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Project: I have no idea what I'm doing (Moved from p4x4)

Just about buttoned up the motorhome this weekend, which means I'm just about back to this thing.

Also these showed up. Nothing like some new parts to add motivation:

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Just about buttoned up the motorhome this weekend, which means I'm just about back to this thing.

Also these showed up. Nothing like some new parts to add motivation:


Shinier than anything else on this turd. Back to work. :flipoff2:
 
Back at it this week with no pictures just yet. I hacked up the other side of the tub to fit my new wheel well cap and realized the upper bracket for my swing out door(tailgate?) was going to be in the way of progress. I'm thinking my life would be easier if I just converted it to a drop-down tailgate. Eyeing the swag-offroad kit at the moment, but the lack of a latch on the driver's side makes me worried it's going to rattle over rough stuff at speed.

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https://www.swagoffroad.com/SWAG-Jeep-Wrangler-Aluminum-Drop-Down-Tailgate-Conversion-Kit_p_25.html

Has anyone done anything better with their existing tailgate?
 
If you're worried about rattles just throw a big toggle latch on the two plates that go where the upper hinge used to be.

If you want it to latch on both sides like a proper tailgate then you're gonna need to fab something.
 
If you're worried about rattles just throw a big toggle latch on the two plates that go where the upper hinge used to be.

If you want it to latch on both sides like a proper tailgate then you're gonna need to fab something.

Hmmm.. doing my own toggle latch is a good idea. Might still buy swag's kit and then put my own latches on it.


In other news, I finally got off my ass last night and did the passenger side:

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It even matches the other side(this is a big deal if you're a hack like me)!

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Ah the joy of two steps forward and 12 back...you will get there, just not when you think you will(as you already know)!!! But you are keepin' the ol' noggin pressed to the pumpkin and making progress---good job on the pics and details...
 
Speaking of 1 step forward and 2 steps back.. I turns out that it's not the best idea to evaluate your fab work in the dark. I looked again during the day and my passenger side roll bar was .75" farther back in the tub than my driver side. Of course I had already proudly tacked everything into place, soooo....


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Now that everything is straight, I tacked it all back in and then was feeling so good about myself that I attempted to weld something. Ugh, big mistake. People who actually know what they're doing with a welder- any tips on how I can my welds look/work better?

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There's nothing really wrong with your welds themselves. Looks more like you went a little slow and got extra buildup that's making them convex. Still a sound weld, just not as pretty as it could be.

Now your technique to welding around the tacks sucks. Tacks are always a cold weld, just not enough time to properly heat up the base metal. You can see it in the HAZ. Always weld over the tacks (I'm lazy and just run over them, but it's probably best to grind them way down before running over them). What you there is a cold tack with welds that stop on either side of it creating a weak spot.

I'd fix it cause it's a cage and it's important.
 
There's nothing really wrong with your welds themselves. Looks more like you went a little slow and got extra buildup that's making them convex. Still a sound weld, just not as pretty as it could be.

Now your technique to welding around the tacks sucks. Tacks are always a cold weld, just not enough time to properly heat up the base metal. You can see it in the HAZ. Always weld over the tacks (I'm lazy and just run over them, but it's probably best to grind them way down before running over them). What you there is a cold tack with welds that stop on either side of it creating a weak spot.

I'd fix it cause it's a cage and it's important.

Thanks! No one has ever told me that about the tacks before. I was always starting and stopping with a little overlap on them.
 
Tried bending up a rear hoop for my cage. Failed just enough that I have to do it again.
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Each of these bends was supposed to be 45*. I swear I had everything locked in and set the little gauge on the bender to zero when I got all the slack out before starting the bends, but for some reason:

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Anybody got any pro tips on how to make sure you're consistently getting the correct angle out of your bender? Or even better, any pro tips on how to salvage what I have already bent?

I'm using a JD2 model 3 with swag air ram setup.
 
Tried bending up a rear hoop for my cage. Failed just enough that I have to do it again.


