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beater!

ehall

NAXJA Member
NAXJA Member
I talk about my beater some, here it is... This was my mom's commuter vehicle. She bought it new from dealer inventory back in 91 and used it as her long-distance DD in Florida, Ohio and Maryland. My baby brother also learned to drive on it, and he did most of the serious damage on it. Current mileage is almost 335k miles. All service records were kept and it was pretty well maintained from what I can tell.

I don't really know where I'm going to take her yet but I'm pretty sure I will use it for sport UTILITY vehicle instead of SPORT utility vehicle. I'm building a new house later this year so I will use it for hauling construction materials through muddy fields, and will also use it when I don't want to drive my Cadillac for whatever reason (ski trips, bad weather, etc).

Exterior.gif


Exterior has the faded paint typical of the era, some very small rust spots (none on the rockers or anything, just a little bit around the fender lips), and had some cosmetic problems like broken mirrors and window vents. I replaced the mirrors and window vents and some other small things already. Door dents need to be fixed after some other more important work is done. I'm going to cover each piece in dark grey primer and will then give it a new coat of dark grey metallic after the body work is finished later this year.

Fender.jpg


I've already got OEM replacement bumpers and am ordering end caps and other trim pieces between bigger work items.

Nose-2.jpg


The interior is pretty bad too. Headliner, visors, console, and seats are all damaged beyond repair and need to be replaced.

Interior.jpg


I yanked everything out and am going to R&R everything from the floorboards through the seats.

Floorboard.jpg


Lots of rust under the rear carpet, but the front is okay.

Rear%20Center.jpg


Engine was serviced pretty regularly and it runs okay once it's warmed up, but the whole thing including accessories are overdue for replacement. I've already cleaned it up a bit, replaced thermostat and water housing, replaced battery, did the whole tune-up, etc. So it looks a little better than in these pics. I am going to replace the pumps next, and will use the newer items on a replacement engine once I figure out what I want to do.

Engine-1.jpg


Engine-2.jpg


The rear axle is the 27-spline 8.25 so I will probably build up an 8.8 replacement instead of locking this one.

rear-axle-front.jpg


Immediate work items in order are replacement rear floorpan (already bought and waiting for installation), new seats and replacement items (looking and buying now), 3" OME lift and some 31" retreads (next month), exterior body work (next month), additional 3" of lift (springtime), engine swap (summer), additional body work (springtime and summer). Hopefully I have a good little SUV by the end of summer.
 
D35? Belive the 8.25 didn't show up til 92-3 but I could be wrong
 
not seeing a flat bottom lip on that axle
x2 on it being a d35
8.8 in the future tho, so your in the right direction
 
See the rubber drain plug with the Diamond... thats a dana spicer logo

But yay for the 8.8
 
just my opinion. but with all the new stuff going on...why not get new tires???
other than that it's not a terrible ride man. looks like you have a good plan for "restoring" it
 
The axle in the front is a 8.25, the one in the rear is a D-35. There is a visible difference, you most definetly have a D-35.

axleswap6me8.jpg
 
xjtrailrider said:
The axle in the front is a 8.25, the one in the rear is a D-35. There is a visible difference, you most definetly have a D-35.

axleswap6me8.jpg

front = D30
rear = D35
 
beakie said:
front = D30
rear = D35

He is talking about the picture he posted with a d35 and 8.25
 
beakie said:
front = D30
rear = D35
Pretty sure he was refering to the axle in the front of the picture and not the one in front of the Jeep..........;)

Interesting though that it has a D35 when the build sheet says otherwise. '91 was the first year for the 8.25, my '91 had one. So there is no reason it wouldn't have one.
 
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Well with 335K on the clock, I suppose it's certainly possible the original 8.25 crapped out and someone opted to swap it with a low mile D35.... maybe?

After all, SOMEONE here trashed a D44 and spent goofy amounts of money to build a D35 with 4:10's to replace it....... and has no 4 wheel drive..... :D
 
According to the service records my little brother broke the rear drive shaft and the u-joints a couple of times. It's possible that the axle was replaced but it's not reflected in the records. Maybe the mechanic saw and liked, dunno.
 
YELLAHEEP said:
After all, SOMEONE here trashed a D44 and spent goofy amounts of money to build a D35 with 4:10's to replace it....... and has no 4 wheel drive..... :D
What a crazy asshole. That guy sounds a little desparate. Maybe his friends, being the good people I imagine they are, should help him remedy that situation asap instead of spending their time building a spare parts empire..........;)
 
Just bought these S-10 seats off eBay. Power, heated, leather...

s10-seats-ebay.JPG


underside-1.JPG


underside-2.JPG


Looks like there is lots of metal to play with so the fronts should go in pretty easy, but I don't know about the rear. If they don't work I'll give them to my brother, since he just bought an S-10 for a beater.
 
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