01 XJ "Daily Driver" build.....

I bought this XJ about a year ago as a daily driver and have waited a while to get an idea of what I wanted to do with it before I got started with my build.

I have an 06 LJ on 40" LTBs with about $60k in it for a wheeling rig, so this is going to be my 100+ degree summer and winter snow wheeler. I am not going to be beating and wheeling this hard since I have a dedicated rig for that. This is going to be more of a "Colorado/Utah" and road trip rig.

After a brief molestation by a drive through carwash wand on the rear bumper we received some funding for some armor which included new bumpers and other goodies from JCR OFFROAD.

JCR has some great products that are truly well built and have better than average fitment considering the lack of quality from Jeep in general as well as a UnitBody XJ.

We ordered the following from JCR:

Front Winch bumper (bare- no tube work) we will add our own bars to it
Front Steering box spacer (stock style- not 4 hole)
Stage 3 sliders (with RE fitment)
Rear lower 1/4 panel guards (full size so we can cut them to fit)
Rear Upper 1/4 panel guards (with integrated led tail lights and side markers)
Gas tank skid
Rear Stage 3 bumper with tire carrier

We also ordered the new Bushw-h-acker flat style cut out flares to give us some room to stuff the new tires. This will allow us to cut to fit the plastic flares and the armor so everything integrates nicely before we have all of the armor professionally painted white to match the factory paint.

Since we have the Cherokee torn apart for all of this we decided it was as good a time as any to go ahead and slap an XJ Dana 44 under the rear with a Street Rod MFG disc conversion kit, 4.56 gears, Eaton E-locker, and custom Moser shafts. The best part about this disc brake conversion uses the Phantom 79 Eldorado Caliper with e-brake. Since we have our powder coater on speed dial, I decided to have him sand blast and powder the axle black and my diff covers white to match the Jeep.

If anyone needs any of these calipers we have a line on them for about $100 a piece which is $60 cheaper than local auto parts stores. They are brand new and come with a warranty.

Back to the build......

We also decided since it was going to be down for a while we would go ahead and install

Rubicon Express 7.5" Long Arm
35 x 12.50 x 15 KM2s
15 x 10 x 3.62 ProComp 1079s
M.O.R.E. Steering box brace
PSC Upgraded Ported Steering Box
Superwinch 9000lb winch with wireless controller
Montana Fab Transmission Control Unit (1st & 2nd gear lockout module)
Corbeau Moab front seats w/ corbeau brackets (stock belts)
Yukon Hardcore Chromo front shafts
New Timken front unit bearings,
New Spicer Balljoints
New Currie HD Steering
Crane Diff Covers (powdered white)
JB Conversions standard SYE
Drive Train of Mesquite 1/4" Chromoly DOM CV rear driveshaft with high angle CV and oversize agricultural splined slip (10" engagement over 2" diameter)

At this point we have everything installed and I am waiting on my parts to come back from paint next week to get everything installed for the last time.

I will post the final pics next week when we get everything finished....

Wow looks awesome

Why 4.56, 4.56 is kinda shallow for 35s.

Very nice. I love my JCR parts too!

WaXJ_Skier said:

Why 4.56, 4.56 is kinda shallow for 35s.

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I would have to disagree... I personally feel like 35s and 4.56's go hand in hand. That is what I always recommend for 35s. 4.88s are ok, but in a 30, you are on your hands and knees begging for a R&P failure.

Team Willys said:

I would have to disagree... I personally feel like 35s and 4.56's go hand in hand. That is what I always recommend for 35s. 4.88s are ok, but in a 30, you are on your hands and knees begging for a R&P failure.

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I agree. Seen it happen a few times. Someone on here knows all about that from this years winterfest :moon:


looks great!

I liked my 4.56's better with the 35's I had than my current 33's. Not to mention I got better gas mileage with the 35's.

jakeWI said:

I agree. Seen it happen a few times. Someone on here knows all about that from this years winterfest :moon:


looks great!

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Hmmm.....I wonder who that could be!

Wow, that looks great! One day before I die I'll know what it's like to HAVE money. Can I borrow it next weekend?

I want to see some more pics of that Wagoneer!

Team Willys said:

4.88s are ok, but in a 30, you are on your hands and knees begging for a R&P failure.

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thats a bunch of bs, ive seen 30 blow apart with 4.56's 4.10's and 3.73's they dont care what gears you have when your running 35s and a stock carrier

Like I said its my daily, Ive got an armored up LJ for a crawler to beat on.



We do a lot of gears at our shop and I don't recommend anyone putting 4.88s in a 30 due to the corkscrew pinion....

Since it is a daily and a light weight xj, the 4.56s and 35s go back to a stock ratio and get the best mileage.

I will get some pics up this week when we get the armor and bumpers back on....

The Waggy is my shop owners. Its an 87 with the Gladiator front grill. We did a frame up on it a couple of years ago. It's easily one of the cleanest nicest Waggy's you will ever see. Even has about a $10k custom leather/vinyl/nav/screens/amps/subs interior, done very tastefully. I think hes got about $40k in it. It has the original 5.9 Edelbrocked out. He's thinking about selling it in the $30k range if anyone is interested.

