Ranger Diesel Swap 4

Here's an update for my viewer:

It's been said that bad news travels fast, and in my case "fast" is about 16 years it seems. The JDM diesel engine that I purchased back in 2007 was purported to have 40 to 60,000 miles of use on it before it was removed from the original vehicle.

In my preparations for installing the engine a couple of weeks ago, I dug out some of the parts that I had removed when I first acquired the engine, including the timing belt cover from the front of the block. I noticed a small sticker on top of the cover, with Japanese printing on it, and took little notice of it as I don't read Kanji. Then I noticed that there were faint ballpoint pen marks on the sticker, numbers, followed by something I could understand: "Km", or Kilometers.

A quick search of the Delica forum later, I had an answer I didn't like. The sticker was notification that the timing belts(s) had been replaced at 224,320 kilometers, or about 139,000 miles.

There was also a place where the date the belts were replaced, but this was less helpful, as the year was either not filled in, or the ink had faded completely away. If the maintenance schedule had been carefully followed, this would have been the second timing belt replacement in this engine's life. Without an idea what year the belt was replaced this time, I could only speculate as to how many additional miles the engine has run with this belt. Perhaps as many as another 60,000, as belts are replaced on a 100,000 Km schedule.

Well, OK, so I have a well-broken-in engine. Being a diesel, it should have some life left in it, right? How bad could it be?? (Thinking again about the brand new 4D56 long block I could/should have bought instead)

In other news, I just picked up some additional research materials at the post office yesterday. So far, I have nothing in the way of electrical wiring diagrams or descriptions of the diesel version of the Ranger trucks. This little fleabay score will certainly help at least a little:

For the short term, the engine swap project it taking a back burner position while I put up some firewood for winter, take care of at least some of ~last~ winter's storm damage around the yard and fight the moles out in the lawn. I've also had to spend some time reconfiguring the photovoltaic panels in my solar power system due to a couple of module failures, and my hydro generator system is requiring replacement of the manifold and motorized valve that feed water to the generator. Couple this with the weather changing like a click of a switch to monsoon season and my lack of indoor workshop space, and it seems it might be a while before I make a lot of meaningful progress.