Systems and Gestalts

Done for the night. The more I work on my Jeep the more I am amazed that it has been built so easily and worked so well all along. It is to the point now that when I decide to do one little ething like a belly tuck, it ends up being a major job.

This belly tuck was going to eliminate the front and rear lower control arm brackets from directly under the frame rails, move the crossmember up, clock the transfer case up above the frame rails, and install a flat skid under it all. Really all it involved was two - five inches hanging down of maybe 125 total square inches here and there, not even over the whole surface of the belly of the beast.

I have had to reroute front brake line, reroute rear brake line, fab a new crossmember in the stock location, fab a new crossmember in the rear location, fab new front lower link mounts on the new front XM, fab a new front upper link mount on the new front XM, remake the front upper link (longer,) fab new rear lower link mounts at the new rear XM, cut/grind off the old rear lower link mounts at the axle, fab new angled rear lower link mounts at the axle, retube the rear driveline from 2.5 inch diameter to 2 inch diameter, and now to top it all off I'm going to have to rip through the floorpan in two more places to fab new rear upper link mounts at the body as the current ones prevent the now triangulated lowers from articulating. I'm sure there's more but my brain doesn't work like it used to. Maybe it has something to do with inhaling all that weld smoke and powdered steel and cutoff wheel.

Looks like Rimrock is out next weekend...