96cherokeemike

hello i have been a member for a while now and i figured why not start a build thread of my 96 xj.

long story short when i bought it, it was a non running pile of junk thats been sitting for 3 years.






after i got everything fixed, it needed a lot of work, i replaced the power steering pump, alternator, radiator, crank sensor, full tune up plugs wires rotor everything and it runs beautifuly!

96cherokeemike

after i got the motor running and everything set it was time to start working on some of the other problems it had, holes in the floor, mold in the carpet, exhaust rusted appart all that good stuff along with painting all the donor panels i got from the local scrapyard.










i also decided seeing as the carpet was moldy and such to just rip it all out and bedline the entire inside of the jeep, well the floors anyways.



another thing i did was paint the grill and bezels and rims flat black





after the painting of the panels

96cherokeemike

after this was all done we decided to take the heep out and see what it could do in the snow, living in wisconsin we have plenty of snow so we found this drift and got stuck



at this point the jeep didnt have headlights or anything because an animal chewed the main wiring harness, i had to re wire all the lights and such, talk about a mess and a lot of time messing around!

i drove the jeep like this for a while then it really started to transform into a rig and not just a normal cherokee.

first thing i did was built a front bumber. the old one was smashed from a deer hit before i owned it. the bumber is all quarter inch steel and very very strong! it started out being just a simple channel iron bumber to being a little more than that but still simple enough, best part is i can unbolt it for easy access if i ever for some reason need to!





added a light rack to the top for my offroad lights



i dont have any other close pics but i then bedlined the whole bumper to give it a rugged look

96cherokeemike

after the bumper was made i chose to bedline the rockers and lower doors







i forgot we took the jeep to the pipeline in spring to try it out too heres a pic from that weekend.



i got sick of having a stock height jeep so i ordered a 3 inch lift and some rims and tires.





i am in love with these tires, they are retreads from Treadwright, size is 245 75 16s they measure to 30.9 inches tall.

96cherokeemike

i then put the lift and all the goodies on







this is my homemade snorkel, isnt very pretty but works great, saved my butt a few times as ill show later



i then decided i wanted to change the exhaust again so i added a dual cherry bomb extreme muffler





this setup was a little too loud for on street use, so i added two glasspacks to quiet it down a bit



the rest of the pics are all pics from memorial weekend on the pipeline and some poser pics, i will add more to this build when i get them accomplished, i added custom fender flares since then and i also swapped in a chrysler 8.25 for the dana 35 and i also had to swap in a np2312 with a hack and tap sye.











it was too tempting not to!!





this is where snorkles come into play



hack and tap sye



damaged ring gear from a weekend of fun, i ended up blowing both front and rear diffs that weekend



fixing the damage



my other truck (show truck) pulling my jeep home

96cherokeemike

ill add as i go along my jeep journey

here is a pic of my wheeling group



we now have 3 cherokees including mine

i have tons of videos on youtube.

my username is TMracing159, lots of videos from the pipeline on there as well, any comments or questions welcome, i appreciate any help i can get.

96cherokeemike

so i know nobody found interest in my build because its pretty average, but ive added a few things recently, ill start with exhaust work, yes again exhaust work, for the 5th time now, i put on an aftermarket header because my stock manifold had cracks galore in it, heres a few pics

96cherokeemike

a few other new things, my hacked fenders and homemade fender flares, i didnt make my flares as wide as others do but they are about 2 inches from the body.















now i just need to make my custom mud flaps, hopefully this weekend i will get around to it

jeep4lf

Really like it so far a nice clean build

96cherokeemike

thanks man appreciate it, its a budget build with lot of live and learn along the way, i like to have fun with my xj not just keep it nice so it looks good.

cjk09

lookin good especially seeing before and after pics of it....i made a rear bumper almost like the front one you made for my 1994 f150.

96cherokeemike

oh yea lots of work from then till now, i was thinking about making a rear bumper as well with a spare tire carrier, only problem is having the time to do it while working 2 jobs.