Modernizing the XJ

moparmansfield said:

I'm a big fan of the TJ, but I would rather go with the LJ. Both of these lack a lot of the benefits that the newer rigs have, and finding a good deal on a LJ isn't easy.

The main reason for the stark comparison is because I have recently been seriously considering buying new, and for the long haul.

I'm not a fan of the JK, subjectively, but I really like the updates that came with the JL. The JK has held it's value very well, so if I wanted to pick a few year old JK, I think it makes enough sense to go for a new rig.

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Here is another thought: Wait a few years and pick up a used JL.

If I were trying to achieve your goals I would be looking for a JK (or farther down the road, a JL) with a blown motor. Do an LS swap on it and then you will have a solid drivetrain that should at least last a long time. Then you just have to figure out how you are going to maintain the body electronics and doo-dads.

Anak said:

Here is another thought: Wait a few years and pick up a used JL.

If I were trying to achieve your goals I would be looking for a JK (or farther down the road, a JL) with a blown motor. Do an LS swap on it and then you will have a solid drivetrain that should at least last a long time. Then you just have to figure out how you are going to maintain the body electronics and doo-dads.

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JKs/JLs don't seem to depreciate enough to justify buying used and wondering how many woo-pows the previous owner used to get over that waterfall...

I just went through this, and in the end decided that the JT isn't a very good truck, nor is it a very good Jeep. With the money "saved" not buying new, I'm going this route instead:

https://motoiq.com/jeep-ls-swap-part-1-introduction/

And probably getting a newer truck to replace my tow pig (2000 Excursion V10).

More thought before you comparing "Apples to Oranges"! You must first look at the wheelbase, then look at the suspension type as coils are not as stable as leaf's.

I gotta be blunt and honest. If you don't have cash to buy it, you can't afford it.
Borrowing money is bad, the credit score era is a sham.
Yes, I am a Dave Ramsey advocate.
This covid year has hurt a lot of people who said they could afford it...that is, until you lose your job.
Keep saving and buy a nice TJ for cash. Or keep the XJ and buy something modern with 100k miles on it for $10k as your commuter. My 99 XJ is my daily driver and toy but I am looking at a more "plush" vehicle to drive 60miles roundtrip for work. Something AWD, because that 242 in the XJ don't like patches of ice on I70!!


Good luck in your decison!

My two cents:


I own a 2001 XJ that has every conceivable upgrade. Seriously, the only part of this thing that is stock is the body. One-off custom made by me air suspension (real air suspension not just body lift bags), frame stiffeners, Clayton offroad 4 link rear, JK rubicon axles, a friggin supercharged LS3! Just to name a few. Oh do I love my xj, however, I also own a 2018 WK2 Diesel Trailhawk. Other than real tires it is bone stock and in every category except for actual no joke rock crawling and very likely long term reliability it out performs the xj. It is way way way more comfortable, quieter on the highway, tows better, gets 28 MPG, and brakes way better. The point is no amount of modernization will make your XJ feel like a modern car, but I would argue that you should not want it to. XJs are simple and relatively easy to work on. There is a huge amount of aftermarket support. They have a ton of potential and are most importantly fun. All the ridiculous amounts of work I put into my XJ was never about making it feel like a new car it is about the process and satisfaction of completing the job then hitting a trail and enjoying the work.

Additionally the importance of not worrying about dents and dings can not be understated. My favorite car I ever had was a POS 2004 Jetta with enough miles to go to the moon and the beauty of it was that I simply didnt care about that car at all. One day I found my two kids in the front seats with sharpies drawing all over the leather. Didn't care. Imagine that with a JT that you are upside down on the minute you drive it off the lot!
I say keep the XJ and the $750 a month. Buy a POS daily driver that you do not care about and work on the XJ one thing at a time.

macgyver_7_6 said:

I gotta be blunt and honest. If you don't have cash to buy it, you can't afford it.
Borrowing money is bad, the credit score era is a sham.
Yes, I am a Dave Ramsey advocate.
This covid year has hurt a lot of people who said they could afford it...that is, until you lose your job.
Keep saving and buy a nice TJ for cash. Or keep the XJ and buy something modern with 100k miles on it for $10k as your commuter. My 99 XJ is my daily driver and toy but I am looking at a more "plush" vehicle to drive 60miles roundtrip for work. Something AWD, because that 242 in the XJ don't like patches of ice on I70!!


Good luck in your decison!

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This is it... I'm am also a fan of Ramsey.
My solution to a similar problem is to have 2 xj's... I do not require modern conveniences... If I drive more than a couple hours I take the wife's car (momma deserves a decent car) # Ramsey

One xj (96) is the pos crawler with probably 400k on the clock. It's been a tank and did 350k as the daily bone stock before upgrades. It was so good I bought a 99 for the "upgraded" facelift. It's been pretty great for the past 50k miles and with only 200k on the clock I expect another few solid years of dd duty out of it. When I can pay cash for the next daily all the parts will transfer from the 96 to the 99.

