Nvr-Enough's YJ (re)Build

Nvr-enough

Red Skull
Joined
May 20, 2020
Member Number
598
Messages
265
Loc
Crystal Park, CO
I figured I'd go ahead and start a build thread (that I'll probably never finish just to piss off SLOWPOKE693 ) to try to motivate myself to get this (re) build moving already.

Little back story- Bought this well broken-in, stretched/leafs/tons/40s YJ years back to play with while I was collecting parts and building a 1 ton TJ, well life changes, and I ended up sticking with the YJ and have been slowly giving it a new life, about to really dial it up.

It was originally built by cutting and moving the stock spring hangers, pushing it to a ~114" WB if I recall. Full hydro front Chevy D60. 14B rear. 4.56s, welded both ends. AW4/Dana 300 swapped. Terrible cage built off the stock cage. Typical hillbilly OH/KY/TN build, where I bought it. :laughing:

The week I brought it home-
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To be continued..






















Oh and sneak peak:flipoff2:
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I'll call this phase 1 of the rebuild-

Biggest first change, new cage. I bought a lazer notched/bent kit from Welderd.com. His design was for a family style cage, after a little back and forth emailing and MS paint CAD files we tweaked a fastback style design based off his cage design. I sent him cash, he sent me a pile of tube. Fitment was steller, definitely could have fully tig welded it if I wanted, but I didn't. :flipoff2:Would definitely order from him again.

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Along with the cage came new suspension seats, mounted to the cage of course, with 6 point belts complimentary from crashed GT3 cars.

I think the cage design turned out pretty slick-

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And the hardtop and doors still fit. I've sold them off since then, but nice to know it's an option again in the future.

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I'm sure someone will zoom in on some weld and have beef about it. That's okay, I'm a race mechanic, not a welder:flipoff2:

Things to update on the cage moving forward-

-Raised bar for the shoulder belts; they're a little too low for me going through the seats, so a raised bar and then the belts up over the seat back (I'm ~6'2")
-Some form of a hip bar/door bar. It's not a race rig, but would like some hip protection.
 
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After the cage install I had a bunch of **** to do in not much time to get it ready to drag out to KOH 2023.

I removed a lot of bull**** and bad wiring, etc. I removed the factory HVAC box, a bunch of unnecessary wires (was an AX15, converted to AW4 with manual control), ****ty radio set up, non-working compressor system using the factory AC compressor, charcoal canister and vacuum tanks, etc etc etc..

Then started to add stuff into the jeep-

Installed a new fuel cell, pump, filters and lines, all stainless aeroquip. I now have a proper motobilt cell hold down sitting on the shelf waiting to be installed.

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I added a proper trans cooler (with fan), with aeroquip lines. Mounted on the firewall where the stock battery box was mounted. Just on a quick bracket my buddy tossed together helping me KOH prep. I figure eventually the whole cooling stack will get redone, but until then this works great.

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Installed a 'hot rod' heater box to give a little heat to the pass compartment. Simple, compact and throws out plenty of heat for a little jeep cab.

Mounted the battery under the pass side of the dash to be up out of the way. Used bulkhead battery terminals to pass through the firewall. Nice and tidy.

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Cleaned up the full-hydro set up to a minimal degree knowing that most of it will be getting replaced at some point. But put a fresh cooler in front of the rad, replaced a bunch of hoses, etc.

Did a bunch of general maintenance, serviced all fluids, replaced hardware as needed, etc. 4.0 got a full tune up, the usual. Some fresh LED sealed beams for a little extra light.

Loaded it in the trailer for KOH 2023 and left 1.5 days later than planned after finishing the prep, rolled out of the driveway at 11pm and headed off into a blizzard through the mountains on I70 :homer:

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I definitely miss that truck, often.

I'm pretty torn on the 250. I just picked up that pop-up slide-in camper with hopes I wouldn't be way over GVW and could (legally) tow my crawler behind it. Finally got a chance to run it across the scales. Front and rear axle weights are under and have plenty of room to spare. But GVW is at its max (only 8800 being a 250..), before I even hook the trailer to it :frown: if I 05+ swap it, it will add a couple hundred pounds to the truck pretty easily, so despite having better brakes and steering, it would have even less hauling capacity. But maybe I'm over thinking that and shouldn't worry about being 1000lbs over gvw if my axle weights are under. Haha

And the other side to it, I'd almost feel bad cutting it up, the truck is painfully original, even down to the stock (terrible) down pipe, radio, etc... I've got a deal made with another member for an OBS D60 for it and have considered that route to keep it period correct original
 
Had an absolute blast with the rig at the Hammers '23. For a tired old crawler running worn out flat leaf springs, the thing just worked...until it didn't.

