Almost 3 years since i've posted here, got the ol' XJ Back..

I sold my XJ 3 years ago to my Uncle, who needed something to drive on short notice and didn't have a ton to spend at the time.

89' Laredo
4.0
AW4
NP231 With a AA SYE. (came factory with a np242)
87' D44 Rear
D30 non disconnect front.

About a month ago he passed away, and he had been telling me how he was working on it in his shop. Well it's been left to me and i'm sort of going to take over where he left off and also go my own route with it.

My uncle didn't know a ton about those XJ's, so he just kinda went ridiculous with it right off the bat as you can see here (The rear is a dana 44 out of an 87 XJ, but the front is still the toothpick dana 30)



He threw 39x18r15 Baja belteds on a 10 wide wheel (puke)

I've already sourced out a set of 33x12.50 Cooper SST Mud terrains for it for the time being.

The control arms and mounts I built for it before I sold it are still intact thankfully, and i'm gonna get some new coils up front since he just went ahead and used some spacers, which i've never been a fan of.

But it's cool to be back here, and great to have my old jeep back.

Can't wait to get it back into drivable condition so I can hit the trails again.

Sorry to hear about the loss, But it is great to hear you will get your XJ back an continue the build !

Tom95YJ said:

Sorry to hear about the loss, But it is great to hear you will get your XJ back an continue the build !

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Thanks bud, it was a hard loss definitely, but he was suffering from many ailments and was in a lot of pain.

I also have a 95 Orvis ZJ that was daily driver, I had some plans of building it out, but i'd rather build on the XJ platform.

Here's a couple pics from where I left off (4.5" 31x11.50), and i'm hoping to get pretty extreme with it in the near future.



Little thing took me almost everywhere I needed to go on 31's with a detroit in the rear.

ARB's and a 44 front is on the agenda definitely.

Can't wait to get back on the trail, and i'll probably start a build thread when i start digging into her again.

Sounds like a plan, I'm on 31's now but within the next few weeks my XJ will have my new 3.5" RE lift, Bumpstoped properly and have the fenders trimmed running on 33" Toyo Opencountry M/T's (I could not pass up a deal on 5 tires with 1200 miles on them for $300 )

Yeah that's a smoking deal

I have a set of Cooper Discoverer SST's 33x12.50r15's on hold from a friend for 250 with ~ 60% tread, and they run like 299 or something each new.

Then I can get these ridiculous Baja Belteds off of it and hopefully sell them to somebody for 200 bucks or so.

They'd be great in the sand or something, but the thing just can't support a 39 and it looks like a moon rover, lol.

The "toothpick" D30 will be fine for your planned 33's.

rocknxj said:

The "toothpick" D30 will be fine for your planned 33's.

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I do have to give the dana 30 credit where credit is due.

But in no way would it stand a chance of holding up with 39's

I'm glad I have the non disco front with the 1 piece shaft.

But if I can source a nice wagoneer 44, i'm definitely gonna snatch it up for peace of mind.

The stance today

Still a lot of work to do, but at least it's driveable now.. They ride pretty well, took a few extra weights to balance them out, but they're great tires.