93 XJ build

[BigClay]

Sorry we never got a chance to wheel this summer, maybe next summer

 

[NickMaul]

Sorry we never got a chance to wheel this summer, maybe next summer

Its alright. I may make an effort to 231/231 double this setup. So next summer the xj may be moving pretty damn slow on the rocks

 

[NickMaul]

Motor Mount Install

Tonight I did the motor mount install and I have to say it was a very smooth install. None of my bolts where rusty and they broke free on the first turn. All that was needed was basic tools and some extensions for your basic socket wrench. The instructions said to begin with the driver's side then after the driver's side is finished do the passenger side. It was explained in the instructions the passenger side was going to be the hardest but we managed to do that one in less time than we did the driver's side. I would not recommend doing this bit by yourself because trying to wiggle the new mount in and finding where the through bolt can slide through takes some finess. All in all it took my buddy and I two hours and for the rest of the week I will be adjusting the through bolts on the mounts until the jeep feels smooth at idle.

Picturessss
Driver's Side

Driver's Side mount was trash

Complete

Passenger's Side required turning the oil filter adapter down in order to get
the bolt out of the old mount an into the new mount

All put back together

 

[AJEEPINDEEPZJ]

Looks great Nick! glad i could help out man.

 

[NickMaul]

Still working while at school! Ordered a diff cover for the 8.25. Was going to do ruffstuff and their diff cover all ready welded up but hey where would all the fun be? So I stumbled onto bluefabtorch and found a DIY diff cover. Came in five pieces, 1/4 inch thick all around. BEEF baby half the $$$$. Got a nice work shop for engineering here at school and welded it up with a 210millermatic on max power. Felt pretty damn big compared to my 110 lincoln at home. Welded inside and out keeping my fingers crossed for no leaks. Cant wait to crush some rocks with it.

 

[NickMaul]

More work to be done at school to take advantage of the tools and machines here at VMI. I will begin a NAXJA inspired version of a homebrew anti rock sway bar. The idea is very simple and strait forward. All that a currie anti rock sway bar is, a spring steel treated solid bar splined at both ends. Knowing the properties of all types of carbon steel can allow anyone to calculate torsional strength of steel using the diameter and so on.

Well after some reseach and credit given to a user on NAXJA I found that the diameter of the sway bar that currie provides for TJs is .75 inches in diameter at 36" long. Well it turns out a 1984-1991 izuzu trooper's torsion bar is one inch in diameter and 39" in length, splined at both ends and have convenient spline adapters. So for me this was a perfect candidate for a jeep cherokee XJ with leaf springs in the rear.....I hope.

As my current setup I have no sway bars equipped and I have become accustomed to driving and wheeling with out them. It is not my intent on eliminating all body lean/roll while driving on the road or highway with this torsion bar/sway bar hybrid. Most of if not all of my wheeling interest is in rock crawling and 99% of the time I get my front wheel(s) on the rocks and the front axle flexes out nicely while the rear springs rest since the front axle has already articulated to the max. I love that articulation but when the front axle has passed the obstacle and the front wheels are back on level ground my leaf springs will lean my jeep way overboard since the coils are the first to do all the work.

This is the concept behind a currie anti rock sway bar that remains attached at all times making sure there is equal articulation between the front and rear axle. That will be my goal.

Here is what I am working with.

The plan is to make arms that connect to the spline adapters that fit everything together. The arms will have to be very thick as they will see lateral movement when the axle travels. Also I will be mounting the torsion bar as far forward to the front of the car as I can to allow the longest arm length creating the most torque to "work" the bar. Mounting should not be an issue. As you can see from the pictures a stock sway bar bushing and bracket can hold it all up.

This will be slow going since school right now is busy but I hope to work on it during the weekends!

Stay Posted

 

[NickMaul]

Some more updates! I have been making some progress here at school with the torsion sway bar. I decided that drilling a hole then taping the sides of the bar to keep the arms on with a bolt and a large washer won't hurt the strength of the bar. A little bit safer then tack welding the arms on the end of the splines. Still need to get some measurements on how ling the arms will be. I plan on using curries design and drill many holes at the end of the arm so I can adjust the angle of the link that connects axle to arm.

Using the lathes here at school has been nice and I feel that I will use the burn table here to cut out some nice arms. Just need to come up with the design. I was making good progress just the other night then when I went to tap the holes........Snap!

