A friend of mine bought a yj a few months back as a basis for a daily driver/wheeling rig. I dont really have any before pics but when he bought the jeep it had 4" shackles, bastard leaf packs with way too many leaves, a poorly done spring over with bad welds, terrible pinion angles and 0 deg. caster up front, and terrifying steering. What made it a good buy was that it had a a straight tub, a strong 4 liter, and a few bonuses like a slip yoke eliminator, braided stainless brake lines, 35" BFG's and steels, some exterior lighting and so on.
Our goal was to build for him a dual purpose rig that could be both driven regularly on road and wheeled, be reliable and not break the bank in the process.
Wagoneer front 44, stripped, blasted, tubes welded to center, Ruff Stuff perches.
The rodeo rear had a Trac-Lok that we decided to rebuild and use in the front
I added a few leftover carrier shims between the outer most steels and the carrier to tighten up the packs a little
Drive
Coast
Demo
I put a JCR steering setup on this jeep right after he bought it to replace the terrifying linkage that was on it. I would not recommend this product to anyone. The threads in both links in our kit were cut so poorly that we have to use a large pipe wrench with a cheater bar and a shit ton of force to spin the tie rod ends in and out. Since the links have no hex or even flat spots machined onto the ends to put a wrench we are left with no choice but to ravage them with the pipe wrench.
Had to shorten the tie rod by removing about an 1 1/4" from both ends of the rod, and the same from the shanks of both tie rod ends
New calipers, pads, rotors, metric studs to match the rear, warn hubs
Had to relocate the bracket for the brake T to the driver side to line up with the line on the jeep.
Overall the work seems pretty clean and solid.. One question though...Do you have any concerns about the front housing cracking here where you relieved the material for the u-bolt?
I'm not looking at the unit in person to see exactly how much material you've taken out, but I have seen unmolested d44 housings break in that exact spot, with the drivers side axle tube acting as a lever against the cast center. Adding a truss could help.
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