87 Suzuki Samurai

[DETN8R]

Haven't had much time to work on the Samurai. Started a new job recently and my daughter just started school... Priorities.

Some good news though. Someone was throwing away a two piece hard top! So I got one for free. it's the weird one though where it turns the tailgate into full door.
Some glass was broken/missing but you can't beat free!

The latches were in bad shape so I sourced some new ones from McMaster Carr.
Part Number is 1864A15
https://www.mcmaster.com/#1864A15

I drilled out the old rivets and removed the old latches and riveted on the new ones.

The rear portion of the top has a longer distance to reach for the latches and I was missing one of them.
So I determined that I can reuse some of the ones I removed from the front portion and make them reach the tub of the samurai using some threaded rod and some coupling nuts made from tee nuts.

For now I will just replace the broken window with acrylic or lexan. Whichever the plastic shop has scrap of. I will also probably replace the rear glass. Currently it is plexi with window tinting. I'm pretty sure at some point it was actually glass . I also need to figure out how to mount it to the tailgate.

 

[Somecallmetimm]

Congrats on the amazing dumpster prize!

 

[DETN8R]

Can't really call it a dumpster prize. Technically it was given to me. But I can't beat free!

 

[Somecallmetimm]

Even better!

 

[inthedirtagain]

Had several Suzukis over the years. 1st one was a 1986 Softop. Learned to weld on that rig making my own tube bumpers. 2nd was a 1983 SJ410 hard top. Fab'd my own lift kit, roof rack, rear bumper w/receiver hitch. 3rd was a 96 Geo Tracker 4dr. Nothing special about that one. Lastly, I had a 1998 Sport with the 1.8L engine. That one was fun, but sold it when I got a job offer out of state. Had to haul my camper trailer and dirtbike with me since I was going to live out it until I could find housing and move the family out. Fun li'l rigs, fo sho!

 

[DETN8R]

Had several Suzukis over the years. 1st one was a 1986 Softop. Learned to weld on that rig making my own tube bumpers. 2nd was a 1983 SJ410 hard top. Fab'd my own lift kit, roof rack, rear bumper w/receiver hitch. 3rd was a 96 Geo Tracker 4dr. Nothing special about that one. Lastly, I had a 1998 Sport with the 1.8L engine. That one was fun, but sold it when I got a job offer out of state. Had to haul my camper trailer and dirtbike with me since I was going to live out it until I could find housing and move the family out. Fun li'l rigs, fo sho!

Nice. Been teaching myself to weld on this Samurai also. Though I've had others weld critical areas.
Been looking for another tracker or sidekick.

 

[DETN8R]

I've been driving with the hard top all this week. Sure was a battle getting here and it looks like we're starting to get some more snow now here in Colorado.

Being that I was able to get the front piece mounted with rivets and the catches from rally tops I intended on doing the same to repair/replace the latches on the rear as well.

I was originally going to just use the rear latches the way they were because most of them were still mounted. I went to do a test install and one of the latches broke. I ordered some new latches and some hardware from McMaster Carr.
I got some M5x0.8 All thread since that's the thread size of the hook latch on the latch. I got some stainless M5x0.8 coupling nuts because they were cheap. I also ordered some new catches from rally tops again.

Another thing that I did that wasn't really in the plan was that instead of rivets for the latches on the rear hard top I used some expanding rubber rivnuts. The same type I used to mount my custom ABS door panels. The hard top did have some metal reinforcing laminated into the fiberglass.

I did not like the way the hook latch mated into the catches from rally tops.

I did discover that the triangle eyebolts from the cheap Amazon latches I bought had the same thread size as the one on the latch.

The latches are just made of folded steel. Same for the hook on the latch as well.
This means that the threads weren't perfect and I had to chase all the threads with a tap before it would accept the allthread extensions I had to cut to get the latches to reach the tub of the Samurai.

I drilled a center hole in all of the catches from the cheap Amazon latches so that they could pivot to some degree because the two rearmost latches are angled and I didn't want the headache of trying to mount the catches at the correct angle.

With the rear piece of the top mounted I had to figure out the mounting for the rear glass. Now this is the most retarded setup I've seen from a hard top company. At least rally tops has some legitimate hinges for their rear glass. The glass had some brackets that attach to the tailgate .... somehow. I've never actually seen it in person and the few pictures I've seen online don't show details.

I cleaned all the paint and rust of the brackets and repainted them.
I had a plan to mount some flat plate aluminum to the tailgate for the rear glass to bolt to. Me and Abby purchased a bandsaw about a 2 years ago. It's been sitting outside for about a year and I needed to cut some aluminum plate to make the brackets for the rear glass.

I used some more rivnuts to attach the plate to the tailgate. I marked out the material I needed to remove to clear the gasket when the tailgate was closed.

The drivers side of the tailgate had a raised section to clear the latch mechanism but I needed the plate to attach on the side to provide stability for the rear glass brackets. The bandsaw sure made easy work of all of this.