I was just about done tapping the first hole when it got really tight and the tap snapped inside the hole. I am trying to deal with this now and am thinking about buying a mill bit used specifically for drilling out the tap. Looks like my only option. I was using a four flute tap for it and I believe when I tap again I will try and get a 6 flute tap. I believe the bar is made out of some high strength spring steel and that is making tapping very difficult for me.

Some Pictures

Also I have been knocking off the land rover lights on my bumper more and more breaking plastic and trying to remount them so I am abandoning them and looking for some led lights that are more compact and have a better light output.

After looking through pirate4x4 more and more and checking out all the competition for led light bars I found a guy in Colorado selling lights that they have on KOH rigs and became pretty hooked after I saw night shots of them lighting up a giant field out west. So I ordered two, dual row 6" led bars for $200 free shipping.

They are much smaller than the land rover lights and I can build protection around them unlike the lights before. I cannot wait to wire them in and light up the night when I am making those real late night trips through the mountains and on back roads.

This is what they have on their website displaying what a single 6" light puts out. I am Hoping for a little more output and a larger spread especially with two led bars.

Completely water tight!

Nalgene Bottle Size Comparison

 

[barrelmaker]

I'm interested in that antirock idea, i read the naxja pro crack write up.
Also love the look of those led bars.

 

[Granny]

I was just about done tapping the first hole when it got really tight and the tap snapped inside the hole. I am trying to deal with this now and am thinking about buying a mill bit used specifically for drilling out the tap. Looks like my only option. I was using a four flute tap for it and I believe when I tap again I will try and get a 6 flute tap. I believe the bar is made out of some high strength spring steel and that is making tapping very difficult for me.

If the tap hasn't shattered in the hole I would recommend trying a tap extractor first. If your school has an EDM tap-burner your problem is solved. Instead of a 6-flute tap I will highly recommend a 3-flute gun tap for most anything you are tapping. This advice comes from an old guy who has spent many years in a machine shop.

 

[NickMaul]

If the tap hasn't shattered in the hole I would recommend trying a tap extractor first. If your school has an EDM tap-burner your problem is solved. Instead of a 6-flute tap I will highly recommend a 3-flute gun tap for most anything you are tapping. This advice comes from an old guy who has spent many years in a machine shop.

No EDM here. I could only wish! I am not sure if the shop here has tap extractors if they do I will go ahead and resource that and extract it, but to buy one for this one broken tap looks to be too pricey. Especially since I can get another torsion bar for $15 at a pull a part. I may get something to drill it out. Looking at these http://www.2linc.com/tools_broken_tap_removal.htm

With the lathe I can feed the bit extremely slow so it will be a smooth process.....fingers crossed. Also I guess more flutes doesn't equal better strength? Or will the higher flute count clog up with fillings to fast?

TIA Granny

 

[Granny]

No EDM here. I could only wish! I am not sure if the shop here has tap extractors if they do I will go ahead and resource that and extract it, but to buy one for this one broken tap looks to be too pricey. Especially since I can get another torsion bar for $15 at a pull a part. I may get something to drill it out. Looking at these http://www.2linc.com/tools_broken_tap_removal.htm

With the lathe I can feed the bit extremely slow so it will be a smooth process.....fingers crossed. Also I guess more flutes doesn't equal better strength? Or will the higher flute count clog up with fillings to fast?

TIA Granny

I reckon the big question is: what size is the tap? The little ones are harder to remove than the bigger ones for obvious reasons. I can't give you a straight answer on the flute count stuff. There are many specially designed taps with multiple flutes, spiral flutes, etc., and I'm sure they all have a benefit, especially on the high speed machines. As an old-school job-shop machinist I'm mostly familiar with what works best for most. For my money, the 3-flute gun tap just can't be beat. It is designed to cut easy, and draw the chips out of the hole as you tap. As with any cutting tool, two senses are required for proper use... a sense of feel, plus the old fashioned one called common sense.

As for that tap-cutting drill... I would be very interested in hearing whether or not it works. To the best of my knowledge, I have never been in a shop that had one. If they actually worked, I believe every small shop in the country would have several of them stashed in the toolroom.

 

[amcjeepman]

If you are not in a hurry I can get the tap out for you at work. I have plenty of access to carbide drills and other fun tools for such. I am in Greensboro nearly every day.

 

[NickMaul]

It is a 3/8-16 tap. And unfortunately I am not in greensboro for a while. Up in Lexington VA at school and won't be home until early march. If I am still in a bind with all of this I will just bypass tapping and focus on the arms and finish the project with removing the broken tap and tapping correctly with the help of amcjeepman and others

 

[barrelmaker]

Any progress on the sway bar?