I'll post some pics of the Waggy when we wash it again.

Sweet looking set-up man, and a beautiful LJ.

~ Stump

Update:

Everything is back from paint except for the Jeep.:question:

Actually, we weren't planning on doing anything with the rest of the body but on a last minute decision we decided to have it buffed out so all of the new fancy paint work would not make the rest of the 10 year old Jeep look....well....OLD.

We should get the Jeep back on Monday and we'll post some pics as everything starts going back together.

Stay tuned!

Finished my switch panel and had to "de-badge" the Jeep before they could buff it. Here's a few pics:

Update:

Everything is back from paint except for the Jeep. :smoker:

Actually, we weren't planning on doing anything with the rest of the body but on a last minute decision we decided to have it buffed out so all of the new fancy paint work would not make the rest of the 10 year old Jeep look....well....OLD.

We should get the Jeep back on Monday and we'll post some pics as everything starts going back together.

Stay tuned!

Finished my switch panel and had to "de-badge" the Jeep before they could buff it. Here's a few pics:

AT FAB XJ said:

Since it is a daily and a light weight xj, the 4.56s and 35s go back to a stock ratio and get the best mileage.

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I'm gonna have to disagree with 4.56s getting the best mileage but to each their own.

Sweet rig, but why is this in advanced fab...?

What gear ratio would you say would be the best for a daily driver?

The 4.56 ratio with a 35" tire puts the engine RPMs at about 2200-2300 rpms at 70......This is where the stock rpms will be, which in this particular Jeep got about 18 mpg mixed use when it was stock for the past year. Not that this will get that kind of mileage now with lift, armor, 35s....

A 4.88 ratio with a 35" tire puts the engine RPMS at about 2500-2600 rpms at 70.....
This is too high to be economical. Though it will be more aggressive.

I won't even pull the numbers on the 4.10s

We sell and install about $100k a year in Yukon gears and shafts and about 10 years of research has brought us to our conclusion which is also what we recommend to our customers everyday........

I don't mean any hostility by any of this, just curious how you came up with this ratio not being correct on 35s....


What section should this thread be in? Is there a projects section?

AT FAB XJ said:

What gear ratio would you say would be the best for a daily driver?

The 4.56 ratio with a 35" tire puts the engine RPMs at about 2200-2300 rpms at 70......This is where the stock rpms will be, which in this particular Jeep got about 18 mpg mixed use when it was stock for the past year. Not that this will get that kind of mileage now with lift, armor, 35s....

A 4.88 ratio with a 35" tire puts the engine RPMS at about 2500-2600 rpms at 70.....
This is too high to be economical. Though it will be more aggressive.

I won't even pull the numbers on the 4.10s

We sell and install about $100k a year in Yukon gears and shafts and about 10 years of research has brought us to our conclusion which is also what we recommend to our customers everyday........

I don't mean any hostility by any of this, just curious how you came up with this ratio not being correct on 35s....


What section should this thread be in? Is there a projects section?

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When I daily drove my rig it was 4.88s and 33s with an ax15, when I build my front 44 I didn't want to pay to re-gear two axles so I went 4.88 again. 35s and 4.88 feels pretty good, but I got better mileage with the 33s. I don't drive 70 though I usually keep it around 60 because it's a lifted vehicle with tons of drag due to the boxy shape. 60mph with the engine around 2650 is nice. My DD is on 31s and 355 and we run it in 3rd(auto 1:1) because it gets better gas mileage at 2700rpms than it does at 2100rpm.

The picture showcase would be more appropriate. There's no tech here and nothing advanced.

WaXJ_Skier said:

When I daily drove my rig it was 4.88s and 33s with an ax15, when I build my front 44 I didn't want to pay to re-gear two axles so I went 4.88 again. 35s and 4.88 feels pretty good, but I got better mileage with the 33s. I don't drive 70 though I usually keep it around 60 because it's a lifted vehicle with tons of drag due to the boxy shape. 60mph with the engine around 2650 is nice. My DD is on 31s and 355 and we run it in 3rd(auto 1:1) because it gets better gas mileage at 2700rpms than it does at 2100rpm.

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You must be somewhere with a lot of hills/ mountains.....

Its pretty flat down here in Texas and 2000+ rpms is enough to hold any hill or overpass just fine at 60-70 + mph.

Its kind of backwards to me that you would keep it out of overdrive on the highway, most people and our customers down here are trying to put overdrive transmissions in everything old or new just to keep some kind of reasonable mileage.

I just had 4.56 in this jeep with 32s for a couple months and it was at 2700 rpms and got about 14 mpg. This is 4 mpg lower than it got stock.

I don't think there is any gear ratio that's gonna beat the stock final ratio gearing at 18 mpg..... Thats why we use and recommend 4.56s with 35s... It stays at the stock final gear ratio.....

Oh well..... to each there own I guess.... You never know what your going to hear/see.....

I thought with the fabrication and bending of the stinger and welding and axle swaps this belonged in this thread like some of the other bumper builds I saw in here.....

If it needs to be moved please feel free to move it or delete it.......(mod)

Just thought we would share some pics and info on a fun little xj build.....