Getting the samurai to Harlan

ncsutj said:
I thought I saw you there in the campground one time I was passing through.
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We didn’t camp at the ranch but we parked the tow rig behind the arena on Friday and Saturday.
 
I’ve been having some problems keeping the engine cool when going slow in the rocks.

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My old fan was one that was laying in the back of the geo engine donor I bought. No clue what it came from and it didn’t cover the whole radiator. It was too thick to run any sort of shroud. I fabbed a new shroud with some sheets of abs plastic. And got a thin 14in fan.
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It’s clears the water pump by just enough to not be worried about it. I used some jumper wires to turn it on and it holds a sheet of paper flat against the grille with the fan running, so it has good air flow now.
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I’m trying to improve my wiring skills, So it got wired in with a Dtp connector and the chassis side got some cloth loom.
 
It’s been a while since I worked on this because I’ve been working on a large house project. I’m done with that for now so I can get to my gears and rear axle swap.

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I cleaned the old brackets off the Dana 44 and welded on new spring perches and welded the axle tubes to the center section.
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I’m working on getting the 5.13s installed. Revolution gear is having to send me ring gear bolts because the ones in the install kit were the wrong size.
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Picked up one of those little 120v stick welders to take on trips. It runs 1/8 7018 ok and was only $68
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I got a camper shell for the tow rig since it got so cold in the tent last year.

We have an October trip to Karios planned so I’m trying to get everything done and tested before that.
 
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Dropped the Dana 30 out on the lift. I’m honestly surprised the welds holding the tie rod from moving never broke.
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Once the Dana 44 was bolted to the leaf springs I could see that the traction bar mount was going to be up on the casting of the center section. I reused the traction bar mount from the old rear axle.
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Made custom brake lines for the new axle. I used the hoses from the old setup. The they are tj front hoses at the caliper. The hose that drops to the axle is a rear hose for a lifted tj.
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The rear driveshaft was too long so I had to shorten it up.
 
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I got the front axle geared and started removing the fender flares. They were rubbing with the 31s. So no way they would clear the new tires.
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Flexed out on the engine hoist and found the rear was pretty close to clearing. Just some slight sheet metal trimming and it was good.
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A before shot of the front fenders before trimming for the new tires.
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And after. It stills rubs a little in the front but I don’t want to rework the front bumper more.
 
I saw a rear steer truck coming through an intersection in front of me yesterday and immediately thought about this thread. They're just really cool trucks for some reason!

Keep up the good work :D
 
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Got all the roxzillas mounted, wiring secured under the hood. And ready for a shakedown at uwharrie
 
I haven’t updated this in a while. I didn’t really do anything after the shake down run for a while. The tires make such a huge difference. And the gearing is about right. It will bog down some but I try to just roll into the throttle when I need more torque.

The trip to kairos wasn’t really a good wheeling trip. The camping with the family was good but we only found the one rock crawling trail and it wasn’t anything to write home about. Wish we had just gone to ger.

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I did another frame swap at home so my shop was tied up for a while.
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I had a fueling issue sometimes that after some brain storming I decided the fuel pump just didn’t have enough pressure on steep climbs. My old one was a 2psi pump. I got another Holley pump that’s a 4 psi and it seems to be fixed.
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The uhmw pipe on the traction bar works so good I wanted to try it on my front lower links.
 
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We went to ger in April and it was an awesome trip. I had the underdog rig since the group was mostly buggy’s.
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I decided to try cripple creek the second day and made it without winching and only needed a spotter twice. These tires are magic lol. We ran all of the hard trails I know are there. It even walked can opener with no trouble. I had to winch there last year.
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I did get stuck in the honey hole when I tried to bump it and got hung up on the rear leaf springs. Lost a bunch of transmission fluid out of the shifter.
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Twice I tried to use my winch at the ranch and it didn’t work when I was pointing uphill for some reason. The rough country 6500 side by side winch has been on my radar for a while as an upgrade/weight savings, so I ordered one when we got back.
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It fits in front of the radiator where my old Ramsey 8000 was under the radiator.
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Synthetic rope and wireless remote are a big upgrade too!
 
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