I thought this would be a good opportunity to post here everything that has been done to my sambar from the day I picked it up until now in case anything I have done to it, you have been considering doing. I picked up the truck in June of 2019, I am someone who cannot leave anything alone and keep it stock. All my vehicles have been customized with aftermarket treats in some way or another. This vehicle was purchased to be a daily driver through the city (F350's don't like the city driving) but still be capable for major highway jaunts(100km+), and regular highway travel between cities(80km). I don't plan to off-road it anytime soon so keep that in mind. This is the day I brought it home. This is a 1995 4WD Sambar Special Type II Carb'd w/ AC. I don't know what the "Special Type II" is indicative of, so if anyone has any insight into that, that would be awesome. I assume its like having a Lariat instead of a XLT or something along those lines. Truck was in really great shape, with only 24,000 km on the odometer with original paperwork, showing regular maintenance in Japan. I'll slowly update this thread over the coming weeks once I have all the images organized as its been on-going since day 2.
Shortly after bringing it home, first thing I wanted to tackle was the rust. There was only some minor rust surprisingly accompanied by a small ding in the rear taillight area. The bed had already come with what seemed like a bedliner but appeared more like just black paint than textured bedliner. I'm not a fan of white vehicles, so I decided once the rust was cleaned up to coat both the interior of the bed and all around the exterior with Raptor liner. The cab was in pretty good shape for its age, so to preserve that I decided to wrap it. Winters can be brutal here with the amount of salt the city tosses on the roads. I have had good results from vinyl wraps protecting the paint in the past and its a cheaper alternative than having the cab sprayed even tho the cab is so tiny, so that was the route I planned on going.
Next on the list was wheels and tires. The 12" steelie's wasn't cutting it. I wanted something just slightly bigger for a more pronounced look. I wasn't sure at the time just how large I could go without causing issues with both speed and rubbing, I opted for a 165/65/R14 setup. I know now I could have likely gone with a 185/60, possibly 195/55 and been fine. Rubber is Hankook iPikes directional tires, which were pretty durable all summer and very grippy in wet conditions. Rims are a 38 offset 14x5.5 Vision 426 Cross in a Matte Black. I do plan on swapping these rims and tires out for a beefy 8-10" wide tire eventually with possibly a 15" rim as there are so many more options once you move into that size and beyond, I like the oversized tire look with a bit of protrusion, it will be interesting to see how that does affect the minimal amount of horsepower these little trucks have on the road.
Adam, I like what your doing with it! There's some really good, past post's from previous members on the forum, on different wheel sizes, and loss of power, fuel economy, and what have you! Same here, rust can be brutal on vehicles. Same here, I'm not a fan of the white truck! I can see it in a hot climate, environment, I'm more after the off road, back woods hunt vehicle, type truck! Just diff. strokes! I'm almost through a total de- rust program myself. Keep up the good work! Limestone
Now that the truck was ready to be put on the road everyday, first thing to do was fluids. Even tho the place I got it from mentioned fluids were changed prior to me taking ownership, I still wanted to replace all the fluids for my own piece of mind and tracking. Oil will be swapped between 10w40 in spring/summer/fall using Redline Full synthetic 10w40 (https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B002PEYXMA...olid=3NAOLG5E2T46V&psc=1&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it) and Mobil 1 5w30 for the winter months. I have had good experience with the Redline brand, so I decided to stick with them for this truck. If anyone believes oil is just oil and any brand will do, I urge you to look into Project Farm on youtube. He runs through many different tests, pitting oil, gear oil etc brands against one another for comparison. Results are actually quite surprising. Dropped a bottle of Redline fuel cleaner (https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B000CPI5Z0/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1) into the fuel tank to work its magic in case anything was gummed up inside or in the carb. Both Rear and Front Differential - I opted for Redline's MTL 75W-90 (https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B000CPCBEQ/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1) GL-4 fluid. And the coolant that was in it was a green coolant, so just stuck with that and went with OEM brand green (https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B077NSLG4N/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1)
The wrap looks great! I've tried wrapping portions of cars and found it super frustrating and came out terrible. Any tips? I have those same rims in 15" with 205/75-15's. Took a lot of work to clear the bigger 15" tires.
Honestly, just spending the extra money on top quality vinyl. Good quality vinyl is not cheap, but it lays down much easier, stretches much nicer with heat, and its more resistant to being overstretched and then wasted. The pros of that outweigh the frustration, headaches and lack of patience that come with cheap product. Good little magnet pucks are also good to have to keep vinyl in place in corners freeing up both hands.
Adam, I am a huge fan of Synthetic oil. On an earlier post, on this forum, more than one person cautioned against syn oil in these mini's, saying that it could, or will hurt or affect your cam sensor! Because of that, I was thinking about staying with conventional 10w40, and 5w30! Redline is a great product, not the point I'M trying to make. The Syn oil is a great product, Iv'e been using it in all my small engines for yrs. Instead of 30 weight oil, 5w30, full Syn. SAME THING!!! Just trying to pass along what I have learned, or read! I think that I'll put that question out there on another post! Limestone
You sir, would be correct, I believe this is the post? https://minitrucktalk.com/threads/engine-re-build-kit.6914/#post-48132 Currently my engine is sitting just over 30,000 kms and the engine has been looked after, so I may be fine for now with a full syn. As the engine begins to accumulate higher mileage I might revisit the oil weight of choice, unless I start seeing the blue smoke of death. and after going through the manual it actually mentions straight 30W
This bit of work was done due to nearly being re-ended by a larger truck, that I think struggled to see my tailights because they sit so low to the ground? I decided to install an led third brake light on the top of the back rack, its wrapped with Vivid tailight vinyl to blend in when not lit up. When doing so I also upgraded the tiny cargo light that was there, I drilled a hole directed through the cargo light casing and utilized the factory 2 prong connector with some male connectors.
