Haven't made a post since I went off to college 14 years ago. Time flies and I forgot my account name until last night. I've gone through so many vehicles since then; this thread feels like a tiny fraction of my relationship with Jeep Cherokees, but here goes.

First of all my name. Ghettojeep1. Why? Well, let me show you my first vehicle.







I bought this 1995 Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo 4.0 4WD in 2010 at a dealer auction for $400. Had 230k on her, was completely stock and unmodified, and everything worked. One day on my way to school, a pothole caused my door to fall off do to 2 broken pins. That day she became known as the ghetto jeep and the rest was history. I can't find pics of how she ended up, but she was a great woods rig. Sold her for $400 when I went off to college as parking garage spaces were absurdly expensive.

ENTER: 2000 GREEN XJ

My junior year I moved off campus to a house with a driveway, garage and a big ole steep hill for a front yard. Needless to say, I went on Craigslist (well before the days of our glorious marketplace) and found a 2000 Jeep Cherokee Sport 4.0 4wd completely unmolested, functional AC, perfect green metallic paint, and 102k original miles with a clean title. $1700. That was a lot for an XJ back in 2014, but she was super clean and in my budget.



Since I hadn't learned my lesson yet, I immediately cut and folded the fenders, bought a set of 31" kenda klevars, then flexed her out with stock suspension on the aforementioned hill. She was the perfect vehicle. Then the water pump went out, the AC stopped working, then the SKIM went kaput. I towed her to a dealership and had her reprogrammed and new keys made for a whopping $700. She went the rest of my college experience with no issues and I never appreciated that until recently. This is the only pic I have of her from that time period.

ENTER: 2018 Volkswagen Beetle Dune Edition

I graduated college and immediately took a job offer as a project manager for a major construction company. I was living the dream. But my old jeep with no AC became a hassle in city traffic, I had a 2016 Tacoma SR5 that work paid for and I got accustomed to creature comforts and nice paint jobs. One day my young and dumb self waked into a Volkswagen dealership to look at a used 4Runner, but got immediately side tracked by the most gorgeous thing my eyes had ever seen. A brand new 0 mile Volkswagen Beetle Dune edition in sandstorm yellow metallic. She was only $27k which seems like a damn bargain nowadays looking back.



Needless to say my ole 2000 Jeep XJ sat undriven for a couple years, but never considered selling her because I knew she'd become useful one day. Enter the pandemic. Car prices soar, the Beetle had been discontinued in 2019 which had already inflated the used Beetle prices, but the offers from the dealer for my car became too hard to refuse. In 2021 I sold my little thug bug back to the dealer I bought it from for $32k with 30k miles on her. That same day I put insurance back on my Jeep and charged the battery, started right up. At that point she only had 132k on the clock and was ready for some more modifyin'. I lifted her 3", added some affordable offroad bumpers, new brakes, new wheels with some BFG M/Ts, bushwhackers, and a bunch of other stuff. Just gonna dump all the pics I have from around that time.




Deleted the passenger seat at some point to haul lumber for the new house build














We got rear ended and shoved into a truck, so the front bumper and bull bar got chopped, reinforced, and left as a stubby.

Thus concludes the era of my slow green Jeep. After this point she got really spicy with nitrous and the next part of this build thread will feature many more modern pics of her. Also pictures of my other 2 project XJ/MJ's I've acquired from marketplace the last couple years. Stay tuned!

 

During the top of the XJ boom market in 2022, I found this beautiful, rust-free 1996 2-door SE 2wd on marketplace and low-balled the guy $800. He said yes and I drug home my supposedly "blown engine" XJ with no keys but a title in hand. After getting her washed up, I found the keys over the sun visor. After swapping in a new battery she fired right up with a major exhaust manifold leak and the distributor sounded like a bag of wrenches. This frustrated me because I originally planned on throwing one of my 5.3 4l60 packages in, but I hate tearing apart a perfectly good XJ. So the refresh/rebuild began.



When I bought her she had wheel adapters and JK wheels. No offense to anyone running these, but they look awful on an XJ.














I redid her entire brake system front to back, even down to new parking brake cables and star adjusters because the PO had left something unhooked before that destroyed everything. I was just making headway to getting her on the road when my dream popped up for sale on marketplace. After low-balling I brought home this 1989 Comanche 2wd short bed 2.5 5 speed running with no rust, clean title, and 164k on the clock for a mere $1400.




No rust, newish Goodyear tires all around


Comanche came with a spare AX5 that's 4WD and front driveshaft

the original bench seat and a spare matching wheel

Transfer case ready for 4WD swap


Here she is parked next to ole green. The Comanche had transmission issues, which I diagnosed to a broken shift shaft and subsequently tore the transmission apart, the spare apart, and swapped one of the good shafts back into the 2wd. She had a major windshield leak that had ruined the carpet and caused quite a bit of surface rust in the floor pans. after sanding the rust down, there was only one "fresh green bean" sized hole that would need to be welded up. I test fit the bench seat and threw a coverado back seat cover I had I the green XJ and took her for a spin. After only ever owning 4.0 Jeeps, the 2.5 was a bit underwhelming, but fun to drive nonetheless.




ANYWAYS, back to sexy red as I've been calling her. My 2000 green xj finally popped her 0331 head in drastic fashion after fixing everything I could on her, and a whole host of new parts throw at her. Oh well, at least most them fit the '96. I took the bullet hole wheels with 275/60/15 Hankooks on them (more on that later), her new alternator, new starter, new radiator and hoses, and a few other parts off ole green and applied them to sexy red. After searching marketplace for a while, I found a perfect condition chrome front bumper to match the rear and replace the mangled up black bumper the PO had installed and hit a deer with.
















This is pretty much where I'm at now. Been driving the '96 and shaking her down for any new problems, my green 2000 XJ sits needing a rebuild, and my Comanche drives but still leaks and is underwhelming. I'm smelling a full guts swap of the 2000 into the Comanche. I just picked up an Edelbrock performer head, scorpion 1.7 rollers, and a moroso oil pan for 500 beans from a guy in my neighborhood. Had never been installed except on his motor stand. At this moment the plan is to pull the 4.0 4wd setup from ole green, rebuild with my new goodies, and shove her into the comanche with one of the many 4wd front axles I've acquired over the years. My green jeep has been chugging nitrous for a few years, so I think the little carb'd 2.5 and 5 speed 4wd AX5 will go into her to use around the farm and beat up in the woods. She has a salvage title and not a single body panel is straight anymore, but she's been mine for so long I can't sell her or part her out.