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Fantasy XJ if you could...

A

avius808

NAXJA Forum User
Location
HAWAII
G'day all,
I just found out I will be laid off in January, so I figured that will be the perfect time to build out the 1999 4dr 4l XJ I've always wanted!
Heres the thing:
1) I dont know SH*t about 4x4ing, other than the trials, tribulations and excellent adventures I have read on the forums.

2) I want to order all the parts now and just lay into the build and have it done in 1-3 weeks- my new full time job!

3) I have a fantasy pic list put together at random I was hoping to get ya'lls insight, recommendations and reviews of products you like and use and lastly cheapest prices new or used.

Heres the fantasy list:
Rough Country Kit Includes:
· Front: High flex coil springs, lower high clearance arms with X-Flex Joints, upper control arms with X-Flex Joints, long arm mounting crossmember, transfer case skid plate, adjustable track bar, drop pitman arm, sway-bar disconnects, and stainless steel brakelines.
· Rear: Rear leaf springs, lifted shackles, u-bolts, and stainless steel brakeline.
· Shocks: (4) High Performance 2.2 series shocks
· Combo-Kit Inclusions: Slip yoke eliminator kit for NP231 transfer case. Extended length CV rear driveshaft. Performance 2.2 steering stabilizer.
ARB Air lockers
ARB Bull Bar
Some sort of safari rack
Rear Bumper with tire carrier
I dont know yet about gearing
Well I suppose thats it for now,
Any insight will help!
AV
 
Whew! Thats a list! 1 to 3 weeks for all that would scare me... You doing this work yourself?

Most of what you have looks like bolt ons... Assuming all your old parts come off nicely, and new parts fit up like you expect, might be possible, but those are high assumptions!

Your axles though - What tires you planning on? How hard you planning to beat this thing? Bigger tires, you are going to want to consider gearing. Again, doing this yourself? Gearing and installing lockers is quite involved... I am facing that project right now. What kind of wheeling do you anticipate? Will this be your daily driver? Before you get into gears/tires/lockers, you need to know what you want out of your rig. Then you will better determine what you need/want, and what is practical for you.

And always - search is your friend!!
 
Frame stiffeners front, middle and rear made a big difference for me, and if you plan on daily driving it or even doing some decently hard trails I would highly recommend them
 
You didn't say how high you want to lift it or what tire size you want to run. If you want to run 33's you will need at least 4.5 inch and trimmed fenders. At that point you would want to re-gear to 4.56 to get back to norm. Arb's are very nice i have them but my friend has the OX lockers and i think I would go that route if i did it again. The reason being is that OX's can be controlled via air, cable or electric. Also keep in mind that the bumpers are very heavy and will affect your vehicle height. I had to put on spacers (soon to be JKS Acos) after my bumper and winch were put on. Search this forum and feel free to shoot me a message... Your build is very similar to what I have.

here is my junk: http://www.thewordofmatus.com/wp-co...81308742890_1544603320_31837677_4347639_n.jpg
 
I like the enthusiasm!
Sorry I left a bunch out, I was writing the post during work hours ;) ... I'm already checked out of this gig and ready to be laid off!
The jeep is a universities that ran small errends to a post in the mountains 104000 miles and recorded maintenance, oil changes every 3000.

I'll answer these as they came in-
4WDlifeform- "Your axles though - What tires you planning on? How hard you planning to beat this thing? Bigger tires, you are going to want to consider gearing.
Click to expand...
it's a 6.5" lift ( does the type of gas really matter in the shock)
I was thinking 35's on craigers and I just read a thread here on gearing saying for with 4.888 gearing 70mph would be 2300rpm.
can I put those gears in the stock axle?


4WDlifeform-Again, doing this yourself? Gearing and installing lockers is quite involved... I am facing that project right now. What kind of wheeling do you anticipate? Will this be your daily driver?"
Click to expand...
I'll enlist anyone that will help; neighbors, friends, my lady... but most of the work I did plan to do solo.
I live in Hawaii so the wheelin I would asume is a lot of mud and trails, not much rock crawlin but I am a newb.. But I do know I want it built right the first time and that so theres no situation that can stop the beast ( within reason of course!).

jimbo93- and 420BlackXJ- sliders and both bumpers are definite, searching craigslist for ARB style bumpers now . Any other ways to stiffen the frame?

matus2- I'll look into OX lockers, I definately want to be able to unlock for street use with the flick of a switch and I like the idea of having a compressor on board, even if its tiny!. I hadnt even thought about the weight of the "stiffeners"
I plan to cut out the wheel wells, do you think I need to get spacers too?
BTW your XJ is AWESOME, very similar to my vision!

snail-What axles will you be running? If the front is LP you may want to consider swapping in a HP before dumping money into it. Same idea goes for the rear in terms of strength...
Click to expand...


