Mods
2.5 inch straight through exhaust, Webasto coolant heater, fiberglass box, custom built micro computer (work in progress)
Build story
What I have here is my 1986 Toyota Pickup/Hilux with a factory 2.4L turbocharged diesel engine. This truck is identified from toyota as an LN66 model. This model was specific to Canada only and was built between the years 1985-1987. Every mod ive done is completely reversible to a factory state as this was a major goal of the build. Firstly, ive added a webasto coolant heater as pictured. The entire webasto system is contained in the ammo can which is placed in the secondary battery box slot. This means it is as simple as removing the 2 coolant lines, the fuel line and the switch wires and the whole setup can lift out of the truck. Ive removed the lid of the can for picture purposes, but when the lid is on, it makes the system look like a second battery. This also makes the system sleek and clean. Ive added a custom 2.5 inch straight through exhaust from the turbo back. The factory exhaust is completely intact and can be replaced if wanted. Ive also added an EGT sensor, oil pressure sensor and boost gauge. The gauges are ugly and out of place so we are going to be replacing them with a computer that will read all the data and send it to the touch screen radio as a display. The computer will have control over the radio meaning that if a sensor relays non-optimal numbers back to the computer, it will switch displays and warn the driver of the problem by activating warning light and the door alarm. The computer being a custom addition also means we can customize the computer to control the webasto heater. The truck is going to have its own sim card installed into the computer meaning I will be able to text my trucks computer and tell it to turn on the webasto anywhere in the world. This will also allow me to track the whereabouts of the truck and remotely disable the truck in an event of it being stolen. This system is still a work in progress, but should be installed by the start of the summer. \r
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This project came to light by complete accident and a number of lucky scores and close calls. Here's the story as to how I got the truck, and what ive done to the truck over the 4 years ive owned it.\r
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In early 2016, I had just received my license and along side my first car, a 2003 VW jetta with the 1.9 TDI turbo diesel engine. The car was bought for scrap value as the engine had a valve strike. Me and my father fixed it for cheap and thus it became my beater to learn stick in. To make a long story short, I was out fooling around with my friends one day when I decided to back the car into a fence, bending and breaking too many parts that were not worth replacing. Thus began the search for a new vehicle.\r
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It was August of 2016 when my dad sent me the link for this truck. $500, rough start, white smoke and no power, the ad had been up for 1 day at this point. I figured it would be a fun truck to throw some money into to make it a new daily driver. I messaged the guy selling the truck only to get a response back that he had received over 12 emails and 3 people asking to put payments on the truck. After some persuasion, I managed to convince the seller to let me go out same day with the cash in hand and take it off his hands, and that's exactly what I did.\r
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Skipping ahead a few months, me and my father had done some diagnosing and eventually ruled out that the engine needed to be pulled and rebuilt. once the engine was removed and tore down, we discovered that the engine was in very rough shape, cylinders 1 and 4 had excessive scoring, the rings on almost all pistons had broken, it was a mess. With weeks of research and data collecting, we eventually realized that what we bought was much more rare than we had originally thought. The true rarity of this vehicle came to light when Toyota told us that the truck didn't exist. \r
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Skipping more months, we realized that the old engine was going to need more money than what was willing to be spent in order for it to return to a operable state. Weeks of searching for the correct engine came back with zero promising results until, out of all places, our local Parts Source chain came to the rescue.\r
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The Part Source in my town is the only Part Source in all of Canada to have an attached machine shop with machinists on staff. When we mentioned we were searching for a 2LT toyota diesel to an employee, the employee calmly mentioned that he had an entire short block complete with head, valves, springs and camshaft just sitting in the machine shop. Turns out, the engine was brought into the store to have work done years prior only to have the owner never return for the engine. After all was said and done, we walked out with an almost complete engine with over $1500 of engine work done to it for $300.\r
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Months go by as me and my father slowly collect parts necessary to build up the new engine. This task brought us all over the world with almost all the engine parts being from Japan, Australia, Russia and the UAE. We are full steam ahead on rebuilding the new engine, top to bottom, for our very first time. This process took close to 4 months to complete as me and my father took as many steps we could to make sure we didnt screw up the rebuild. In the summer of 2018, we heard the freshly rebuilt engine fire up to life for its first time. After roughly 1 week of careful commuting, we discovered a severe lack of power, lots of smoke and louder and normal valves. We returned the truck to the garage only to realize after pulling the truck apart that we had accidentally set the cam and crank timing via the timing belt out 180 degrees of rotation meaning we set the engine on TDC for cylinders 2 and 3, not 1 and 4. This mistake almost cost us our new block and caused some valve damage, however, by shear luck, we had decided to use the old engines head instead of building the new one and upon inspection of the new pistons, none had struck any valves or obtained any damage.\r
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Ever since the timing incident, there was always issues with the head making excessive tapping noises, however, the truck ran well enough for us to in the mean time source parts for the new head and to move on to other parts of the truck.\r
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With this being a Canadian truck, unsurprisingly, it had rust issues. The box was toast and in turn had us looking for a new one. This task was much harder than anticipated as Toyota used a number of different bed styles on this truck. The box my truck needed was a Xtra cab short box with the Canadian model only box style. With some research, we learned that a man in Canada built full fiberglass boxes for these trucks upon request. The excitement of a having a fiberglass box was quickly extinguished once we learned the builder was 3 Years back ordered. Searching began once again for a metal box in better shape than what we had until somehow, once again, god came through and presented us a Kijiji ad for the exact type of fiberglass box we needed for the truck. Not only had we lucked out on finding a new engine, but a brand new fiberglass box that was an exact fit for the truck.\r
Once we got the new box, paint was next. We had a local body shop paint the truck its original colours.\r
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Once we found the new head and all the necessary parts required for the new head, we built it up and replaced old for new. The truck has been running excellent ever since. We have since started rebuilding the old engine so we can have a spare just in case something were to happen.\r
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That leads us to today. The truck continues to run amazingly and its proven to be one of the most reliable vehicles we own that turns a lot of heads. Thanks for reading my story!