If you can afford the 750 a month in payment you can open a bank account named "car fund" this allows you to pay for a car (jl) without needing the bank to help... No idea what your loan would look like but as an example... borrowing 30k at 4%over 7 years is dang close to 5k added to the cost of the vehicle... I don't know about y'all, but I'm good with not doing that!

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I'll agree. I see people around me afford all kinds of stuff. Diesel pickup, jeep, snowmobile, boat some have it all. While I daily a truck I've had for 15 years. I have a jeep ive invested lots of time i have tools and mortgage.

I have good credit could bring home everything everyone else does but bluntness is honestly honest I can't afford a 60k truck a 20k utv and 12k sled on top of a mortgage payment.

I'd build the xj Itl be like a long term investment in sanity

I dont think anything is affordable in Hawaii.


So in your predicament thats what I'd do. Put money here and there into what I have. Even if when you are done you have 20k in it over 10 years it happened over time and with cash



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Skruffy said:

My two cents:


I own a 2001 XJ that has every conceivable upgrade. Seriously, the only part of this thing that is stock is the body. One-off custom made by me air suspension (real air suspension not just body lift bags), frame stiffeners, Clayton offroad 4 link rear, JK rubicon axles, a friggin supercharged LS3! Just to name a few. Oh do I love my xj, however, I also own a 2018 WK2 Diesel Trailhawk. Other than real tires it is bone stock and in every category except for actual no joke rock crawling and very likely long term reliability it out performs the xj. It is way way way more comfortable, quieter on the highway, tows better, gets 28 MPG, and brakes way better. The point is no amount of modernization will make your XJ feel like a modern car, but I would argue that you should not want it to. XJs are simple and relatively easy to work on. There is a huge amount of aftermarket support. They have a ton of potential and are most importantly fun. All the ridiculous amounts of work I put into my XJ was never about making it feel like a new car it is about the process and satisfaction of completing the job then hitting a trail and enjoying the work.

Additionally the importance of not worrying about dents and dings can not be understated. My favorite car I ever had was a POS 2004 Jetta with enough miles to go to the moon and the beauty of it was that I simply didnt care about that car at all. One day I found my two kids in the front seats with sharpies drawing all over the leather. Didn't care. Imagine that with a JT that you are upside down on the minute you drive it off the lot!
I say keep the XJ and the $750 a month. Buy a POS daily driver that you do not care about and work on the XJ one thing at a time.

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I agree with Skruffy here, having an XJ, a EcoDiesel WK2, and wrestled with your very same thought. I really wanted to mod-restore our XJ but finally landed that absent of 10s of thousands into it, it'll never match the wk2. I finally landed I would continue to work on the XJ for fun, enjoyment, and to teach our kids - it will hopefully be their first car - but not go all out. I personally recommend building the xj for fun as time and budget allows but finding some mid-range rig for the creature comforts.
The WK2 with an ARB looks good, by the way.

Either way, this should be a fun thread!

Oh, if you go all-out on the XJ, I'd start with the interior first since you already have fairly well built. Seems more important to you at this point to have the feels and looks inside done.

IMO the charm of the XJ is it's lack of "Modernization". The look and feel call back to a time before electronic nannies and infotainment systems.

Rockwood said:

I just went through this, and in the end decided that the JT isn't a very good truck, nor is it a very good Jeep. With the money "saved" not buying new, I'm going this route instead:

https://motoiq.com/jeep-ls-swap-part-1-introduction/

Click to expand...

I don't really have anything to add to the thread discussion, but I have to say, I very much enjoyed reading your LS swap introduction. I found several bits downright hilarious (especially where you compare AMC's "Soviet Overkill" with Chrysler's "send that @#$& to the moon" approach, not to mention your commentary on the 1997 models, which seem to be much more of a rival for the 1996s in the "worst XJ year to try and get parts for" competition than I thought.

Have you considered a "build thread" here that just links back to each installment on that other site (so you don't have to post it twice)?

As a side note to this thread (hopefully I don't angry the op) a wj is close to a modernized xj. They have great street manners and a 4.0....

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SlowXj said:

As a side note to this thread (hopefully I don't angry the op) a wj is close to a modernized xj. They have great street manners and a 4.0....

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And my understanding is that it is a much stiffer unibody, so no need to mess around with plating. There's quite a few good condition WJ out there now too for a good price, often lower than what people want for a good condition XJ.

maxbraketorque said:

And my understanding is that it is a much stiffer unibody, so no need to mess around with plating. There's quite a few good condition WJ out there now too for a good price, often lower than what people want for a good condition XJ.

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Ain't that the truth. Around here you can get a decent WJ for the cost of a beat to hell XJ.
The target market for the WJ would generally be people with more financial means. So they were more likely to be garage kept, kept in a stock condition and professionally maintained, now those are all over the market years later.

Lot's of good input here.

