SAR rescue mobile - 93 zj long arms yota axles

shawn.m · Jul 4, 2013

65 for driveshaft shortened. Plopped it in the jeep and put the skid plate on.
Also bought a replacement radiator overflow tank from oreilly for $10. Bolted that in besides the air box and routed the houses.
Then took it out to flex it out. The higher rate rear springs also lifted the front a little bit. Will posted a couple pics in a moment.

Everything works! Exhaust is nice and quiet with all the exhaust leaks fixed
Only time the exhaust hits is at full extension.
Front driveline miss the exhaust down pipe
Only thing hitting was the front tire at full stuff when turned.
Trimmed that a bit so it does not hot.

This thing flat works! It is amazing to me every time I drive this how much it flexes and just putters over rocks in first gear idling.

Now I decided to make a roof rack out of my sons old bed.

Will post pics in a moment it looks pretty good actually

shawn.m · Jul 4, 2013

Flex shots

flex shots

shawn.m · Jul 4, 2013

Rack pictures

I just placed everything on the roof. I think it looks pretty good

I bought two ATV hitch luggage carriers from Harbor Freight a while back when they were on sale for $35 each. that is the end parts that you see.

had my wife the fashion expert say it looks pretty good from 5 feet away.

so going to bolt it all together today . This way I can put my gas tanks on the top of the jeep for my trip tomorrow. Going to do trail clean up of Barrett Lake Jeep trail with the SAR OHV group and the Higlanders 4x4 jeep club. Taking my son with me and doing it overnight.

shawn.m · Jul 4, 2013

oh yeah I need to add the clayton flat belly pan. On my Test Rock that i show all the flex shots on I turtled the jeep. The skid plate for the transfer case worked great but what got hung up was the exhaust system.
I was talking to greg of frobot fab about building one. maybe in a couple weeks

shawn.m · Jul 8, 2013

pictures of radiator overflow tank moved. it did very well this weekend with teh rocks on barret lake jeep trail

The Beep · Jul 9, 2013

I'm liking the rack, easy side loading yet good stops front and rear. Are you just tying it in to the factory cross rails or mounting it straight to the base rails?

shawn.m · Jul 9, 2013

I mounted it to the cross rail sliders. not to the rails and not to the base rails.
now after having it come loose on barret jeep trail I might just tighten it up. I was afraid to tighten it really good knowing I was going to barret. Barret lake jeep trail is probably one of toughest trails in state. about a quarter of the time your vehicle is at some sort of angle

http://www.hi-landers.com/BLT/BLT.html

shawn.m · Jul 14, 2013

Barret lake run report

Ofok had a good but tiring trip

bertha - wifes name for jeep- worked great. big ol marshmallow going over rocks. My steering stabilizer fell victim to a wayward rock on the way in. bent it into a curve. plus it loosened my steering at the same time.

You dont think a zj is wide until you do Barret lake Jeep trail with a roof rack on.

Actually end up coming back out instead of staying overnight. One of the guys in my party broke both ball joints and drivers side drive shaft. It happened right in Rock Garden so he was blocking the trail. some of our party went ahead to the lake. Luckily the finance of one of our party had the ball joints and we got another person raised on the Ham radio to stop by the broken partys house and then run the parts up to us. So jim broke at 2pm and we got him fixed by 9pm.

at that point we were still 3 miles from the lake and the other guys who went into the lake said the trail just got rougher. So choice was camp for the night were we at, drive in during the dark or turn around and go home .

with jim running a suspect used drive shaft, our other person having engine issues and not being able to idle down and me just being beat up. Plus I was only planning on doing a two day trip not three day. So I would be doing a one day trip into the lake and back in one day. so we decided to go back out.

It was a long run out - much tougher to do the trail in the dark when you really tired and dont have enough lights.

At one point I misjudged a tight fit between trees and took a tree root to my front tire. bending the rim and flattening the tire.
in the end I just put my spare tire on.

Next time I will just camp out instead of doing a night run.

need to go through rear of vechile as something is clanking .

only picture that I took during the trip as I was too busy driving .

What the jeep looked like this morning. notice spare tire and the bent center link

shawn.m · Jul 14, 2013

Rear lugge rack

Ok built a rear luggage rack inside rear of vehicle
Used angle iron from a bed frame that I had laying around. Then muffler clamps to clamp it to the roll at. Didn't weld it in as I want to see if I want to keep it.
Used my new mig welder to weld it together. Welds are crap as I didn't clean up the metal enough.
Now I have the rear tire on the platform and it just fits

shawn.m · Sep 2, 2013

update - plus video

hoked up trailer hitch wiring harness that I had from my parts jeep.
now I can tow a trailer as i sold my daughters explorer that had a great hitch and setup on it.

