Heffs_Heep(Build Thread)

[Heffs_Heep]

I've been bouncing around forums like , JeepForum, ComancheClub and Pirate for years without starting a thread or even registering, so tonight instead of working on the cherokee I've decided to start documenting my progress. I'll try not to post too much text here but a little background would be nice to have. This is my second cherokee, got the first when I was about 18 it was an 89 and I pretty much bought it halfway built. it was lifted and but didn't run when I got it. Thats how I got started in all this. through a series of trades I now have a 91 Laredo and i've been working on it for around 4 years now. Just a heads up if you wanna back out now, everything I do i do really slow, and not necessarily cause I'm being methodical, it's just cause I'm slow. this thread will start when I got the jeep and I'll throw every picture I can find from back then on here and I'll just see how fast I can get caught up to current. Don't get your hopes up though it's been a lot of re-doing what I did last time whenever I work on it. Currently working on rockers but I am again about to revisit suspension. anyway...Oh I also got married about the same time I got this jeep, so that slowed things down quite a bit too. Ok I'll get started now.



The blank canvas



Pretty much the very first thing I did after I brought it home was dive into a rear main seal replacement. I really drug it out too. I warped the oil pan trying to get it off and then I coudn't get it to seal up again. went through a few different gaskets and a few days of work to finaly get it all back together.



Then I did some exhaust as the existing had a huge hole in the muffler. I did this sweet action side pipe that I pulled from my 81 wagoneer. Sorry for the terrible pictures it was a while back though, just trying to start from the begining. you'll hear about that 81 wagoneer again as it was what my axles came from.



The 81. it was pretty cool but had a lot of issues I just didn't want to deal with so i opted to build the Cherokee instead.



Directly after the lift. I wish I had some pictures of the awesome spacers we built for the coils. the rears were a bastard pack of cherokee leafs and front leafs from the wagoneer, which were lift springs from BJs offroad. The front: random coils one of my buddies brought home one day, we don't know what they were out of, and we built some really nasty looking spacers out of 3/8 steel plate and orileys coil spacers. :gee: they didn't last long before deforming and falling apart. but I did get tires on from the 81 before that happened.



With tires.

and thats all I have time for right now. Hang in there, it'll get weird I promise!

 

[Heffs_Heep]

Set up like this I wheeled it a couple times but the ghetto front springs set up starting to deform, the rear packs I built were really stiff, shackle angle was terrible and I was having really bad death wobble due to jacking up all kinds of geometry.



The shocks, breaklines were all out of the wagoneer, it had a nice set up from Bjs(as mentioned)

Anway the next phase was rebuilding the rear packs, and putting 6.5" BDS coils in the front. at this time we also re-did the trackbar(still not really understanding geometry though) and built some really sketchy extended control arms. Oh and some fender trimming.


during all this I replaced several other parts like, radiator, PS pump and fuel pump. I drove it like this for a while and just dealt with having death wobble. I built a couple different trackbars trying to fix it but they were either too weak on the ends and would wear out or they were at the wrong angle and didn't have the right geometry. So i just dealt with it till I could save up a little cash and do my axle swap. front dana 44 and rear AMC20 from the 81 waggy. Next post should be all about the rear axle swap and shock set up. Also as this gets closer to current the picture become more frequent and detailed.

 

[Heffs_Heep]

Just wanted to make a quick post here, found a picture of those sketchy extended control arms I was talking about, basically just cut the control arms, then welded in a piece of 1x2x1/8" that had been cut and welded at I believe around a 120 deg angle. the idea was to have kindof a built in drop. I believe they were actually flexing under strain and contributing to DW. But yeah super sketch haha. A lot of the stuff I've done here is pretty sketchy, but it gets a little better.

 

[Heffs_Heep]

my axle swapping project took a while as I lived in a town 45 minutes from where I was doing the project. Heres what pictures I still have of the rear axle swap.

Pulled the axles from the Waggy

Cleaned out the diff

buddy of mine helping clean up the housing

Spring packs we put together, Shackles are just two sets of xj shackles welded together to make a long set.(actually still running those:looney

mocked up the shocks through the floor.

Working on the crossmember for shock mounting.

Painted.

went ahead and did a rattle can bedliner job in the rear before we bolted everything down.

Shocks are mounted to the spring plates with some tabs from ballistic.

Also did one of these during the swap. getting ahold of a driveshaft for the rear was a real pain, closest self service JY around here is around 1.5 hrs away. but I made a trip and found a shaft and few other goodies.


