1988 Suzuki Samurai Expedition Machine.

Have I told you that this rig makes me break the 10th Commandment?

sweet seats. I did some similar jiggery-pokery to put a power split bench out of an 89 Taurus in the 69 F100 I had years ago.

And Flight's right, that truck is sinfully cool.

Thanks guys. I can honestly say I have enjoyed this build more than just about any other car build I have done.

I let my son drive it home from work today because I had a meeting on the way home. I told him if he wrecked it he had two choices. Come to the house, fess up and die like a man, or make a run for it and I would hunt him down and make it painful.

He's been on Craigslist ever since looking for something similar.

Toyman01 wrote: Still plugging away. Tomorrow was supposed to be the day to finish the front axle but it looks like that won't happen with a 90% chance of rain coming. I did piddle with it some this afternoon. Off road vehicles need lights. As much as I would love lots of super bright LEDs, the budget says Hella halogen instead. A set of Hella 500FFs should do the trick for the front. I'm not sure I like the mounting location, but there aren't a lot of options.

You're welcome. I was working at Rugged Ridge when we were developing our line of winches. We wanted something, ANYTHING, to differentiate our fairlead from every other one out there. Those four holes were what I came up with. Neat to see it in use.

In reply to DILYSI Dave:

Cool! And thanks. I actually had the chance to use the winch, for the first time, this past. The ice storm a couple of weeks ago had dropped a fair sized oak tree across the road and the forest service crews hadn't cleared it yet. It worked like a charm.

Another small update. I had added several circuits to the electrical system for accessories like the air compressor and inverter. When I ran those circuits, I pulled them from the battery with inline fuses. It worked, it looked like crap. It had to go and it was replaced with this:

This gives me 6 fused circuits, looks better and should make troubleshooting easier in the future. The panel came from a boat supply store and all the metal in it is SS, so it should survive under the hood.

If I haven't said this recently, I Love this little truck.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIB8tADe0Jk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHlFmh9DOtA

I have determined the winch was a waste of money.

Haha, you'll need it at some point.

In reply to SyntheticBlinkerFluid:

The way my luck goes, I'll bury it so deep the winch won't help.

Another update.

This thing isn't fast, at all. It's happy at 50, it will go 60 if you don't mind listening to the engine turn 4000 rpms. Anything past that is probably asking for a rod release or valve munching. As I cover all the areas to explore close to home, I'm having to drive farther and farther at highway speeds. So I had an idea to tow it to a base camp or a parking lot and explore from there. I could throw it on a trailer and haul it just about anywhere, but Samurais are still a popular toad for the RV crowd because they flat tow so well. It will also keep my trailer from getting stolen from some parking lot.

I still need to get the wiring for the lights run, but it tows like a dream. Being able to tow it at 65-70 rather than drive it at 50-55 will enlarge my weekend trip area to cover most of the state. Not to mention my truck drives better and has A/C.

I'm looking for a slide in camper for my F350 now.

Oh, here are a couple of more pictures.

Parked down on the edge of the Santee River.

A old engine I came across on the side of the road. I think it's a diesel. For comparison, my son is 5'10"

This is a boiler that was in the same field.

You have seriously inspired me to try and build something similar. I am sorta near the areas you are exploring and want to try it out. Gotta sell a toy and then turn the money into an expedition vehicle.

I've has a lot of fun working on it. Probably the only thing I would do different is a smaller set of tires and lower it some. For 95% of what I do, the lift isn't necessary. It is fun to have the other 5% of the time.

Update again.

We've had some beautiful weather, so any excuse to be outside is a good one.

As clean as it looks, there are still a couple of rust spots. They were't major but they needed some attention. There is a paint job in the distant future, so I didn't need to do a perfect job, but I did need to stop them from getting worse. First step was to sand them down to metal and neutralize the rust. I use Ospho, but there are others on the market. Ospho turns iron oxide into iron phosphate. I've had good luck with it stopping rust from spreading.

Then a shot of silver paint. Naturally, Samurai silver isn't available so Ford silver will have to work.

Good enough.

