Jeff 98XJ WI
NAXJA Forum User
- Location
- Butternut, WI
I screwed around under my Jeep again this past weekend for WAY TOO LONG and have a tiny bit of progress to show for it. Everything is a compromise between competing issues when trying to build this damn thing! First, I had to clock the t-case a bit to gain some clearance between the front output CV and my 2" thick crossmember mounted with it's bottom flush with the bottom of my sleeved frame rails. The tranny/t-case still needs to be moved up a bit from stock too. I actually raised it as little as possible while still getting some clearance for the front driveshaft. Then I installed the front shaft and let it droop till the cv was in a bind. Hmm, not as much droop as I had thought I would have. Even with this much droop, the shaft got in the way of where the control arm mounts were supposed to go. Things might have worked out better if I could have pushed the crossmember back a bit, but other considerations made that difficult. So, I did a bunch of thinking and planning before finally cutting, grinding, welding and such to come up with what I have. I'm not even sure it will work, but I guess I'm ok with it. The bottom of the Johnnie Joint is 1" below the bottom of the crossmember and with the driveshaft at full droop, I've got less than 1/4" between the top of the Johnnie Joint and the driveshaft. My old crossmember only hung 1.25" below the bottom of the frame, so the bottom of the Johnnie Joint is a tiny bit higher than the old setup while the rest of the crossmember is a bit higher. The arms will be 34.5" to 34.75" long with this crossmember. I still have a bunch of work to do, including the mount for the single long upper link, but at least I actually built something instead of just doing more pondering! Jeff
http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeEN2jZq0btmG_
http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeEN2jZq0btmG_