And then a pretty good finished product pic. so that pretty much concludes the rear axle swap, I'll redo some leaf spring stuff later and move perches around but not till after I did the front, which was actually several weeks later, so I didn't wheel it for a while as the waggy axles still had the 2.73 gears in them then and the front dana 30 was still 3.55.

rear axle swapped in with the waggy 6 bolt rims and the front still 5 bolt dana30.

 

[Heffs_Heep]

it'll probably take a few posts to do this next part, front axle swap. I took quite a few picture during this process as it was my first time doing anything to this magnitude. I first began collecting parts, a large order from ballistic, some from BJ's offroad, polyperformance, ebay and some others I'm sure. hard to remember them all.




waited till I had a good weekend and pulled it into the shop. I probably took a whole day just getting the old stuff out

Then began the axle prep

tacked up the LCA/springplates and tacked onto the axle so I could mock everything else up

centered under the jeep. I set up some plumb-bobs hanging from the bump stop towers to get centered. from there I built the cross member. I cannot find any pictures of it though. I did a lot of frankensteining on the original transmission crossmember, braced it, plated, and built the LCA mounts coming directly off the front of it it hopes of keeping them tucked up away from harm. The UCA it on top of the crossmember and I did cut a whole in the floor for it(which I have not patched to this day, just flopped the carpet over it).

thats the UCA mount after I had the exhaust run.

got time for just one more pic before I gotta go, (Halloween birthday party)
one end of a LCA

And here is what one of my LCA looks like before welding it all up. I haven't had any issues with the cut and bend method but I think I'm going to pull them and weld some 1/4" flatbar on the side the was cut here pretty soon, just for reassurance. But yeah they have actually taken some pretty good hits and haven't mis-shapen or anything so as sketchy as it may seem, they have worked great. but I'll have to jet after this pic so it's kind of a teaser.

 

[GordoSmasho]

Subbed

 

[Heffs_Heep]

So there was a lot of: cut, fit, cut, fit, cut, fit to get to where I had these and the right curve and length but eventually I got here.


Fun fact that makes this more sketchy, the front and rear axle swaps were by debut into the world of stick welding, it had only been mig up to this point. So this is were I got my feet wet. so far so good.

UCA mount with trackbar mount. ended up not using that trackbar mount, but again this is the only pic I have of the tower.


some CA welding


my weld art = on point


LCA fit


Another showing LCA fit, you can see the plubbobs here.


tower on the axle


I don't have any great pics of the UCA going in, but basically it goes from the tower to the tranny crossmember. it's somewhere around 4-6" longer than the lowers and has 1.25" heims on both ends, one RH one LH. after that was made I built the trackbar which ended up having to be really short to match the stock draglink from the wagoneer. wasn't very happy about that but it's worked fine. I currently have a new steering materials in the shop waiting to go in but Im in the middle of my rockers project so new steering and trackbar will be going in after that. And it should be pretty exciting, some kind of ghetto fab crossover on stock knuckles.:gee:

I did have to have the pitman arm reamed out to fit the waggy TRE

After it was all mocked up I pulled the axle, burned everything in, and cleaned out the tubes before putting new seals and bearing in. then lockouts went on. I used MM lockouts. My jeep funds are very limited, especially since I just bought a house, so i guess this probably classifies as a budget build.

Lots of dirt in this axle, previous owner really liked mudding and river runs and not cleaning. Waggy 44s have no outer axle tube seals, so that sucks. I found a couple different aftermarket options for outer axle tube seals of pirate but haven't tried any yet, maybe when I actually get to regear I'll try some.


assembling


Enough for one post.

 

[Heffs_Heep]

Alright, just a couple pictures left from the axle swap.

Installing the axle.


Me feeling satisfied of a completed project.


Trailered to the exhaust shop to have pipe run. was cut off right under the oil pan at this point.


New exhaust pipe. Local Muffler shop guy does an A+ job and running pipe. I've been very happy with it aside from my muffler just being too dang loud.



Cheapest exhaust route possible, used existing magnaflow dual out and had new pipe run, so 50$ for exhaust. Thought that was very reasonable.

then of course I had to try and flex it.

as you can see the rear doesn't flex very well. to be addressed next. like I said before, most of my work I do on my jeep is redoing work I did on my jeep.:wstupid::fuse::badpc:Hasta

Oh I also made the switch from 33s to 35s during the front axle swap. so sitting on 35s now.

 

[Heffs_Heep]

Couple little details have been coming to me as I think back about this swap.

