Fixed it all up nicely over the weekend. New lighter rear seal, flywheel and clutch from LCE, some transmission/shifter boots and pieces (marlin had a sale on some ) and a new centre bearing (the old one was only a few years old but the rubber had cracked). Oh yes, new spark plugs... I had some Bosch 4 point platinum ones and two of them had the insulation of the center electrode cracked. These definitely aren't good quality, replaced with NGK platinum ones.

It was still a struggle to get the transmission back up. But it drives very smooth and the lighter flywheel makes a noticable difference. Not much loss of torque and a bit more power. Wish that damn crossmember could be removed.

 

Glad its all fixed up. Always makes me happy another toyota lives on

 

Correct. The torsion bars are connected to the tranny x-member on the 2WD's, thus why there part of the frame. The 4WD's however are removable due to the torsion bars having there own mounts forward of the x-member. The x-members on the 4WD are further back because the mount is on the transfer case.

 

Did you disconnect the exhaust down pipe clamp from the diver side?