Solid Axle Swap

The Reason
My whole family is into toyota's, and at the time I owned a 1988 Toyota Supra Trubo running, being that I live in Utah, this was not good in the winter time. So, I needed a truck. But at the same time I wanted to be able to haul people around, so in February of 2000 I got a 1994 4runner(I actually was looking for a 1994 Supra, but the dealer couldn't find one for me). Anyway I enjoyed the 4runner.....for a little while. There was definatly something wrong. It was a nice vehicle to drive, but that is not what I want. After taking it wheeling a few times, I knew something needed to be done I noticed that my friends solid axle trucks could go many more places than my brother and myself. My brother also had a 4runner, but with a 4" lift and 33" tires. But because of his IFS, he got stuck all the time. I knew right then, I had to have a solid axle.

So, I spent months researching what to do and how to do it. There were people who bought kits, and people who made thier own kits. I took the route of making my own, and using parts of kits. Throughout the next few months I collected and made parts to start the conversion. Hangers:

I built my own front spring hanger derived from plans I got from David Moore. I then purchased a set of rear spring hangers for the rear of the rear spring hanger on an 84 pickup.

Axle:

The I picked up was from an 1981 Toyota Pickup. It wasn't in the greated shape, but it would do. I would just have to sandblast it and give it a nice rebuild kit. I used FJ60 rotors and the calipers off my old ifs suspension.

Springs:

I build the spring pack from a datsun, mazda, and 3rd generation toyota truck. With these springs, I built my front springs. I really don't like the way they turned out, so I will probably order a set of custom Alcan's

Steering:

For steering, I used a set of All-Pro Hy-Steer steering arms, All-Pro tie rod and drag link, FJ80 tie rod ends, and a modifed pitman arm. The pitman arm had to be modified because the joint was built into the pitman arm, but the FJ80 tie rod end has the joint built into it. So to fix this, I had the joint in the pitman arm removed, took an end off my old steering linkage, sized it to fit into the pitman arm, and had it welded in place. This end already had the correct taper to fit the FJ80 end, so re-tapping was not neccesary.

Shock Mounts:

I used some ford shock mounts that I got for really cheap from the dealer in combination with some 1" steel bar. I shapted the steel bar and welded the shock mount to the bar, and the bar to the frame.

Starting the conversion

I began by torching off all the ifs stuff. This took me a couple days, one, I had never used a torch before, two, my cutting tip was bad. Well, got off all the ifs junk, and ground all left-over stuff as best as I could. Because I do not weld, I had the front and rear hangers welded on while the ifs was still attached. This made it a little tricky for mesuring(in fact it will end up costing me). But it was all I could do at the time. After everything was out of the way, and several trips to the hardware store, I bolted up the springs. Using ubolts I had made from six states, I tightened up the axle to the springs and preceden on building up the knuckles with the FJ60 rotors and the IFS calipers. After axle was secured, I connected the tie rot and drag link, and got the toe as close as I could. Longer break lines were of installed, and of course after bleeding them, I was up and ready to start driving. There are of course a lot of little bugs I have to work out, but it is nice to be solidified.