two months ago I purchased a 20 year old Land Cruiser I was in Australia with the
vehicle in South Africa it's for my own use in Africa when I visit to come and
explore and now I'm here to rebuild this vehicle and turn it into an overland
Tora
I'm Andrew st. Pierre White join me as I share my passion for building four-wheel
drive trucks and traveling to the remotest parts of the world
Paul Marsh givest naman and I have already established without the engine
or finger things of importance being butchers so that's not great news a lot
of work to be done now it's on the lift to check out the condition of the
chassis and drivetrain there is an oil leak between the engine and gearbox it's
really difficult to actually you know you've you Morphin it not between them
rear main oil seal that then when you look a bit higher up it could be further
up from the cylinder head all could be a gill or someone welded the exhaust mount
bracket a sign of abject ignorance what they have done here is made these all
solid but you don't want the exhaust fixed because now there isn't it's it's
not carried economy rubbers where he's here you've got rubbers holding the
exhaust and you want the exhaust to be carried on rubbers so that you don't get
the vibration noise machetes in fantastic condition a
seminar please look for how does the chassis look
so shock absorbers we're going to change rubbers we're going to change anti-roll
bar rubbers we're going to change Springs with interchange diff Bri this
here's a dip breather okay yeah normally he's a blocked and we'll extend them to
the front because these should be extended up to there and get blocked up
with mud so one of the Telltale's is the swivel balls here and you can see that's
still quite good condition that one there it's a little bit of corrosion way
there which can be cleaned up okay but that's often a telltale and the vehicles
that you get back say in England those get really badly pitted and it's
difficult to repair them and you know you'd have to change a whole casing axle
casing to repair that unlike the Land Rovers which I think have a good design
where you can bolt off those landcruiser doesn't so one of my tell tales is will
strip all that down is little bearing at the bottom is a little bearing at the
top and all these will be replaced it's a complete kit inside there the CV joint
and drive shaft through to the Divya gets checked and we'll take the diff art
completely well we're going to take the default completely a bit of backlash
it's not severe but when driving in low speeds you can feel that you can feel it
it will you pull that out when you do the diff view pull that the backlash
well will first check the condition of the diff crown wheel and pinion to see
how they're meshing and what the wear is yes and then look at the bearings and
then if we're going to do anything to the diff we invariably put new bearings
new bearings new seals and then adjust the backlash because it's a short change
just to adjust the backlash you've got it out dude properly change the the seal
especially this pinion seal over here ok check the breathers clear because quite
often people don't realize that it's leaking here but the cause is a blocked
breather which is just pushing it's gotta get go somewhere you know and I've
often said when I'm teaching people push mechanics is that you know you've got a
leak and as long as you can check how much was going out now you won't know
but if you look on the ground and you see it starting to leak I'm a little
of a mark on the ground pop it up in the morning so the car needs to be level
take the fuller out which is on backside here just put the oil until it runs out
that's level drive 50 K stop let it cool down have a cup of tea check if it's 50
case you haven't lost in your will significantly considering the words
expanded slightly then go and do 100 KS do the same check then go and do 200
case by the each time doubling up you will know when you need to put a Whelan
and I drove right across America with an advanced transfer box doing exactly that
every third day I had to put a bit of oil in and that was I wasn't a period I
was managing it but I was managing it carefully enough to know that the amount
of distance I could drive before I needed to put oil in was this amount and
I stuck to that and that did that allowed me to keep driving where I could
get somewhere where I could actually fix it properly wasn't critical but it
needed to be managed you bear shows how the bushes have worn no you can see this
is to be expected
completely torn that's these I've had these break on
trips where people broken them often enough because the bushes weren't
changed won't buy a time and they could snap so it's again bushes gone yeah so
she's gone so now this there's a any movement with something as justice the
people have thank you to the following European people just to make it a solid
bush yes so the rubber bush gives you movement but Polly orphan doesn't yes
that's why it's next I should have trained tame it as a really good bush
and we come to looking at their bushes it's so much better products that they
use like an elastomer it's a self lubricating product and a way that
designed the bush I've never seen before on the inside they use a crosshatch sort