Each of these bends was supposed to be 45*. I swear I had everything locked in and set the little gauge on the bender to zero when I got all the slack out before starting the bends, but for some reason:



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Anybody got any pro tips on how to make sure you're consistently getting the correct angle out of your bender? Or even better, any pro tips on how to salvage what I have already bent?

I'm using a JD2 model 3 with swag air ram setup.

What are you using for the degree indicator on the bender?
 
How much too narrow are the ends now? If it's only off by an inch or so.........and doesn't look goofy........you might be able to spread the ends enough to tack it in place.

I assume you've already measured the amount of spring back you get for that size tube on that die? And I assume you already know at what point (degree mark) it begins to make the bend? Start point degrees + spring back degrees + the degrees you want to bend = what you want. Maybe the Model 3 is different, I have a Model 4.
 
How much too narrow are the ends now? If it's only off by an inch or so.........and doesn't look goofy........you might be able to spread the ends enough to tack it in place.

I assume you've already measured the amount of spring back you get for that size tube on that die? And I assume you already know at what point (degree mark) it begins to make the bend? Start point degrees + spring back degrees + the degrees you want to bend = what you want. Maybe the Model 3 is different, I have a Model 4.

My first attempt was terrible, it was bent waaay too narrow. I figured it out this weekend- once I got past 20* or so the bolt that holds the end in tight on the bender was getting loose and letting the tube slip, so when I would check against spring back, it the angle the model 3 was showing wasn't actually correct. Once I realized I had to tighten that thing up half way and keep going, everything worked great.
 
Well the gong show kept on gong-ing this weekend. I figured out my bender issue- bolt kept getting lose and the tube would slip. After that I was able to bend up something reasonably straight(good one on top, abortion on the bottom):

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After that I started looking at how I was going to fit that puppy up and since it was supposed to go right on the downward bend on my c-pillar, I nearly had an aneurism trying to figure that out, so I decided it was too early in the morning for that and worked on some other pieces instead:
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After that, in an effort to keep avoiding doing hard things, I pretended to care about how my junkyard-bought, sight-unseen, shipped-from-the-east-coast-via-a-facebook-marketplace-deal soft top frame was going to fit. I noticed that most dudes doing the LJ top swap on their stretched CJs or YJs have a different looking bracket than I do: Theirs only has one pivot. Mine has two and for the life of me, I can't figure out what the lower one is for- there's no part of the frame that fits on there. Anybody?

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Some tactical zip-tie action and head scratching later and I finally had to suck it up and try to cope my cage hoop by hand. It sort of works. Fitup isn't the greatest, but eh...

First try(not so good).
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Second try: Better, tacked it.
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Those of you who have better vison than your average 80 year old probably noticed that it's angled down a bit. I was originally thinking about doing that to make sure the top cleared, it turned out not to matter, but the wife came outside, saw it that way, and decided that it looked better. There's a lot of things outside of her control on this build(like the day I got mad and decided to link it), so I figured she could have some artistic control.

top shot:
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So.. hard part over right? Just have to put some kickers out back and some top bars to connect everything up. Put the bender away, it's all straight, just measure and cope it properly and I'm done right? I don't know if it was standing out in the heat all day, a lack of beer, or I just plain used up what small amount of braincells I had allotted for the day, but after three horribly coped tubes that didn't fit right, I put the notcher and grinder down, shut the garage, and went inside looking for someone's dog to kick(luckily I don't own one).


Tube massacre:
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Hopefully I'll grow some more talent later this week.

Harry Johnson out.
 
I'll say this much. You give me inspiration to be able to link my XJ in the near future. I too have no idea what I'm doing and you seem to be making all the right mistakes decisions and it's helpful to see you continuing to move forward with a positive attitude.
 
I'll say this much. You give me inspiration to be able to link my XJ in the near future. I too have no idea what I'm doing and you seem to be making all the right mistakes decisions and it's helpful to see you continuing to move forward with a positive attitude.

The link calculator is your best friend... as long as you have another best friend who can tell you what the link calculator numbers should look like.
 
Picture heavy update coming in hot!