We went at ran a bunch of trails in the evenings, had a blast. Ran turkey claw, chocolate thunder and a bunch of others, thing didn't miss a beat.

On my last day out there I decided we were gonna send it, ran a bunch of trails back to back and ended up at Backdoor. Backdoor won. At the time I thought I just broke a yoke, ujoint and tail of my driveshaft. Drove the rig to the trailer in front wheel drive and took it home to sit in the garage for a few months.

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So moving forward I bought a companion flange for the 14b, new driveshaft bits, etc. Rolled under the ol girl to install them and realized the pinion was pointed at the floor board. ****.

Turns out that it twisted the center chunk/left tube because the right side had the traction bar. Broke the plug welds.

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I knew I wanted to 4 link the rear of the jeep, and had ended up with 4 new Fox by-passes along the way, so my next move was ordering up a truss from Motobilt and planned on gluing the 14bolt back together.

But I kept second guessing if I would trust it with the truss, or if I would always be worried about it pulling a tube out, etc and the gearing was still **** at 4.56 with a welded diff.

Earlier this week I remembered my brother has been storing a set of early super duty axles from my first crawler project. SD D60 front with a Detroit, high steer, and a sterling 10.5 rear all stuffed with 5.38 gears.

So new plan will be swap in the 10.5 rear, drilled to 8x6.5. Go through the brakes, blast and paint the housing, truss, 4 link brackets, proper cover, etc.

In the front, my short term plan is rob the Detroit from the SD60, put it in the D60 that currently under the jeep with some 5.38s. Then someday (when I have more time and money) build a 9" front using the outers from the SD60 and swap it under with a 3 or 4 link and the matching dampers with the rear.

SD axles. Crusty from living in a garage in the midwest for years but they will do the trick.
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This brings us up to date. As time allows I'm slowly working towards stripping stuff down to get ready for the rear suspension rebuild.
 
Parts are starting to roll in from a bunch of vendors.

Doing a frame back half from Artec along with their frame side 4 link mounts.

Then axle side I'll be using Goatbilt combo lower link/by-pass brackets.


Got the 14B and old suspension pulled out the other night. Just waiting for some of these pieces to start showing up and I'll start chopping and fitting it together.

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A bunch of goodies showed up to the shop today.. just in time for me to head to Texas tomorrow to deliver some racecars to their new owner. :homer:


I should be able to start tearing into this stuff next week. Have a loose goal of dragging this thing to Sand Hollow over Thanksgiving while visiting family in St George, so we will see if that's a possibility, going to be tight with my work/race events between now and then.


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Ran to Chicago over the weekend to grab my Super Duty axles from my brother's place.

Worked on cleaning up the rear axle tonight. It was in my last XJ crawler years back. So I had to cut off old shock mounts and leaf spring mounts. What a messy job that I don't think anyone enjoys. :homer:

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But the axle is now ready to head to the sand blaster to get cleaned up before I start welding to it.


And I couldn't resist doing a little mock-up while cleaning up.
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Worked on it for a few more hours today. Cut off a bunch more metal then finally started working towards adding metal back. Real tired of grinding on old dirty metal at this point. :shaking:

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The Artec back half kit is designed around the rig having a 1.25" body lift. I don't and I'm sure and hell not installing one. So off comes the rear floor-
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Much better, so much room for activities-
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And tacked together the pieces for the back half kit and slide them into their future home-
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I took tomorrow off before heading to Daytona for the Classic 24 Hour on Tuesday for a week. In the morning I'm planning on heading to the scrap yard to dump the **** I've cut off this turd, then the metal supply shop to pick up materials for building out the rear frame. Hoping to at least get everything tacked into place tomorrow and see what my geometry will look like before I leave town.
 
Slowly making progress on this thing between traveling for work, life, etc.

Got the chassis side link brackets burned together and tacked to the frame.
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And had a local old-school machine shop drill and spot-face the hubs for the sterling from 8x170 to 8x6.5. The hubs had some casting marks in the valleys between the stock studs, so that was the reason for the spot-face job.

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The hubs are .5" thick where the new studs seat, which is about the thickness of the 99-04 front U.B.'s I have on the shelf, so I can't imagine that will be an issue.

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And for studs I found a dorman stud that is affordable. 10 pack for ~$20 on Amazon, most of them were even still in the box when they showed up.:homer: They're 9/16-18 to match the front Chevy D60 studs. Original application was E450. Nice and long.

