What's up guys! All of you know me by the red 83' hilux I used to have. Well I sold the V8 X-cab last night and just picked up a sweet new ride.

It's a 1979 Toyota Pickup SR-5 longbed in smurf blue. I got it from the original owner, with the original manuals from the dealership, and with only 97,000 miles ran through the 20r. My plans for it are the initial maintenance, notch, drop, and wheels for now. There is some rust that needs to be attended to and paint will probably follow shortly after. It needs a good clean and some love, but nothing that I am not capable of. I'll be sure to keep a clean build thread with pictures of everything so you guys can keep up with whats happening. I'm hoping to have it dropped and on rims before Toyotafest, but we will see what fun things we run into. Here's some pictures of it, I'll take better ones tomorrow while I'm cleaning it up.

I bought it about 100 miles away and after being non op for 3 years, she fired right up and handled the drive home perfectly. Gotta love toyotas!


This is going to be fun!

 

Nice but I what i really like is your smurf blue shirt that is themed with your truck. Now thats true toyota fan...

 

Gotta love the smurftastic blue.... lol. Pretty excited to see how this build goes....

 

Sweet truck........congrats!

 

Congrats on getting the truck, I'm really happy for you. Looks to be in pretty good shape.

What a small world w live in, you are in basically the excate same situation I was in when I bought my truck, stock, shell, 1 owner. I remember the first thing I did was pull off the shell and rear bumper, made a big difference and started cleaning it up.

Congrats again and just start doing one thing at a time.

Thought I'd share this pic of the ad fpr my truck in 08, I paid $2200.00, what did you pay if you don't mind me asking, wondering how different Ca is from Wa on pricing of our trucks?

 

Congrats on finding another mini bro!!!! Someday ill find the one im looking for and get back in the scene.

 

Right on man! Welcome back to the game. Can't wait to see where you go with this!!!

 

I remember seeing this truck on CL. That's cool buying this truck off the 1st and original owner and the mileage is awesome for its age. I'm clocking 276,000 miles on mine. I simply love the '79-'83 trucks!!!

Rick

 

nice ride.

 

Thanks for the warm welcome guys! I'm going to post updates when anything is done to keep you in the loop. When I got the truck the engine needed a significant tune up. The hoses that were supposed to be hard were soft and the soft lines were hard. Along with some other maintenance stuff, me and SD_YOTA had a full day or wrenching.

So, waiting outside for Alex's ass to crawl out of bed and get last night's questionable substance our of his beard, I was bored and picked at what seemed to be like a little rust.......



It grew dramatically, but nothing that cannot be fixed in time.



Then we went to our first of 3 trips to autozone to pick up what we thought was everything we needed for a good tune up.



While alex got started on the engine work I got going on the interior which was horrid...



Stripped...



meanwhile...



We took the carpet to a laundromat and it actually cleaned just about 33 of the 34 years of stains out of the carpet.



This is what we got done on the engine (when I say we, I mean Yota )

* Coolant flush
* Oil Change
* Air filter
* Plugs & wires
* Distributor cap, rotor
* Radiator Cap
* Choke Hose
* EVERY damn vacuum line
* Fuel Filter
* Fuel lines
* Carb cleaned
* Throttle Spring
* Thermostat (didn't have one)
We still have tranny fluid, rear fluid, timing, and belts to do another day. Can you believe this thing took over 30 feet to replace the vacuum lines! Ridiculous!



Less old now....



After all of that it was too dark to take pictures, but we took the camper shell and rack off. It looks much better.

I'll be placing a suspension order in the next few hours, but will hold off on installing until I can get a notch.

Here's what were looking at for the drop:
* Bel-tec Drop leafs (3")
* 5-6" beef blocks (5-6")
* 84 ball joints
* Lowering arms (3")
* Toxic shocks (3")
* Torsion drop & re-key (2-3")
* Either helper bags or airshocks

That is going to put me at a 8-9 front, 8-9 rear drop with adjustability in the rear to carry a load in the bed. Should be killer! So keep checking the build and i'll keep updating til I'm out of money! haha.

 

i got a smurf blue yota yesterday too mines a 79 sb just swapped a w58 for the l43 last night afterwork so im jealous of your factory overdrive you got a job to handle with that rust maybe just look for a clean cab to swap?

 

ps love all the fishing gear in the cap reminds me of my first 82 it had a boot on it and a carpeted pad kinda like yours

 

It's rare to see that much rust on a SoCal truck. Originaly an out of state truck? You must have got a killer deal on that truck

btw, 5-6" blocks? Is that safe?

 

I saw quite a few cabs at the yard today that were worthy doners. could take a roof clip too and get that welded on. Just seems like a lot of work so it will come after the suspension work.

I don't know if it is originally from CA, but it's because he stored his boat on top and apparently that is where the water likes to drip off the boat and make a cozy home.

And as far as the blocks I am going to do a link from the cross-member to axle to keep axle wrap at a minimum, so it should be just fine.







also have a little update. did tranny fluid, diff fluid, timing, carb power mod today and scored on a solid rear in the yard that I'll be throwing on soon. My camera was dead but I snapped a few pictures with my phone.





also, theres a yota in town I literally ALWAYS gives thumbs ups to, and I can never track him down... Saw him today again. the mystery goes on.... heres his ride:

 

Goodies are on the way! Just ordered rims, tires, airshocks, drop leafs, compressor, toxic's, mirrors, and a bed mat. Now I need to get the notch by beef, some beef blocks, and a bench seat and this **** will be popping.

Still have not even had a chance to wash her Been too busy getting parts. But stay tuned

 

hope you saved the cap they are getting hard to come by and nice to have when you need them plus theyll save your ass in a roll believe me in know

 

Cap's on the corner for anyone to pick up. I have no place to store it.

Today I put the solid rear window in and gave it a wash finally. Looks so much better. Finally looks like a truck! Now for suspension

 

Man look at you go! Sweet deal man, i dig the smurf blue myself! unfortunately mine came "primer" gray aka house paint w/ brush marks all over haha. I'd be interested in seeing your link setup to reduce axle wrap when you do it, im getting hop clear into 2nd up to 45mph if i lay into it on 3" blocks right now.

 

I recognise him from another forum, I have been following his thread, just cant exactly remember now. Toyota Nation I think.

 

anyone driving east with a longbed and want to drop a camper in the middle of oklahoma?