Pickup cab on an 80 series chassis?

etzicle

New member
As the title says, I'm interested in the feasibility of mounting a 4th gen or 5th gen toyota pickup single cab onto a locked 80 series chassis. Can anyone point me to someone who has already done this? Does anyone have any insight about the process to accomplish this/how well it would work? Any manual transmission ideas for a build like this?
 

etzicle

New member
It will be an A, that'll be done before the new cab is put on. I'm more interested in the logistics of the cab swap. I explored the option of the axles under a 5th gen pickup but read too much of suspension/spring perch nightmares and weak guts. So, got any input on the cab swap idea?
 

RadarVector

Party on Wayne
I've heard of people using an 80 series chassis and grafting a 70 series body on. Never a Tacoma.

Obviously in the US this is the only way to get a 70ish series.

Good luck!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

RMP&O

Expedition Leader
To me it seems much easier to just make the 80 a pickup by cutting the body up.

Issues with a Taco on an 80 would be;
cab width compared to frame.
Frame length compared to a Taco, my 04 Taco was longer than my 80.
width of axles, how much are they going to stick out? My Taco was narrower than my 80.
steering? Use the Taco or 80? Graft the two?


Cheers
 

Metcalf

Expedition Leader
I'm building an FJ45-esk body on top of an FJ80 frame...



The FJ80 chassis is rather interesting. The high pinion front differential makes packaging the front driveshaft and engine challenging. I don't like how low the rear control arm brackets hang, but it isn't a deal breaker. The front suspension has about 1.5" more compression travel than the rear suspension at full bump if the chassis is level. The steering is nice and compact. The front of the frame is pretty narrow for the axle width. I was able to clear 40" tires lock to lock with a 17x9 wheel and 3.63" backspacing. The rear of the frame with the coil buckets is pretty tall. I don't know how much depth this will leave in the bed. The belly section of the frame is 6" tall.
 
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Metcalf

Expedition Leader
Some more interesting things about the 80 series chassis.

-The stock front shock mounts will fit a 10-11" travel shock. The stock front coils will also cycle that much shock while keeping some preload on the spring at full droop.
-The stock rear shocks mounts will fit a 9.5-10.5" shock. Stock rear coils will also cycle that with preload.
-The front suspension has a separate mounting cone for the front bumpstops...this will let you mount upgrade units without having to cut the coil mounts up.
-The rear suspension has dual bumpstops. The inner bumpstops inside the coils act like an overload while the outer units under the frame act as the final uptravel limiting point
 

Metcalf

Expedition Leader
I'm not talking about an over priced 25+ year old model. I want a newer version.

There is that old saying about wanting in one hand and doing something in the other.

You could always move to another country that offers those vehicles. If you want to stay in the good ol' USA, you probably aren't going to be able to get exactly what you want all the time at fair prices.

Slee got off the pot, and ponied up some serious cash, to build exactly what they wanted in this project....

http://www.fourwheeler.com/features...es-the-best-toyota-parts-in-one-land-cruiser/

Something like that is going to be in excess of 100K easy.
 

collk22

Observer
There is that old saying about wanting in one hand and doing something in the other.

You could always move to another country that offers those vehicles. If you want to stay in the good ol' USA, you probably aren't going to be able to get exactly what you want all the time at fair prices.

Slee got off the pot, and ponied up some serious cash, to build exactly what they wanted in this project....

http://www.fourwheeler.com/features...es-the-best-toyota-parts-in-one-land-cruiser/

Something like that is going to be in excess of 100K easy.

Slee also cut an 80 into a Ute, which seems far more approachable than trying to recreate the truck they built in the fourwheeler.com article:

http://www.sleeoffroad.com/technical/vlakvark/vlakvark_main.htm
 

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