bad_idea

Well, that answers that.

I didn't realize they were so cheap. I assumed they were priced similar to the fabricated covers. How do the Solid covers compare to the fabricated covers? How thick are they?

XJlimitedx99

I believe they're always $65 a piece, which is a smokin' deal.

The Solid covers are cast iron as opposed to formed plate steel. The cast is weaker in the sense that it will crack instead of bend but I imagine it would take a hell of a hit to crack it. Not to mention the diff housing itself is cast steel. I'm not sure how thick they are. I thought I remembered reading 3/8" but now I can't find anywhere that says that. Everybody seems to love them so I figure I can't go wrong for the price. They're basically two for one compared to the other covers.

XJlimitedx99

This winter has been hitting hard! Last week was around 0-5 °F all week. I need an inspection this month and there are a few things that I know I can fail for so I've been looking for a garage to get into. A buddy of mine recently bought a house with a garage but it was full of stuff from the move and he didn't seem too interested in letting me use it. I found a garage to rent elsewhere and tried to pursue that deal but it ended up falling through which gave me the leverage I needed to get into my friend's place.



So I got one day of work in! Luckily, the day I worked was 55 °F! Crazy temperature swings around here. I put in a long day's work replacing my leaf spring bushings as well as installing parking brake cables.

When I did my disc brake swap two summers ago I intended to modify my XJ parking brake cables to work with the KJ backing plates. That never happened and I realized that I will probably never do that so I bought the Crown cables designed for the swap and they worked great. Very easy install. The only hiccup was my adjuster was frozen up but I was able to get it moving after heating it for a few minutes with my MAPP gas torch. So I have a functioning parking brake again with my disc brakes. Woohoo!



As far as the leaf spring bushings, you may remember that I replaced them previously when I installed my lift a few years back. I believe I messed up on the install and caused them to wear prematurely. When I put them in I installed the leafs and let the vehicle sit on its weight for several days before torquing anything. When I torqued them I noticed the bushings had cracked under the bolts even though they had zero miles on them. This is what they looked like after these few years.




The bolts sitting at the bottom of the springs caused the front eyelet of the spring to push up into the floor which caused a bit of damage. There's a project for another time.





I picked up some new u-bolts for this but made a bonehead mistake and overlooked the length of them when I bought them. They ended up being too short. Dang. Had to reuse the old ones.



I also took this opportunity to change positions on my shackles. Previously my leafs were mounted on the longer position on the shackle but I've wanted to change to the shorter one because the geometry will work together better. After moving to the shorter one my shackle angle is too shallow (hard to see in the picture) so I intend to move the upper mount back on position on the relocation brackets.



So I go back to school in a week and I still have a CEL and need an inspection this month. I'm hoping to get one more good day of work in to resolve my evap leak. I ordered a new vapor recovery line to replace my crushed one and intend to go through every inch of my vacuum system very thoroughly. I will find it. I'll keep ya updated.

XJlimitedx99

The Jeep took a sticker this morning!

Last week I put some time in locating my vacuum leak. Turns out my vacuum canister was cracked and leaking. No surprise there because it was cracked years ago and I JB welded it back together. It held for awhile and didn't owe me anything. I replaced it with a TJ canister which is more rectangular shaped than the egg on the XJ's. The inlet port is the same size. So, that cleared my CEL and it hasn't come back on in about 50 miles.

Glad to have that resolved and have my sticker. I just moved back into school today for this next semester so, as in the past, the Jeep will be on hold for awhile. I'm just glad it got to make the trip up here with me.

JandDGreens

Nice!

XJlimitedx99

Haven't done much with the Jeep this semester because I have been super busy with school but I got the chance to play a little bit.





On my way home from school the other day I was getting some serious howling under load that got louder with speed. My first thought was I smoked my differential. I was picturing the Jeep sitting in the driveway for the next year before I could afford to fix it.

Got under there yesterday to do some noggin pokin' and found a junk u-joint in the rear shaft. $20 and like an hour later and the Jeep is vibe free! I feel like I dodged the bullet on that one.

My CEL also came back on about a week after my inspection. I just had the chance to scan it and came up with P0442 and P0455 which are for a large and small evap system leak. I never replaced my vapor recovery line so I'm hoping that is the cause. Also could be a check valve that I was suspect of when I was searching for vacuum leaks last time.

I'm not going to be living at home this summer. I will be living at my family's beach house in Hampton, NH and working in Portsmouth. I also plan on living there throughout the next school year. This is very exciting but I'm concerned I will not be able to do any heavy projects while living there (aka WJ swap). I might leave the Jeep at my parent's house and come home on the weekends to work on it. We'll see.

Bonus picture: Here's my girlfriend helping me air down before a little trail run the other day.

XJlimitedx99

Went out on a little recovery mission the other day to help out a buddy of mine. There was a large bank pushed up at the end of the trail. I hit it with a bit of momentum expecting the belly pan to rub on the top of the pile. It did. What I didn't expect was the back of the bank to basically be a vertical drop. I essentially jumped my Jeep over the pile on accident. Despite how aggressive it was, nothing too major broke. I was holding onto the shift lever and I actually ripped it off in the process.

I ended up caving my rocker in a bit and blowing a trans line that was well due to be replaced. It had been rubbing on the bottom of my crank pulley for like 2 years and I have neglected to do anything about it. I had this one coming. I don't think I'll be able to do the line in my apartment parking lot so I'm thinkin I'll just have a garage do it and move on.

bad_idea

Trans lines are easy to swap out. 20 minute install w/ the right tools.

