1991 Toyota 4Runner... the $1500 daily driver, budget beater, winter wheeler

DetroitStyle

Club Member
Well, since it's the only thing I'm working on these days, it gets a project thread!

The day I brought it home for $1500

NEW4RUNNER.jpg


As you can see, the rear did sag a bit, so I started thinking "Boy, modding your daily driver sounds like a good idea!" Then my front shock started squeaking pretty badly, so I decided it was time. However, this IS a budget DD and I wasn't about to go crazy and spend $1000+ or do a solid axle swap. So the decision was made... Land Cruiser coils in the back, 1.5" ball joint spacers up front, and new shocks all the way around. Total cost? About $400.

The parts:
4runnerliftedparts_50.jpg


Unfortunately I didn't take a ton of pics of the rear install, but it was a LOT more of a bitch than I thought. 165k miles and 20 midwest winters made for some rusty crap under there. You can see when I first started working on it... not much under the truck

4runnerliftedrearwheelsoff_50.jpg


Then, after all was said and done, a lot of crap under the truck!

4runnerliftedreardone_50.jpg


Since I didn't take pictures, the process was
1. Remove shocks
2. Compress stock springs
3. Use a 2x4 to get several and push the lowers down and wiggle the springs out
4. Compress new springs
5. Wiggle them in
6. Uncompress springs
7. Realize that you put the spring compressors on a spot that won't let you get them off without running into frame, LCAs, etc
8. Curse, rewind and repeat

6 hours later, it looked like this.

4runnerlifteddriverside_50.jpg


4runnerliftedpassengerside_50.jpg


4runnerliftedrear_50.jpg


At that point we called it a day. I was at my in-law's house and the dog had been locked up for 8 hours and if I didn't get home, I was in for a mess. So the wife and I drove home in her truck and left the 4Runner.

I got there this morning and started on the front. Should go MUCH smoother, right? Just undo a few bolts, put the spacer in, swap the shocks and we're done. 2 hours... tops.

Sign #1 that we were in trouble, it took us a HOUR to get the front wheels off. Fuckers were FROZEN to the hubs. We beat on the tires with a hammer. We lowered it back down with the lugnuts off and drove the truck back and forth a few feet. We turned the wheels. We put a 4x4 against the rim and hit the 4x4 with a bigger hammer.

Finally, we used a 2x6 with a bit of angle and hit it from the inside and after dozens of hits, it finally broke loose. Fuck! Already sweating, mad, and ready for a beer and we're barely anywhere!

All of the directions I read ahead of time, said just pound out the stock studs from the balljoint spacer:

Yeah, these fuckers
bjspacerinstall1.jpg


They would NOT budge. Apparently directions are geared towards California Toyota owners who can remove bolts by hand after 20 years.

So we decided to use a pickle fork and pop the balljoints out and take them to a local mechanic to get pressed out.

You can see, it didn't go as planned. Destroyed the ball joint. So I had to order new balljoints. Picking them up tomorrow.
4runnerliftedbrokenbj_50.jpg


The balljoints breaking kind of limited how much further we could go, but I did manage to grind out the UCAs to fit the spacers. Looked pretty damn clean when I was done.

4runnerliftedfrontwork_50.jpg


I'll have pics of that tomorrow.... but here's my F-I-L grinding away at the other side...

4runnerliftedbobgrinding_50.jpg


So right now, I'm exhausted, frustrated and scraped up and sore... but I figure we're 75% done. Tomorrow SHOULD just involve putting the new stuff in to replace the old. I think it SHOULD take 2 hours, so I'm planning on 6...

More details to come!
 
Yeah im a horrible mechanic too. :) Goodluck!

Those michelins always last 100k+ miles and they look alright for a DD!
 
Day Three STARTED off with good news. The replacement ball joints did NOT come with pressed in bolts. This was a happy surprise as we thought they would have to be pressed out so we could use the longer ones with the spacer kit. Sweet!

Got into the garage at 9:30am and got cracking

10am:

Spacer is in!

4Runnerliftedspacerin_50.jpg


10:30am

Shock is in!

4Runnerliftedshockin_50.jpg


10:35am

Wheel is on and the driver's side is on the ground and done!

4Runnerlifteddriversidedone_50.jpg


4Runnerlifteddriversidedone2_50.jpg


It LOOKS like the front is higher, but I'm sure this is some sort of optical illusion. When just the rear was lifted, it looked level in the garage. Took it outside and you could clearly tell the back was higher. Hopefully when I get a good look at it outside, it's level. If not, I guess I'll just have to buy a nice heavy ARB winch bumper and winch to pull the front down a bit :D

OK, on to the driver's side.....

3 hours later, and I'm totally fucked by the stock ball joint. It would NOT come out. I'll spare you the details, but nothing went smoothly here. Had to drill out the cotter pin from the castle nut... then the castle nut wouldn't budge, so I had to cut that off... and in the end, I cut the top off which proved to be a major mistake. I didn't realize they are tapered and there is NO WAY my plan of pounding it down through the hole would work.

4Runnerliftedproblems_50.jpg


So here we sit, stuck at this point. I had to leave to go to work, so it's going to be sitting like this for a week until I can get to it on Saturday. Other than the stuck bolt/stud from the ball joint, it's ready to go. As soon as that comes out, it will be 10 minutes to put the spacer and shock and wheel on....

GRRRRR!!!
 
A ball-joint press should get that right out. If you don't have one, just hit the side of the knuckle a few times with a good-sized hammer and it will pop up.
 
A ball-joint press should get that right out. If you don't have one, just hit the side of the knuckle a few times with a good-sized hammer and it will pop up.

See, here's the thing... I'm a big dummy. I THOUGHT my father in law had already removed the castle nut from the bottom of the ball joint. So I went ahead and stuck the tuning/pickle fork on top of the knuckle and pounded that bastard in there GOOD. I was cranking on it HARD. I'm sure that because the nut wasn't removed, I've created some sort of fusion within the hole.

But, my father in law's buddy is coming over tonight, hopefully, and he's a mechanic and should be able to press it out.

Fingers crossed. I hate having other people do my stuff, but the truck is an hour away from me... in my in-law's garage. So I need to get it done and out of their way.
 
It's 95% done. Just have to install the panhard bar drop bracket. Right now, the bracket is misaligned and pulled the rear axle about 2" to the passenger side... hopefully that's what's causing my decel vibration...

but here it is, out on the road.

cropper4runner.jpg


Now I just need to save up about $900 for some 33" Duratracs
 
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