I drank the kool-aid (project Mall Crawler)

[ClarkPeach]

You had the old style though didn't ya? The old ones make the new style ones look like gold lol.

Double beadlocks eh? Who makes em? Price? Pics?
PM me

Dunno, didn't keep em long enough to really care. Wanted bigger anyway. :dunce:

PM sent.

 

[mcantar18c]

Finally got some time to give the ZJ a little attention. Crawled under it to investigate the trans leak, appears that its coming out of the overdrive housing like the PO suggested it might be. The PO had a shop and rebuilt the transmission himself, which is nice because these trannys aren't known for lasting very long.... but if he couldn't get a gasket to seal right, I'm not sure I trust his work. Never taken apart an automatic trans before, but it looks like I'll have to pull it to get to that gasket anyway, and I'd hate to pull it and replace the gasket just to have it blow up on me in 10k... so I'm thinking that my best option is to pick up a trans out of a ZJ being parted out or something and just swap that in.

After I get it in DD condition, I found a Ford HP60 and a 14b to toss in it. Matching gear ratios, so I can toss em in and get the suspension all set up and run them as they are until I can afford a good set of gears. As for gears, I'm thinking 4.88 is gonna be the sweet spot for fairly low RPMs while driving and a decent crawl ratio on the trails. Not gonna bother with lockers, I'll just weld both ends... its cheap and it works.

Haven't decided on a width yet though, I think about 3" wider than ZJ-width
would look pretty good, but I dunno if its worth the work.

Now I know I'm gonna catch some flak for this, but I'm looking at 38-40" tires and 4.5" lift. I'm expecting 4.5" springs will net me around 6-6.5" total when taking into account the larger diameter axle tubes and the height of the coil buckets, and I should be able to stuff 38-40s under there without a ridiculous amount of trimming. ZJ fenders have built in flares, so for any trimming that needs to be done I'll be widening the openings in the fenders so they'll look factory by cutting the flares, spacing em out forward and upward, and filling in the spaces with some sheet metal.

Here's a build I found over on mallcrawlin.com running 40's on 4.5," so I know it CAN be done :gee:

 

[in4aride]

link to that build? and on 38-40 id do 5.38 or deeper, if not then absolutely gear the tcase. but thats strictly my preference not telling you what to do

 

[in4aride]

hydro assist? cuz full hydro on street would be not so hot an idea i dont imagine

 

[mcantar18c]

link to that build? and on 38-40 id do 5.38 or deeper, if not then absolutely gear the tcase. but thats strictly my preference not telling you what to do

Gimme a sec to dig through my bookmarks. EDIT: here ya go... http://www.mallcrawlin.com/forum/showthread.php?t=22794
That pic is at 1" below ride height BTW.
I've driven my buddies rig on 42s and 5.38s with a V8, and it definitely feels pretty good on the road, no trouble merging onto the highway or anything. I'm just worried about my RPMs, I'd like to see around 12mpg and I dunno if that's possible if I'm sitting at 5k cursing down the highway. I dunno if that's possible period lol, but the point is higher RPM = lower mileage and increased engine wear.

hydro assist? cuz full hydro on street would be not so hot an idea i dont imagine

PSC has self-centering orbitals, so I suppose its possible to go full hydro, but I don't wanna try. I'm looking at different hydro assist systems... which one I go with isn't a huge priority just yet as they're all basically the same.

 

[Rockken]

Finally got some time to give the ZJ a little attention. Crawled under it to investigate the trans leak, appears that its coming out of the overdrive housing like the PO suggested it might be. The PO had a shop and rebuilt the transmission himself, which is nice because these trannys aren't known for lasting very long.... but if he couldn't get a gasket to seal right, I'm not sure I trust his work. Never taken apart an automatic trans before, but it looks like I'll have to pull it to get to that gasket anyway, and I'd hate to pull it and replace the gasket just to have it blow up on me in 10k... so I'm thinking that my best option is to pick up a trans out of a ZJ being parted out or something and just swap that in.

After I get it in DD condition, I found a Ford HP60 and a 14b to toss in it. Matching gear ratios, so I can toss em in and get the suspension all set up and run them as they are until I can afford a good set of gears. As for gears, I'm thinking 4.88 is gonna be the sweet spot for fairly low RPMs while driving and a decent crawl ratio on the trails. Not gonna bother with lockers, I'll just weld both ends... its cheap and it works.

Haven't decided on a width yet though, I think about 3" wider than ZJ-width
would look pretty good, but I dunno if its worth the work.

Now I know I'm gonna catch some flak for this, but I'm looking at 38-40" tires and 4.5" lift. I'm expecting 4.5" springs will net me around 6-6.5" total when taking into account the larger diameter axle tubes and the height of the coil buckets, and I should be able to stuff 38-40s under there without a ridiculous amount of trimming. ZJ fenders have built in flares, so for any trimming that needs to be done I'll be widening the openings in the fenders so they'll look factory by cutting the flares, spacing em out forward and upward, and filling in the spaces with some sheet metal.

