Hello to all who are interested in this build. I'm one of those guys that is proud of my square "grocery getter" and that it's not some oversized truck that gets stuck every time it leaves the pavement. It hauls my entire family if need be, tows whatever I attach to the rear, and will drive through wherever I point the nose and plant my foot. Not much else you could ask of a vehicle really in my book. The endstate I'm going for it an expeditionary style vehicle that can more or less handle whatever I throw at it. Not a rockcrawler by any means.

I'm really starting from sort of the middle of my Jeeps build as I post on here. I will however try to get what I've managed so far posted as sequentially as possible to.

I started with a completely stock 2000 Green Jeep Cherokee SE.

- First mods for the Green Wagon were a simple cone K&N airfilter (stock was clogged and I like to upgrade whenever I get a chance) and tube to put it in the stock airbox location.
>>I later cut up a large mudflap and rivetted it to the frame to form a really ghetto CAI, but for $8, who's gonna complain?

- Next was a Flowmaster Delta 40 Muffler and a Magnaflow Cat. Stock muffler was rotting through at the rear and the stock cat wasn't passing emissions anymore (again with the upgrade). I'm still running a version of this setup and love the growl of this engine!

- Finally I get to do something to the suspension of this thing - I ordered a 2 inch budget lift from Rocky Road Outfitters. I must have gotten lucky because everything arrived quickly and was exactly as described despite the horrendous online reviews of this Utah company. This contained a 2 inch poly spacer for the front, 3 inch lift shackle for the rear (net 1.5 inches of actual lift), 1/2 inch leaf block, and Bar Pin Eliminators for the shocks to extend them out a bit. Overall, everything went together fine and I ran this without issue for nearly 4 years.

- When my stock tires finally ran down to the point of no return (can you say upgrade time?) I researched and found some 30x9.5 Yokohama AT-S's and have loved them for the past 45,000 miles (still easily have 15-25,000 to go if I can hold out that long). At this time, I really didn't want a complete off-road tire, as I spend 95% of my time on-road, but was wanting to transition that way. These tires perform excellent in Washington all year round (rain, rain, rain, sun, more rain). Only in moderate snow or icy roads have I ever needed 4WD to get around and that was for safety mostly (it's also more fun when I can go and others cannot). I've had these in mud twice and wouldn't recommend them there at all, but otherwise it's a great tire.

Next on to the more recent fun stuff.

 

Early last year I finally purchased an ARB Bullbar, IPF Lights and a Warn M8000 winch for the front end of the Jeep. I cannot say enough about the fit and finish of this particular piece of equipment (the bullbar). After reviewing every possible option on the market I had to go with this one. It also helped that I lived within 45 minutes of the distibution center in Renton, WA so.... free shipping!



I was pleasently suprised that the weight of the bumper only dropped the front end about half an inch. However, on moderate speed bumps, driveway entrances, etc , I could now bottom out my suspension.... not good.

On to the rear end:

I couldn't find a sollution anywhere that filled the role of what I desired: A "clean" looking tirecarrier that was also completely functional as all around rear end protection. I also wanted a skidplate for my gas tank, just incase. While I weighed the options current available options and not being sold on any of them in particular, started combing the area for a fabricator. I then linked up with Rob at SBF Fabrication, a local shop in the Gig Harbor area and started exchanging ideas. I eventually decided to design this one myself based upon what elements I'd seen in other designs via a 3D Autocad software, he found a donor cherokee to mock up the pieces on and more or less went to work creating it. All I can say is my hat's off to him for an excellent job. I get nothing but compliments on the looks of it, as well as the satisfaction that I was able to personalize such a big part of my vehicle.



*Lights On


This plus the tied in tank skid really added some weight to my Cherokee, probably putting an additional 250lbs+ on the rear end and causing similar suspension symptoms as the front.

 

Very clean XJ. Not every Cherokee needs to be a mean flexin, fender cut off road machine. Practicality is what makes these Jeeps what they are. Thats a very nice rear bumper.

The reverse lights look a little bluer than the bumper lights, you have LEDs in the reverse lights as well?

 

Thanks man! The stock reverse bulbs are LED as well as the bumper mounted ones. Overall the effect is quite the improvement over stock as far as rearward visability goes for night time backing up. Plus I prefer the look of LEDs overall.

I'll post a more thorough update tonight with pics. Probably will be able to get everything current in one or two posts.

