Any Jeepers in here?

[lovemachine]

Aye, in many ways this is probably true. Soft riding coil springs, reliable and efficient fuel injection, cushy plastic surroundings, and plenty of cup holders. A Jeep comfortable enough for a lady to drive daily. It takes a real man who can change his own gears to drive a CJ. ;-)

So how's that CJ coming along?

 

[Jackson]

So how's that CJ coming along?

I found a brake caliper bracket on EBay. So that helps. I need to rearrange the garage again after the reloading event so I can get back to work on it.

 

[eldirector]

Thanks to Williams Tool and Machine in Jamestown, I'm back in business! They bored out the broken bolt in my steering knuckle. I can begin reassembly! I'll try to take some pics.

First up will be to rebuild the passenger side steering kingpins. I need to mock up the steering under the jeep and check for clearance. I suspect I moved the spring mounts too far forward (on the front bumper now), and the drag link will contact the diff cover at full bump and full lock. If so, I'll need to cut, move, and re-weld the front shackle hangers (and then fully weld the tacked-on rear hangers once it is all set).

Just to keep this all straight in my head:
- Rebuild front kingpins
- build steering (need to bore out the Pitman arm, build draglink and tie-rod, mount ram-assist)
- gears and locker
- shorten both driveshafts (and likely change flanges)
- replace axleshaft u-joints
- all new front brakes
- all new wheel bearings/seals and front hubs
- all the little stuff!

At least with all this rain, I can't do any yard work anyway. May as well work in the garage!

 

[lovemachine]

Thanks to Williams Tool and Machine in Jamestown, I'm back in business! They bored out the broken bolt in my steering knuckle. I can begin reassembly! I'll try to take some pics.

Glad we could help out!

 

[Jackson]

Glad we could help out!

You work at a machine shop where precision to the .001" Or possibly the .0001" Is a daily thing, and setting up a gear set scares you?

 

[lovemachine]

You work at a machine shop where precision to the .001" Or possibly the .0001" Is a daily thing, and setting up a gear set scares you?

Quit talking sense Jackson!!

 

[Jackson]

Quit talking sense Jackson!!

Sorry about that. I forgot where I was for a minute. This is INGO after all. :-)

 

[lovemachine]

For me to do it, it would take too long. I'd rather not be without a vehicle for that long of a time. I just think I would rather pay someone who does it on a regular basis and only be without my daily driver for 3 days.

 

[eldirector]

You work at a machine shop where precision to the .001" Or possibly the .0001" Is a daily thing, and setting up a gear set scares you?

The push broom isn't nearly that precise.

I'll post up when I'm ready to set the gears in the front end. Might be this weekend, or next. Ya'll can "supervise". I'll need help lifting the darned thing, anyway.

 

[Jackson]

The push broom isn't nearly that precise.

I'll post up when I'm ready to set the gears in the front end. Might be this weekend, or next. Ya'll can "supervise". I'll need help lifting the darned thing, anyway.

I'm not uncomfortable in a differential. I probably don't know what I'm doing, but I'll take a crack at screwing up most any job. :-) I do think lovemachine would be satisfied with himdelf if he went ahead and did his own. He'd have fun with it too.

He should buy a TJ Rubicon rear air locker. I like the concept of the torsen/spool combo. I actually think it would be even better in the front. assuming it reliably actuates under some load.

 

[lovemachine]

I'm nowhere ready to do anything just yet. I still need lotsa lotsa $$$$


I'm accepting donations

 

[Jackson]

I'm nowhere ready to do anything just yet. I still need lotsa lotsa $$$$


I'm accepting donations

If you were serious you could sell a kidney, or a testicle, or sell your body on the street corner. You could make it work if you were really motivated.

 

[lovemachine]

If you were serious you could sell a kidney, or a testicle, or sell your body on the street corner. You could make it work if you were really motivated.

LOL nah I'm motivated. I just don't have anything I really want to sell to finance this quicker. I'm just forced to save up a little each week.
I already sold 2 guns to finance my other hobby, so I'm kind of at my minimum number of guns right now.

