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New leaf springs

Yep, that last fellow isn't kidding. It took me 60 hours of effort to lift my son's 97, half of which was the leaf spring bolts. I still haven't put in the shackle relocation brackets, because I haven't addressed the upper shackle bolts yet.

I'm letting the springs settle in... Yeah, that's the ticket...
 
Just buy them with bushings installed.

That is the easy part!!!

The hard part, almost impossible part is getting the old bolts out!!! :shiver:

All the old bolts, not just the leaf spring ends.

Hand grenades do not work. :dunno:

I've been working on one leaf spring removal since Before Hurricane Harvey.

The trick is shopping for the meanest impact wrench you can find, and grinder-cutting blade tool(s), cold chisel, safety glasses, and a case of PB Blaster LOL

Oh, a 5 foot 1-1/4" ID cheater pipe, hydraulic lift, and a 3/4" breaker bar with 3/4" impact sockets.

And a TORCH!!!!!

I spent more on Tools than I did the leaf spring, LOL.
lol
im reading this scratching my head wondering why you have not gotten like 6 different sized drill bits and just removed it that way....
just my 2cents
 
lol
im reading this scratching my head wondering why you have not gotten like 6 different sized drill bits and just removed it that way....
just my 2cents

Why complicate it? He has everything he needs.

I'm just wondering why he didn't already have the tools. ;)
 
Why complicate it? He has everything he needs.

I'm just wondering why he didn't already have the tools. ;)

Tools, I use my head (best tool I have) most of the time, LOL, worked for 45 years. But I rarely, until now do this kind of work. I am not, or at least have not been into welding and cutting, metal fab work. That seems to be changing.

But this time a 5 foot cheater pipe and 3/4" breaker bar using a hydraulic floor jack to push the cheater pipe and the jeeps weight on the other end with a weak of PB Blaster soaking did nothing to loosen the bolts.

Two super heavy duty 3/4" impact wrenches (one 600 ft lb that broke down and bought) and one huge IW-BRUTE that my friend uses for larger industrial bolts on power transformers both got laughed at by the bolts after 15 minutes of beating on them. I was shocked the bolts did not break or break the welded nut up the tube frame (god forbid).

There are 2-3 write ups on the how and why you need a cutting torch and a grinder to cut the spring off, then the eye of the spring off (3/8" tick plate), then the outer steel bushing, then the rubber bushing off, then you need to chisel the inner bushing split open, and then soak the bolt/sleeve in PB Blaster tell you get the inner steel sleeve loose from the bolt. The inner steel sleeve rusts and welds itself to the bolts. The rear bolt you can just cut off both ends (the lower shackle bolt to bushing anyway) but even then you still have to deal with the remaining uncut ends stuck in the frame box holes.

The high risk on the front bolt is breaking the weld on the front nut that is inside the frame tubing. Or having the bolt break with out getting the bolt/thread out of the nut!!!

Only way we ever got the nut off the rear bolt was getting it cherry red hot for 4-5 minutes to break the rust weld/bond. Still never got the bolt to rotate inside the sleeve thus could not tap it out, finally just had cut the thing into 3-4 pieces to get it out.
Using that torch :flame: 3-4 inches from a full gas tank is fun. Always say your prayers first boys LOL

I am Still trying to get the front inner split ring off the front bolt.

Plan to try again today if the weather holds up and I have time. The problem is that even if you get the bolt loose from the hidden unreachable nut in the frame tubing, the now fully exposed inner steel sleeve is stuck to the bolt, and rotating the bolt just bends and damages the box that holds the spring bushing assy, until you get the inner bushing steel sleeve loose to rotate and slide on the bolt.
 
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lol
im reading this scratching my head wondering why you have not gotten like 6 different sized drill bits and just removed it that way....
just my 2cents

You are joking right?

I guess I could have prayed real hard that bolts removed themselves LOL.:laugh3:
 
You are joking right?

I guess I could have prayed real hard that bolts removed themselves LOL.:laugh3:


So just to confirm.
you are talking about removing the sleeves from the axle bushings ?
or removing the 13/16ths grade 8 bolts that go through them ?

for the bushings.
I drilled my sleeves out with 6 different coablt drill bits....

My rear bolts were originally stuck.
I took an angle grinder to them and literally sat there until there was no nut left. and then pushed the bolt out...

no silly prayer here. action. :)
 
So just to confirm.
you are talking about removing the sleeves from the axle bushings ?
or removing the 13/16ths grade 8 bolts that go through them ?

I think he was pretty clear that he's talking about the leaf spring bolts- which BTW are M14, not 13/16"...
 
Axle bushings????

No, the bushings in the end of the leaf springs, on the rear of the XJ.

I am talking about removed the two main leaf spring bolts in ends of the leaf spring. And the U-bolts that attach the middle of the leaf to the axle had to be cut off too.

How did you drill sleeves out with the bolt in there? And why?

If I understand what you are saying, you got lucky, as cutting the nut off does not solve having an inner steel sleeve rust-welded to the entire length of the bolt!!! There is no "just pushing it out." of the sleeve.

And you can not cut off the nut on the front bolt, it is not accessible, it is hidden in the frame rail, welded to the inside of the frame.