I even used my jeep on the farm to pull a large tree off

https://plus.google.com/photos/1133...389765639/albums/5918869036368047025/5918869035952383410?authkey=CN2n0JClwPLiJw

shawn.m · Dec 6, 2013

10" inch of snow forecasted over 6000 feet lforecasted! Woo hoo!

shawn.m · Dec 22, 2013

New tires

traded my tires for 35's this last week! went to Maxxis Bighorn MT.

Tight fit but able to fit all 4 35's in the jeep

Tires before going on

my dog bacchus likes the new tires!

My son likes the new meats also

rear tires stuff with no issues

plenty of room at front of tire

front droop

Need to do some cutting at front of tire under full stuff in the front

shawn.m · Jan 11, 2014

So bought new tie rod and drag link stuff. Bought the 1.5 I ch tune with .25 thick wall, 60 inches for drag link and 30 inch for tie road weld on threads, high angle drag link to Pittman arm.
I didn't buy the 1 ton TRE ends as I am concerned that the height of the tie rod ends will make the tie rod hit my panhard bar mount. It may still hit but I need to mock it up first. It it hits it hits and I might just do the TRE.

Also going to move the axle forward to see how far I can get it. I actually called clayton and talked to them about my suspension. I talked to the other owner , not clayton, and he thinks I have one of the first run of the clayton long arms. Basically they used to make the joint by welding fine thread all rod to the joint and hem using a massive 1.25 inch long nylon lock nut. The all rod would be about 6-7 inch long, so I might have enough to move the axle forward a inch or so. To be safe I will mark the all thread with stock position unwind it all the way out to measure it and then thread it all the way back in.

I will need to to,do this first before I can mock up my steering fixes.

Currently cleaning up my shop of the last year of projects first and then I can move my jeep into the shop which has a higher ceiling than my garage.

I also stopped by and looked at 5.9 Andy's 1998 1 Ton, hmm. However, I would need to sell my jeep first and the market is soft for built 4x4 zj's in California.
__________________

shawn.m · Jan 11, 2014

Shop all cleaned out. Got a sm420 from a buddy in exchange for all my ford ranger stuff plus my chevy 208'so he can make a doubler.

Finally got my jeep in the garage. Dropped the drivers side arm down with some help from a crow bar. After jack stands of course.
The big nylock nut is big! Had to grab a pipe wrench as nothing else was big enough. Broke both sides loose by only half turn so I know how far out I did it. Then tried to crack the pivot bolt. No go both hands on pipe wrench with feet against arm pulling hard. So need to bring the heat. Need to get the torch it with a big breaker bar.

I pulled the top arm off as I could feel slop in top joint, like 1/4 inch! So pulled that off. The top rubber joint is shot. Need to figure out what to replace it with. Same with lower rubber link on bottom of arm

Also pulled console apart as was getting exhaust leak into cab. Looks like I have two air leaks, one at my mounting plate and one at the rubber shifter boot. Mounting plate is easy, rubber mount not so easy. Need to see if I can make my existing one better maybe by making a new plate that is metal with a smaller hole

shawn.m · Jan 11, 2014

Spent almost two hours getting the big joint to move. Having to use a 2 foot pipe wrench with a 1 foot extension and get maybe 1/8 turn at a time. Using both arms and all my body weight.

Threads are rusty! using torch on arm side nut, PB blaster on threads afterwards its slow going. I did get the joint moved about 3/4". THen I started flexing it out, and that seemed to gain a bunch more space. I need to actually pull the spring and fully flex it out. At the moment it looks like 3/4 inch forward might be enough. Right now their is about 3.5 inches of thread showing. So if joint is 6 inches long I am good. Greg .frobot. Has same age of arms as me and said he had 6.5 inches of thread.

My vise is not anchored well enough for me to pull the link off and just use a pipe wrench with a 4 foot extension on pipe wrench. Maybe I will call Greg at frobot fab and see if his vise is anchored well enough.

The tie road and drag link swing look good right now. However, that is only with stocking steering. Have to see what happens when I put in the bigger 1.5 inch drag link along with bigger tie rod

shawn.m · Jan 11, 2014

Put it up for sale - would like to buy 5.9 andys 5.niner but need to sell bertha. if it doesn't sell so be it will keep working on it.

shawn.m · Jan 20, 2014

I can't emphasis enough good documentation when you doing a build.

Yesterday when I pulled the upper control arm axle side bushings off. I discovered the top axle side busing was a rubicon express super ride bushing not the stock k316 moog part number. So i need to update my build book

Will order that Monday. Then I think today's task is going to be pulling the lower long arms to see how bad the bushing is n the lower long arm axle side. Should be the clevite bushing that clayton sells but you never know.

Also bought the trail gear breather bellows for the front axle. Will throw that on today.

Once I have everything ordered then I can go finish up the new steering setup. Still trying to decide if I should get the 1 TRE or not. That will depend on mock up today.