Nice on the 3rd brake light it's on my list too. As far as syn goes it's OK to run when ever and where ever. Lots of old really bad info on this floating around. I use Pennzoil Ultra Platinum 5w-30. You can get it for ~$25 off amazon. Don't know if anyone watches Project Farm on YouTube but that oil came in second to Amsoil in his testing of something like 20 different full synthetics. Amsoil runs like $15/quart so much better bargain in the Pennzoil @ $5 quart.
I like that you mentioned Project Farm as well, the tests he runs are very thorough and has changed my views on a lot of different products after seeing real results from his tests. Conventional vs Synthetic test on 45 year old tractor.
I know this was posted somewhere else in this forum, but this was the next step, started ripping out the entire interior for a clean up and color change. Its interesting what you find in the spots that you cannot get to with a vacuum or for general/regular cleaning. The grey wasn't really that faded, but since I wanted to take a look and clean up all the potential dirt and grime behind and under the dash anyways, this was the opportunity to do it. In doing so, I also decided to get rid of the big 15" steering wheel, for something just a little bit smaller (12"). When removing the steering wheel, I hadn't seen plastic totally disintegrate into a powder immediately before, and that's what happened to the plastic steering column bushing on the top of the column, so I ended up ordering a replacement off Megazip.
That's pretty cool! I tore mine apart, didn't find anything even close. I'm a big fan of Synthetic oil, just not sure on the older Mini's! I'll take as much info as I can get! Limestone
I solved the third brake light with one of these: Xprite RZ Series RYWYR 30" Offroad Rear Chase LED Strobe Light bar w/Turn Signal Brake Reverse https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0713WJX3Q/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_t4dwEbYWHV5X7 Running lights, turn signal/brake, revers light (which is actually bright enough to be useful), and flashers. Wish I could have mounted it to the headache bar, and not the cab. But, with a dump/scissors lift bed, the wiring would have been a nightmare to route. A dump bed would have been pretty straight forward, but the scissors lift made it too mouth an obstacle.
Nice job. How far did you have to run wires to get that 3rd brake light working? All I got was an empty pack of Japanese cigarettes in mine.
Quite a ways. routed it along the back rack in through the cargo light switch on the right down the back pillar behind the drivers seat, across to the center console and down along that console, between shifter and dash where the lines for the 4wd run and up to where I could tie into the main harness lines. Might have been faster and cleaner to go along the headliner above the driver door and down inside the little A pillar and come out behind the cluster, but the way I did it seemed to work, just needed more wire to do so.
That is pretty nice with everything rolled into one bar, don't give me more ideas! These things are like having a jeep addiction, the mods are never ending.
After getting the dash torn out cleaned and dyed, while waiting for all the pieces to cure I backed the truck into the garage to get started on some engine fixes. I had a problem with the truck not wanting to come out of 4wd sometimes as well as it occasionally would battle me to fire up. The spark wires looked to be the original red ones, so they were due for an upgrade among some other things. The 4wd issue I traced it to a torn vacuum line coming off the actuator, needless to say when one vacuum line needs replacing......might as well start changing them all for good measure.
Adam, Nice job! To me, vacuem lines are like belts and hoses. They are wear items! Nothing last's forever, not even me and you! Limestone
Work continued on the replacement of vacuum lines and moved into replacing coolant lines as well. I got a little carried away and decided to paint the valve cover (green seemed fitting for a clover engine) and replace the gasket while I had the lines out. I replaced the CCV hose off the valve cover with a high temp silicone hose, but I wasn't sure if it would swell with the oil vapors seeping up through it. When I took out the intake, there was a tiny bit of oil sitting in the bottom. So the plan at this point was to just run it with the silicone hose and see what happens. Worst case ontarios it swells and I replace it with the original rubber hose, I decided to experiment at least until I could install a catch can in between that line. I also replaced the ground strap with a lower gauge line. Hose diameters used for this were a combination of 3mm, 6mm, 8mm and 10mm I.D.
Adam, Very good pics. Looks good! Hey, St. Patrick's day is right around the corner! Can't go wrong with the silicone. Keep us posted. Limestone
Fast forward two weeks and a few items arrived from Japan. I found a set of mirrors from a 97 sambar dias on https://autoparts.beforward.jp/. They required drilling an additional mounting hole in the door, but the line of sight through the mirror on these is so much better than the tiny little things that come stock, as well as they don't pivot like the stock mirrors, so I feel they will last much longer. My original mirrors after 25 years, the plastic was just continually cracking any time they pivoted on the little ball. I also upgraded the tail lights to a pair of smoked lens that I found on https://www.rakuten.co.jp/. It cleaned up the rear end of the truck and eliminated the mis-matched red and amber. This was also the time that I upgraded all the bulbs in the truck to LED. Headlights were plug and play from amazon. I've had great lasting results with Hikari Bulbs, so I stuck with them for this truck as well. https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B07GKKJ9M4/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