The spring was broken, the main leaf spring snapped in two right at the axle. There was no saving or reusing the leaf spring or bushings.

I litteraly had to destroy, cut off, piece by piece, step by by step the front spring loop, then the outer steel ring on the rubber bushing, the had to cut and remove the rubber, that after 30 years was still like new under the out steel tube I cut off, then you must use a steel chisel and PB blaster and a BFH hammer to open up and unweld the inner steel tube off of bolt. Then if you are lucky heat the hell out of the bolt, and using PB blaster, try and get the bolt (front bolt) to turn with out breaking the weld on the nut in the frame that it is so in love with.

So just to confirm.
you are talking about removing the sleeves from the axle bushings ?
or removing the 13/16ths grade 8 bolts that go through them ?

for the bushings.
I drilled my sleeves out with 6 different coablt drill bits....

My rear bolts were originally stuck.
I took an angle grinder to them and literally sat there until there was no nut left. and then pushed the bolt out...

no silly prayer here. action. :)
 
I think he was pretty clear that he's talking about the leaf spring bolts- which BTW are M14, not 13/16"...

Thanks, I thought I was making myself perfectly transparent, LOL.
 
Thanks, I thought I was making myself perfectly transparent, LOL.

Yes, that and how he said he "just pushed the bolt out" after it was apparently seized, seems he may have been dipping into the "medicinal" marijuana too much.

That, or there is a huge language barrier.
 
Yes, that and how he said he "just pushed the bolt out" after it was apparently seized, seems he may have been dipping into the "medicinal" marijuana too much.

That, or there is a huge language barrier.
Or he lives in a arid climate, where steel does not corrode at the same rate as other climates.
 
The one bit of advice I will add is to order them one at a time, several days apart.

My OME's beat the daylights out of each other getting to me. I think SOP with shipping springs is to just slap a label on each spring and send it out. No box is going to hold up to the springs. But the two of them against each other, from one truck to the next, is anything but gentle.

It's a frigging leaf spring. It's going to live under the vehicle in worse conditions than that.so many more important things to worry about
 
Or he lives in a arid climate, where steel does not corrode at the same rate as other climates.

If it's not seized, why bother cutting it out...
 
Or he lives in a arid climate, where steel does not corrode at the same rate as other climates.

Yeah Arizona and California. we do not have that rust stuff here in the same levels as elsewhere....

axle bushing on the xj are the leaf bushings :) lol
so I was talking about the same bolts.
if it was rusted in place that makes more sense as to why you could not remove them..
I thought you meant the nuts were rusted to the bolts.
that's how mine was. and it took a good hour with the grinder.

then the bushing replacement was not possible with the press. so we drilled them out.


what about the bolts above them holding the stock drop bracket. ? might be same situation. but worth the idea ?
 
K this is starting to make a bit more sense now.

What is the "bolts above them holding the stock drop bracket"? I am not aware of any stock drop brackets in an XJ.

As for bushing replacement not being possible with a press- this is why I use a blue press- MAP gas in a torch. Remove item from truck. Burn out the bushing, and replace with poly. Problem solved.
 
Flames.., sheesh.., LOL. Me; I related into the XJ parts topic acquisition that commie red army labor provided products are a crap shoot, and recommended that they be avoided if possible, and get flamed by the 'we' person. Then the 'we' person flames someone again by saying; "seems he may have been dipping into the "medicinal" marijuana too much" AND; "That, or there is a huge language barrier." Now.., who is allowed to be off topic?

Calm down burntkat, I gain expertise from you, as well as others.

Had a rear leaf spring bolt mess after a week's worth of PB Blasting, several times a day, plus hammering etc., when failure resulted with a 4 foot pipe, and cheater bar with socket on the outside. Torch did not seem to cure the issue. However I found that a set of 'easy-out' type sockets helped to remove that last bit. Opened up the rear panel to access the frame rail in order to manage said socket inside that 'tunnel', and other tools onto the outside in order to remove said. Like ammo, one can never have enough tools.., jost sey'in.

Peace.., over, and out.
 
K this is starting to make a bit more sense now.

What is the "bolts above them holding the stock drop bracket"? I am not aware of any stock drop brackets in an XJ.

As for bushing replacement not being possible with a press- this is why I use a blue press- MAP gas in a torch. Remove item from truck. Burn out the bushing, and replace with poly. Problem solved.
my 92 xj had a stock drop bracket.

** edited.
Pretty sure it was stock.
my jeep is the laredo model that came with everything. including the transfer case skid. gas tank skid and front engine skidplate.
was Quality oem steel.
the bolts were near impossible to get off in 2007.
Ive owned the car since 2006 so pretty sure considering how tight the bolts were that it was done before that.
But I could be wrong
 
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The rear of the leaf spring has a stock OEM drop bracket on them all. The front does not. The upper bolt on the rear bracket is an unobtanian, unreachable spot for the kind of tools we are talking about. In fact if it can rotate, and move on the top side, I wonder if it helped break the leaf spring at the axle. The bump stops are gone on mine, and I have yet to pull and test the rear shocks to see if the caused the problem.
 
OK, what you keep calling a "drop bracket", is a shackle.

Totally different thing.
 
OK, what you keep calling a "drop bracket", is a shackle.

Totally different thing.

Other than the name what is different about them?
 
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