1st: U joints, I installed orileys brand or "superstrength" I think, anyway that has been the downfall of my set up so far, I have since replaced with spicers but those orileys joints both broke and warped axle shaft ears so now I have issues with caps spinning, I've welded caps back in but they still just break the welds and continue to spin. So Chromolys are in order whenever I can afford them.

2nd: I installed one of those cheap mini spools off ebay in the dana 44. I think I payed like 50$ for it. and that has worked flawlessly, no complaints there. I was skeptical since no one really has anything good to say about them, but it's made from 4340 steel and hasn't cause any issues other than perfect lock up:clap:

 

[Heffs_Heep]

Next phase of the built was that I moved and got my own shop to work in. I'm sure my friend was happy to have me out of his shop for good.

gettin settled into the new shop with an oil change and some under hood maintenance.



From here I waited a few months so I could get a welder, as I also changed jobs(other welder I was using I was bringing from work, with permission).
Ended up purchasing a longevity stickweld 140 with a bunch of homedepot gift cards I had received over the last two years. really small, really light, but will go up to 140 amps with a 60% duty cycle. I found a new mixed reviews on them but I was just out some giftcards so I went for it. And it has not let me down, love the little thing.

Once the welder was purchased I started in on my shackle angle correction project. Fabricated a couple brackets that would allow me to move the shackle around as well as move the entire leaf spring forward or backward. they're a little bulky, especially the front one, but they have worked very well. They were designed to bring the spring inboard slightly, plus mount the spring lower, as they hang from bottom of the frame rail as opposed to beside it. here are a few pics.

rear: shackle side


mounted


one of the fronts


welded up


how they mount, halfway under the frame, still outboard though.


I'll try to elaborate later. but they have been working really well and allow me to run a nearly flat leaf pack and still match around 6" of lift in the front.
Flex limiting factor in the rear are the shocks, so hopefully i can address that after I do steering here pretty soon.

 

[Heffs_Heep]

Short post.

decided to take the doors off this summer and had to find some mirrors. so found some 10$ mirrors from orileys and bent up some flat bar, drilled some holes and made these.


they ended up shaking too much, not enough support Im guessing. so I modified them a little and they work great now. think I'll probably end up painting the mirrors black though.


I later flipped the mirrors to be horizontal.

 

[Heffs_Heep]

over the next few wheeling trips i developed a pretty bad serpentine belt squeak. after a series of parts replacements and test I narrowed it down to the compressor bracket/fan pulley. it's a pressed in bearing that isn't really replaceable. Everytime I found some information on replacing the bearing the person trying to do it actually just broke the housing and ended up having to replace the entire bracket, and since there aren't any decent pull apart around here I decided to eliminate the mechanical fan and go electric. So began my electric fan conversion.

went and got a good sized sheet of 16ga plate and started mocking up the shroud.




A large part of this project was cutting off the old pulley shaft and rerouting the belt so you still get a good wrap on the alternator. Also had to change up the alternator bracket so the new belt route would have clearance. unfortunately i don't have any pics of the new belt route or the changed up bracket. just pics of the fan stuff. if anyone is interested just let me know and I'll go snap a few pics.

Got the shroud just about finished up. I had to extend the tabs so the shroud would sit high enough to clear the steering box.


test fit with top mounting brackets.


Used an adjustable thermostat controler from summit, it was like 25 bucks. I tried attaching the sensor like suggested to the outside of the radiator, but it wouldn't heat up quick enough. So I ended up actually putting the sensor inside the top radiator hose. hopefully there won't be any corrosion issues, but it's working really well right now.


not real sure why I went with yellow... but it's not bad.


added some stripping to seal up the fans. also added some around the edges.


Thats pretty much it. I originally had two relays because I had one fan to come on like the factory one use to, and one to come on with the controller before that one. but didn't like that so they're both just coming on with the controller.



And after all of that, when it's it low and working really hard the fans don't pull enough air... driving around town it's fine but in low on the rocks its not enough, so the plant it to put a 14" on the passenger side and if thats not enough then look into some hood venting.

Also tried using a 180 tstat, and as I read from others, it actually made it worse. Stayed cooler longer but once it got hot, it really never would come back down.

 

[DieselSJ]

Just a critique of the fan install -

Is your mount right against the radiator? If so, then you are only pulling air through where the fans are mounted. You need 1-2" of gap between the "shroud" and the core so that air can be pulled through the entire radiator and not just 2 12" circles.

