Restoration

I see a lot of threads about modifying XJ's but not a lot about restoring them so I thought I would take the opportunity to thank all of you who helped me with questions over the past couple of years and share the progress on my Cherokee project.

This is a '90 Cherokee that I decided to restore in advance of its 25th anniversary. I started with the mechanicals (it wasn't running when I bought it) and got the old Renix beast to the point that it passes emissions with flying colors. I added some lift, bigger tires and a lot of "little things" from later models like: factory tinted glass, 3rd brake light, power mirrors. I stripped the body down to bare metal, welded in some new steel to fix some rust spots and changed the color from Grey to Hunter Green Metallic ('93 color code). The old chrome bumpers were pretty scarred so I banged out the dents and painted them flat black. I then refreshed the plastic interior panels with a fresh coat of SEM interior paint. I then re-dyed the carpet back to its original color (it had become badly faded in areas). It is now all buttoned up and ready for the trails again. The only thing left to do is to wait a couple of more weeks for the paint to fully cure before I add the Jeep badges back on.

Hope you enjoy the pics.

before:


after:

Nice job. Any interior pics?

I still have a little work to do on the interior (plastic around the bottom of the seat track). I also need to order more carpet dye because I forgot the back of the rear seat. The rear wheel well carpet was almost white so the interior pics highlight how well the dye worked. You can also see how the SEM interior paint came out because the plastic trim over the passenger rear wheel well was BADLY faded and stained but came out pretty nice.

Awesome job. I love the Renix XJs and hope to restore one myself one day.