Steve's 1985 FJ1100 restoration in San Diego

[STLanduyt]

The FJ1100 is now suspended in the garage like a mechanical marionette.

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The wheels are off and waiting for new tires.

I removed the front forks, cleaned the outsides, and will later disassemble, clean, and re-new them.  If you have any suggestions of how to go about front forks, please let me hear from you.

The same request for the steering head, which I just started to disassemble. 

For general road dirt and grime, what cleaners and detergents seem to work best?  I am using mineral spirits (paint thinner) to clean off the old grease

Most of the rust is on the front of the frame, and I am clearing that area so  that I can remove the rust and respray it with the same silver (thank you Pat).

I apologize for the condition of my garage.  Most of the garages shown on this site are cycle palaces in comparison, but I wanted to show that progress is being made and I appreciate all the advice that has been given.

Steve

[86FJNJ]

I've been using a 5 gallon bucket filled with hot water and lots of dawn dish soap and a sponge to get crud and gunk off, it works well. Then I've used the engine degreasers from the auto parts store, those do a good job too.

Or if you have a trailer take it to one of those self service car wash places and spray it down.

[red]

Steve,
Once you get the rust mostly removed, as best you can, there is now a whole new "paint" product on the market. It is called a "Rust Converter." It looks and acts like spray-can paint, but it is far better than paint. Rust can creep under regular paint, but not this stuff. It is an epoxy-like product that uses rust as the activating "hardener" agent for the chemical coating in the can. You can get aerosol rattle cans of Rust Converters in various colors. It can work as a paintable stand-alone primer, or it can serve as the color coat, if you wish.
Just a thought . . .

[Pat Conlon]

Great suggestion Red!
For one step process I'll see if there is a silver color close to the FJ's silver, if not then use it as a primer and top coat with Argent Silver.

I'm ready for a respray on my '84 frame.
Here's how the "UV resistant"urethane clear coat yellowed over 50k miles in 12 years. I'm not happy.
I park in my garage but nevertheless, the desert sun is unforgiving.



No more "UV resistant" clear coats for me.

I used JB Weld epoxy putty to clean up the ugly bracket weld, normally hidden under the side reflector.
No Bondo in that area, won't last.

[STLanduyt]

I have a question about converting my 1985 FJ1100 from gravity flow to a fuel pump.  I am confused.

The carbs were sent to RPM to be converted and I ordered the fuel pump sold by RPM

Today Randy at RPM called to discuss work on my carbs, and the topics of what fuel pump is appropriate and what diameter fuel line to use came up. I understood from Randy that the RPM fuel pump is NOT suitable for the conversion and that a fuel pump with a larger diameter opening should be acquired as should larger diameter fuel line.  (I cancelled the pump sold by RPM as a result).

The two-part article on the fuel pump conversion specifically references using the RPM fuel pump and fuel line, which leads to my confusion. 

Can anyone help unconfuse me here?  Pat Conlon, Randy mentioned that you use a different pump than RPM's that has a larger diameter output.  Perhaps I missing something here, but I thought the fuel pump used a smaller diameter output than the gravity flow did.

Sorry to visit my confusion on y'all,

Steve