My friend and I have started this process on his cherokee.

Today he cut the fender wells out (huge), he cut through the inner fender and we are just going to weld in sheet metal to make up the differnece. He has a 3in lift right now and clears 35's without rubbing. We are getin D60's next weekend Front and rear.

I think we are going to run 44044's up front (i think). We took a really good look at his frame and it seems plenty strong. We are going to truss the front between the front hanger and shaclke (shackle reversal). We might add steel plate to the mounting location of the shackle to make the frame strong enough in that location.



we plan on running the stock (rebuilt 4.0) what would you recommend for a tranny and xcase (465-205)

I read the thread on leaf sprung front xj's but his frame seems strong enough.

does anyone have a 3d drawing of the xj mono frame in autocad, solid works or catia?

Can you see any problems with what we have instore for his cherokee, or any suggestions?

if it's his XJ and not yours...GO FOR IT!:D

Originally posted by Cutter
if it's his XJ and not yours...GO FOR IT!:D

He is a good friend and has helped me with my rig several times and has done good work when helping me so now i am going to help him and i am going to do a damn good job (none of this ghetto shit i see all the time).

I like the general idea of extreme hacking instead of extreme lifting to get big tires and ground clearance. That way you get a lower center of gravity and have better higher speed (non-crawling) driving characteristics. However, getting good flex might require some innovation, since most of the products on the market are based on the lift approach. There are lots of other issues to deal with too, but that just goes with innovation. It seems very doable to me.
Just curious, why did ya'll decide to go this way instead of doing something more traditional like a 10" inch lift to fit 44s?
On the strength issue, you might want to consider reinforcing the entire length of the frame rails with something like C-channel steel and adding cross-bracing and a roll cage to make it rigid. That's probably overkill for what you're doing right here, but it sounds like you're building an extreme trail machine and the XJ unibody is notorious for cracking.
On trannys/xfer cases here's a link that might come in handy if you don't already have it. There's some basic info on various common models and the company makes a bunch of adapters to fit various things together.
http://www.novak-adapt.com

XJ 'frame rails' are not very strong in the front. make sure its all braced good, and add a good steering box mount or brace as well

As for the tranny/ t-case its up to you. You have enough drive line length for a doubler. What front 60 is this?

thanks for the info

I was going to truss the front front the hanger to some rear location but i can't find a location that i think is strong enough. I will probably end up tying it into the cage but that still isn't the est solution (and i can't bend tube).

I could add c- channel to the frant but it is too expensive. Tight budget. I am deffinitaly going to be doing lots of cross bracing (especially around the steering box).

how much would someone want to exo cage it?
----i was just thinking i will set it up like a toy SAS, where is run a bar with the hangers on it across the front then we could tie in the exocage and the hanger mount and to the frame and carry it all the way back to the truck (that would be the right way to do it)

what do you guys think of that idea.