Second, those aftermarket fans don't move anywhere near the amount of air as a stock fan. IMHO, a much better (and proven) setup is to use 2 stock late model fans. This is an easier swap if you use the TJ version of the alternator/AC mounting bracket, which eliminates the stock XJ mechanical fan idler.

And go back to the 195 t-stat.

 

[Heffs_Heep]

Just a critique of the fan install -

Is your mount right against the radiator? If so, then you are only pulling air through where the fans are mounted. You need 1-2" of gap between the "shroud" and the core so that air can be pulled through the entire radiator and not just 2 12" circles.

Second, those aftermarket fans don't move anywhere near the amount of air as a stock fan. IMHO, a much better (and proven) setup is to use 2 stock late model fans. This is an easier swap if you use the TJ version of the alternator/AC mounting bracket, which eliminates the stock XJ mechanical fan idler.

And go back to the 195 t-stat.

Will definitely be going back to the 195 tstat.

Very good to know about the gap needed, I wasn't really sure of the science and all that so thats some good info, I'll try something new when I go to put a different fan on.

I cut the old mechanical fan pulley off so I've got quite a bit of room to work with.

Very helpful, thanks.

 

[Heffs_Heep]

Next project that I took on was building a rear bumper, the factory bumper was pretty mangled by this point, both tail lights broken, and I popped the rear glass out once when hitting a line pretty hard(didn't break though so i just put it back in).

As far as design goes I was wanting something really low profile so it wouldn't hold me up on things. I also wanted some kind of angled like skid to the bottom side of it; wanted a hitch slot and tow points. Also wanted it took look decent and line up well with the body and taillights. So here we go.

Very first thing I did was build some mounting brackets, the're really ugly but I wasn't too concerned since you weren't going to be able to see them with the bumper snugged up anyway. strong but ugly. I had a lot of 2x2 in the shop so instead of buying some 2x3 or 2x4 I just sliced the 2x2 up and welded it back together to get them tall enough.


Initial mock up. Brackets are bolted in for mocking, ended up with 3, 1/2" bolts on the under side of the frame and then the 4 5/16" bolts that are original for the bumper. The main structure of the bumper is 2.5"x2.5"x3/16.


chopped the ends pretty close to matching the lower body line and then bent them in slightly towards the body.




Rat nest in the frame


Burned the hitch in and started working on the under plate.



Some of the pics are terrible, sorry about that.

Plate all tacked together.



Corner Mock up.

tacked

Burned terribly, thank God for flap wheels.


Gotta split this into two posts.

 

[Heffs_Heep]

Making it pretty.


Welded on some tow points and started painting. primer, then satin black.... I think... Might have been gloss.


you can kind of tell in this pic. when I burned on the long angled plate I forgot about warping and welded it continuous. you can see the slight curve it has in it. Pissed me off. but I'll live with it.


Finished,

 

[Red99XJVT]

It looks like your front axle was a passenger drop, then it looks like it became driver side drop. I am curious as to how you made that work. My apologies if I missed something. The resin I ask is because I have an opportunity to pickup two d44s,cheap, but the front is passenger drop. I'm wondering how much money and work to get to driver side drop.

 

[Heffs_Heep]

It looks like your front axle was a passenger drop, then it looks like it became driver side drop. I am curious as to how you made that work. My apologies if I missed something. The resin I ask is because I have an opportunity to pickup two d44s,cheap, but the front is passenger drop. I'm wondering how much money and work to get to driver side drop.

It originally a driver drop out of a 81 wagoneer. I didn't change it. I think you could make a passenger side drop into a driver side drop by re tubing the axle. other than that you'd just have to find a passender side drop TC, which I think some chevy stuff is(Dana300). but you'd have to run some special adapters and whatnot so not very cost effective. I think most cost effective would be to find a driver drop d44 unless you know someone that could retube an axle for cheap. just do some searching, theres a lot of info out there on this kind of stuff.

 

[TRCM]

It looks like your front axle was a passenger drop, then it looks like it became driver side drop. I am curious as to how you made that work. My apologies if I missed something. The resin I ask is because I have an opportunity to pickup two d44s,cheap, but the front is passenger drop. I'm wondering how much money and work to get to driver side drop.

It looks that way cuz the front axle you see on page 1 in the truck bed is a spring under axle, not a spring over axle......so in the pic, you are looking at the bottom side of the driver side pumpkin cuz the axle is upside down.

 

[Red99XJVT]

Ahh,ok. I wanted to follow up with a " but, but.....". I decided not to bHastaecause I figured someone would clear that up or I would eventually figure it out. Thanks