So after a ton of trial and error, I think I finally have this coping-by-hand thing figured out. Turns out the main problem is I am a dumbass. :homer: I was measuring up 1/2 the diameter of my tubing from the baseline rather than 1/3. So yeah, once I figured that out, things went much better:

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Don't mind the random shitter hoses. Those are for a different project :laughing:

After that, I had two more bars to do up top, but I wanted to make sure that my soft top would clear them, sooooo...


I chopped down that JK bracket I had, and once one of the pivots is removed, it works pretty good as a LJ/TJ bracket.. at least for where the B pillar on my cage goes. If you're wondering where I got the numbers, it's from the "I wish it was longer" project that rangerrod was doing over on the other site. It should be 40 1/2 inches back from the dash(as long as your dash is flat), and 11 1/4 inches up from the top of your tub. I'm not sure if I want to add some threaded bungs to the cage so I can bolt the brackets in or just weld them to the cage, but for now I tacked them in place to see how everything would fit:
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I also had to grind down my windshield and fill some holes with the welder to accept the TJ/LJ windshield seal. No real measuring here, I just flopped the seal on top and looked at where it was not fitting, and fired up the grinder. Added some primer after so it doesn't rust out sitting in my driveway waiting for paint:
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Little bit of overspray there... oopsy poopsy.

After that I had to figure out how to reassemble my cheapo beater facebook purchased east coast junkyard frame. Surprisingly, it all fit... though it didn't come with any hardware to bolt it all together, so it's currently affixed with random bolts I had in my garage until I can get to the hardware store and buy the right stuff:

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At that point, I was pretty sure everything was going to clear, but I know that those frames flex when you tighten down the top and I was excited to see if I actually put the tubs together in the correct length, so I decided it was time to add on my cheap-o junkyard TJ soft top rails. I still gotta figure out what to do with the extra 15 inches(that'swhatshesaid) of tub, but I wasn't even sure this was going to work until I tried:

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Interesting side note: I was kinda digging the stock TJ burnt orange color... Might end up trying to paint the whole jeep something similar.
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The moment of truth... Spoiler alert: it actually worked. #imagenus! :homer:
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Windows and fitting and stuff:

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I haven't cut the notches for the front latches in the windshield frame just yet(I ran out of time this weekend), which is why the top it's totally taught yet. I do have the latches hooked around some little loop brackets that were screwed into the windshield for some sort of soft top setup at one point, and it's holding them pretty well. But yea, that's next on the list. I also just ordered some TJ door surrounds, TJ upper door windows and the TJ brackets for the rear that will secure the back window to the tub. Over all I'm pretty stoked with how it turned out. I also really like the quality of the Rugged Ridge soft top. It was cheaper than the best top option, but the material, zippers, etc all seem nicer than the previous best top I had on here. If I do any replacement in the future, I'll probably go with them again.
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So yeah, I'm going to finish up the upper part of my cage next, and then go back to making the soft top seal up perfectly. That's a priority since fall is coming and I'm working on this thing outside in my driveway.


So the to-do list is getting pretty short, but the big ones:

Get soft top to fit.
Clearance TJ doors so they can close instead of hitting the a-pillar of my cage
Drop down tailgate
patch giant holes in floor
Order new bench seat for rear and tie it into cage
Pull cage and do final welds
Strip entire cage and paint it- thinking of using steelit
Re-run tail light wires, add back up light switch and wiring, re-run fuel pump wiring
Hook up brake lines, parking brake cable, and bleed brakes
Re-run fuel lines
Figure out exhaust
Figure out how I'm going to paint it

...I think that's it.:flipoff2:
 
Just saw this. I skimmed through it and can't say I saw anything totally ghetto. Of course I'm no expert. I'll be watching.
 
Front of my cage was too close to the windshield for the LJ top latches to clear properly. Did some trimming of them yesterday. Works better than I thought it would:
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Back at it with the hope of making it out to KOH. Currently working on the cage. I'm almost hesitant to put this part of the build up here since I know what a shitshow a roll cage discussion can devolve into, but here goes.