I really dont know sh*t about 4x4 yet so I am not sure what LP and HP are. I have been looking for axles on craigslist and found these will any of them work?


Dana 60 rear I have 2 I think. $200 ea. Dana 70 rear $250ea. Driver drop Closed knuckle Dana 44 front $200. passenger drop Closed knuckle Dana 60 front $200. 89 f350 high pinion driver drop king pin Dana 60 front with leafs and steering matching Dana 70 rear single wheel. Set is $1600 firm. 72 bronco running gear 9" rear 44 front Dana 20 tcase 3 speed manual. Sitting in bushes. Make offer. 10 bolt chevy 1/2 ton axles 1 front 2 rears make offer.

snail- just looked at your project thread.. you went ape shit on that XJ!!!:eek: very inspirational though, i'll have to study it more closely when i have time.
And your end product is a bad a$$ beast!

MAN! I am so pumped to get this started, looking at all the threads and rigs on here! I barely got any work done today.. for the company that is!
Goodtimes Ya'll keep it coming
AV
 
Last edited:
Touch base with KGP416. He is stationed in Hawaii with the Army MPs. He's built more XJs than I can count. I'm talking wrecks stripped down to the frame and completely rebuilt.

I would reach out to him. He's a great resource and he's in Hawaii!
 
Not to rain on your parade, but for most of the Hawaii stuff I've seen, I think you'd be better off with a 4.5" lift on 33s than going with 35s.

One of my regrets was not doing more research and reading before buying my XJ. I probably would have saved a fair bit of time and money knowing what other folks found worked before trying it for myself.

But, this thread is a very good start to get ideas.

My ideal build is close to what I now have:

4.5" lift
33" x 10.5" KM2s
4.56 gears
ARB lockers
Trussed 30 front axle with Vanco brakes
8 1/4 rear axle
winch up front with bumper
swing out tire carrier on rear hitch bumper
full skid plates
frame rail stiffeners
sliders
roof rack

Do part of it at a time, expect do the axles all at once. If you're not sure of a piece, wait on it until towards the end, to learn as much as you can before committing yourself.

David Bricker / SYR
 
Hawaii, 'eh.., never been there. Thing about ARB bull bar(with area for a specific winch, i.e., Warn M8000 model, is that it is designed to crumple a bit for 'Roos, and Zombies. 'Roo road kill would be tasty on the 'barbie, 'dunno 'bout Zombies though... You might want to look into some local built bull bar, as any shipment from the mainland is 'gonna cost 'ya. ARBUSA has an agreement with 4WheelParts.com as one of their retail outlets, which is not too far away from each other in Wa. State. Should you decide to order from them be aware that you must pay a State Sales Tax unless you obtain a Wa.St. Tax Exemption form, (relatively easy via Google), and submit it with your order, some kindof way, and also the retail outfit may require a photo copy of your Ha.St. Driver's license. You just might be able to all of that on your computer if you have a camera for the drivers lic., etc., etc., etc. My orders, weighed 350 pounds, and I was charged only 33 cents per pound for barge freight up the coast to Alaska, lucky me. Some good XJ setups I've seen have 2" recievers in front and back bumpers in order to use the portable winches. Me: I just went with the ARB, and Warn, and Old Man Emu coils/leafs/shocks, with some anti-death wobble products, and steering box brace from Kevinsoffroad, including JKS discos, (cut that rear sway-bar out, and kept just a couple of it's parts to recycle, lol). It's amazing out much the XJ's can be modified to suit the terrain one expects to be mostly within, and to squeeze all the performance possibilities from it. Soon, I'll be ordering a 135 pound ProFab rear tire carrier bumper so as to help raise the front up from it's present 1.5" California rake. Most of my area is sand, gravel, and mud. No pumice, no sharp rocks, shale, boulders, etc., or anything to bother the sidewalls of my next year's expenditure for 29" Hankook Dynapro MT tires which won the 2011 mud tire shoot-out. (I use Blizzaks for winter). Are you going to get a winch for that ARB? If so, consider an extra battery set-up. Salt air, being near the water, (lol.., if'in you listen very quietly at night.., one can hear their vehicle rust), and the crap they use on our roads requires some underbody sealants. Your choice, especially if you drive around on some of your salt ladden beaches. I painted the top of my hood, and roof flat black in order to obtain whatever sunlight it can get during our winters in order to gain the extra btu's. Don't need no 'friggin AC up here, lol!!!! Surf's Up!! (with ice flows).
 
