Took the XJ out to the VA4WDA Members Only Ride at Big Dogs Off Road in here in VA. Finally got to put it through some serious rocks. It handled it well but due to a malfunctioning rear locker I had to do a lot more bypasses on day two than I would have liked.

The bumpers, skids and sliders I built all performed well taking some serious hits along the way with minimal damage done. Mostly just scrapes. The engine skid seems to have bent just enough that if it's sitting on a side slope the exhaust rattles on it a bit. Also may be that the tranny mount is loose and letting everything shift over. Seems to be a lot of movement there. Won't know for sure until I clean it up and take the skids off.

Also had trouble with the jamb nuts on the track bar and drag link loosening up and letting those clunk around. I guess blue Loc-Tite wasn't enough. Finally had to take a chisel and hammer to the track bar to tighten it up on the trail.

As for the ARB problem, I'm not sure what to say there yet. We swapped the front and rear air lines to see if it was a solenoid issue but the front still worked while connected to the rear solenoid and switch so it's down stream of that. Hopefully something stupid like a cracked air line. I do have a leaking axle seal on that axle too so I'm wonder if it's a bad breather building pressure and pushing oil out the seal and into the locker so it won't actuate. Again, once I get it cleaned I can take a better look at things.

Here's a couple shots of mine and my buddy's '97 from the weekend.

Camp all set up. Had to wait as soon as I laid out the tent it started to pour so we had to hurry to get it up before the inside was soaked.


As always I'm the little Jeep in the group. Just makes it more fun to go where they go.


Steve's '97 on 36's and 8.5" lift.


View from the driver's seat.


Beat the crap out of it coming down the hill to this point. Lots of big drop offs. You can see the HD tie rod bent somewhere along the way down. Not a mark on it so I don't know how it happened.






Steve trying not to roll over in Bunny Hole. It was all two of us could do to hold him down until he got it out. The right rear was in a deep hole and it just wanted to unload to the passenger side. It climbed even higher after the picture was taken.

 

Looks like a blast! Those trails defiantly put those 33s to use and abuse I can see.

 

Yeah, I'm seriously thinking of going to 35's. I like being the little guy in the group and going places they don't think I should go but with the extra wheelbase vs my old TJ it's just not quite where I want. It may also be that I'm rolling on E rated 16" tires now instead of C rated 15". The stiffer, shorter sidewall doesn't flex as well and honestly it's beating the crap out of me on the trail.

Got the power washing done last night and went over things again. Everything front to back took a hit somewhere. The belly skid got pushed over a bit and is hitting my exhaust but the full length scrape down the edge would have been the pan on the transmission without it so I'm fine with fixing that.

Rock rails have rock rash on the bottoms and tree rash down the sides and I don't have any body damage. Happy with that too.

Now I just have to figure out the issue with the ARB. At least it's the axle I bought that giving me all the trouble and not the one I built. In hind sight I guess I should have built both.

 

Looks like a fun time! What kind of trailer is that in your pics?

 

That's a trailer I built a few years ago to pull behind the TJ. The style and color matched it very nicely but it looks a bit goofy behind the XJ now. Not to mention I had to build an 8" goose neck adapter for the hitch to get it to reach the bumper.

 

Ah! Looks super nice! Did a great job on it. I've been looking around at some for my XJ for camping and such and haven't found any that really like totally yet except this one...and its custom built lol. Just my luck.... keep up the nice work!!

 

Thanks man. The trailer is great for that. It's nice to just lock it up and leave it so you're not wheeling with a Jeep load of stuff.

I've kicked around building them and selling them but it's all part of my "maybe someday" plans. Not really sure where things are heading right now as far as fab work is concerned. If I can get our website built up to a point where it can be on autopilot for a little while I would like to get into the fab work end of it. I have too many ideas and not enough of me to make them all work right now.

 

Totally understandable! I'll keep an eye out if you ever do decide too!

 

I may end up selling this one at some point. I'm thinking of getting a smaller RV or a truck camper and towing the Jeep on a trailer. We keep getting further away from home and I keep thinking one of these days I'm not going to be able to drive it home. The wife loves to go wheeling but she hates tent camping so that's cutting down on it's use quite a bit.

I'll let you know if I ever decide on that.

 

Awesome! Sounds good!

 

I understand. I'm looking to go 35s as well and you rarely hear anyone complaining about 35s over 33s. I'm sure that rating makes a difference, maybe go down to a 15 or find a lighter rated tires? What gearing are you?

 

Running 4.56 with a 4:1 t-case. 35's should actually put me closer to stock on the highway which will get me out of the drone zone RPM wise. I had planned 35's in the beginning but as always I talked myself out of it at the last second. Silly me. ;-)

So I pulled the cover on the axle and it's pretty clear where the ARB issue is.




You can see the copper from the air line smeared on the ring gear teeth.



Note: I didn't build this axle. It was an assembled part I installed.

They told me it was normal to run the line long and around the bottom but IMO that just leaves it way to vulnerable to moving parts. Case in point. It won't be going back in like this. I'm guessing there was enough flex in the line that the gear oil pulled it into the ring gear. Also explains the axle seal leak since it was pumping 90 PSI into the housing.

 

That's my plan as well. 4.56 and 35 A/Ts which will give a great ride, better torque than my 3.55 and 31s now, and will have more tooth engagement of the D30 pinion and gear than 4.88s.
Nice gear paint job! Really conductive and electrifying.

 

Pattern seems a bit off though.

 

So my choices for the fixing the ARB were either drive to NC and get it fixed and keep the rest of my 5 year warranty or they will credit me $300 and I fix it myself voiding the warranty.

I figured if let them fix it I would have spent the 6 hours driving, missed a day of work & burned a couple tanks of gas. If anything went wrong again after that I wouldn't let them touch it again so the warranty would be essentially useless anyway.

Since I know a really great off-road parts place to pick up the parts and a guy that knows how to install an ARB ;-) I opted for the second choice and put an order in for the parts. At least this way I know the airline will get run correctly and I shouldn't have that problem again.

I found this picture from when I did the first oil change. I remember thinking "this thing isn't going to last" and taking a picture to document it. I wanted to change it then but I figure it would just kink the tubing if I tried to bend it 180 the other way. They told me it was normal and there's plenty of room down there for it but I think there's a good reason ARB says to run it over the top in air and not in the thick fluid below. Pretty sure the fluid just pulled it into the gears. Just because you can doesn't mean you should. Probably save two minutes by not cutting it to length.