The WJ - I almost bought one before buying my current XJ, but the one I want is the most highly desired one - 4.7 HO. Overland - but people are pretty aware of their value these days. I chose the XJ for many reasons, mostly because I know it so well, the aftermarket support, the looks, the huge community, everything about it is cheap. My 99 2 door 5 speed with long arms, gears, other doo-dads cost me less than 4k. I had to put some money into it to make it a safe driver, but a great bang for buck no doubt. I could drive it states away, wheel hard for a week, be able to fix 95% of issues that may pop up, and drive it home for less than 5k invested.

If I'm going to have a cheap jeep platform, it's going to be the XJ.

I've ridden in some well built Xjs and was very impressed at how they drove - so I know it's possible to make them ride great (relatively).

There's lots of reasons to invest in the XJ's creature comforts, but there's also strong argument for having a modern rig that you don't have to do anything to, be very comfortable, and go most places off-road I'm wanting to go.

My goal is a well rounded vehicle that can be easily driven on the street with the family while being more offroad capable than most modern 4x's, all hopefully while keeping the price reasonable. XJ seems like a good choice as long as true reliability can be attained.

I find my setup to be reasonable as a non-luxury DD with the key creature comforts and traits. I've figured out a nice cell phone stand that has wireless charging, integrates calls through the stereo, and the stereo will play music from the phone or via a USB memory stick. Cruise control works fine. Power windows and mirrors. AC blows cold. Headlights are updated. Keyless remote works. Interior noise levels are not particularly loud, but aren't particularly noisy either. I could easily reduce the noise with some sound deadening, but not sure I care enough to bother. Ride quality on the street is pretty reasonable. Power level on the road is sufficient for me (although I wish it had a bit more). Gas mileage sucks, but no fixing that, so just accept it. Handles sufficiently well on the road. I can't rail it like my sedans, but I don't expect that from a lifted 4x. Its more of a cruiser type ride on the street. Overall, I'd say it sort of just squeaks in as a family-acceptable rig. If it were any more noisy, if the ride were any worse, or if it was any further off the ground (my wife is short), I think it would fall out of family-worthy status, at least for my family.

If I ever decide I need a more civil/luxury 4x, I'll likely go with a WJ. There's pretty reasonable aftermarket support for it now, and in some ways its better than the XJ as a starting platform for a moderate offroad vehicle.

You missed out the benefits that come with building your own XJ: knowledge, experience & self-sufficiency etc


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OzXjay said:

You missed out the key benefits that come with building your own XJ: simplicity, knowledge, experience & self-sufficiency etc


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Worth stating twice.

I’m in the same boat. But maybe for different reasons. I have sort of gone too far with my XJ to even begin making it a comfortable family friendly long drive kind of rig. So I’d have to start with a clean slate on something over 20 years old with an unknown history and usually over 200k miles these days. And with a kid safety features become a factor. I love my XJ and have had it over 15 years but it’s not practical as I won’t be doing any hard trails it’s built for anymore and all of the creature comforts have been removed. Plus I don’t want someone’s project that will nickel and dime me to death. I am looking hard as JL rubicons. With a 2” lift and 37’s they’re pretty turn key ready for moderate trails and will be far more comfortable getting there. But yes, they aren’t cheap

well a Grande as I call them (WJ) is an option, they can be more modern, newer than a standard Cherokee Some folks wheel them, you can get aftermarket lifts, shocks, big tires, regear, etc..... Although I see a lot more Standard's wheeling verses Grande's wheeling. I suspect there is more aftermarket offroading modification support for the Standard (XJ) than the Grande (WJ) based on a my casual observation.

Also consider the higher trim levels within a model type to get more plush interior, and often more power options ( power windows, seats, locks, etc...)

My 1990 Standard (XJ) is a Laredo trim level, which is nice.... cloth seats, power windows and locks, chrome trim. The lower end 1990 year modlel trim levels lacked the power stuff, and may have vinyl seats for example.

A Grande might be the ticket for you. They are a bit larger than the old XJ, which can be useful to some.

what are the minuses in owning a WJ verses the XJ? do the WJs have specific problems? Any lemon year model's of a WJ to avoid?
I imagine the newest WJs will have a higher repair cost over the life of the vehicle do to the more disposable nature of car design these days, and the high repair cost of the high tech gadgets. A small bumper "tap" when parking can cost many thousands to repair thanks to bumper mounted cameras, radars, which "talk" to the computer for lane departure, auto braking systems, and such. These are not only expensive to buy, but also labor intensive to replace, and properly align and calibrate. I imagine the latest model cars have these things, earlier models WJ's lack these techie things. If you wheel even lightly, you dont want autobraking or lane departure systems.

and not only do you have a camera on the bumper or grill, you also get a camera lens washer sprayer, yet another sub system that you need to maintain, and eventually have to repair.

So consider the pros and cons of having a totally high teched out vehicle. Id go kind of medium tech at most, not loaded with cameras and auto pilot features so many cars have today