So I'm not a technical guy and I'm hoping that I'm posting pictures of the Jeep and not my family vacation. I included a chain of photos and I'm not sure the order that they appear, but you should see pretty much what I did. This was basically how I did it.
1) I unbolted the rear sway bar and ubolts
2) I unbolted the rear shackle bolt
3) I used an angle grinder with a cut off wheel to cut the leaf spring as close to the front spring eye as possible. What you get is more or less a round ball of spring around the bolt.
4) I then cut a relief of the spring eye and outer bushing sleeve. You can do this with the same cutting wheel (you might what a smaller diameter wheel). You can see this by one of the pictures the two spring eyes. The one with the smaller cut came out in 15 minutes.
5) From here I took a utility knife and cut the rubber bushing until I could see the inner bushing sleeve. Unless you have a real cutting torch or a nuclear reactor don't try to burn out the bushing (with a propane torch). You will stink up your garage and waste a lot of time.
6) I rotated the whole spring eye until it literally fell out of the pocket leaving only the exposed bolt with the sleeve around it. One of the pictures shows this. If the spring eye doesn't rotate around, cut another relief (that was what I did the first time that took 2 hours)
7) Once you can see the inner sleeve, heat it with a propane torch and see if you can break loose the bolt and hopefully run it right out. Don't force it! You've come too far to break the nut weld or rip out the threads. Take a chisel and open the seam in the sleeve. I would spray it with PB Blaster and walk away at this point.
8) Return the next morning and heat it again and work it loose. It will break loose and leave you with a great deal of satisfaction.

I don't know about the rest of you, but this RC lift kit took a ton of time to put in. I would not expect to do it in 8 hours. Plan on taking your time and doing it right to minimize bigger problems. However you can do it. Tools I used: air impact gun, angle grinder, sawsall, breaker bar, torque wrench, usual wrenches, sockets and such. FYI the RC directions are a joke. Good luck!!

 

Welcome!!!

Great job.

 

There's a great post on this with plenty of information started by Basslicks.

https://www.cherokeeforum.com/f51/sh...es-fix-225263/

 

Great thread. I love how he says that the process "...doesn't involve major surgery", and then the first step is to cut a hole in the floor.

Got a couple of these from Morris; good thing they come with thread lock on them. I wouldn't want them to inadvertently back out once installed (sarcasm alert)...

 

I'm going to make sure I watch all my caps

 

I should have bought a lottery ticket yesterday...


I went home after work last night and proceeded to remove both leaf springs without incident... penetrating oil, heat, a breaker bar, and a BAMP (big-*** metal pipe) cheater bar.


One of the happiest days of my life; I could just cry...


Of course on Sunday I did snap the long brake line running the length of the vehicle; still not sure how I will deal with that. It snapped back near the fitting to the flexible line that runs to the axle.

 

After 8 hours and carnage on my drivers side leaf spring, I was prepared for the worst and was planning on spending all day on the passenger side. It came off in 15 minutes with no cutting. Some of us get lucky!

 

I've installed quite a few sets of leafs on XJ's and have never had issues with the front or rear bolts.... I'm a firm believer in overall mechanical experience when it comes to these things. Knowing the feeling of a bolt before it breaks or how much pressure to exert before you should stop, things like that.

 

Dude, that's trippy; I was thinking the same thing. You've got to become one with the bolt.. BE the bolt.

 

i found out the front bolt on the driver side was broken at the nut. for a good 6 months i thought the hole was oval and that's what caused a clunk, but when I was finally ready to install the new springs, my jaw dropped. could've been messy.

i also got the bolts from morris, since one broke and the other looked like a toothpick because of corrosion

 

I am in the process of doing a 2 inch add-a-leaf. Wish I had measured before disassembling... oh well. It wasn't until I broke the springs apart that I noticed they were different. Could the vehicle have come from the factory like that or has a leaf spring definitely been replaced?

 

Couldn't agree more.

 

It seems some here are more concerned with grammar, spelling, punctuation, dangling participles, homonyms, etc.

So... I will answer my own question. I emailed the previous owner (the only previous owner) and she replied assuring me that she never had a spring replaced in her 23 years of ownership. Therefore we both presume that the vehicle came from the assembly line with the different (looking) springs.

 

hmm I've never looked that closely or actually disassembled a factory leaf pack so I couldn't tell you what's going on there.

 

Leafs are out. Took a long time because I'm a rookie but no broken leaf bolts! These guys were my best friends. Heat that front sucker from the access hole and it came out with less than one arm's strength and a 2' breaker. And sometimes corrosion is your friend. My bushing holder (real technical term) was rusted off. "So that's what was rattling when I went over bumps!"