Work Harder Not Smarter or "Is This Guy Ever Going to Wheel With Us"

[xj42]

Alright, I'm finally getting around to putting together a build thread, albeit a slow build.  The title comes from all the work I caused myself later in the build and the fact that I haven't gotten to take this out for a couple years now. 
On to the build...
I'm going to start at the beginning, that way I can add more pictures, I heard that they were mandatory for a build thread.
Here is my Jeep, bone stock.  Not much to look at.


Installed some tow hooks.


At this time I also added a K&N and a Flowmaster.  Looking back I gained nothing from doing this and now feel like it was a complete waste, but I did get some sweet stickers which added the real power and helped with the aerodynamics.  I wheeled it like this at SMORR, where I met Jimmy, who invited me to a meeting.  So blame him if you wonder why I showed up.

I decided that the first thing in order was a lift.  So I ordered a RE lift from 4WS and it was all downhill from there.
Here it is after the lift, RE 4.5".


Be sure to show your neighbors how redneck you are by flexing in your yard.


I drove it like this for a while, yes with the stock tires.  Vibes brought the suck so I installed a SYE and a front shaft from an XJ.  This sounded way harder than it was, once you crack the case everything makes more sense.  It is a major pain to drop the case so do it in the vehicle if you can, my 2 cents.
Before the SYE.


For those of you that like shafts.


Installed


Back in the Jeep.


Much smoother ride after this was completed. 
While I was taking my time deciding on tires I decided to make some rock rails.


Here is a bracket that ties into the rear spring hanger.  Here is also where I stopped taking pictures and just finished the rails so the next pictures are after I've had them on for a while.






I finally decided on some tires, Maxxis Bighorns.  Bought off a guy on ebay, had the best price shipped that I could find.  Tires rubbed when I turned so it was time to do a little trimming.  Here is the thread I followed: http://www.naxja.org/forum/showthread.php?t=87959
Before.


After.


Do the redneck thing out front again to check clearances.  Much better.  This reminds me, I need to add RTI ramp to the real estate listing as a "feature".


I then added a CB, here is a bracket and where it got mounted under the dash.




After that is was a gas tank skid, which can be read about here: http://ozarksjeepthing.com/c/index.php/topic,7430.0.html
Finished product.

[calebsxj]

Kool man! I see you on Sunshine every now and again.  You need to get that thing out to Smorr!

Caleb

[YJ_Aaron]

Nice, so that catches you up to like a year and a half ago right?

[LoneWolf]

I wheeled it like this at SMORR, where I met Jimmy, who invited me to a meeting.  So blame him if you wonder why I showed up.

  
I'm still getting death threats to this day. 

Nice thread thanks for sharing.. It'll be my inspiration when I start on my Cherokee.

[xj42]

Nice, so that catches you up to like a year and a half ago right?

That's about right, this stuff went pretty quick.

 
I'm still getting death threats to this day. 

Just trying to pass the buck, not going to take any personal responsibility, figured it was ok with the libs in office.

[xj42]

Now we're getting to the meat and potatoes part of this build.  Axle swaps.  This is also where I caused myself a whole lot of extra work.
I finally decided to put a Toyota axle in a Jeep, which some consider a sin.  You can read about that here: http://ozarksjeepthing.com/c/index.php/topic,7434.0.html

This left me with mismatched gear ratios and bolt patterns the "solution" to this problem was a Waggy 44.
Here is what I started with.




I bought a couple bracket kits to speed this whole thing up.  I went with the Ballistic Fab kit for the coil buckets and lower control arm mounts.  I went with the RE upper bracket kit and truss kit.  This seemed to be the cheapest way to get most of the brackets I needed.


Passenger side with track bar mount.


How the shock mounts.


Coil bucket with top plate to clamp it in.


Lower control arm mount.

[xj42]

With the brackets here I ran into my first minor issue.  The coil bucket and truss didn't fit due to the Waggy housing having a leaf spring pad cast into the housing.  The length of exposed tube between the housing and inner C was not sufficient for mounting the brackets.


Get out the grinder and cut off wheel, problem solved.  I cut off enough so that everything would fit.  After cutting there is the same amount of casting on each side of the diff, so I don't think this is a strength concern, but time will tell.


Before I welded any brackets on I wanted to set pinion angle and caster.  Research told me to shoot for 5-6 degrees of caster, this left the pinion point almost horizontal, I wanted it to point at the transfer case.  This isn't completely necessary because I'll have lockouts so the drive shaft won't spin all the time, but this should help a little with bind when the driver side droops.  To adjust this I had cut and turn the knuckles.  The first side went easy, the second side, not so much, but I finally got it done.

Grinding the factory weld.


Cutting down to the tube.


Get out the BFH and start whacking on the C.  Be sure to cuss a lot and question why you decided to do this.
If you look close you can see the mark I made on the tube and C and see how much I rotated the C.


In relation to the pinion angle.


Check both sides and the pinion with an angle finder, until you get where you want.




Tack it it.  Before I tacked everything I double and triple check that everything was square and the same angle.


