I'll probably tackle this when I do the speedometer cable. I did get this cool pic of a Praying Mantis on the truck when putting air in a tire last summer. Not sure how I feel about the critter turning 'rust color' to camouflage itself

I see a couple per year in my town. I can double that if I need to do something on the military base. But if I want to see 10 or more, I can drive past a friend of my body shop guy's place. He buys every 2.5L MJ in the area.

Thanks! I wasn't sure what to expect with this Toyota, but I have definitely been converted to a yota fan. But parts are expensive... Had to replace the electric brake booster on the Cruiser at the tune of $2k. Come on, that's more than I spent on 3 MJs! If this rig ever does need replacing (most likely due to an accident), I will certainly be looking at another Land Cruiser or the Cruisers weird brother, Lexus.

I want to want one, but that is probably because I've been waiting for the Gladiator for 15+ years. I'd have to sell one of my vehicles to add a Gladiator to the fleet, but I just don't see that happening I like most things about them, but I do not like the back doors. The door is obviously the same as a JL door and is cut for the JL fender. It looks unrefined and like something that was put together in a hurry by a sub-par shop for SEMA.

I think I got it fixed. Thanks Pete! For some reason when I originally posted, the pictures were linking to my private Google photos album. I uploaded them directly to CC now.

Towards the end of 2018, the truck started running terrible. It was constantly miss firing and struggling to start. I jumped into a carburetor rebuild with parts from Mike's Carburetor Parts. I also replaced the aftermarket inline fuel filter, swapped out the spark plugs, replaced the rotor and cap and replaced the condenser and breaker. Set the points and timing and now the truck fires right up and runs great! I also had to put a radiator in it:

Had to rebuild the gauge cluster because the speedometer and odometer locked up One thing I have missed driving the truck was the lack of a radio. Even if the terrestrial radio stations don't play your preferred tunes, the sound is nice to have. So, I set out to install a non intrusive radio. There was a metal plate riveted over the radio opening in the dash. I didn't think there was any damage to the dash behind the plate so I bought a factory AM radio to install. Unfortunately when I removed the plate I was greeted with a 70's era dash cut out. Since it will be some time before I am ready to weld/paint on the interior (I plan to go back to fawn), I went to eBay to find a radio and scored big time. Picked up a Medallion AM/FM/CB radio manufactured in 1976 that looked like new. It included 2 sets of knobs, owners manual and the stripped ends of the wires were straight. To top it off, the radio fit the hole in the dash perfect and would drive two 4Ω speakers! The speaker gave me trouble. This cab had none of the factory speaker brackets under the dash and I did not want to do anything extreme, so I studied the factory speaker configuration and those silly aftermarket speaker brackets and built my own. The speakers are two 4" Rockford Fosgates mounted on a left over piece of work bench top with foam cups, some bent up metal and FatMat left over from my MJ project. I styled the design off the factory set up utilizing two rubber stoppers that fit into the dash lip and a j-hook/wing nut under the windshield. I finished it off with some weather stripping around the edges for a tight fit against the dash. I won't win any audio competitions with this set up, but it doesn't sound half bad... especially being centered in a tin can, er cab.

This is my K20 project, Old Blue. Wait, what? Blue? The dang truck is orange! The project name is sentimental, so let's start there. I was introduced to the most stylish Chevrolet pickup at birth. My father had just completed his '66 K10 show truck when I came along and some of my earliest memories are of rides we took in that truck. The truck was known as 'Big Blue', primarily because it was rolling on 38" mud tires. Below is my father tinkering with the big truck in the early 80's: He ended up selling the K10 and bought a worn out, multicolored, rusty '66 K20 that had a giant '01' painted on each door. This K20 was known as 'Old Blue' because a faded blue was the dominant color on the truck. The truck was primarily used as a wood hauling truck where we made many more memories. Over the years we collected rust free body parts (including NOS fenders) in preparation for a rebuild. The truck was stripped and put in the garage as a rolling chassis with a good cab. Time slipped away and the truck (or rather the parts to make a truck) was sold to a family friend. It was reassembled by our family friend, painted orange, new wheels and tires installed and a local flatbed was dropped on. Our friend unexpectedly passed away and the truck was stuck in the estate's mess for many years. I was able to buy it back in May 2018. It may not be blue any more, but it will always be Old Blue to me. Here it is in all of it's glory. It is a pretty original truck despite all of the replacement metal. Original 292 with the SM420 and Rockwell T221 with 56k miles. It worked great to unload a big pallet from ARB

Trash cans I hadn't even thought of that! I agree The key is it has to be done well! I am not even a Ford guy and kind of like the Mustang. No welding on some of these, but they have the same level of craftsmanship!

Unfortunately this Toyota has consumed me and the poor MJ has been left alone in the garage for many years. I absolutely love it and love driving it. I am now at 328,000 miles on this vehicle and am continually staying on top of maintenance and making it mine. I even convinced my brother-in-law to buy one...albeit the Lexus variety

Still loving this TJ. It's now at 145k miles, so I have about 125k on my rebuilt. The rear main has started leaking and the steering gear has also started leaking. I did ditch the cowl intake assembly and went back to stock. It is amazing how much quieter it is driving this thing now.

I bought my TJ Rubi (4.0) with a blown motor, so I stuck a WJ motor in there while I rebuilt the stock motor. When I got around to installing the fresh motor, I expected to gain a seat-of-the-pants improvement in power. Actually, the opposite occurred, I could clearly feel that the fresh motor (built to stock specs) was not as peppy as the WJ motor. The machinist and myself discussed and researched what the difference was, and it turned out the cam in the TJ 4.0 was different. Both the WJ and TJ 4.0's felt way under powered in comparison to a HO XJ or MJ 4.0. I blame updated emissions system and coil on rail design. Does the front compressor keep running or does it shut off? Are you sure the front is locking? If the front diff fill plug is tightened too much, it can prevent the locker from locking or unlocking. There is no stopper on the diff cover for the fill plug, so you just wrap the threads with Teflon tape and screw it in a little ways. There is also a switch on the locker that sends the 'locked' signal to the dash light. This switch is probably not working if the axle is really locked.

Holy cow man. That yard is killer!

Stacking is the best way to transport a rust free bed!

I thought Pete was going to grab some tools and start working on my truck when he stopped by! In all seriousness, it was great to meet you Pete. I wish we could have visited more, but it was fantastic to put a face to a name. I'd love to travel the same way you are someday and meet folks along the way. Your enthusiasm for these old trucks rekindled the flame that has been a mere flicker for awhile. Once I get the overpriced Toyota brakes repaired I fully intend to start back on my 92...or maybe the 91. Keep doing what you are doing. Thanks for taking the time to stop by rural Kansas to say, 'hi'.

Yeah, but you could stop at the Coleman Outlet in Wichita if you stayed on Hwy 50. The great flat blah is terrible unless you have a lot of time to see some of the sights (there are a few out there)! I'm open either way and look forward to meeting up.

Soooo, I am just over an hour from your trek through Kansas. Would love to meet the mad man behind the CC curtain! I'm certainty willing to travel to meet up as well.

I am not surprised with the outcome. After all, it has a Wrangler drivetrain. Hopefully things will get interesting when the diesel is released. +70dB is super disappointing for cab noise with a stock truck.

x2! I am not pleased with the bracket I cobbled together and would gladly pay for a quality bracket to install the Dakota bench.

Sent.

Thank you for being a friend Don. You will be missed. Rest in peace. I hope there is infinite CHROME where you are.