well its ben a while,been getting quite a bit done over last few weeks,and am now currently half way through a week off work,still have 3 days to go.engines been mounted for a while now and running.here's the mounts



ive now got all the dash wiring reinstalled and run to where it needs to be within the truck.2nd battery tray all sorted and put in along with relay box which to do so also involved delooming the engine bay of all the old wires that went to old motor

after that ive got electric fan back in and wired up,just have to install temp switch now and that'l be complete.for those that commented earlier here's some pics.fan in place,you can also see the stainless tank hanging down the bottom,that's now been bolted back up into the chassis rails (well just below but its never been hit where it is and this time ill be making a guard to cover it up)

and also the gap between rad and pulley.was 15mm as i remembered

ive also got the gearbox mount bolted in properly now after cleaning up the threads which were caked in mud along with the remaining xmember bolts,again which involved cleaning out the threads

.from there i moved onto exhaust which was now making contact with the body after dropping body lift to 2".that involved moving mufflers back 100mm so they tucked up into the back seat cavity.all that's left to do now is finish off where the pipes dump just behind the diff head.
ive also made good progress on back end.the final cut has been made to the body which has made it look a lot more in proportion along with the hole opened up to fit the sliding window correctly.ive got the deck frame welded up & deck surface from 21mm ply cut


and this is it with the spare on where it will go

and with the boxes I'm potentially going to be using (they're the brother n laws old boxes and currently have no use so I'm just trying to decide if I like the look of them or not)


ive also got to figure out weather i put dive tank on deck or behind the back seats but I like the idea of having dry storage space so thinking it'll go on deck somewhere.as well as that ive flex tested the rear and all is clear,bunp stops work and shocks have been measured up.i can only fit 10" in there under full compression but will loose 3" of down travel so I'm currently thinking of new shock mounts and how to make it work to fit some 14s in there.
oh and the 80series fuel tank will be pulled out next weekend and replaced by a 140L custom fuel cell

.2 reasons for this.1 with the 80s tank it has to go in from the top meaning once decks welded on it'll never come out so that's no good

and 2 with new fuel cell I'll have a nice long range tank which in theory will get me to Wellington on 1 tank
man that's a lot of typing

,enough for now anyway