El Burro - 1989 4Runner Build

[TheCascadeKid]

No way, my girlfriend used to do their social media and helped with the women's line they put out last year. We still have a pair of second year Billy Goats in the garage for friends that visit since I've gone back to snowboarding full time.

That's awesome! The ones with helicopters on the left ski? If so I definitely built those!

 

[TheCascadeKid]

It took a bit longer than expected, but I finished installing my exhaust tonight. I'm just waiting on some new hangers I ordered to keep it all tucked up out of harms way.

​

Of course this configuratoin leaves my downstream O2 sensor about 8" short from making the connection to the engine harness, so tomorrows task will be to solder in an extension.

My list of tasks to compete the swap is getting shorter!

• Extend 02 Sensor wire
• Mount Battery
• Bleed Clutch
• Solder in Reverse Light Switch
• Solder in 4WD Detection Switch
• Clean Up Wiring Harness

I promise my harness looks worse than it is! I tested it with all my connections completed with wire nuts to make sure I didn't make any errors before soldering or repining. After that I have a few others parts on the garage shelves to install and she'll be ready for a road test!


All said an done this a very manageable swap for a solid increase in power and drive-ability. Yotatech is definitely the best source of information on this topic, but I would be happy to answer questions for anyone considering this swap!

​

 

[TheCascadeKid]

I spent a good part of this weekend working to wrap up the swap. I knocked out most of my list, but of course some new issues have now surfaced. I cleaned up my wiring harness and got all my wire runs tidied up under the hood and body of the truck. It felt good to finally square away the rats nest that my harness had become and get it tucked away in the passenger kick panel.

​

After an unsuccessful first attempt at bleading my clutch a week ago I was able to get enough pressure in the system to pull her forward and back in garage. Progress! The proper action would be to bench bleed the MC, but I'll get to that another day. Ok, now the driveway shuffle to get El Burro out of the garage to stretch her legs on the street. Easier said than done when the last summer's unfinished landscaping project and a boat lie en route down my one lane driveway...but alas I made it out! I even got to bust out the maxtraxs when I was flexed on a pallet of landscaping rocks and spinning a wheel in my sand pile

But then she was free!

unnamed by Duncan MacDiarmid, on Flickr

A spin around the block confirmed that I definitely need to bleed the power steering system and my temperature gauge is acting up. The temperature gauge in this era of Toyotas is known for being unreliable and acting up as mine is. This isn't a good thing under normal circumstances, and it's extra troubling when I'm trying to monitor my coolant system to ensure it's functioning. The fact that there's some smoke from burning off all the dust/oil/various solvents that have been collecting on this engine for the last 2 years isn't reassuring me either. I took it out for a second spin (probably 20 blocks) to see if the temp gauge would start acting normal but alas no such luck. I parked her and called it quits for the night.

I need to hook up a switched power source and ground to my OBDII port to start reading engine data. From that I'll be able to monitor the temp close enough to start trouble shooting without the concern of overheating.

 

[redforman]

Awesome 4runner! I have an 88 that's almost identical to your's. Mine's automatic, 3.0 V6 with almost 300k miles on it. Still running "well" but it's due for some major work so I'm looking at my options.
Your thread particularly peaked my interest with your 3.4 swap and your mention of a camper build for it. I'm in the info gathering phase of a 3.4 swap. I'm also toying with different build ideas for camping. I was wondering how your swap is going and what camper ideas your toying with? My ambitious side likes a mash up of miniorf's Tacoma camper build and stormnmormn's 88 4runner rear shell modification. In reality my ambitious side may lose out to my lack of skill lol.

Here it is the day I picked it up in Portland, April 2014. Drove it home to Toronto without a problem. Currently residing in my garage for the winter.

 

[Crenshaw]

Get that OBD port hooked up pronto so you can keep an eye on the temps. I remember having a bit a of a fiasco getting my 3.4 bled properly for a while after my swap- I can't remember exactly what hoops I had to jump through but if finally worked itself out.

Man I miss my '87- I would sure love to have another 1st gen but to find one that's not totally ragged on for a reasonable price seems like a thing of the past. Hit me up if you have any questions about your swap. I've put 10 or 15k on mine with literally zero issues.


Here is my solution for the hood clearance issue. I should've made the hole just slightly larger as it's slowly self-clearancing itself further as time goes on. I, like you, was really opposed to adding a body lift- chopping the hood didn't really bother me.

 

[redthies]

Here is my solution for the hood clearance issue. I should've made the hole just slightly larger as it's slowly self-clearancing itself further as time goes on. I, like you, was really opposed to adding a body lift- chopping the hood didn't really bother me.

Too funny. I was just going to post a link to your solution as I just read it yesterday. I like the hand hammered look!

Awesome 'Runner Cat! I have been shopping for a nice 84-88 pickup or 4Runner, but stumbled on to a super cheap and clean '96. No 3.4 swap needed

 

[austintaco]

I have not tried this yet, but I bought a speed bleeder meant for brakes and I have it on my clutch. They worked great for bleeding brakes, but I have not finished hooking up the slave and master on the clutch to test it out. I'll let you know how it goes.

 

[TheCascadeKid]

Awesome 4runner! I have an 88 that's almost identical to your's. Mine's automatic, 3.0 V6 with almost 300k miles on it. Still running "well" but it's due for some major work so I'm looking at my options.
Your thread particularly peaked my interest with your 3.4 swap and your mention of a camper build for it. I'm in the info gathering phase of a 3.4 swap. I'm also toying with different build ideas for camping. I was wondering how your swap is going and what camper ideas your toying with? My ambitious side likes a mash up of miniorf's Tacoma camper build and stormnmormn's 88 4runner rear shell modification. In reality my ambitious side may lose out to my lack of skill lol.