of serrated like rich in size a little little groups and in those grooves that
traps the grease and on the edge of the of the seal of the bush but like a small
look and that retains the grease more than other bushes and it stops the dust
coming in so it's a clever design that's common that happens
where's our fronts are absolutely rocking that radiator so what's telling
me is good here as these pipes are off and rust this is all in good condition
here the chassis you can see some loads had a bull bar welded and an adapter to
fit it's really in good condition and that's that's what I look for for sure
she's in good condition and doesn't look like it's had any accidents and the
bodywork looks good we can repair a little bits in it
you know the rust is the key thing for me the fact that if I mean underneath is
in place you know nothing looks like it's been changed bastardized all that
so this car doesn't look like it's had a really tough luck but what's worrying me
the most are the free wheel front hubs fitted by somebody that thought that
converting this vehicle into part-time four-wheel drive would be a good idea in
order to make this viable in addition to the hubs something in the transferred
gear box would have to have been modified but what the 105 has permanent
four-wheel drive with a differential trace to their prop shaft that is
lockable some people had free wheeling hubs to basically stop the fun part of
the drivetrain from moving when traveling at high speed and they do it
because they I mean I have to make this assumption they do it because they want
to save fuel all right it doesn't say fuel I don't believe it all my
experience with driving forward drives and full time for drivers and part-time
for drives and experimenting it saves no fuel I challenge you to measure it the
other part is that of course it it saves on wear and tear that's the theory but
it doesn't save on wear and tear the cars know what happens in the front prop
shops people with the freewheelin hubs the stern still a lot of the time people
drive the car and you should engage them on a regular
basis to turn them loose or grease the pop shelf wrinkly and when it sits in
one place Troy is out with a single plan you know
not good but that would be part of your turn it's quite significant if I had
known this I probably would have walked away from this purchase well it's too
late now adding things like that to a vehicle that is designed as a full-time
four-wheel-drive vehicle to me goes against the principles that Toyota put
into the vehicle to get it to work well the biggest loser are the people that
fit them so we will be removing them and putting it back into standard form so
the vehicle is slowly revealing its past there was some noise definitely they
think it was in the front the aim now is to try and sort out the only the only
problem discovered is the loud noise being emanated from the vehicle in
Reverse so I can see now that it's the only thing that they're actually a
little concerned about because everything else we've seen it's kind of
oh well we'll fix it will replace the part not had not a challenge to sort out
but for this noise so that's what we're trying to do now is get to the bottom of
that it's vital that we do so before we go any further it's hard to tell me
where at least I've given you a challenge
Calaveras sometimes the caliper bolts trip and they used either one fell sir
fall out when you reverse helper falls back we're gonna do is actually put it
on axle stance all four wheels off and rather then drive it on axle stance then
we can get underneath and actually see what's
doesn't mean give up
like you know some gremlin in there someone's put a banana peel with some
sawdust in that old trick for that silicon it's noisy you put a pan on a
pyramid some sawdust so Andrew what's really interesting is part of what we're
trying to find out is more about the car more about the history and I took out
the log book yes and going through the invoices here I can see that the engines
been rebuilt being rebuilt yeah so what must have happened is they've removed
the turbo turbo because there was a problem popular relating from it's had a
madman gage on it yeah madmen normally put a vgr gage to the messenger yes it's
got an old pro botany and manifold yes in fact it's got an old Probst is that
the EGR gage was there which is a good source gas temperature exactly thank you
and and what that gage is doing is telling you when you're running a turbo
whether you're running too hot and on an engine that's not filled like this one
this is actually one hdt month motor which is turbo diesel built in the
factory by - you're a total charger and this would be the most ideal motor in
the car yes but that one doesn't have a turbo and had an aftermarket other
critical the danger being that that Pistons can't take the heat so when you
fit it took aftermarket you want to manage the temperatures that the engine
runs at right and the best way to do it is using the exhaust manifold and
putting a program yes see eg Teague and that's got a probe and it's got a probe
which isn't working at the moment because they would have taken it out and
the gauge in the car yeah if I'm admin good gage showing more to the story as