\r
This project came to light by complete accident and a number of lucky scores and close calls. Here's the story as to how I got the truck, and what ive done to the truck over the 4 years ive owned it.\r
\r
In early 2016, I had just received my license and along side my first car, a 2003 VW jetta with the 1.9 TDI turbo diesel engine. The car was bought for scrap value as the engine had a valve strike. Me and my father fixed it for cheap and thus it became my beater to learn stick in. To make a long story short, I was out fooling around with my friends one day when I decided to back the car into a fence, bending and breaking too many parts that were not worth replacing. Thus began the search for a new vehicle.\r
\r
It was August of 2016 when my dad sent me the link for this truck. $500, rough start, white smoke and no power, the ad had been up for 1 day at this point. I figured it would be a fun truck to throw some money into to make it a new daily driver. I messaged the guy selling the truck only to get a response back that he had received over 12 emails and 3 people asking to put payments on the truck. After some persuasion, I managed to convince the seller to let me go out same day with the cash in hand and take it off his hands, and that's exactly what I did.\r
\r
Skipping ahead a few months, me and my father had done some diagnosing and eventually ruled out that the engine needed to be pulled and rebuilt. once the engine was removed and tore down, we discovered that the engine was in very rough shape, cylinders 1 and 4 had excessive scoring, the rings on almost all pistons had broken, it was a mess. With weeks of research and data collecting, we eventually realized that what we bought was much more rare than we had originally thought. The true rarity of this vehicle came to light when Toyota told us that the truck didn't exist. \r
\r
Skipping more months, we realized that the old engine was going to need more money than what was willing to be spent in order for it to return to a operable state. Weeks of searching for the correct engine came back with zero promising results until, out of all places, our local Parts Source chain came to the rescue.\r
\r
The Part Source in my town is the only Part Source in all of Canada to have an attached machine shop with machinists on staff. When we mentioned we were searching for a 2LT toyota diesel to an employee, the employee calmly mentioned that he had an entire short block complete with head, valves, springs and camshaft just sitting in the machine shop. Turns out, the engine was brought into the store to have work done years prior only to have the owner never return for the engine. After all was said and done, we walked out with an almost complete engine with over $1500 of engine work done to it for $300.\r
\r
Months go by as me and my father slowly collect parts necessary to build up the new engine. This task brought us all over the world with almost all the engine parts being from Japan, Australia, Russia and the UAE. We are full steam ahead on rebuilding the new engine, top to bottom, for our very first time. This process took close to 4 months to complete as me and my father took as many steps we could to make sure we didnt screw up the rebuild. In the summer of 2018, we heard the freshly rebuilt engine fire up to life for its first time. After roughly 1 week of careful commuting, we discovered a severe lack of power, lots of smoke and louder and normal valves. We returned the truck to the garage only to realize after pulling the truck apart that we had accidentally set the cam and crank timing via the timing belt out 180 degrees of rotation meaning we set the engine on TDC for cylinders 2 and 3, not 1 and 4. This mistake almost cost us our new block and caused some valve damage, however, by shear luck, we had decided to use the old engines head instead of building the new one and upon inspection of the new pistons, none had struck any valves or obtained any damage.\r
\r
Ever since the timing incident, there was always issues with the head making excessive tapping noises, however, the truck ran well enough for us to in the mean time source parts for the new head and to move on to other parts of the truck.\r
\r
With this being a Canadian truck, unsurprisingly, it had rust issues. The box was toast and in turn had us looking for a new one. This task was much harder than anticipated as Toyota used a number of different bed styles on this truck. The box my truck needed was a Xtra cab short box with the Canadian model only box style. With some research, we learned that a man in Canada built full fiberglass boxes for these trucks upon request. The excitement of a having a fiberglass box was quickly extinguished once we learned the builder was 3 Years back ordered. Searching began once again for a metal box in better shape than what we had until somehow, once again, god came through and presented us a Kijiji ad for the exact type of fiberglass box we needed for the truck. Not only had we lucked out on finding a new engine, but a brand new fiberglass box that was an exact fit for the truck.\r
Once we got the new box, paint was next. We had a local body shop paint the truck its original colours.\r
\r
Once we found the new head and all the necessary parts required for the new head, we built it up and replaced old for new. The truck has been running excellent ever since. We have since started rebuilding the old engine so we can have a spare just in case something were to happen.\r
\r
That leads us to today. The truck continues to run amazingly and its proven to be one of the most reliable vehicles we own that turns a lot of heads. Thanks for reading my story!