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For rotors I'll be running ~'01 E350 rotors. They're same dims as 01 F350 but they're 8x6.5 bolt pattern. They have the internal drum parking brake same as F350, but I removed all that from my axle so not applicable for my use. Calipers will just be stock 01 F350 calipers.

Left- 01 F350, right- 01 E350
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And if you look close you can see the bolt pattern offset to the new rotors.
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There has been progress on this, but been busy as hell with work and family obligations.

Frame rails and bumper are tacked up. Fuel cell mount is burned in.

Stuck a hitch through the rear bumper for an additional rear recovery point, tied the fuel cell mount into it.

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New departure angle-
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Now working on shock hoops and mounting as the current project. Trying to package both shocks and an air bump and keep decent angles on everything. Looking like it will probably end up with travel set at 7" up/down bumped with 1/2" shaft showing.
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And as things seem to go for me, I keep cutting out sheet metal. Because **** that sheet metal. :laughing:

Looking forward to getting home from the family Xmas trip to FL and getting back after it. A break away was needed, but getting to crunch time if I'm gonna go wheel this thing during KOH.
 
Still chipping away at this thing. Have all the shock mounts tacked in place and have been cycling the suspension around, looks like it might just work.

KOH to do list-

-Notch the frame to clear the bypass tubes.
-add shock hoop support tubes
-Fishplate rear bumper corners
-Burn-in all mounts/truss on axle
-Build rear 1410 driveline
-Weld links
-Install fuel cell, run new lines
-Run brake lines
-Install torq locker in sterling
-Paint all new fab work
-Install locker and gears in front axle
-New front leafs, shock hoops
-Install new 5 point belts
-Install winch cable, re-wire winch
-Oil change...nah **** that 4.0 liter:laughing:



Sitting here at the end of the evening after cleaning up a bit. Decided to toss a tire up to see if I could run a spare and caught myself thinking about 4500 class rules:smokin::homer:

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Had a buddy come help hammer on this thing this weekend. It's officially roller status again. Got corner weights so I can order springs for the rear.

Get low-
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Got the front hoops and bypasses done today. Pic from initial mock up. Waiting on bushings for the new leaf springs to final assemble all of it tomorrow.

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A million small things left to do. But last 'big' project will be getting the front gears and Detroit into it.

Leaving for the hammers a week from tomorrow, the 27th.
 
Blase said:
Looks good. Good luck at KOH.
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Thanks!

Unfortunately I decided I'm not going to bring the rig out this year. Felt like too much of a thrash and I would prefer to slow down on some of the smaller details and make sure I'm happy with them. I would hate to drag the pig 1000 miles from home and have a dumb/small issue screw up the trip. Going to load up the JL and have an easy trip. Plus my buddy is bringing his Class 10 car out, he had planned to just pre-run, but I think we have him talked into racing, so this way I can be better focused on that effort, and possibly get some seat time in it co-dog and maybe driving.


That said, I've been continuing on down the list. Front end suspension is wrapped up with fresh leafs, shock hoops/mounts done and painted. Needs the Detroit and gears still.

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Had a good time at the Hammers, we got 3rd in our class in the desert limited race in our Class 10 car. Wheeled my stock JL Rubicon around a bit, lots a belly dragging, testing skids and trying to tear off body mounts. ****er is low. :laughing: I have some 35s to swap on it for camping/exploring trips once winter is over.

Since coming home I have taken a little break from this thing to relax and enjoy a little time at home before pro-racing starts up and keeps me on the road a little too much.

But I did roll it outside to organize and clean up the garage a bit. Rear ride height is still a little high here, maybe an inch over my target. I'm hoping once I add tools, fuel system, etc it will settle it down where I want it to be with 7 up/7 down in the rear.
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And next to the JL on stock ~33" tires -
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Been back at it with this turd again. Trying to bang it out (or as much as I can) before I head out on my next multi-week race trip. Wrapping up most of the cutting and grinding now. Next up is mostly plumbing and regearing the front and I can go shake it down. So ready to watch this thing roll out of the garage under its own power.


Where have the last 6 8 months gone?
 
Just a million more little details to knock out, but good to see final assembly starting to take place. After it passes a shakedown run (or 2) it will get stripped and everything painted.

And at some point the corners will get skinned with some fresh aluminum. Cant decide if I should just keep it light/easily replaced sheet aluminum or if I should cut up some real corner guards that are a little beefier. Concern being that there's not much structure left for the beefy material to mount to without building something. Might just be better if it has 'tear away' skins, buggy style.

Here you can see the quick and dirty side dump exhaust I knocked out. Idea will be that it dumps through the skins in front of the wheel well. Looks a little crazy for now. Oh well.
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