I do not mean to be taking this off track or beating a dead horse - but I think my point may have been missed here so i wanted to clarify for teh record. I absolutely agree that all that stuff could stack up to 2.5-3k in no-time flat, esp if you are buying it peice-by-peice from junkyards, board members, etc.
What I was reccomending is that you can avoid this by just doing what the junkyards do - buy a whole truck that already has everything you need on it; tranny, axles, springs, yada yada. No trips to junkyard, AND you get a template to see how it's all supposed to fit together.
For example, I bought a whole '88 Runner that had been used as an engine donor for $800... came w/ eveything minus V6. only reason I even paid that much was 'cause it was in good shape and came w/ many spare parts. Now I have taken eveyrthing I need off of it and sold many parts, and it still has everything in the suspension/driveline that Beginner would need and I'm letting it all go for only $300 b/c I want this thing out of my garage. I know guys that do this all the time. In fact if things work out you can sell teh parts you don't need and make back soem of the $$ spent on purchasing the junk/parts vehicle. The sum of the parts is always > the whole.
Now this is assuming that an IFS setup is okay. To me, this would be fine as it would cost much less up front and fit the bill fine for the type of use stated. Certainly doing SAS instead would get costly very quickly, it's just not clear that it's necessary.

Beginner, I agree with the others, it sounds like yo uare onto a good plan. 4Crawler's linsk above are good, the BJ spacers will start to get it up in the air pretty cheaply. Also I believe the 2wd rear is a spring-under-axle style, you should prob be able to get a kit to convert to spring-over, I'm sure that will net several inches in the back.

the 2wd doesnt have ball joint spacers, you have to use lift spindles or controll arms and crank the torsion bars. i reccomend larger torsion bars also. look over at downey off road.com , they seem to be the cheapest place to get prerunner parts for the 2wd yotas. i have a 94 2wd with fabtech lift spindles (discontinued) and downey upper a arms in the front and a rear spring over axel swap with 31x10.50's


if i had to do it over i would have rather done a solid axel swap but its comming after my 84 is done. id also not use the crappy spindles , the steering knuckle is notorious for breaking grade 10 bolts right off on a regular basis, real nice on a trail.... if you want to lift a 2wd do a 3 inch body lift and the downey kit with their rear lift leaf springs and then a detroit trutrac you will haved a decent lil' off road truck with plenty of drivability, only drawback is the price you pay for that you could sell your truck and buy a 4x4...

I'm pretty sure that you are wrong. http://www.sdori.com/SDORI_Products.html

ill be damned.... i wonder what those would do on my truck with the control arms i have from downey, i wonder how the camber /castor would be affected on the aftermarket a arms? thats definatly a cheap way to lift the 2wd though, with i would have known about those earlier.

Yep, 2WD ball joint spacers have been available for at least a year now (as can be seen on the web page I posted a link to earlier):





http://www.4crawler.com/4x4/ForSale/Docs/BallJointSpacer_HowTo.shtml#2WD

THe nice thing about your 2wd is the gas mileage, Use it to daily-drive and get a beater 4x4 to offroad.

you say the body is good...i'd be doing what was mentioned above. try to find a wrecked one. maybe if your lucky the frame will be straight and intact and you could just do a body swap. thats basically what i am doing. but if your not very mechanical, i would advise against converting this truck to 4x4. may be more then ya bargined for. but good luck and keep us updated <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cheers.gif" alt="" />

YES!! YES!! Subliminaltrips, that the kind of lift I'm lookin for. Everyone keeps the tips comin!! Now I'm as excited about creatin a prerunner as I was about convetin to 4x4. Hmmmmmm, what's my first order of business? (told you I was a noob) <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" /> Are all of you guys professional mechanics? I will be attempting to do all of this hands on with my mechanic buddy to guide me along.

I'll try to get pics up as soon as I can.

begginer

Converting the 2wd to a pre-runner would be far easier than swapping the 2wd to a 4x4, a lot less work, a lot less money(depending on which way you went), and no welding. I would think you and a buddy would have the body lift, ball joint spacers and springs done in a weekend. Changing out the rear would take more time and cost more, but it wouldn't need to be done at the same time. The links that 4Crawler posted should give you an idea of prices for the 2wd lift. A locker for the rear would run between $200-800 depending on which one you chose, an Ausie(full time/always engaged) would be on the low end, and an ARB(air actuated) or Toyota Electric locker both of whuch are selectable(engage them when you need them) are on the high end, you could also choose a limited slip for around $500. If the 4wd 3rd member will work in a 2wd, you have a good chance of picking one up geard and locked used. Another mod that would help the 2wd Pre-runner on the trail would be to install a 4wd tranny and transfer case, this would give the benefit of being anle to use low range on the trail, without much modification, other than cutting a second hole in the floorboard and mounting up the 4x4 tranny x-member.

2nd gen 4x's can be picked up cheaply, the '86 I bought for $350 needed an interior, other than that it ran fine. However the '86 X-cab I picked up for $600 needed a new engine, hood, door, windshield, interior, paint, etc. You can also find a diamond in the ruff. I picked up this '86 4-Runner for $1k(I made the roof rack and installed the lights). The previous owner was told that it needed an engine rebuild(by a Pepboys tech) because the #4 cyl. had zero compression. All it was was a tight valve, with a valve adjusted everything was fine. The interior was in poor shape, needing new paint on faded plastic, new carpet for the rear, a realling good steam cleaning, etc. I only put about $300 into it to get it to look like new again, I then turned around and sold the Runner for $4500.

3rd gen's like this '91 22re X-cab can be found for around $1k, though they trend to be in pretty poor condition. The bed and fenders were well dented, the interior had'nt been cleaned in about 10 yrs(it was a farm truck), and the engine needed repairs. I wasn't concerned about the dents, since I am turning it into a flatbed trail truck, and it took less than $200 to fix the engine. Normally the 3rd gens if needing engine work and the rest is good tend to run about $2k here in CA, you might be able to find them cheaper in your erea. You can also find first gen and 2nd gen straight front axled rigs that are in need of repairs, but they tend to sell for more than their IFS counterparts, because the SFA are more in demand and there are fewer of them left than the IFS rigs.

If you are willing to do a rebuild, you can have a good looking truck for far cheaper than buying one, though it takes a lot of elbow work and some time to get them looking good again. In any case even having to replace an engine it is still cheaper than doing a 4wd conversion. Even with the '86 X-cab and all it needed, I still haven't put more than $800 into it.

RatLabGuy


The only way this would work would be to find a 3rd gen x-cab trauck with a good frame and ruinning gear than swap out the cabs. To swap the IFS 4x4 components would be unreasonable, which puts him back to SASing the 2wd, which will easilly exceed $2500, or $4k if he has to pay someone for labor. He would be better off just buying a rig like the one you did and simply rebuilding it, over swapping components to the 2wd or swapping the bodies