bhennessee1

Depending in how they mount, you may be able to cut them off a little before the unibody rail.

crdude

These finally showed up. Time to get to work.

crdude

how it sits now


I didnt put my coil spacers in yet because it sits fairly level as it is now. When some of the snow melts I can pull the less saggy rear springs from my parts rig and then I will gain a couple " in the back, and will put my spacers in then.

I also removed the rear sway bar.

And I debadged the jeep, other then the 4.0 high output badge and the jeep badge on the front, I didnt get a picture because I still need to remove the left over glue.

crdude

I forgot I worked out a deal last summer, and my buddy owes me a set of 32"s from when he went to 35"s on his B2.. If all goes as planned, I may be sitting about stock hight on 32"s pretty soon.. Bring on the trimming!

Atmos

ditch those side steps and you'll have a good looking jeep there

crdude

As usuall I havnt got much done on this, been to busy playing in the mud.

The spring that keeps the side mirrors from flopping all over the place and dangling from the wire broke on the pass side, so that got replaced.
Front shaft joints are toast, just picked up a new set. The guy at autozone was trying to sell me DL ujoints, I never seem to have much luck there. So I went over to schucks and picked up a set of outer joints. Should be getting that done this weekend.
Took some measurements on my rig and my parts rig, from the axle tube to where the bump stop meats the uniframe rail on my rig is 5 3/4" WITH my 2" lift shackes. parts rig sits at 7 3/4" with stock shackles, which is a bit higher then most came fromthe factory.
rear springs from my parts rig with my shackles should set me 3.5-4" over what most xj's came from the factory at. Now Im not sure if I'll even use the lift springs I have for the rear.
I found the factory messurments here- http://www.naxja.org/forum/showthread.php?t=912893
I messured my front a bit different then they did though, I messured from the knuckle directly bellow the spring to the top of the spring isolator. parts rig messured only 3/4" higher in the front then mine, so I'll still be looking for some 3-4" lift coils.

I'll try to grab some pictures when I get my front shafts pulled. have all the bolts/nuts soaked in penatrating oil, rusty bolts should be ready to come out by this weekend.

crdude

jeep spit the rear DL, so I was on the hunt for a yoke for a few days there.

While it was just sitting, me and a couple buddys decided to tackle some things on the xj I'v been wanting to do.
Got the original seats swapped out for a set that recline and all that good stuff. Still need to swap the rear seat to match.

Next it was time to change out some windows..
This is what the old windows looked like, anyone need them?

Getting them removed was pretty simple, we had both out in about an hour.

We then removed the vented windows from my parts rig..

Finished product, it took about 30 min to install the first window, the second one went much faster.


Finally found a yoke, got that all back together.

Next thing on my list of want to do's is get some lower geared axles under this thing. I can see it being pretty gutless with bigger tires and 3.07's.

crdude

Picked up a d30 and d35 with 3.55's today, should be a nice jump from my 3.07's.

The d30 under my xj is not a vac disconnect axle and the one I just picked up is, I'm trying to decide if i want to shim the fork on the disconnect so it's always engaged or if its a direct swap I could just swap one of my non disconnect shafts in.

Either way, I'm pretty excited to get these under my xj!

crdude

Picked up a set of 31 m/t's so its time to get a little more hight out of the jeep. Told my buddy I was pulling my rear springs, he wanted to help so I told him to grab a sawzaw and start cutting.

Made easy accses to the shackle bolts.

Now its time to swap the leafs into my xj.

crdude

Got one rear leaf in. I'll get the other one done next weekend. I ended up cutting the front leaf bolt out, then using a hole saw threw the frame to be able to put a nut on the new bolt. Now I need to reinforce the section around where I put the hole.
cut off the wanna be rock slider on the driver side.

I was kind of thinking I could throw some D rings on it and use it as a bumper, untell I learn how to build something nice that is.


and now this is how it currently sits, remember the pass side spring is still sacked out, so alot of the weight is being held on this spring. and theres a D30 sitting inside my jeep along with other misc parts and tools. with everything in it this still sits 2.5" higher then the old spring.

crdude

Got my other spring done, looks pretty silly with the front being so much lower. Paid for some re 4.5 coils, now I have to figure out how I'm going to get another 2" in the rear.

Went to the Alaska 4x4 meet&greet today and hit the RTI ramp for fun, scored a 282, lol. Did decent in the I obstical course, i skipped the rock section, giant stretch with 60" or so tires to crawl on and the last mud bog that swamped a few motors. I had to pull my buddy's chevy on 33"s out of a section my jeep crawled threw. All in all, I had a blast today. Will post a couple pics soon.

crdude

Couple shots from this weekend.


getting me some "serious" flex going on...

crdude

Swapped my 31/10.5's on. Tested it out in a little mud, does alot better then the a/t's did but still dosnt like going threw holes that my buddys k5 on 33's made when he got stuck. I also managed to destroy that 1 months old ujoint out on that trip. Bought the $30 napa "super strangth" ujoint this time, I guess I'll find out if it last better then the $15 ones from autozone. And my RE 4.5 coils showed up.

crdude

finally replaced the front fender that was crunched when I got it. Also did the cut and fold on the front fenders. I sanded it down a threw some primer on it, I'm slowly going to sand down the hole jeep and do some body work before it gets painted.
Front bumpers off, time to start planning what I'm going to do for a bumper.

crdude

And a little update on the d30/35's I picked up. rear end looked good when I popped the cover, 3.55's all looks good.

Pull the cover on the d30, I check the gears.. 3.73!

So I went out and found a d30 front from a 99' with 3.55's. This was a good find because it was new enough for the better shafts/larger ujoints and old enough to be HP. I knew it was from a wrecked vehicle, and a couple of the brackets were bent.. I thought no big deal, Ill just cut some off one of my spare front d30's and weld them onto this one... then I noticed the long tube was bent when I got home. I'm still not real worried about it, it was almost free, got to meet some fellow jeepers and still ended up with a good gears/carrier ect. I need to pull the long shaft out and check to see if its staight.

I have thought it over a couple of times, and have decided what I'm going to do for axles.

The 3.73 front will be going in. I will be eliminating the vac disconnect. I'll use the 99' shafts IF they are straight! If not, I will use the non disco shafts from my 91'. I will have to get new shaft seals and I'll order a vac disco block off plate.

For the rear, I'm now on the hunt for a 3.73 ford exploder 95-01ish 8.8. I want one from those years for two reasons, 31 spline shafts and disc breaks. Id preffer to find one with a good LSD unit so I wont have to buy a locker, and then have more $$$ into the rear axle then my XJ is worth.
This is the 8.8 swap kit I'm planning on buying when I find the right axle
http://www.ironrockoffroad.com/Merch...gory_Code=F88S