 

As the title says, after I installed the bumpers I needed to seriously decide how I was going to proceed with the next phase of the Green Wagon - The Lift! (ominous echo should be inserted here)

Like any internet junkie, I researched and researched.... and researched. I eventually got in touch with Dirk from DPG Offroad, who for the record has superb customer service and is really knowledgeable when it comes to this subject. With his expertise I came down to either a Rubicon Express (RE) short arm kit, a hybrid RE kit with Old Man Emu (OME) shocks/springs, or OME shocks/springs with JKS control arms/trackbar/swaybar disconnects. Did I mention before that I am a complete sucker for doing things the right way and only once? He set me up with some outstanding deals in the first place, then even to make the deal sweeter, I had the option to pick up the shocks and springs in Renton myself, saving a ton on shipping as each leaf pack weighs 50 lbs + each.

Here's what I ended up with:

In the front-
- 2 inch poly spacer
- OME 4 inch lift TJ Coil
- OME Nitro Sport Long Travel Shocks
- JKS Adjustable Lower Control Arms
- JKS Adjustable Upper Control Arms
- JKS Adjustable Trackbar (for 4-6 inches of lift)
- JKS Quicker Disconnects
- Rough Country Control Arm Drop Brackets

In the rear-
- OME 2.5 inch lift XJ Medium Duty Leaf Pack + OME XJ Add a leaf
- OME Nitro Sport Long Travel Shocks
- JKS Extended Length Boomerang Shackle (1 inch lift)
- 4 degree shim for pinion angle adjustment
- HD U-Bolts

To say the least, I ended up spending nearly 50% more for the OME/JKS equipment but I can only attest to the ridiculous quality standards and beefiness of it. It also gives me the adjustability to go taller later on, should I come down with "lift-itus".



I'll snap a bunch of pictures tomorrow while I have it up on the lift putting in my new SYE and driveshaft. I can't wait to be back to having a rear wheel drive Jeep again.

 

Ok, so everything I've read so far says that this is a 2-3 hour job. I should always just apply the 2x rule to all instructions since this took me 4.5 hours. Granted, about 40 minutes was spent using the wrong tool to extract that small snapring from the stock output shaft before even getting the tail housing off. My hat is off to Advance Adapters for making such a straightforward kit that fits together like a glove.

And now for my admission of guilt: I failed to charge my phone(camera) over the past few days and it was deader than Oldsmobile about an hour into the tear down. Tomorrow when I'm diagnosing a rattle I discovered a week ago, I'll be sure to snap pictures of the new pretty tailhousing and shaft.

Back on track - Once I got the chance to pull it out of the shop in 2WD (rear, lol), I ran it down the street on a little test drive to make sure everything was holding together ok before putting all the tools away. I had almost forgotten how nice it is to have light smooth steering again. The new DS is really smooth with no vibrations whatsoever. It's nice to once again be able to use my right foot for a quick take-off if need be (or the urge just strikes me).

 

Clean Jeep. Lots of nice touches, and like yours, mine will be a multi-use daily driver. Nice.

 

I almost forgot this afternoon to snap these, but here's some quick ones:


Tom Woods DS into Chrysler 8.25


New Advance Adapters SYE + Drive Shaft


Rough Country CAD with JKS upper and lower control arms


OME Shock and Spring


JKS Quicker Disconnect, JKS Adjustable Trackbar

I've found that my alignment still needs some work, but it's only off a little bit. Only suspension upgrades that I still need to work on are raising my rear shock mounts. That should fix my rear droop problem (lack of droop). I had a chance to take this thing down some fairly rough trails and some not so rough ones, I'm glad to say that this suspension is nicely well rounded and is great for what I'm doing. Thanks for all of the replies!

 

Got out the tape measure today and squared up my alignment problem and got my steering wheel to sit straight again too.

I've been having intermittant problems with my fuel injectors for some time now. One of them had a slow leak and another would refuse to function after the engine is brought up to operating temp, shut off and restarted again. It had happened once or twice before, but it started happening once or twice a day and that became ridiculous.

Called up Precision Auto Injectors and ordered a set:

No installation pics (my hands were filthy and I wasn't reaching for my camera) but here's the finished setup. Gotta say I'm happy that it goes with the rest of my green theme!



Here's a shot of the entire driver's side engine bay, most notably the AFE CAI



Now that I'm done with that I will be reinstalling a lower air dam I made that functionally improves my gas mileage quite a bit and isn't in the way of the suspension. Probably going to be my weekend project.

 

DIG!!!

This is exactly where I'm going with mine.

 

Beautifully built Cherokee, Glad to see a cherokee done right and would love to do the same as you some day.

 

That rear bumper is gorgeous.

 

Looks great man, can't wait for more updates!

 

I agree!

 

Thanks for all of the compliments guys! I'm unfortunately going to be overseas for a while and won't be able to touch the Jeep.

I will say that my next planned upgrades are 36" tires, 4:56 gears, and a roof rack with a VisionX 52" light bar.