avius808 said:

it's a 6.5" lift ( does the type of gas really matter in the shock)
I was thinking 35's on craigers and I just read a thread here on gearing saying for with 4.888 gearing 70mph would be 2300rpm.
can I put those gears in the stock axle?
Click to expand...

4.88 gears is the deepest you can run in a Dana 30 (your front axle). I don't recall what the deepest are for the 8.25. If you have a D35 you should swap it out if you plan to do 33's or 35's.

I plan to cut out the wheel wells, do you think I need to get spacers too?
Click to expand...

Spacers are unnecessary if you get rims with a decent amount of backspacing. 3.75 or 4 will be good. The stock BS is 5.25 IIRC

I really dont know sh*t about 4x4 yet so I am not sure what LP and HP are. I have been looking for axles on craigslist and found these will any of them work?


Dana 60 rear I have 2 I think. $200 ea. Dana 70 rear $250ea. Driver drop Closed knuckle Dana 44 front $200. passenger drop Closed knuckle Dana 60 front $200. 89 f350 high pinion driver drop king pin Dana 60 front with leafs and steering matching Dana 70 rear single wheel. Set is $1600 firm. 72 bronco running gear 9" rear 44 front Dana 20 tcase 3 speed manual. Sitting in bushes. Make offer. 10 bolt chevy 1/2 ton axles 1 front 2 rears make offer.
Click to expand...

LP stands for Low Pinion (found in 2000-01 XJs D30), HP stands for High Pinion (found in older XJs D30)..In regards to the D30..the general consensus is that the LP is weaker and provides less ground clearance.

I don't want to give you any mis-information about fullwidth axles..but here's some quick info. 1978-79 Ford D60s/D44s have welded on mounts.. so they can be easily cut off. Passenger side drop front axles will require you to rethink the Tcase for a flip or an Atlas swap.
 
Last edited:
lowrange2 said:
My fantasy XJ wouldn't look much like an XJ except for grille and headlights. The parts list would be 2 miles long.
Click to expand...
THIS


plus 6.5" lift is effin huge. keep it more like 4.5-5" should be more than enough on 35's.

33's cost almost exactly what 35's do so buy the 35's

get a smaller, better clearing set of bumpers. arbs are nice and well built but heavy and huge

good shocks make all the difference

wider is better


if you are new to the jeep thing are you new to the wheeling thing?

If so, get a budget boost, some 31's, sliders and beefed up steering and learn how to drive the darn thing before tossing it at trails....
 
in4aride said:
if you are new to the jeep thing are you new to the wheeling thing?
Click to expand...

THIS.

The first part of your first post suggests you are not a wheeler yet.

I would suggest hooking up with some locals and going on a few trails either driving or as a passenger before you spend a dime on modifications.

Then remember, lift kits and bumpers are cheap and easy. More important are axle gears and lockers.
 
/QUOTE]

if you are new to the jeep thing are you new to the wheeling thing?

If so, get a budget boost, some 31's, sliders and beefed up steering and learn how to drive the darn thing before tossing it at trails....

So true Ive grown with my rig and it does make sence to build it up over time because its good practice :greensmok
 
I'd probably save the money till I had a new job lined up and start wheeling it stock, decide if it's really the motorsport you want to go for and then modify the jeep.
 
kastein said:
I'd probably save the money till I had a new job lined up and start wheeling it stock, decide if it's really the motorsport you want to go for and then modify the jeep.
Click to expand...

DING DING DING! I can't believe it took this long for someone to tell you that.

Save your money until you have secure employment. :twak:
 
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