One thing I'm terrible at is coping tube to fit in a cage. Can I do a straight 90? Sure, everything else I are dumb. Anyway, I got to this point and then asked some friends for ideas:
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At this point there were not too many triangles, or even much lateral support for the cage(don't mind the ends on some of those tubes, I haven't done final clean up yet. One of my big challenges is that I want four people to be able to climb into this without going through a jungle gym. I went back and fourth with some buddies and we decided there needs to be more triangles up top and, to help facilitate that, I need to move the bars out back over to the bends.

So off I went to cut those back out and move em.
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Wider spread with the planend addition to make more triangles:
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Meanwhile I decided that while I had the bender out, I also wanted to add some back seat support.... uh, except that I'm a moron and forgot about one bend until I was elbows deep into the thing. :rolleyes: At that point I figured screw it, I'd keep going and see how well it fit in the tub.
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Glad I did since I needed to take about two inches out of the vertical section of the tube to make everything fit nice and tight. I also forgot that the closer I get to 90, the more the angle finder on my bender is off... Next version will be about 2* less tight.

So back to coping. I had to make a node and I was scared. I busted out a Pipe Master and did a couple of test tries on scrap. Here's my "for reals" attempt. I'll need to weld the first bar on before putting this in place:
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I also started on the c-pillar frame tie in because straight copes are easy and it was getting late and I was tired:
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So yeah, cage stuff. Once that's done, there's not much left to make this thing KOH worthy. At this point I'm gonna keep my head down and keep grinding away.
 
Would you hurry up and finish this already! :flipoff2:
Looks good with the top even. Nice work.
 
Would you hurry up and finish this already! :flipoff2:
Looks good with the top even. Nice work.

I try to get work in when I can. I was supposed to have all last weekend and next weekend and the whole week in between while my wife has our kids down at her parent's house in LA. Turns out there's some kind of shitty smoke issues down there, so they're coming back up here today. I had to spend all last night making it look like I wasn't leaving jeep parts/tools in the house, actually folding the laundry I washed, recycling lots of beer cans that were living in the garage and on the coffee table, etc.

Hopefully I'll still get some time this week. Need this cage done asap.
 
5 weekends until KOH. Added air bumps this weekend. My neighbor had these cool little slugs that you can mock up different air bump lengths. Made life way easier. He had them set for some he was adding to his 4runner, and the little rings were rusted in place. I didn't want to mess up his mojo, so I used zip ties at the notch I needed. Worked pretty well, but it ended up setting it 1/4" lower than needed. At this point I was willing to sacrifice 1/4" of up travel for ease of setup :
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Mediocre-ly weleded:
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At that point I heard from a buddy of mine a hour away that he had an old Toyo sticky I could have for a spare, so I dropped everything and went and picked it up. Going to be pretty funny when I swap in the spare for sometihng and it becomes my "good tire":
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Two hours worth of driving, some bullshitting, dinner, and a couple of beers later and I got both bumps done, welded, and painted.

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Might rain next weekend. So I'm gonna have to figure out some indoor activities for this thing. Getting close now. Pretty much just need to weld cage and frame tie-ins and figure out my exhaust and that's all the fabrication I have left on this thing. Then I bolt some some on and run electrical/lines and it's shakedown time.
 
I fawking hate welding sheet metal. So I've been putting this part off, but other than pulling the cage out and finishing it, I have officially run out of things to weld until my new muffler shows up, so I had to sack up and do it. It looks like shit but I don't think I'm even going to bother cleaning it up before paint. Not trying to win any shows, just not have my crap fall out driving down the trail.
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After that first piece, I figured I'd change it up and do the fender wells instead:

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Got one done and of course I ran out of wire on a Sunday, so I went into full Give-a-Mouse-a-Cookie mode and went looking for another spool I suspected I had in my garage. It was so hard to dig through the chaos, that I decided I was going to clean the whole place up. Which then led to me tearing everything out, and sweeping the floor....
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Which then let to me wondering while I was storing my tires in one pile and my wheels in another when they could both be together.

...so that's how I ended up tightening bead lock bolts until dark. :rolleyes:

Actually, the bead lock part was a proud dad moment because it's the first time my kid was actually able to be useful when he came out to "help" me. Not bad for a 3 year old.
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Also, I never found any wire. So I'm gonna pick some up at lunch today. :flipoff2:
 
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