XJlimitedx99

I'm just worried about getting heat for draining oil in the parking lot or getting it everywhere. God forbid I get cited for some environmental garbage or something like that. I ordered the parts so I might end up just doing it and hoping nobody says anything.

bad_idea

I hear ya. I rented a 10x30 storage unit when I lived in an apartment. The manager of the storage facility was cool, didn't mind me working on the car there. These days there are storage facilities that cater to car guys, providing a functional garage at a fair price. I knew a guy that was renting a 30x40 garage w/ 220v power for $250 a month.

Suprmn

Great job and nice Jeep! Enjoyed reading the thread.

XJlimitedx99

Here's your quarterly life update:

That trans line was not an easy 20 minute job. Couldn't get the quick disconnect fitting off on the radiator side. Messed with it for a couple hours then gave up. I was deep into school work at that point and didn't have the time to be patient. Ended up having a shop do it.

Finals have now come and gone. I can honestly say this semester of school was the most difficult thing I've ever done in my life. I was putting in 60-65 hour weeks for most of it.

I've recently moved into a family owned cottage on the beach in Hampton. Working full time at an internship and living by myself hasn't left me with a ton of time to play with my toys.

I do have a good sized shed that I cleaned out and got my motorcycle into. I've spent a few nights this week doing some maintenance on it.

A month or so ago I picked up a daily drive. Little 2009 Nissan Versa with 115k for $1000! It has crank windows, manual locks, no AC or radio from the factory, etc. Its funny that somehow my wheelin rig is fully loaded and my daily is a base model. I screwed that one up. The daily failed inspection yesterday for a ball joint and a couple other little things so next on my list is to get a sticker on that.

After all that, maybe I'll be able to play with the Jeep a bit this summer. I will not be able to do the heavily cutting and welding that I was doing last year but I'm hoping I can spend the summer cleaning up many of the corners I've cut in the passed. My first focus will be tackling many of the things on my list of issues several pages back. I also would like to clean up my rats nest of wires under the hood around my battery by filling in all of the slots in my factory fuse and relay box.

If by some miracle I finish all of that (which I won't) I also would like to wire in a decent CB setup as well as rewire my audio system with a big speaker amp that I've had laying around forever.

Truth is, my Jeep is falling apart. Its not the gem it used to be. My rockers and doors are rotting bad, many electrical things don't work anymore, and she's just not as much fun as she used to be because I don't have the time to love her right. Now my girlfriend wants to spend time with me and my mother wants to spend time with me and nobody appreciates that I need everyone to leave me alone so I can build a better Jeep.

Bonus: This is funny. I drove the Jeep to work yesterday while the Nissan was in the shop. It was raining out and I had forgot that my door panel was off. I needed to roll my window down on the road to pay a toll so I quickly threw the door panel on and went to work. When I got there I pulled the handle to open the door and nothing happened. I hadn't connected the door latch rod. Had to climb out the passenger side. Oops.

bad_idea

Roll the window down and use the outside handle. BTDT

I know what you mean about life getting in the way of your hobbies. It only gets worse from there my friend. Married, kid, work 60+ hours weekly, etc. I have a 79 Camaro that was my first car. Still have it kicking around. It is showing signs of neglect, has been sitting for last 5 years or so. Hope to give it some love in the next year or so.

XJlimitedx99

Been playing with the Jeep a bit recently, nothing too major. Been going to town with my multi-meter and soldering iron resolving some long standing issues.

Spent a few days diagnosing my intermittent power locks. I traced a high resistance circuit to a corroded connector coming from the driver's door ajar switch. The connector would intermittently trigger the door ajar features as I handled it so it definitely was an issue. Bypassed the connector and the locks have worked since. Could be a coincidence. Maybe they're just cooperating now that they're getting some attention.



Pulled the wiring harness out of the driver's door jamb and fixed a few wires in there which got my my driver's side unlock button as well as my power mirrors back.





Moved onto fixing my rear wiper and rear washer. Found a nightmare in my quarter panels. I pulled all of the connectors apart, fixed any broken/corroded wires and gave them a good glob of dielectric. Got my rear wiper back and determined my washer is a bad pump. New one on order.















The melted connectors are very interesting. On both the driver's and passenger side the hot lead cavity going into the brake light was melted. They both still transferred power and the ground circuit has continuity. I've never blown a fuse for any of this so IDK what's up with that. Maybe it was from the PO?

I'm going to continue going through electrical stuff and solving problems where I find them with the intention of cleaning things up and setting myself up nice for future accessories and shenanigans. Also just ordered a new power steering line to fix my leak, new longer u-bolts as well as a few other little things.

Poser pics because that's all I've been doing recently:

XJlimitedx99

Been pokin' around with the Jeep a bit. I'm bumping this list from post #143 because I have been addressing some of these points and I'd like to keep the list relevant.

Changed out my battery terminals the other day. My negative terminal has been broken for some time now which actually was convenient because I didn't need a wrench to remove the terminal. The Jeep picked a good time to not start because of the terminals because I had already ordered new ones and was planning on doing them.


Also address my leaking high pressure power steering line. I changed out both lines and flushed the power steering system while I had the line off. This is the first time I've done anything to the power steering system since owning the Jeep. It was definitely due for a flush after a few years of pushing 35's. I flushed the system by putting the front axle on jack stands and cranking the wheel back and forth to push fluid out of the pump. I also started the motor momentarily to purge fluid out of the pump. To refill I did the same actions until the fluid level stopped dropping.