Here it is the day I picked it up in Portland, April 2014. Drove it home to Toronto without a problem. Currently residing in my garage for the winter.

View attachment 388238

That looks like a super clean 88. Nice find!

As for the swap I would start by reading this thread. https://www.yotatech.com/f160/3-4-swap-101-a-239002/ From there just start searching yotatech every time you run into an issue and chances are someone has documented the solution. The most daunting part for me was definitely making the wiring harness. After reading a few tutorials and staring at wiring diagrams it starts to make sense. Let me know if you have any questions!

My camper plans continue to evolve. Currently I plan to remove the top and replace it with a forward hinge pop top. I keep wavering on the balancing having space in the camper while not trying to cram too much into a tight space.

As for my swap I'm about 95% of the way there. I drove it far enough to flush out a few issues. The main one being a high idle. I pulled my IAC valve and it was filthy as expected. It's supposed to allow coolant to pass through, but the inlet hose was full and the outlet was dry. Hopefully that's it.

Now - I have a serious problem with starting new project before finishing others. With my 4Runner out of the garage for the first time since buying my house I got really excited about the potential to insulate the walls to make winter wrenching a bit more comfortable. That led to sheet rocking the walls...I was going to save the ceiling for later, but I knew "later" would soon become "never"...so i cleaned out the rafters, re-did some wiring for my shop lights, insulated the ceiling, and hung the sheet rock. Just need to tape and paint the ceiling before I pull el Burro back in and finish up the swap so I can start in on the camper. It's been a two week detour, but I can't wait to work in the clean, bright, re-organized space!

Cheers to 80's Toyotas!

 

[TheCascadeKid]

Crenshaw - I've always been a huge fan of "old's cool" thread and your truck. Do you feel like the 4.88's are a good match for your 33's and the 3.4?

I'll definitely get the temp monitoring sorted before a longer drive. It made me very uneasy driving without the ability to monitor it knowing the system likely needed to be burped. thanks for the offer, and I'll definitely hit you up if I run into any (more) issues!

 

[TheCascadeKid]

I have not tried this yet, but I bought a speed bleeder meant for brakes and I have it on my clutch. They worked great for bleeding brakes, but I have not finished hooking up the slave and master on the clutch to test it out. I'll let you know how it goes.

Love to hear how this works out! I hear good things and my girlfriend would love it if I quite dragging her out to the garage to help me bleed the brakes, clutch, etc.

Along the lines of bleeding - Anybody have a good method for getting the air out of the powers steering system? All the methods I have found seem to be rather slow.

Jack up truck. Turn the wheel lock to lock a dozen times. Lower truck. Run engine. Wait 20 minutes for bubbles to go away and repeat for a couple hours until no bubbles are created. Very doable, but I would love a better method if it's out there!

 

[Crenshaw]

Crenshaw - I've always been a huge fan of "old's cool" thread and your truck. Do you feel like the 4.88's are a good match for your 33's and the 3.4?

I'll definitely get the temp monitoring sorted before a longer drive. It made me very uneasy driving without the ability to monitor it knowing the system likely needed to be burped. thanks for the offer, and I'll definitely hit you up if I run into any (more) issues!

Yeah, 4.88s are just about perfect. I did them when I still had the 3.0 and they pretty much necessary at that point. With the 3.4 you could probably get away with 4.10s and not feel horribly gutless but not ideal. I stumbled into my 4.88s for a raging deal years ago and just couldn't pass it up.

I need to post some updates on my pickup in the Old's Cool thread, it's got some new suspension, tires, some other stuff- almost 100k views in there! I've never been very good at build threads or updates, always way more interested in other people's projects than my own!

 

[TheCascadeKid]

Well, that 4 week garage project managed to stretch to a short 6 months. Yikes! It's finally just about back together, and I should be pulling the 4Runner back into the garage after the long weekend.

Luckily one of the reasons for the delay is the unreal nice summer we are having up in the NW. I've been getting out for some weekends in the back of my gen 1 Taco. I picked this up when I pulled the engine on the 4Runner (3 short years ago) so I would still have a way to get out into the woods. In celebration of occasionally finishing a project and getting back to work on el Burro; here are a couple shots from the Eclipse and the 4Runners new home.

Hope everybody has a great, safe long weekend

IMG_3337 by Duncan MacDiarmid, on Flickr


IMG_3258 (1) by Duncan MacDiarmid, on Flickr


IMG_3307 by Duncan MacDiarmid, on Flickr


IMG_3304 by Duncan MacDiarmid, on Flickr

 

[TheCascadeKid]

Started working on installing an auxiliary temperature gauge tonight. I plan on using a joint pipe radiator coupling for the install. Unfortunately it's threaded for a 1/8 npt sensor and mine is 3/8. Looks like I have a good excuse to buy a tap set

In the mean time I checked my gauge tonight to ensure it's accurate. Just a hair over 210 in boiling water. Good to go!

IMG_3357 by Duncan MacDiarmid, on Flickr

 

[L3TT3RS]

Subd

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

 

[Stoffregen Motorsports]

I know how you feel. Personal projects get relegated to the back burner. I spent 3 straight months getting my '83 Toyota project running and driving with the intention of having it complete for KOH...2016. It's still under a cover on the side of the shop.

Someone should invent a new stove with all the back burners moved to the front.