Putting ABS Brakes On A Non-ABS XJ?

[seanof30306@yahoo.]

OK, so I see lots of posts about people wanting to get rid of their ABS brakes ... what if you want to put 'em ON?

I bought my '96 XJ new, and I'm stilly daily driving it today. It's totally a road dog, I've never off-roaded it.

My one regret with mine is it's a 4-door, not a 2-door, so I just bought a 2,000 2-door and I'm gonna upgrade it to be like the 4-door I've had all these years.

Thing is, my 4-door has ABS brakes, and I love 'em. What's involved in putting ABS brakes on my non-ABS XJ?

 

[Anak]

What is involved is most likely far more work than it is worth.

Biggest issue will be axles. You need axles with ABS sensors. Might be able to convert the D30 over with just new unit bearings (I am guessing that is where the tone rings are located--look into it). You will probably need a completely different rear end. Factory was a D35 if it included ABS. I have read that you can get a Ford 8.8 to play nicely by grinding off every other tooth on the tone ring (Call that hearsay--look into it more deeply before you proceed).

Once you get axles taken care of you then need to worry about the electronics side of the picture. I don't know what all is involved on the computer side, but I wouldn't be surprised if you need to swap computers. It would be wise to get an FSM for your 2000 and start checking to see where all the wires run for ABS and then seeing if you have those wires/plugs already in place, just not doing anything. Make sure there are contacts in place in the fuse panel for the ABS fuse and that you can get power to those contacts. Otherwise you may need a new wiring harness.

And then there is the ABS pump/hard lines and whatever else in involved in that cluster under the hood. That part is probably not too complicated. If you are lucky you can get it from someone who has yanked the system from their own XJ. I think that would be the easy part of the job. I think axles/computer/wiring will be the killer.

Again, none of this is from first hand experience with a Jeep ABS system. I am simply operating off what I have read and what I have seen in junkyards. It is not a task I would want to undertake.

 

[IslanderOffRoad]

The front tone rings are on the shafts iirc