I ended up buying a piece of polycarbonate to replace that rear glass since the tinting on it and yellowing from age made it impossible to see through.

So far so good. I'm having some issues with the front top piece sealing against the windshield but my gasket is damaged and trying to source a new one is hard.

Now hopefully this winter I can source some Air Conditioning parts.

 

[Memento_Vivere]

What a/c parts are you needing?

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

 

[DETN8R]

Pretty much everything. My donor sidekick didn't have air conditioning.

 

[Memento_Vivere]

I have a/c parts off a samurai not sure if they're good or not.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

 

[DETN8R]

I have a/c parts off a samurai not sure if they're good or not.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

Sent you a PM

 

[DETN8R]

Haven't really gotten much done. The new job keeps me pretty occupied. As well as my 10 month old son and 4yr old daughter.

I noticed some cracks under the passenger seat starting to form a couple of weeks ago. I drilled some holes at the ends of the cracks to keep them from growing.

There are a couple of things I feel contributed to this.
Number 1 - Thirty Year Old Truck
Number 2 - Previous owner installed pipe flange seat risers
Number 3 - Sidekick Seat swap

I used my harbor freight welder to patch up the cracks. It went surprisingly well.

I sprayed some paint over it and on the underside of the tub and called it finished.

If I see the cracks opening or new ones forming I'll add some more metal underneath the seat mounts/sliders.

I've been noticing a bit of vibration recently as well. It became especially evident between 15-20mph recently. I had chalked this up to the new tires.
I changed my transmission oil.
I inspected the transmission mount.

And I glanced over at the rear drive shaft and noticed a shiny spot.

My u-joint was completely destroyed!

I've continued to be impressed by this vehicle. Even with this completely destroyed U-Joint the Samurai did 70mph+! The vibration was hardly noticeably above 30mph.

The flanges are pretty well ground in one the forward direction. The remaining u-joint held together well enough to keep my going forward.

I dropped it off at Bill Englewood Driveshaft and he was able to get the flanges swapped out and I had my driveshaft back the next day.

I'm still trying to battle noise inside the Samurai. I picked up some Boom Mat to put in some key areas of the tub to see if it helps. I'll keep you all posted!

 

[DETN8R]

I've been battling road noise in the Samurai. I thought that getting the hard top would get the noise down to what I'd consider a reasonable level for the road trips I take with the family.

I started out with purchasing an 8 pack of some 12x12 DEI Boom Mat. DEI states that 100% coverage isn't necessary and that 25%-50% should yeild the same results.
I started by removing the seats and all the carpet. I cleaned the tub of the Samurai with simple green and paper towels.

I put one full sheet under each front seat and in each front floor pan. I put 2.5 sheets underneath the rear seat. I split one sheet and put half on each side of the transmission tunnel.

I reinstalled the carpet and drove it for a couple of days. This small amount of boom mat yielded some small but noticable results.
Enough that I felt justified to order another 8 pack of boom mat as well as DEI's Under Carpet Light. A 48"x70" sheet.

I added some more boom mat to each firewall, the top of the transmission tunnel beneath the heaterbox. I added some to the vertical surfaces above each wheel.
I split one sheet between both wheel wells. During this time my daughter was playing with my phone so I did not get many pictures of the added boom mat.
I started cutting the Under Carpet lite, focusing on the front of the samurai. I spend more time in here than my family since I drive it daily.

I placed a full sheet inside each door.

My daughter also helped me remove the seats this time around. Afterwards she hung around to play on my phone and keep me from taking pictures.

I used some cardboard to make a template for the transmission tunnel.

I tried to completely enclose the tranmission/transfercase tunnel with the undercarpert lite.

I had a nice piece leftover that almost covered the rear of the samurai underneath the rear seat so I begin reinstalling the carpet.

After all this work, which wasn't much, this has yielded some significant results. I'm pretty happy with it.

I'm beginning to suspect some more transmission problems. I've been hearing a whine that goes away whenever I press in the clutch. I figured this was the throwout bearing.
Some more knowledgeable folks have said that it's the input bearing so I believe I may be having louder than usual transmission noise.
My EGR Failure code has also been ever present for the last few weeks. I picked up another head because I suspect my headgasket may be failing too. Sweet smelling exhaust...

While I had the doors taken apart I decided to try swapping in the window channel from the same 4dr sidekick from the junkyard that I got the head from. It's ok.

 

[geckoadventure]

Good work nice to see the old ZOOK's being restored. Plenty of them here with the Nissan SR20DTE engines in them. THat wakes them up lol.

 

[DETN8R]

Good work nice to see the old ZOOK's being restored. Plenty of them here with the Nissan SR20DTE engines in them. THat wakes them up lol.

Thanks!

I wouldn't really say I'm restoring it. I'm just trying to keep it on the road.