Postal CJ, nope not euro!

[markpetersonii]

haha nice!

[gli_ryan]

Well got my furnace working so I have heat, thank god. So that started my day on a good note and I finished on a good note with getting the leafs on. I do have an issue though, my shackle hangers are cj ones and my shackles are yj. So the bushings don't fit. I'm not sure if that was my fault or the guy I was talking to's fault. Either way I'm going to call them and see what they say. But I've got the front hangers tacked on. That bell crank steering setup is not going to work I don't think, unless I extend the tie rods and get a drop pitman arm. I'm looking for a saginaw steering setup and d30 front axle anyways. Thinking that would be the best and most useful setup.

Leafs in, its way too big. Going to have to pull the 3" body lift at some point, which is fine I guess. Wont get the fuel cell mounting quite like I wanted, but I'll have the suspension I wanted.



stock bell crank is not going to work.



can't really tell but with no motor the shackle angle is just a little past 90 degrees (or less?)

[gli_ryan]

Got some more work done today. Started out by going to the steel house to pick up some tubing and square stock. I was in the want it now and get it done mood so I ended up with a nice piece of black schedule 80 with basically no inner bump, I needed it for the bushings since I realized I was sent cj shackle hangers, then realized I have the small yj bushings at 1.25" diameter. I also bought 1.5x2" box tube.

I pulled off the rear wheels/leafs and got to work cutting off the old mounts. Then I realized I REALLY needed to rework the rear frame because of how crappy it was, plus some of the bolts/rivets holding it on were in the way of where I wanted to mount the shackle hanger.

Hole sawed the box tube


Then hammered it down just a bit to hold onto the tube.






Is it a good design? No idea, unless someone says otherwise….? Live and learn. I'm going to cut an angle in the front of it then cap it, and cap the rear so nothing can get inside it as well as build onto the overhang. Axle was moved back about 6". I really wish my 220 was working in the garage as I would have loved to tig these pieces up. I only got one side done, hole saw got chewed up and am waiting for a replacement to be brought over, gotta love Irwin holesaws! Lifetime warranty, spendy at first, but its worth it.

Watched a vid of an old cj with a v8, it was cool. I wouldn't be opposed to that I guess.

[9jetta6]

this thing is gunna be hella sick

[gli_ryan]

Thanks!

Got a motor and complete power steering setup home today! Install tomorrow, at least the motor. Pics tomorrow too. Gotta stop spending money now, after I buy cage material Monday haha.

[gli_ryan]

Worked on the motor install today. Pulled the grill to made it easier to slide it in, much easier and I'm really glad I did. My trans that is in the jeep already had a bellhousing on it, I pulled that off because there was one on my new motor. Got the motor in after messing around getting the bellhousing off and lining up the output shaft, required some wiggling. Well then I realized there wasn't a clutch fork in the bellhousing, so I tried to slide it in (I had one from my old bellhousing). Then I realized there wasn't a throwout bearing so I put the one out of the old bellhousing on the trans again. Well after messing around I submitted to pulling the bellhousing off the motor, it wouldn't all fit without that off first.

Bolted that stuff up and put the motor back in, after another hour of messing around back tracking. Stupid. But now the motor is in and bolted up. My transmission is pretty stiff, I don't think it has been touched in a really long time. And I hope my tcase is the same because I pulled on the levers and nothing really happened. I'll check it out more later.

So motor is in. Then I drained the power steering fluid out of the pump and tried to get the lines off, they wouldn't come unfortunately… Not sure what I'm going to do about that, but I think that needs to be my next step. Otherwise I'm not sure of the best way to go from here. There is wiring, fuel cell mounting (might go propane though), fixing pinion angle on the front axle, flipping my rear springs around since I installed them backwards, mounting the power steering pump (need to build a custom mounting setup since that motor never came with one), mount the power steering box, get a new tie rod or shorten this one, build an arm for a drag link or drill out a new knuckle to accept a drag link, etc etc. Lots of work left unfortunately. I like the front shackle angle now that there is a motor in it though, so I'm pretty happy about that.














Last week went to a Jeep/Willys junkyard. It was pretty sweet but didn't find anything that I needed.

[gli_ryan]

Worked on the jeep today. Moved the rear leaf hangers back another half inch, I think this is the spot. I want to move them back another quarter inch but when I put a tank of gas, people, and the cage on I think this will be pretty close. I also tried flexing it out to see how close my shocks will be to being a good length, the rear seem to be pretty much spot on. So I tacked on the upper and lower mounts for the back. It seems to flex alright, I have no way of safely going farther than this. Oh and I can now get my spare front driveshaft to fit in the back in place. Just need to get my yoke to make sure its going to work. Pics suck, hey its winter and I've got a messy garage. Plus cfl lights don't provide that much lumens.

