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This guy has been my daily driver since 2007 and I have been replacing and upgrading parts ever since. I first started with the winch bumper as one day I would like to get a winch. I liked the looks of this one, so I got it. With the market getting overrun by all the led lights you find nowadays, I decided to jump on board. I went through a few different styles of led lights for the bumper before I found the ones I wanted. At the time I had HID headlights, and though they were pretty bright, they only had low beam, and the bumper lights I found worked as a high beam for me. I have since replaced the HID with LED and am not looking back. These are excellent low/high beam with DRL. Here is a link to the light, other sellers have them but just so you know what to look for. I have had these a while now and they are way better than anything else I have used. http://www.ebay.com/itm/172419130356?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageNa me=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT
DRL
Low beam
High beam
So with the LED head lights up to par, I also switched out all of the turn signals and tail lights to LED. I just had to replace the turn signal flasher to get the LED’s to blink at the right speed.
I have had the 50” LED light bar for a while now, this thing is awesome. Through the process of finding the bumper lights, I ended up with some extra lights to be mounted elsewhere. So decided to put some rear lights, windshield lights, and some side lights.
They have a spot and flood of this 8D version, but there is very little difference between them so I went with the spot...it has a very flood effect that accents your peripherals when on the trail. http://www.ebay.com/itm/8D-2x-TRI-RO...-/390966132142
Continuing on with the upgrades, I put in LED’s throughout the interior except for the speedometer dash console, since I have not found any LED’s that are dimmable for that. I attempted to put in an LED light strip, but it was kind of obnoxious, so I put them underneath for rock lights. Here is the type that i got. It has RGB plus white for a multitude of colors. http://www.ebay.com/itm/231621905481?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&var=5308 53147616&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT
So, with the addition of all the lights, I looked high and low for somewhere to mount the switches, when I finally went from this:
As you may have noticed, there was a reverse cam on the shot with the rear lights, so I had to put in a monitor for that. It goes on sale a lot, so look for it. This is an android head unit. I like it. http://www.ebay.com/itm/332067692289?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageNa me=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT
sorry, i was hard to get a good shot of this.
So this 17 year old 2000 Jeep Cherokee XJ can still keep up with modern technology with a few updates. Now to replace the 218,000 mile engine, swap axles, add lockers…the list goes on. I love these XJ’s…whatcha think?
I also ended up swapping out the front bumper lights for this new version of 8D. As I stated above, When I first got the HID headlights, I used the bumper lights as my high beam. Since the addition of these new LED headlights, the 30w Osram 4D bumper lights are washed out, so I put this light bar instead.
So I guess that's it...I just wanted to share some of my progress with you die hard XJ Cherokee owners who might want to make some changes or upgrade but don't know where to begin. Hopefully you can learn something from me like I always learn from you guys. When I get off the road and into the woods, I'll get some pics to show how they light the area. Thanks for your support. Here is an image of the forward facing lights on, headlights are DRL only.
I put a solar panel on top over the summer for fun.
I have made some changes to this awesome XJ. I put it up for sale and offered more upgrades. I found that the engine was not getting weaker, but the increased tire size had caused a loss in power on long steep inclines. The compression checks out at 150psi +/- 0.5 PSI, which is great. I put in near $1000 in new parts under the hood, including a 3 core radiator (works wonderfully). I went ahead and painted the XJ with some truck bed liner. I put new tires and shocks and flat fender flares. It is looking great, I am getting ready to start working on the next one. Check it out...
I tried hood spacers before putting the 3 core radiator. They did help a bit, but not much.
Last edited by trailcreepers; 12-20-2018 at 12:10 AM.
Reason: more improvements
She's just getting broken in at 218k miles. if the compression is still good, just give her a tune up, complete fluids flush, and a cooling system makeover, and keep running her! Keep an eye on your coolant temp, as those years had the dreaded 0331 head which was prone to cracking. PS, you can tell us what brand of lights and switches you use.
I can tell it is starting to wear out when I can no longer get up a long stretch of steep grades in 3rd.
Could be a lot of things causing that. "Just wore out" isn't really a thing unless your engine is smoking and belching fluids where it shouldn't. Do a compression test and you will know for sure, if it's in the right range, then you will know for sure it is not "worn out". If it's not that there is a bunch of other things that could cause minor power loss, that don't require a new engine. For that matter, even low compression doesn't always mean the cylinders are worn out. They should easily last more than 300K as long as it wasn't too abused.
Otherwise, looks great! I've been slowly popping in LEDs also, such an amazing difference for very little money. I need the headlights now. It really does make a 20ish year old vehicle look very modern.
05-08-2017, 02:35 PM
96-01 Styles Jeep Cherokee XJ Modernization Project