we put the pieces together on a puzzler and this now it's better know what I've
seen geology Dagenham says yeah so 256 and it's done in 2000 to 5000 is now at
299 so that's not very long ago no so what they did when they did this
they would have probably overheated the engine I'm guessing cylinder head comes
off a machine the cylinder head as they've indicated they've done sir yes
they've taken pistons yes own the balls put you Rings in and put your big end
bearings yes which is good so the crank didn't
come out as very likely you see anything like that cylinder head off and what you
brings in pistons in he has also good put YouTube
invariance and pull all that together so it's a probably got on that engine about
45,000 kilometers this is not a lot knowing what they have their taste is so
she asked us piston rings net begin bearings some gas thermos deadpan bells
some things I miss is quite positive very positive because what is telling us
is that this has had work done okay the oil leak we seeing will find
that's the least but the Christians that you hear the guys have just been taking
hey good I think they could so far we've had all the compressions I think they've
got one more to measure okay and they're all really good
so they're very solid it's not a 100% indicator of the condition of the engine
I can't really see inside what is telling us is that the compression
aspect of of the inside of the engine is good yeah and that's what we want we
want stable compressions throughout the six cylinders right not a big variance
in those compressions and that's that's what we're getting which is great the
fact that it's had all the modifications done and taken out you're going back to
standard what we want in a vehicle like this is to keep reliability if you
fitted this engine on theater built with the Pistons that can take to eat and the
turbo and all that fantastic that system which was a
modification done in South Africa by I think it was alpine turbos it all works
when it's driven with the parameters and parts built when it goes through abuse
or it's not marriage that's when damage happens with anything but you will have
really good setup back to back to what it was for point to naturally aspirated
diesel private slowly private enjoy the views and get things and reliably you
get happy so because honestly to be honest with you there is no other reason
to owner one exit engine reliability for us and it can take rubbish fuel and and
so it's it's the whole thing a point of it it's the motor that's used
predominantly in the vehicles in Africa that are still running a lot of newer
motors but it's one thing if you had a problem when you went to one of these
safari company it probably got built around front if you went to a little
workshop in the back and beyond in some little place there's probably some
spares for it that's what you want the footprint on Toyota is massive enough
winger and in many parts of the world it's one of the reasons why more
suitable vehicles by the land travel it's not the only vehicle it's not the
most time deal but it's more suitable for one of those reasons we can get
spares so again going back to the history it
had they've overhauled the past here in Compton which is good because on these
these they're used to week it's a number of earrings that
that's good if you were buying this car and I saw the fact that they've done
this work they've done the power-steering from done it thermostats
they've done the cam belt and tensioner now we're gonna change that because in
my mind it's a serviceable item and if that can belt snaps or something's not
right or they've used them off to market can let you have a I try and take the
car back to zero we want to know we have a new can belt that is good quality the
bearings have been checked the seals are being checked the cams even changed so
that in the event of anything going wrong limiting okay so that's good yeah
am I seeing anything else steering pump they did fit new globe plugs so but all
it comes those are still good yeah so again you never know what you find with
a bigger and all we're trying to do is be trying to piece together the history
and that's the real about it doesn't matter that drill just
didn't services because sometimes always participate but coming together giving
us a more accurate picture of what the life of this car was not so if we were
making a decision do we buy this car big plus that has had the motor died there's
a reason why it done we know that but if that's the plus power steering speedo
we've looked underneath the chassis we've seen that that's really a good
condition little no rust on the chest almost nothing on these few power wash
that down challenged us to find so that's great it's very good
and as we strip the parts or pills to be able to compare what we need to change
and the interesting thing is that this the original owner before that came from
my old hometown you probably find you probably passed each other in the street
respectively thought I think I saw one when he sees this truck he's going to
probably recognize it yeah okay thank testing next week we'll
go through the stock of parts that we have pre-ordered for this build and
begin the restoration process