 

[eldirector]

Passenger side kingpin rebuilt, and high-steer arm installed.

Sitting under the Jeep at roughly full-drop to check for clearance. Not nearly as bad as I first thought. I'll run it!

Driver's side kingpin rebuilt, and high-steer installed. Yes, in case you are wondering.... The tie-rod will run BEHIND the axle in the setup. Up, and out of harm's way. Also less chance of interference with the Draglink. In my case, that is good, since my draglink is not exactly parallel with the tie-rod.

Need to run a couple of errands, and then I'll make some setup bearings for the gears (by grinding out the old bearings). Hope to start setting gears this evening, or early this week.

My "accountant" wants me to wait on buying wheel bearings, brakes, etc.. until NEXT weekend, so I'll need to work with what I already have for now. That's gears and steering.

 

[Jackson]

Looks pretty sweet. Are you using the factory spring perches? The one in the photo looks to belong on the axle tube. If so, what do your frame and shackle mounts look like? What kind of vehicle did you source your axles from?

 

[eldirector]

Factory perches. I can snap more pics in a bit. I moved the shackle hangers to the front bumper, and outboarded the rear mounts. Used brackets from Ruff Stuff. Front is from a 1993 Dodge One ton. It is narrower than the GM and Ford versions. Rear is a SRW 14-bolt.

 

[eldirector]

Rear Spring Hanger (still needs welded in):

Spring shackle hanger, mounted on custom front bumper:

 

[Jackson]

So staying with the axle's stock pinion angle and knuckle angle (castor)? Single or double cardan drive shaft in the front?

I think it would be awesome to swap in big axles and go SOA, but I don't have the motivation to figure out all the details and do the necessary fab work. It definitely seems like more of a pain than staying with a more stock-ish configuration.

 

[eldirector]

Stock pinion angle and stock castor. Worked fine in the OE Dodge truck. Should work fine for me. It is a single-joint front driveshaft. I'll even keep the 1310 u-joints, as they make a better "fuse" than other (harder to replace) parts.

Yeah, spring-over is a PITA. Pretty much EVERYTHING has to change. But, I went down that road years ago. This swap isn't all that hard now, just time consuming (and expensive).

Didn't get as much done last night as I hoped. Broke my large bearing puller trying to get one carrier bearing off. So, back to Harbor Freight for another cheap one.

I did get one side off and ground out for a setup bearing. Also got the pinion bearings off and ground out. Cleaned up the inside of the housing, too.

Tip of the Day: Find a wire wheel a little smaller than the inside of the axle tube. Put it on your Air Die Grinder. Feed the air hose through the tube, and plug into the grinder. Rubberband the wheel on, on slowly pull (pulling on the hose) through the housing/tube. Tada! Push some rags through with a long rod (handle from the push-broom works), and you are about as clean as you will get.

I hope the replace the bearing puller after dinner today, pull that last bearing, grind it out, and then be ready to set up gears sometime this week. My neighbor wants to help, but isn't available until Thursday. In the meantime, I may start on the steering, or maybe replace the axle shaft u-joints.

 

[hpclayto]

Didn't know there was a jeep thread here. Picked up my TJ a few days ago .

I've been wanting a project to tinker on for a while. My first priority is fixing some frame rot that it's got. Gonna pull the body off the frame, fix with some safe t caps and clean everything up and undercoat it. You can see some of the remnants of all the crap that was in the frame rails on the driveway there, I probably pulled about 10 pounds of rust/mud/gunk out of it. Then I'm gonna respray the body, not sure what color yet. Thinking Hydro Blue from the new JK's. After I get all that done I'm gonna look into getting a lift and all that fun stuff but wanted to get the bigger stuff taken care of first.

Also ordered a new jammer and speakers for it as well as a spray in liner kit for it. Hoping to gut the interior and get that done sometime this week. Any other jeepers in the Kentuckiana area on here?