Here's a build I found over on mallcrawlin.com running 40's on 4.5," so I know it CAN be done :gee:

Wow. That thing is going to suck offroad. That thing probably has around five inches of up travel before hitting the bump stops to keep those tires off of the fenders. Epic fail IMHO

 

[in4aride]

i dunno. seen lots-o rigs with 2-3" of uptravel and 10+" of droop and they do damn well. its all in preference. i think the ZJ looks sick. shoulda been a bit wider (2" each side or so) and stretched some. but otherwise i like it for SLOW crawling. road driving and fast stuff is gonna rattle the guys teeth out his head on those bumpstops

 

[kastein]

i dunno. seen lots-o rigs with 2-3" of uptravel and 10+" of droop and they do damn well. its all in preference. i think the ZJ looks sick. shoulda been a bit wider (2" each side or so) and stretched some. but otherwise i like it for SLOW crawling. road driving and fast stuff is gonna rattle the guys teeth out his head on those bumpstops

sounds good to me. One of the guys around here (who some of you met when he went through CO) runs a rig like that, and he does good with it.

I like where you are going with this :thumbup: I can't stand rigs that are lifted to the sky to fit tires with a minimal of cutting, put the COG where you want it and make the sheetmetal fit!

 

[mcantar18c]

Wow. That thing is going to suck offroad. That thing probably has around five inches of up travel before hitting the bump stops to keep those tires off of the fenders. Epic fail IMHO

Like Mike said... flex is flex, whether its 10" uptravel and 5" droop or 5" uptravel and 10" droop.

i dunno. seen lots-o rigs with 2-3" of uptravel and 10+" of droop and they do damn well. its all in preference. i think the ZJ looks sick. shoulda been a bit wider (2" each side or so) and stretched some. but otherwise i like it for SLOW crawling. road driving and fast stuff is gonna rattle the guys teeth out his head on those bumpstops

I kinda like the width that ZJ's at, maybe 1" more on either side if anything. I think a full 4" wider would make it too wide... not too wide to run it, but so wide that shortening the axles would be a bit pointless a bit pointless.
Still undecided on the wheelbase. I have to reshape the front wheel wells to fit these tires anyway, so I'll already have to redo the coil towers, so pushing them forward a few inches wouldn't be any extra work. We'll see.
And with the right shocks, driving on the road shouldn't be all that bad.

 

[mcantar18c]

I can't stand rigs that are lifted to the sky to fit tires with a minimal of cutting, put the COG where you want it and make the sheetmetal fit!

^THIS :thumbup:

 

[in4aride]

Like Mike said... flex is flex, whether its 10" uptravel and 5" droop or 5" uptravel and 10" droop..

kinda wrong. you want uptravel for fast desert type racing
and downtravel is usually best slow crawling type stuff

KOH guys cant be super low cuz it wont do well in fast stuff and cant be super high cuz theyll flop crawlin....

And with the right shocks, driving on the road shouldn't be all that bad.

kinda not true. good shocks will help, but a bumpstop is a bumpstop

 

[mcantar18c]

kinda wrong. you want uptravel for fast desert type racing
and downtravel is usually best slow crawling type stuff

KOH guys cant be super low cuz it wont do well in fast stuff and cant be super high cuz theyll flop crawlin....



kinda not true. good shocks will help, but a bumpstop is a bumpstop

Lemme rephrase that... In my application, uptravel isn't that important.
Yeah, uptravel is important in go-fast stuff, but this won't see anything like prerunners and KOH rigs do.

Not sure what shocks I wanna run yet, but I plan on running progressive bumpstops to help with the ride quality.

 

[fireLt.]

i dunno. seen lots-o rigs with 2-3" of uptravel and 10+" of droop and they do damn well. its all in preference. i think the ZJ looks sick. shoulda been a bit wider (2" each side or so) and stretched some. but otherwise i like it for SLOW crawling. road driving and fast stuff is gonna rattle the guys teeth out his head on those bumpstops

This is how I built my Yota. Not for go fast but it's a beast when crawling.

 

[YELLAHEEP]

Holy keerap.......... I just checked out that ZJ's build thread. That guy has serious patience and skillz....... The frame plating is unbelieveable. I wonder what it'll weigh once it's all built compared to a stock ZJ. There's a serious amount of steel being melted onto that rig......

 

[mcantar18c]

Holy keerap.......... I just checked out that ZJ's build thread. That guy has serious patience and skillz....... The frame plating is unbelieveable. I wonder what it'll weigh once it's all built compared to a stock ZJ. There's a serious amount of steel being melted onto that rig......

Yeah, I was pretty impressed with that. Something like 80something different pieces total. No way I'm doing that unless I can borrow a plasma lol.

 

[Apostle]

Not a big fan of grands, but like the way that red one sits and looks. if it was black, it would be perfect

 

[mcantar18c]

Not a big fan of grands, but like the way that red one sits and looks. if it was black, it would be perfect

Planning on bedlined rockers/flares and dark gunmetal paint.

 

[Rockken]

Hey aren't you just copying Mike's paint scheme?

 

[mcantar18c]

Nah mine'll be prettier .!..!.

 

[Rockken]

Mike, you hear that, Mason says your rattle can paint job sucks @ss and you don't know how to paint and your bill is flatter than Nebraska.