8th year Christmas Jeep

 

I'm still here, and still keeping it real! Hopefully some new projects for the old girl soon. We will be in touch with more building and more wheeling soon.

 

took a ride though the usual place with the usual people.
she may have one more good ride in her before some major renovations

 

What are you thinking? Looks like it does pretty good.

 

Last ride for reals this time. One of our local spots is going to be sold and developed so we had to squeeze in one last ride. It was a fun wet day of greasy rocks.

I


So I got the kiddo out to help me wash it before I start pulling things apart.

The plan is to cut out some more rust spots that have popped up and get this thing patched up with a fresh coat of paint. Mechanically I've been thinking about fabbing up some proper upper control arms for the IRO radius arms and some frame stiffeners would be nice, but one step at a time.

 

I scored some WJ seats from a good friend, his daily was 300+k and was getting rotten so some select parts were pillaged before it got sent to off for scrap. As we already know the passenger side of the swap is very straight forward with the manual rails and all but i"m hoping to get the power recline and lumbar working.

I haven't researched this swap lately but after doing some measurements I realized for the drivers side I could take the lower part of the XJ rails and slide them onto the WJ frame.
I also used the XJ alignment plates that are under the seat to move the seat over toward the middle of the jeep. So this is XJ lower rails on WJ power seat with the XJs relocation bracket.



I used the parts yeti to mock things up, I do have the seat side pig tails so I'll be looking for some wiring diagrams to hopefully feed these things some power and get them working. Who knows maybe I'll get crazy and get those heated seats working too.

 

I've been working on getting rid of the rot.

 

The suspension bits may say IRO and Rubicon Express but the body work says Flex Seal

 

lol i used the same stuff to seal off my rear wells after i cut past the seams and rewelded them together. Lots of tacks and flex seal

 

Finally out of the garage and took it for its first drive in work in way to long.

I'm happy with the fitment and how everything came together. Front fenders are still removable and well protected.


Got a new fairlead that fits the winch plate much better

 

We got out for a fathers day run to the Battle Grounds AKA Rutland. The ride up was a bit angry, her road manners haven't been the best lately. I suspect she will need some control arm bushings and I'm sure the clapped out stock driveshafts have had enough of my shenanigans. Anyway she still goes good in the woods, heres a little section that we call the waterfall. I've never been able to hit it before and to make it in one shot had me pumped.

 

Good drive, man! Nicely controlled.

 

Old Florida Road Dudes!!!!! Hell Yeah!!!!





a little rainstorm while we aired down made sure everything was nice and slick. the whole trial is super technical and rocky with a couple of huge rock ledges. so much fun

 

 

The Jeep and I got called out to join in on an offroad adventure in New Hampshire. Awesome people, awesome trails and other than having a lower shock bolt let go I'll call it a total win for the old cherokee.



From what I gather we loosely followed the trails from the New Hampshire Overland Trophy that was held a few years ago. I'll try and get some more pictures up soon. It really was an epic trip. This is definitely the wheeling I want to be doing!