Oh I also put the tie rod on. This came out of a narrow track, but it was still too long. So I cut it down and plugged it. I wasn't satisfied so I also braced the outside. Yeah, its ugly. But I think its stronger than the rest of the rod at this point. I'd like to build a hiem joint setup anyways at some point. I gave dimensions to a friend for him to make me a steering arm for the top of the knuckle where those 4 bolts are. Going to be putting an arm on the top of that thing for the drag link like the old Willys truck thing.

[gli_ryan]

Another day in the garage! I decided I wanted a nice visual progress boost so I started on the cage. First I thought it would be nice to make rock sliders out of 1 piece of tubing, and bend the ends into the frame. Well I made 1 bend and decided that was going to be stupid. So I switched to a more standard straight slider attached to the frame with a couple of tubes going straight from the frame to slider. I had some 1/8" plate that I used to make pads for the frame attachments, idk if it mattered or not however. I decided on .120 wall for the sliders, then just .095 wall for the support bars. I also welded the sliders to the bottom of the body to stiffen it up. We'll see if that makes any difference, but I think the finished product will look pretty nice. I only got 1 side done.




Then I felt pretty good about what I accomplished. Decided to look at the power steering pump. Chopped the little tabs off the mount, and bolted them where they were closest to fitting. Did some grinding and welded that up. I don't know if the head gasket is going to be ok though. 1 bolt was removed for the engine hoisting, then I removed the next bolt over to get the mount on for the pump. I'll probably let 'er buck and see if its fine. But thats mounted up. With just myself it was tough to get it just right, so the pulley isn't sitting perfectly inline with the other pulley. Looks close enough. Its on the left side of the motor above the fuel pump.



I also tried to fit the steering box on. Its way too heavy to try and fab that up by myself though.

[gli_ryan]

So finally got some work done on the Jeep today with Max's help. I haven't been too ambitious because I didn't feel like buying diesel to heat my garage, and then my dad passed away. But I'm coming along and getting a little back to normal.

I got the saginaw box mounted up. That included boxing the frame, sleeving it, and drilling some holes in plate steel to mount it too and use as a template. I also started putting in the new rear crossmember but didn't finish due to not realizing how big of a pain it was going to be to get it in the frame channel. I may finish it before work tomorrow.



There is 3.5" between these two, I think I'm going to have a clearance problem when flexing… Sorta over looked that, probably going to have to get a shorter arm, or modify something.

[gli_ryan]

[gli_ryan]

Some more work done today. Not a whole lot, but definitely some. I redid the front shackle hangers. They are not finished completely yet; not finished being welded on and not boxed in. I think they will be strong enough, anyone think they aren't good enough?




and here it is back on the ground after both sides were finished.




I eyed up the front shocks today. I think I'll tackle those tomorrow. These narrow axles don't make mounting shocks too easy. I worked a little on the gas tank mounting as well today. All I really did was cut on piece of angle iron and set it in place. I realized however that my original mounting plan won't work. I'm going to support the rear of the tank as well as the two sides. I didn't have enough angle iron to complete the two sides to I skipped that for today. I also thought hard about pulling the body lift, I'm torn. I really want it out but don't want to go through the hassle to try and get the body to fit this frame. Plus it messes up my gas tank mounting a little bit. I'll probably leave it in and regret it later.

[gli_ryan]

Mediocre work done today, a little disappointing but I was out and about for quite a bit longer than needed. I straightened out the front of the frame with the help of my high lift and then pounded a thick piece of channel in between the frame rails. Worked good. Then I ran errands. Came back home and welded in angle iron to sit the fuel tank on. Ended up not being perfect and still needs some work to hold the tank well though.

Then not having decent steel to make the rest of the gas tank mount I moved onto the pedals. They were super sticky, after soaking them with penetrating oil and moving them around they freed up nicely. I'll be adding a brake booster to the brake to help with those steep trails. Also looking at putting in disk brakes up front before too long. I've got most of the holes drilled in the plate as well as the cut for the booster to fit through. Quite a bit of work left but I can see some light at the end.





no holes yet in this pic, but finally got to use my torches to cut this off and the booster hole.

[gli_ryan]

caliper brackets torqued down, steering mocked up (not welded yet), and insulated the fuel cell from the metal it sits on.





Finally it moved from it lair! I've got issues to deal with yet, leaky brake line or two and rear drums not working are high on the list. Power steering isn't leaking and it works great, tranny grinds on initial shift into gear maybe half the time I shifted into gear in my driveway but the clutch seems to work fine. I'm excited.







After lunch got some more stuff done, smaller things. CB and antenna installed but need the cable for the antenna, huge bus mirror, fastened the fuel line and rear brake line so they don't move around much, fastened down the fuel tank, and hooked up a choke switch!

[JK9K]

Neat! It looks like it is coming along well!

[MisdemeanorMatt]

extended spring shackles makes baby jesus cry.