Tetanus - 96 Solid axle Hilux with 3UZ V8 is Aus

[Jgrov2]

I've been lurking and asking dumb questions so I thought it only time to post my Japanese billy cart up.

I present today my labour of love for the past 4+ years. It's a 1996 dual cab Toyota Hilux Ln106. This is a solid axle front and rear model that started life with a 2.8L diesel engine. I bought it in 2013 with 330 000 km on the clock. At 355 000 kms on a 40 degree day the diesel decided it had had enough. I happen upon a small sum of money at the time and my lack of self control and habit of taking things way too far won out and I purchased half a car from Japan.




What arrived was the front half of a 2002 Japanese Toyota Celsior, aka Lexus LS430. These cars had a 4.3L V8 petrol engine which is just a bored out and updated version of the famous 1UZ. At the time I had no idea what I was doing, the most experience I had prior was adding manual boost controllers and stereos. With help from numerous write ups, youtube and experimenting I pushed on. The Ute came with everything being stock except for 3" lift springs, matching shocks ands 31" tyres. First thing I did was add Detroit lockers front and rear.




For now Ill post up so pictures and go into more detail after




Maiden Voyage

Y'all may notice the tray is off a later model, originally it had a hydraulic tilt according to the mod plate

 

[Jgrov2]

The swap




Everything came out easy enough although every bolt had been rounded or seized. The first hurdle was the wiring. The existing wiring had melted together at some point and the donor engine had about 1000 km of unnecessary crap. With help from a guru I tidied up and married the two harnesses but the ecu had a built in immobiliser which didn't want to play even though I had the original key. Sent the ecu to another guru in Russia and it came back and fired up first go.




The Hilux came with a G52 gearbox which I removed and sold in favour for an R150f from a Toyota surf. I used a trail gear adapter to fit the existing R1FA transfer case to it to keep the strong gear driven transfer as opposed to the flogged out chain one it came with. I scored a bellhousing, flywheel and clutch kit from a local supplier and fitted the drive line to the engine.




I managed to fit the engine so that the transfer case Mount and cross member line up in the original position. After a few test drives I think that this might be a few mm out as there seems to be tension between the engine mounts and transfer mounts and the gearbox keeps leaking ever so slightly from the bearing housing.




I redid the whole fuel system in 3/8" stainless pipe with intank pump and external fpr feeding the existing deadhead system. Originally had a walbro 355 but it burned out after a few starts so I swapped to a raceworks branded pump which is still going strong touch wood.




Used a surf intake air box which is a common mod here as it frees up room for another battery (or lots of activities). Then 3" pipe into the intake manifold. Bought a cheap Chinese eBay radiator and fan and made my own shroud. So far the old girl hasn't gone over 100 degrees but I realised to the cap had blown out so it was actually pressurizing so the next run in it will be interesting. Also I haven't driven it yet with the ac condensor on which will add more stress to the system.




The exhaust is 2" existing log headers into cat then merged into 2 3/4" with a cherry bomb vortex. It's reasonably quiet at idle and low revs and really comes on nice.




Engines initial fitting

Original Diesel Engine

Initial Test Run

 

[Jgrov2]

Got the shits with the Detroit locker in the rear was quite ruggered with the added torque from the V8 so I pulled it and dropped in an ARB airlocker. Bit scary drilling through the housing but was pretty straight forward.

Been having issues with the bad girl running hot at speed not in traffic which is a first. Spoke to al at race louvers and he shipped over a hood extractor. Took fuck all to install biggest part was redoing the reinforcement so it didn’t flap so much, I still need to apply some anti flutter foam. Results so far have been awesome. Car is running a shitload cooler and managed to stay at 100c during a heatwave here ambient temp 42c and only two thirds of coolant left as she dumped a third out the day before without me realising.

It’s still acting weird in terms of when the temp goes up and down so I need to look at a real radiator instead of the $150 eBay special it’s currently running.

Going to look now at switching to high/cross over steer as push pull shits me. Going to include steering cooler and possible engine oil cooler on either side of the car on the front little flap I front of each wheel. Enough talk here’s some pics

 

[Aisin]

Quad cab

 

[D.Dixon]

Fuck yea up the Aussies! Looks sweet as man.

Don't suppose you've still got the Detroit and want to move it on?

 

[Jgrov2]

Fuck yea up the Aussies! Looks sweet as man.

Don't suppose you've still got the Detroit and want to move it on?

Sorry mate shes already gone, turns out some landcruisers had the 8" diff as well.

 

[D.Dixon]

Sorry mate shes already gone, turns out some landcruisers had the 8" diff as well.

Ah no worries, bloody cruiser owners​​​​​​