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A friend of mine put a loooong build thread together on here, and thought it would be fun to share mine. I've collected all my photos from the on social media, but not officially on an XJ forum. So here goes:
As I entered into singledom once again after my second divorce, I decided I once again longed for another XJ. (hence #2). I was forced to sell my 99 due to money troubles (see divorce) and have been vexed ever since. So I got the bug once more and went on the hunt. Craigslist and other places are a feeding grounds for sharks, and you have to be quick, or it's gone. UNLESS the item in question so far from anyone no one wants to bother driving to it. That's where this old rust bucket came in. This guy that owned it, said he got 10 calls a day for 2 months with people asking about it, but since he was in the middle of nowhere no one wanted to make the haul. A few weeks after I went to see it, I threw him a low ball offer, and he accepted. Woohoo! He felt so bad it took so long to get back to me, he even met me half way with it. (super bonus). So now I've got it in my grasp, knowing full well the horrors that await me. (this was the only photo for the add in CL) PS. THat's the dude's girl friend.
So the first item up for business was getting this thing cleaned. These two chain smokers left plenty of mess. My girlfriend decided should wouldn't step foot in this thing until it was cleaned to her specs. (I kinda had to agree it was gross) No pics, but it was horrid. We scrubbed, put parts in the bath tub, scrubbed the boogies off the seats, man, it was nasty. She cleaned up pretty good, and I can report after year there is no smoke smell. The next order was my issue. The 90's crusty stickers on the back....wow. Gum off, goo off, wd-40, razor blades... a week later and they were all off.
Non-negotiable, the suspension had to go.... This thing had 240k on her when I purchased it, and the springs were factory and loooooong over due to be thrown in a trash pile. The wheel tucked in the wells as if there was a hippo in it, and worst of all it had helper springs too!
So after a bit of research and leery about lift kits, I decided to go the road less traveled. I went with some Moog heavy duty upcountry leaf packs and daystar 1" drop shackles. (not realizing that would actually be like a 4" lift until the leaf packs calmed down. Cost: 200 for leaf packs, 50 for new shackles. At the time the lift shackles were cheaper than I could find the OEM ones, and they looked pretty beat to me.
In a hurry, I decide to try and level it out using some poly coil isolators and some MOOG variable rate coils. But it wasn't good enough really. Next photo is without sway bar on. (broke the end links as it seems most people do).
Moog VR coils: 67 shipped 2 days amazon prime
Coil isolators: 25 bucks Total front: 92
I should note that these bad boys are built for adventure right out of the box. I had to some ideas to make it a little more adventure friendly. First the suspension needed work. I must also say that the MOOG vr coils are an astounding value and I would highly recommend. Test driving my friends XJ with an ome lift, and the feel was comparable. Next up was a little bigger tires. I bought it with 235/70/15 street tires, and needed something a little more for the be
ach, so I went with some Treadwrite tires called ATG's. They did not disappoint.
After flushing all the fluids and replacing filters and some pesky oil filter adapters seals. I decided to pick up something for a front fishing rod rack I had picked up in a pretty good trade that also included a quality surf rod and real. Item: I am originally and spent most of life in Indiana, and have now relocated to Delaware.
Also installed around this time: Napier precision hood vents/45 LED headlights
Last edited by oldblue#2; 08-19-2016 at 07:09 PM.
Reason: Mistake
I might have gone off the timeline a bit here....Anyway. After looking at some atrocious prices for seat covers/replacement seats (the seats were pretty gross) I opted to utilize my sewing skills and give a recover a go.
PRICE: 50 bucks and lots and lots and lots of trial and error and time.
I would also like to mention if you have noticed in the last pic. This Jeep is a 1994 sport package with 5spd ax-15 and in the factory brilliant blue metallic. It's the only one I've ever come across then and since.
The Jeep came from the PO with the headliner panel sans the actual headliner material. Being much favored to the DIY I picked up some clearance vinyl from Joans, and was able to use a mostly full can of super 77, and finished the job with a can of loctite glue. (edit just use the super 77 loctite stuff is junk) My headliner is already sagging at this point and plan on pulling the vinyl 94 headliner and installing a 97 headliner and relocating the sound bar to the front (more on why later)
So the jeep came from the PO with a walmart universal hitch. It drops waaay down and I wasn't a fan. I was able to purchase an almost completely intact 1996 sercurity XJ on a FB swap and sell for 300 somewhere around this time frame. I noticed it had a hitch that tied waaaaay back in the unirail, and concocted a plan to pull and and get rid of the wally world universal. No pics of this but I did manage to destroy what was left of the bumper brackets removing the bumper to get to the nut strips, (which didn't exist really).
So after tearing apart the Parts jeep and extracting the fancy heavy duty hitch from it, I bought some JCR nut strips and built my own "tail bone" with some DND diy bumper plates (25 bucks) and some 2x2 a friend gave me. This was also cheaper than I could find new bumper brackets. I also installed some led reverse lights on the now bumper (skin)
08-18-2016, 05:03 PM
Adventure Wagon build
