After owning 2 previous SWB Monteros, I decided that I missed them and wanted another. Another member was selling his parts 89 SWB v6 for $100 within easy driving distance which was too good of a deal to pass up. It's not without it's problems, but is a nice platform to build upon.

Here is how she looked when I got her back to my property.



Not too shabby for $100.00. However, that is the good side. There is lots of body damage to this one.

The passenger door, hood, header panel, and passenger fender all have enough damage to make me look for replacements.







Luckily, there were a couple at a Pick 'N Pull within driving distance.

Here is how she sits with replacement panels. They are still in need of some massaging/adjusting to get them lined up properly.





Unfortunately, I'm going to have to cut some pieces off of a donor car to shore up the sheet metal inside of the engine bay. It's bent enough to keep the hood from closing. Next trip to the Pick 'N Pull will include a Sawzall for those bits.

Plans include:

Complete repaint.
Complete reupholstery of interior.
Engine swap with a GM 4.3 or 3.8 and a 700r4/4l60e transmission, and NP231c transfer case.
Locking rear axle from 95sr (already in my possession)
33x10.5 tires.
Custom built winch bumper to house the Superwinch epi9.0
Custom built rear bumper

This build is going to take a while, but I'll try to keep this page updated as a log of the progress.

The price was good and I'm glad someone local bought it. I didn't need it but would have helped rehome it. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I'd be Interested on how much is put into it also maybe include a dollar amount of total cost each update.

Good idea. I'll keep a running total here:

1989 SWB V6 Montero - $100.00
Passenger Fender - $60.00
Header Panel - $15.00
Passenger Door - $65.00
Hood - $60.00
95 SR Rear Axle & Mitsu air pump - $120.00
Hood Latch - $6.00
A/C Switch - $6.00

Total - $432.00

Made some good progress on the front end today. I scavenged a hood latch of of a 1990 LWB at the junkyard today and after a whole lot of tightening and loosening and adjusting, I got the hood to close and latch/unlatch properly.

Strangely, the latch bracket from the 90 is not interchangeable with the SWB 89, so I had to reuse the old bracket with a little bit of bending/adjusting.

Just a bit of shimming now and the body panels will be lined up well enough to start fixing small dinks and prepping for paint.

The seats and interior also cleaned up very nicely. I may live with them for a while until I reupholster since they came out so nice.