Steve's 1997 Lexus LX450

[THATSALEXUS?]

About two years ago I made the decision to do it. To get a Landcruiser. I’ve worked with cars my entire life and knew that an LX450 was a Landcruiser. However, I wanted a “Landcruiser”. Maybe I didn’t like the fluff associated with a Lexus, maybe I just wanted a “manly” vehicle, I’m not sure. One thing is sure however. The more I looked at Landcruisers, the more I realized how badly people treated them. That’s when I opened up to the idea of LX450’s. For some reason the ones I looked at seemed to be much better cared for than their Landcruiser brothers. So I loosened up my search criteria.

After a couple of months of searching I came across an Ebay listing. So the day the auction closes I race home to check the status. It’s at about ten grand and the reserve hasn’t been met. Even though I really want it, I still want to get a good deal. I wait until the clock is down to about five seconds and I place my bid. YOU WON THE ITEM! Holy crap, now I’ve got to figure out how I’m going to pay for it as well as get to Phoenix to pick it up. Well I got it all worked out and in a couple days was driving my “new” LX home.

I ordered my sliders, my lift, my winch and worked the local 4WP on my ARB price. The next few weekends were pretty much filled up. The one thing I didn’t like about all the Slee (lift) parts was all of the different finishes: silver powder coat, gold zinc, etc. So I had everything powder coated satin black. When you look under my rig you don’t really notice anything …… that’s the point! Once I’d done all the wrenching and such I went down to the Firestone that my buddy manages and had my Toyo M/T’s installed. I now had a chance to relax and look back at what I’d accomplished. I’ve got to say that I’m pretty damn happy with my choices so far.

I’ve worked with cars about my whole life but working on this thing has definitely re-affirmed my hatred of grease. I still get in there and do what I have to but it’s definitely a love/hate thing.

Next came the need for some rear storage. Now this is what I like, clean (non-greasy) fabrication. I decided to do a three part modular system. For part one I needed to build out the very back. Basically I decided on something pretty standard, a couple of drawers as well as a couple of cubby holes directly behind the wheel wells. I wanted to have plenty of solid tie down points in the rear most portion. I have to keep all of my bulky cargo behind the middle seat area to leave room right behind the front seats for my dogs. In the end, I will have the ability to have two, three or four seats as well as the ability to use all non-seating areas for storage.

My long term goal is to set this thing up to be as capable of a hard core rig as possible up the point that it doesn’t take away from its expedition/camping qualities. I guess another way of putting it would be to say that I intend to create an “expedition” rig that’s a little more capable than most. It’s funny, almost every time we’re out wheeling, we come across somebody out there that says “he’s not going to try that in the Lexus is he” or “ that’s a Lexus?!”. One of my favorites was the guy in a Jeep (that took the bypass) after uttering the first quote, followed it up with “he made that look pretty easy”. My buddy responded with “yeah, that thing makes just about everything look pretty easy”. Not a jab at Jeeps, just humerous.

I have since replaced my front bumper and winch with a lower profile bumper and removed the winch. I have rebuilt both axles including: regearing to 5.29's (ring & pinions heat and cryo treated), solid pinion spacers front and rear, new rotors, pads and rebuilt calipers, cromoly front and rear axles and all Amsoil products.

I built my own rear bumper a few months ago. It is a 4X4 Labs "kit" which basically means it was about 50 pieces of steel that showed up on a pallet. From there I had to fit, weld, grind, sand, customize and ultimately powdercoat it. In the end, I am very happy with it and the have a sense of satisfaction in doing it myself.

In conclusion, here is the "list":
Slee 6” lift
Slee F & R CV driveshaft’s
All metal parts powder coated semi-flat black
Rear shock mounts extended 1.25”
Slee brake lines (complete set)
Slee Shortbus bumper (last year I had an ARB and a Warn 12K winch)
Slee transfer skid
Slee jack tool system
35” (315) Toyo MT’s
Hanna Quality slider’s
4X4 Labs rear bumper kit wit tire and 3 jerry can holder ( I added a lot of personal touches including a different latch, hiding the swing out stops and rounding over all sharp corners, including bullnosing the recovery points)
Garmin GPS with console mount
Uniden 520 CB
Antenex CB antenna
Sylvania Silverstar low beams
Longfield birfs and inner axles
Poly Performance rear axles
5.29 gears from Ringpinion.biz
Gears and bearings cryo treated by Bobby Long
Solid pinion spacers front and rear
All gear work done by ZUK
All Amsoil in axles
New brakes all around with 100 pads
Factory cupholder
Factory hand throttle
Center diff lock switch
Pin 7 mod
Hoses, Belts, gaskets…
Custom rear drawer system (including 500lb. BB slides, 6 tie down anchors bracketed to body, 2 storage cavities w/lids and all Line-X’ed for durability

Here is what I’m in the middle of:

A/C dryer relocation
Scangauge II
Yellow box speedo correction(need to order)
4X4 Labs relay rod and drag link with 1 ton ball joints
Inchworm front E-locker guard (hopefully it fits with the 4X4 labs stuff)
P/S cooler with supplemental fan
Supplemental tranny cooler fan
Rear storage for 2nd row seating area

Here are some of my future mods I’m thinking about

Custom built aluminum roof rack
Ham radio
37’s with Walker Evans beadlocks
Hydro assist
Winch with synthetic line
Lighting
LED interior lights
Stereo with ipod inputs
Slee rear E-locker guard
Electric fan or blue fan clutch

If I haven't bored you to death so far, I will try to post some pics:

[THATSALEXUS?]

Here goes my first attemp at posting pics on this site, hopefully it's easy:

[THATSALEXUS?]

A few so that you know that I use it:

[THATSALEXUS?]

A few of my co-pilots, Zeus and Zoey (the Dober's):

[unwiredadventures]

That's a nice looking FZJ80! I really like the drawer system.

I bought a 1997 Land Cruiser last week. I appreciate your post. I'll be doing some of the same mods.

[gon2srf]

The rig and the pups are looking good Steve.