While I was at it, I cleaned up the rusty windshield wiper arms and painted them.

In reply to iadr:

Numerically taller. It might be a location thing. Around here 5.38s are taller than 4.57.

For gearing calculators, I've been using a Samurai specific one that already has all the transfer case, transmission and axle gear ratios in it, as well as tire sizes. It makes it easy. I did bookmark the one you posted for future reference. Thanks.

OK, another update.

I've been hauling a canoe on the roof rack. It works well, but I need to haul two canoes, 4 people, life vests, paddles, cooler, food, the usual for a day on the lake or a camping trip. That means hauling a trailer. If you remember, I cut the factory hitch off because it interfered with the rear shackle mounts. That meant I needed to fabricate another hitch. I wanted something bolt on, strong enough to be the rear tow point and it needed to accept a receiver for a future hitch mounted winch.

What I ended up with is this:

This started out life as a hitch for a Chevy Venture. It was 1/2" too wide for the Samurai frame and I needed it to bolt to the side of the frame rather then the bottom. Nothing a little cutting and welding couldn't fix.

It tucks up nicely under the bumper.

The trailer in question.

The trailer was acquired from Curmudgeon. It originally hauled kayaks. I'm going to be turning it into a canoe hauler/camping trailer. It will be going under the knife soon. It will probably get it's own build thread.

More to come as it happens.

Well, I still have it and have done a little work to it. I swapped the 3rd members back out for the stock gearing and in the process took the spool out of the rear axle. The rear axle was starting to make a good bit of noise. I thought it was the gear set puking, but having 1/8" of lateral play in a wheel bearing doesn't make for a quiet axle. It drives much better now.

That gave me a great excuse to buy a few more tools which is always a good thing.

A nice new bearing puller.

And, since I could get them off, I had to be able to put them back. Yes, I know my shop is a disaster.

At any rate, the gears are changed which brings me back to the original problem. Not enough HP to pull them. At 60 in 4th it's turning 3500. In 5th it's turning about 3000 and loosing speed. It needs a little more mid-range power.

The next piece of the puzzle was waiting for me when I got home today.

This is a small one, a GT15. I'm not looking for absolute HP. I'd like to be making boost at 2500 rpms or less, and I don't care if it falls flat at 4500. We'll see if I got it right.

I'll be building a simple manifold for it and then trying to figure out how to get enough fuel in it. Probably not the easiest way to get the job done, but it should be fun. At least until it spits a rod out of the oil pan.

More to come as it happens.

SWEET!

fantastic!!

Needs moar Uwharrie content in this thread.

In reply to ScreaminE:

I tried to make it up to the Zuwharrie Suzuki event the end of April. I even had a campsite reserved at Arrowhead, but plans just didn't come together. I'll have to try again later in the year.

I'm torn with the turbo news. On one hand, this is a darn nice mostly unmolested tin top Samurai. On the other hand, TURBO!

In reply to mazdeuce:

Unmolested except for the 1.6 engine swap out of a Sidekick. Besides, I'm not molesting it, I am "adjusting" it a little. I'm doing what the Suzuki engineers should have done at the factory.

I'm doing my best to not let this turn into a hack, but if the turbo trick doesn't work, it's probably getting another engine swap. I've been eyeballing the 3.4 and the 5 speed in the Camaro pretty hard with a measuring tape and it will fit inside the body. The other possibility is a VW Turbo Diesel.

Either that or I'm going down in tire size and putting the axles back on top of the springs. It's extremely off road capable as it sits, it just needs some on road help. If I go through with my plan to drive it 4000 miles to Oregon, along the Trans America Trail, it needs some better street manners. That and being able to keep up with traffic would help. I want the best of all the worlds. Enough power to get the job done and enough fuel economy to not break the bank. I would so love 25 mpg and the ability to run 65-70 mph. That's not going to happen so I'll settle for 17-18 mpg and 65-70 mph. I'm getting close, it just needs a little more mid-range oomph.

which 1.6 is swapped in there?

just read that it's the 8 valve. i'd look real hard at the 16v MPFI version before i went with a v6, cooling one in that small package is a bear