I then fully welded the C's on.  Borrowed a stick welder, used some pre and post heat, 6011 rod and burned it in.

[xj42]

I then welded all the brackets on based on measurements from the 30 while it was still in the Jeep.  I got close on everything, but due to the differences in the housing not everything is exactly in the same space so it wouldn't bolt right in.  This was probably my biggest mistake, I should have mocked everything up in place and could have avoided some of these issues.  Pictures are going to be a little sparse because I was trying to get everything done and didn't take time to stop and take them. 

Before I installed the axle in the Jeep, I had to get the gears set up.  Found a used set 4.30 gears on ebay for $30.  Read and researched quite a bit and installed them myself.  With a little help, and a whole lot of harassment about the length of the build, from YJ_Aaron I finally got this pattern.




I also installed a used Lock Right I bought off Pirate.  Threw a new pin and spring kit in it and called it good.

Out with the old and in with the new.  If only it was that easy.


I knew I was going to need/want adjustable upper arms for fine tuning everything so I made some which you can see here: http://ozarksjeepthing.com/c/index.php/topic,9283.0.html

Here you can see one of the first issues I ran into.  The RE track bar bracket drops toward the rear of the vehicle.  This was issue for me because of the mounting of the upper brackets and the pinion angle I was shooting for.  Easy fix, make a new track bar bracket.


The next issue was the lower control arms, they weren't long enough.  Due to where the diff sits on the 44 I had to outboard them a little more than stock, probably could have resolved this by mocking up in place.  To solve this I cut them and sleeved them with 1.75" DOM to the length I needed.  You can kind of see that in this picture.

[xj42]

I chose to do cross over steering, separate drag link and tie rod.  I had read issues about inverted T steering "rolling" and having a "dead spot" and I wanted to avoid that if I could.  I sent the passenger side knuckle to a guy on ebay who milled, drilled, tapped, and supplied a steering arm and hardware.  I chose to build the steering with 1.5" OD 0.25" wall DOM, weld in bungs and tie rod ends.  I had to use a longer pitman to match the throw of the steering arm.  Bought one for a bottle of Jim.  Comparison shot.


Since I was going with crossover I would be raising the drag link and need to also raise the track bar on the axle side to be parallel.  This required a new bracket to be made, as can be seen here. 


Once I had the steering mocked up I could then figure out a spot for the sway bar mounts.  This was way harder than I thought it should be, but in the end I found a workable spot that doesn't interfere and allows them to be disconnected easily enough.


Once I had this thing back on the ground I made the track bar and drilled a hole on the axle side bracket to make it parallel to the drag link.  I made the track bar with 1.75" DOM and 3/4" heims on either end.  The track bar still sits too close to the diff, but I should be able to drill new holes and move it up a couple inches on either side and still be parallel to the drag link.


Few more pictures.






I had a couple of "humorous" setbacks.
I bought this Dana 44 with two passenger drop 44's.  I had one set of small bearing and two sets of big bearing spindles, some how I got them confused and actually put a large bearing on and then tried to put the small bearing hub on.  This was especially frustrating because I cleaned and prepped the spindles I thought were the small bearing spindles.
My son likes to come out in the garage and "help" when he can.  Apparently his definition of help is hiding a specialized ball joint socket in a box of cables.  It only took 45 min of looking to find it, several other sockets and 1 heim joint I didn't realize I was missing yet.  We're going to have to work on putting things back where he finds them, I appreciate his effort though.

That's about all there is to it.  I had a few minor setbacks and some idiot mistakes but I finally got it done and am driving it.  Got a few minor thing to address yet, but it is close to being wheelable.
Let me know if you have any questions, or concerns on how I did something.

[Big A]

That is an awesome build with some great components!

Did you do all this in your garage?

<----Jealous!

[xj42]

That is an awesome build with some great components!

Did you do all this in your garage?

<----Jealous!

Thanks.  Yeah, I did this all in my garage.

[xj42]

Haven't done too much as of late, I've been working on reorganizing the garage, and making a table.
But I did get a little surgical on the Jeep the other day.  Since the axle was pushed forward a couple inches with the swap the tires would get into the fender when it flexed.  Some more trimming was in order.  I also decided to get rid of the flare mounting system, because it was a PITA to put the flare back on.

So I marked off what I wanted to trim using the flare as a template.



Combo of jigsaw and Dremel, cleaned up with a flapwheel.



Now I still liked the look with the flare on, but it was a pain to put it on and take it off.  So while I was sitting at the office filing it came to me, binder clips. 



With flare.



Comparison shots.





Picture of the "mounting".



Yes, I know this is completely half-assed.  It's just for mall crawlin', and providing a more finished look.

[gdowling]

  I love this - it doesnt even qualify as booty fab! Parts courtesy of Malone Finkle ?

[LoneWolf]

If it was me I would have done it like....


  Couldn't resist. Looks good Austin. I like your work.

[gdowling]

yea i couldnt agree more - it was just a joke I think it looks sharp!