Hardcore Hilux

Originally Published: March 2019 Words: Paul Looe Pictures: Harry Hamm
<
>
first featured in 4x4 magazine, january 2019

Double-cabs currently account for the vast majority of big-budget off-road builds in the UK. It’s not long ago, however, that new trucks were rarely used as the basis for a project – and that when you did see a pick-up being modified, it tended to be a project involving less bolting-on and a lot more in the way of homespun engineering.

These days, if you’re going to build a big- budget off-roader starting with a brand new vehicle, there’s a strong chance that you’ll do it with a pick-up truck. But even as recently as just five years ago, you’d almost certainly have used a Land Rover Defender.

Not that people weren’t building pick-ups back then. It’s just that instead of spending big money on top-end imported kit to bolt on to a new Ranger, they were letting loose with their workshop skills on middle-aged L200s and old Hiluxes from the leaf-sprung days.

The Hilux you see on these pages is from that era, and the pictures themselves were taken five years ago. But its story dates back some way further, to when an early owner turned it into a bobtailed trayback on 33” tyres.

That’s the condition it was in when it became the property of Ashley Stimpson, an experienced 4x4 builder who wanted a truck that would be a hardcore off-road toy and daily driver rolled into one. By the time we got it in front of our lens, the rear tray had been replaced by a more traditional pick-up tub, though as this was home to the rear stays for a six-point roll cage it wasn’t what you’d call traditional in the, er, traditional sense.

The main part of the cage is made from 2” o/d steam pipe tubing with a 4mm wall thickness, which doesn’t sound like a recipe for the ultimate in weight saving.Ashley wasn’t just chucking heavy metal at it without a care, though – his aim at the start of the project was to bring it home at under two tonnes, and at 1940kg it just managed to put a tick in that box.

By no means was this the first hardcore Hilux to be built in the UK, but a marked difference between it and most of the others is that Ashley set out to try and keep its centre of gravity as low as possible.That’s why, in addition to the 2” Old Man Emu lift springs it was already on when he bought it, the truck has gained nothing more dramatic than a 1” body lift.You don’t fit 35” tyres underneath many vehicles on numbers like that, so you won’t be surprised to hear that instead of going up, his strategy was to be much more savage with the tin snips when removing metal from the truck’s wheelarches. What’s become known as a ‘virtual lift.’

The springs don’t create lots of height, but Ashley reckons they do flex well – and with shocks providing 15” of travel up front and 9” at the back, they get every chance to do just that. The rears are aided by a set of buggy links – the leaf-sprung equivalent of dislocation cones, you might say – which Ashley made himself from a set of suspension top links from, you guessed it, a Nissan Patrol.

Not that that’s the only Patrol part you’ll find on this Hi-Lux. Far from it, in fact.Try the engine, gearbox and transfer case for size. Actually, that’s exactly what Ashley had to do, because the straight-six 2.8 diesel is a very tight fit between the radiator and the bulkhead, and much of the transmission tunnel had to be cut away and remade to accommodate it. The props, meanwhile, were home-made with Nissan fittings at one end and Toyota at the other.

After all that effort, you might be surprised to hear that Ashley was happy to stick with the leaf- sprung set-up – especially as many people might see it as a step down from coils. But he doesn’t see it that way. ‘With the leaf springs, there’s only eight bushes throughout the truck. My old Nissan Patrol had three times that.That’s three times the effort, and three times the expense.’

So, no plans to ditch the cart springs, then.When we spoke to Ashley, however, he was intending to fit rear leaves at the front, explaining that this would increase the vehicle’s wheelbase by 2-3”, lift it a little further and, more importantly, make it ride more comfortably.The was a high-steer set-up ready to go on, too, and the truck’s blunt end was at some stage going to be treated to disc brakes and a winch.

The most intriguing plan in his list, however, involved the engine. Nissan’s 2.8 TD runs the same block as the early Skyline, so Ashley was looking at fitting that vehicle’s much bigger turbo, anticipating that this would be worth an extra 100bhp or so.

As it is,Ashley assured it that the Hi-Lux was no slouch.And with the engine and drivetrain from what was nearly a four-tonne truck shifting something half that weight, that’s as it should be. We won’t repeat the details, but suffice to say that where some 4x4 owners simply go flat out all the time just to keep up with the traffic, if he tries that he’ll soon be clearing the traffic out from in front of him.

It all makes for a daily driver that might be a bit unusual but certainly is very well sorted. Ashley’s not interested in competing, but by the same token he’s not interested in shying away from the gnarly bits at playday sites, and this is a truck that’ll take ‘em on with guts and glory but still come back for more – while getting him to work every day in between.

Share this article

Subscribe to our eNewsletter

Be the first to know about all our latest offers, products, news and giveaways!