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My Toyota Paseo was a great car for myself and my son...running the fuel economy of many a hybrid, but getting married the second time around meant my family size grew from 2 to 6 people with one of them being my new born little girl. While my new wife and family were a positive, I was sad to realise that I needed to say good bye to the trusty fuel miser and look for a people mover. She said we needed a Mazda MPV, I argued that a Toyota Tarago would be a better vehicle, and we than noticed that the 90 series Prado had similar seating capacity to the equivalent people movers, abeit with a better aptitude for my driving style and hankering for the alternate driving route. A 3.4 V6 with LPG fitted was decided on and after several months pouring over the Trading post and Car Sales and Prado Point a trading post bargain was purchased.
So far, since owning it for about five months we have discovered that the LPG range of 350 kms was not good enough and the backfiring while on LPG was blowing all sorts of pieces around under the bonnet. A visit to the local Gas mechanic sorted this out with a larger gas tank. (80l usable - 430kms) and a tune up that meant the Gas carby works well and no longer leaves me wishing for the gas injection system. The new LPG tank unfortunately hangs noticeably lower than the previous tank and the original petrol tank. This will be addressed at some stage with an adjusted bracket to lift the tank closer to the body. First thing to sort out here is the consideration of swapping the body rubbers, which I have been told will give me another 20-25mm to play with.
A trip to Stockton beach has revealed that LPG can be sucked through much quicker under load (250kms for 60 l), while a trip up through the watagan mountains found that the ramp angles of the 90 series are awesome even with the standard height suspension. The previous life of my Prado has seen a set of 17" alloys with Bridgestone Dueller 694s (265/65/17). The dueller 694s keep up extremely well with BFG AT's while the trails consist of dry dirt, gravel, and rock. They have even faired some wet trail work though they seem to show their limit very quickly. The 17" alloys appear to have come off a 120 series with the 30mm offset. The pictures with the 17s show how far inside the guards the current treads are hiding. A set of GU patrol 16", 0 offset steel wheels have been sourced from none other than eb ay. These are currently renting space in the shed waiting fora set of BFG MT KM2s.
A visit to the local http://www.roofcage.com (Newcastle built) has a full length cage being constructed at present.
Future mods to come
Bull bar
http://www.ultimatesuspension.com.au 2" suspension lift
Uniden UHF
Home made shelving
ARB Compressor
So far, since owning it for about five months we have discovered that the LPG range of 350 kms was not good enough and the backfiring while on LPG was blowing all sorts of pieces around under the bonnet. A visit to the local Gas mechanic sorted this out with a larger gas tank. (80l usable - 430kms) and a tune up that meant the Gas carby works well and no longer leaves me wishing for the gas injection system. The new LPG tank unfortunately hangs noticeably lower than the previous tank and the original petrol tank. This will be addressed at some stage with an adjusted bracket to lift the tank closer to the body. First thing to sort out here is the consideration of swapping the body rubbers, which I have been told will give me another 20-25mm to play with.
A trip to Stockton beach has revealed that LPG can be sucked through much quicker under load (250kms for 60 l), while a trip up through the watagan mountains found that the ramp angles of the 90 series are awesome even with the standard height suspension. The previous life of my Prado has seen a set of 17" alloys with Bridgestone Dueller 694s (265/65/17). The dueller 694s keep up extremely well with BFG AT's while the trails consist of dry dirt, gravel, and rock. They have even faired some wet trail work though they seem to show their limit very quickly. The 17" alloys appear to have come off a 120 series with the 30mm offset. The pictures with the 17s show how far inside the guards the current treads are hiding. A set of GU patrol 16", 0 offset steel wheels have been sourced from none other than eb ay. These are currently renting space in the shed waiting fora set of BFG MT KM2s.
A visit to the local http://www.roofcage.com (Newcastle built) has a full length cage being constructed at present.
Future mods to come
Bull bar
http://www.ultimatesuspension.com.au 2" suspension lift
Uniden UHF
Home made shelving
ARB Compressor
Attached Files
Welcome to Pradopoint, it is good to see a range of machines and ideas about how to fit them out to suit their owner's needs.
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