I am also thinking about lowering the front shocks in their mounts. I will need to do limit straps at the same time. It looks like that the shocks have about 3 inches of up travel that they have never used. S I could get more droop if I lower the upper shock mounts.

shawn.m · Jan 20, 2014

installed the little breather tube bellows - looks like it might hit the oil pan - will flex it and see later on

Dropped the lower arms and pressed out the clevite bushings- will order new ones tomorrow, plus order the upper control arm bushings.

Started mocking up the big drag link - measured and cut the big drag link. fitted the tube inserts and heims. fits good! had to do a little grinding on the sway bar mount on drivers side to clear the 1.5 inch tube. Then started grinding on the passenger side a little bit. Not a lot as I dont want to get into the track mount too much.

I did test the 1 ton TRE to see what happens when it is installed. It moves the drag link up about 3/4 inch which is enough to move it into the panhard bar bracket. Which means I would have to redo that also if I want to go to TRE's. Moving the Panhard bar mount and redoing the panhard bar is something I would prefer not to do at the present time. I am fine with Heim joints as I really dont drive it very much on the street. Pretty much drive to trails and back. Maybe a occasion local long drive. My other option in the future is to do a high steer knuckle - this would let me do offset 1 ton TRE's on the drag link without moving the panhard bar mount. However, if I move the tie rod to a high steer then I would have to move the pandhard mount to keep the angles correct anyway.

It now turns full lock to the drivers side and almost full lock to passenger side.

I cut the tabs off the old drag link to see if I can reuse the tabs - got them cut of but they dont fit the bigger drag link that good. Thats what you see in the picture attached.

Then started in on mocking up the tie rod. The high angle joint from Ruff stuff ES2027 is too big to fit into the stock zj pittman arm. Its taper is over size. Suggestion from Ruff Stuff is to drill out stock hole to 7/8 and then drop in a http://www.ruffstuffspecialties.com/catalog/INSSTEER.html tapered insert.

I did test the stock drag link joint to see how far it flexes and it looks like the stock one will flex enough for my suspension. Pretty impressive when you consider that I have 14 inch travel front shocks.

The nut insert that I bought from Ruff Stuff does not work on thread of the stock drag link threads. hmm .
so its either drill it and put in taper, put a heim in and drill it out, get a reamer and make the taper and hole bigger ( like this one best)

I am out of town the next couple of days so will get bushings ordered up - should be here by the time I get back Thursday. Might see if I can get Greg - Frobot fab to do the welding for me on the tie rod and drag link. On something like the steering system I would prefer someone with more experience to do it.

Was looking at brackets on ruffstuff for the tie road to weld onto the drag link. might talk to greg about having him make a better bracket.

Also going to order inner shift boot as I was getting exhaust fumes in cab.

shawn.m · Jan 20, 2014

Ordered a new inner shift boot, the zj one is discontinued of course. So had to order TJ one. Which is a different shape. Will see how far off when I get it in my hands.

Ordered the rubicon express upper control bushing and the lower control arm bushing from 4wd parts doing a ship to store. So once I get those in hand will compare it and post the part numbers for others to compare. It won't matter as much to others as few others will have this setup but I will record it for posterior

Called partsmike.com and he can ream my stock spare Pittman arm to 1 ton taper for $10 if I drop it off at his place. Then need to call Greg .frobot. To see if he can weld everything up for me.

So on track to get everything together by mid next week. Pretty excited to see how it drives with all new bushings.

shawn.m · Jan 20, 2014

dropped all the steering stuff at Gregs - Frobot fab - or agitated pancake on the way to work. so he is going to ream the pittman arm to 1 ton taper, cut the 1.5 inch pittman arm to the length of the old one, weld in the tube inserts fro both sides of the pittman arm. weld in both tube inserts on the drag link, cut or use one of his shock brackets to be the connection point for the pittman arm Heim joint. Then weld it down in about the same spot it was before at the end of the drag link near the passenger side knuckle. You have to see Gregs work in person to understand how good he is getting. I say this after looking at Andys 5.9, Gregs WJ and Mountain Marcs jeep. I have no problem trusting Gregs work

I also picked up the Rubicon Express clevite joint for the lower arms near the axle. they look to be the exact same model that I pulled out . will verify when i get home tonight. Also got my upper rubicon express easy ride joint for top control arm axle side.

Pretty stoked on what I have in play. Once I get the joints in I can flex out the suspension and see what 3/4 extension of the lower arms gives me. I already was beating on the wheel well to give it more room last weekend. I also need to cut out everything in front of the wheels and cut into the front inner fenders.

My welding gas lines on my torch set are shot so I need to grab a extra set or borrow my father in laws torch set =) Then I will be able to do some small welding of the inner fenders when I move them up for clearance sake.

SAR rescue mobile - 93 zj long arms yota axles

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