Jeep YJ Build Up

todays progress: steering completed







next ill tie the cage into the frame and do some finishing stuff, going to get it painted around the end of the month

today i started on the frame mounts for the cage, completed one but the front are the most time consuming. also picked up the rear DS, looks good and only set me back 100- even, 5 day turn around and nice guys down there at fleetpride.




more to come

Well i finished thr front two cage tie in's and the two middle tie ins, i have to wait until i order the crusher corners from genright before i can make the final two, to ensure they dont interfere. I pulled a budget cut and lined the tub myself, welded in about 50 little holes, took forever, and found 4 stress cracks, 3 from the front seats and one near the rear mount for the roll cage, replace body mounts people..... anyway started prepping for paint and im going to swap out the dash this week with a non rusted non cracked one, and going to run some more gauges. going to get the seats re covered and add seat heaters, that will be nice... other than that coming along. the project has taken over the garage, other people in the house are not happy... oh well some things are more important!

also finished the boat sides, just need some sanding for paint

This weekend i had to do the dash, been putting it off for awhile, but here is what i did

pulled off old dash, cleaned up tub that rusted under the dash, prepped the new dash cleaned it and painted it, pulled the rats nest of old wires out and cleaned up wires that remained, re-bunched them and lightened the wires running to the gauges. The new dash pad is the same color, just not cracked.

Quote from shadyluke

Are you still running the 231 T-case? Whats up with the tcase shifter handle. Looks a little odd to pull like that.

im running a rubi case, nvg 241-OR. its a custom handle, works better than my stock one ever did, but will prob pop a cable shifter in it later on down the road to insure it will not slip in or out of gear if i hit a hard bump or hit it with my leg

Cj-

the cage got its first coats of black semi gloss.

Cage is finished just moved it outside till the body work is done, have to wait till the seats are re covered to mount the harnesses and such, started the body work getting it ready for paint. More to come

Quote from Mike W

How was the engine swap? 2.5 to a 4.0 what it cost and who did it?

mike,

everything done on this wrangler has been done by me and my drunk friends, i did the motor swap with two friends and a ton of beer. The removal of the old 2.5 was easy, we cut off the mounts and moved them forward, clamped down the motor mounts and put the whole engine, transmission, and t case in to test fit it. We moved the mounts one last time and welded them in. The skid needed to be modified, the exhaust, the intake, drive shafts, fuel system, got a new radiatior and had to tear apart the YJ harness and mated it to the TJ harness and retained the OBD II system. We had to in order to tune the engine, the motor is out of a 2001 TJ had it rebuilt and rebuilt the 5 speed transmission. I had to buy a snap on scanner to get the motor to run and tune it.

The jeep I pulled the motor harness and transmission from:


Pulled:

Building the motor:


The NV-3550 pulled apart


Pulled the old drive train:



Harness leftovers

Rewelded the skid

Transmission ready to go in and clutch



Installed

Overall it was fun, a lot of work and kind of costly probably around 3-4k, sorry about the different picture sizes, any more questons mike send me a PM

todays progress. body work is hard

well it has been awhile, been doing body work, but the past few days i took a break and did some other stuff

i got the cage in, mounted the seats and started building the center console, also have the e brake set up almost finished, and started the mount for the on board air system. also mounted the fuel cell and ran the fuel lines. put the stock seat belts back in for street driving and added the 3pt harness. i dropped the seats off to get them recovered and have the seat heaters installed, tomm i will run the plumbing for the air system. more to come.








Cj-

Quote from J-Man

I cant wait to see this thing when your finished with it.

thanks man, yours is looking good as well,

installed tanks and pulled the pump off and added the distrbution block for the onboard air, it will have the lines for the two sided to fill tires in the cab, the on off compressor switch, gauge line, air horn, and safety valve, and space for lockers later on




more to come

CJ-

well did the brakes, ran the lines and installed the dodge MC, took out the yj purporting valve and took out the rubber washer, the pedal is very stiff, i can see this thing is going to have some stopping power. also finished the air system, and make new shift lever for the transfer case, i used a craftsman pry bar and welded it up, adjusted the linkage and away we go. the right front caliper bleed valve snapped off when i tried to bleed it, i tied to get it out with a chisel and hammer and then tried to weld a grade 8 bolt to it with no luck, looks like im going to have to replace the front calipers as well. just more money... also installed the air horns and built the center console, i will put the battery in tomm and fire it up, im saving some stuff to do when i get to Vermont, like finishing the line lock for the ebrake and installing dual battery’s. more to come...








Cj-

Rolled it out today it's about finished, finish body work, paint and tie up the loose ends, went to start it and the tj fuel pump is shot, ordered one today,

Hard to say, but I would assume no. I could pull it off but I don't think it will be ready, still lots of little suff, that is not major but very time consuming.

Cj-