 

[NickMaul]

Any progress on the sway bar?

Still stuck on the broken tap in the bar but I am picking up metal to build my arms for the sway bar. I think I will be looking for some 3/8" steel. I have been told 1/4" will get bent. Then we have a burn table here at school so I will cut them out with the drawing I drew up.

 

[NickMaul]

*LED Light Bars Mounted*​

Managed to get my two light bars mounted in the old fog light location. Just an hour job to cut some metal and drill holes for the lights. Had barely any welding wire left and managed to get both burned in before running out. I still need to add some metal in the front to keep any rocks form getting into them but time was limited. I was just too eager to plug them in and see them lit up. I unfortunately don't have any pictures of them on but wow. The light is so intense! Hard to use them on the road because the signs reflect so much light back at you. Love them. Definitely the upgrade I needed for the long windy back roads.​

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[NickMaul]

*Anti Rock Sway Bar Progress*​

Well time I post some progress on this today. I grabbed some half inch steel from home and lugged it up to school. Probably shouldn't have given our burn table at school so much credit and it turns out it can only burn through 3/8 inch steel So since the plasma table was out of the equation I ended up cutting the arms with a CNC mill. So much prep workkkkk. And so slow but the precision is A+. Had a little mistake with the starting point (reason the front is hacked off) but it turned out great. I have a lot of left over steel so I will probably makes some easier stuff that I can use. Like some D Ring tabs and whatever. All i have left to do is weld the torsion bar adapters on and then get this thing put up on my bumper. Will need to find a solution for the sway bar links but I might just use some heims and adjustable rod.​

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Some Progress​

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[TJcrawler97]

looking good man,keep it up

 

[NickMaul]

~Anti Rock Sway Bar Assemble~​

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So got back from school with the arms for the torsion bar and was all ready to put it all together. I am using links with heims at the end to connect the arms to the axle. I think it will all work out good. Upon assembly I quickly realized that my torsion arms were too long. So unfortunately it had to be chopped They used to look so good! But I cut them at the bare minimum length and am concerned to see if the coils will compress and push out and contact the arms upon suspension cycling. I will have to get out and see what happens but for right now I am just driving around on the street.​

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Here is where I managed to hide the torsion bar under the bumper and behind the front stock skid plate. Nice and tucked in there and mounting it was actually very easy. The way I built the bumper just happened to work out great for me!​

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The unfortunate chop but I think it will clear the coils.​

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I plan on having the arms at a horizontal position when the car isn't flexed and I believe I will have enough clearance when at full flex. If not I can can bring it down a little.​

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Finally here are the links I have. Need to run to hardware store to get some nuts and bolts to link it all together.​

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[NickMaul]

SYE and Speedo Gear Swap​

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Ordered a RE drive flange SYE and installed it. I opted for this because I have plans on making a custom tcase parking brake and the disc brake will attach to the drive flange. Reason for all of this extra work is an ax15 is about to be swapped for my AW4 in a few days and my parking brakes are non existent after I did the ZJ disc brake swap. Took extra precaution while doing the hack n tap and made it as precise as possible to avoid any accidental vibes. Also while it was all out I put in a 39 tooth speedo gear for an accurate speedo finalyyyyyyyyy ​

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Here is the ordered disc. The dimensions will work good. I was lucky to stumble on this. Now all I need is a manual brake caliper.​

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[NickMaul]

Five Speed Swap Complete​

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After three days of long days and late nights I successfully swapped in an ax15 transmission along with the sye'd np231 I had done work on. I can say now I never want to have to swap a transmission again. Milestone pictures.​

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[BigClay]

Awesome man! So when you taking me to URE??

 

[NickMaul]

Awesome man! So when you taking me to URE??

When it gets much colder out there. Last weekend was a scorcher!

 

[BigClay]

When it gets much colder out there. Last weekend was a scorcher!

Sounds good, I like URE in the fall best. The offer stands for me to tow your jeep down there, still have all my straps and everything (all minus a jeep that is haha)

 

[NickMaul]

Update Time​

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I have been doing a lot of work to finish up the 5 speed swap and button everything up. One of the major hurdles was the difference in plugs when I used the 97 231 that was attached to the ax15. It took a lot of guess and check once the wires that I needed were determined but a quick ten minutes is all it took. My final piece of work is my custom parking brake utilizing the flange type SYE I am currently using. It will be a good use of my fabricating skills but am determined to make it work. Some mock up pictures to what I am thinking.​

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