Fun with an XJ

looking forward to this thing getting factory wheels, removing the front license plate, and a slight height adjustment.

huge fan of the XJ.

I had a 91 for quite a few years, it was unkillable.  It'd sit in front of my house for months, then fire right up when I needed it.

I didn't want to sell it, but the wife got tired of seeing it in front of the house...

My favorite Jeep of all time, without a doubt. With a little bit of work, those 4.0’s turn into stump yanking torque monsters.

Plus, straight-six growly noises...

UPS is going to be cursing my name soon. The next two days should see a considerable amount of stuff showing up. I'll post it all up as we go.

Eric and I have been discussing the theme of the build. Not theme as in Mystery Machine. No costumes. Really, Eric doesn't NEED a burly offroader so it's all just feeding a fantasy. We'll take it offroading in Moab before it leaves so that it's legit stuff, but still. The theme is basically a backstory, how the final result ended up. Right now, we're thinking it'll be built as if it were a Baja prerunner in about 1984 or so. Not a high dollar factory team, no 35" tires, just what a bunch of guys would put together after they're done with the race truck - but properly prepped to survive the recce. Also, it has to be built to survive daily driving in a Canadian winter, so there's no point in putting a Hi-Lift outside the vehicle as it would first freeze on to the rack then rust solid.

Oh, and it appears the Jeep is now called Midland after the commissioning entity.

This era 4.0 seems to be the torque monster. The 1991 models with the Chrysler EFI lost a bunch of low end. Most of it came back with the HO. There are no plans to build up the engine, just make sure it's going to be reliable.

One thing that showed up yesterday that I'm happy about is the new struts for the hatch. Midland did show up with an Official Hatch Stick (tm) but it's not 100% convenient.

I used a different model from that same line on my Explorer till the day I sold it. It was the Hood Stick (TM). 

Parts are coming. I think my UPS guy may be catching on. 

First, the TPS. 100% success. I swapped the new one in and we have proper transmission behavior. Kickdown, everything. Woo! Even the idle is different.

But this is interesting. On the bench, I saw variable resistance on the new unit. But also on the old. And when I went to install the new unit, I realized that it’s possible to install this TPS in such a way that it doesn’t do diddly. Not exactly a failsafe design there, Jeep. Of course I didn’t realize this until I had the old one off, so I can’t say for sure. But I suspect it was an installation failure on the part of the PO.

Whatever. $15 and we have a known good unit and the Jeep likes it. 

Next, another easy install. 

The headlights, they suck. Sealed beams are bad enough, but both of them had a stone chip that allowed water in. So there’s an obvious solution here. 

Trucklite LEDs! Jeep guys love their LEDs and there are a bajillion on the market, but we went for these because I know they work and they’re DOT legal. They also don’t look like alien bug eyes. Why not the GE units I love so much? Because we felt the chrome horizontal divider might be too obvious. 

Of course, while I had everything apart I had to give the chrome a little touch-up. This can easily get out of hand, but I restricted myself to the headlight retainer ring and the surrounds. 

So that’s it for tonight. But here’s a preview of what’s to come...

Eric asked for pics of the lights. It's funny, they almost look like someone broke the glass out of them. That's probably because they're squeaky clean.

In reply to Keith Tanner :

Those look amazing. 

I’d love to source LED headlights for the Suburban, but I don’t know if anyone makes the right size. 

How old is this Suburban? If it uses sealed beams, then the lights are one of about 3-4 sizes. Makes it really easy.  If it's newer, then you can get LED bulbs.

I personally believe that lights are something that should be standardized. Having different headlights and tail lights for every vehicle - every model year in some cases - is a real waste. We made some decent looking cars in the 60's that all used the same collection of lights. Trying to upgrade the optics on my 2000 Grand Cherokee is a whole lot more difficult than this simple swap was. 

I may have digressed. 

In reply to Keith Tanner :

It’s an ‘89, four-eyed with small sealed beams in a horizontal configuration. I’ve found the larger stacked lights, the singles like the XJ, and of course, rounds, but nothing for the smaller side by side lights...

I, too, would enjoy standardized lighting...

I apologize for derailing your thread; onward to more XJ shenanigans!!!

those LED headlights look a little disturbing...

Ha! You’re not wrong there. Eric needs to have DRLs for Canada so it may only be when the Jeep is parked. 

Recon, looks like you could install the “euro” Suburban lights then swap in LED replacement bulbs. I haven’t been able to figure what the dimensions of your current lights are but CarID does show the 9005 conversions. 

I'll have to look into that, Keith. Thanks!

Looks fun Keith. I remember seeing those trails on my way out of town there. I'm looking at a cheap 2004 pathfinder for use as a trail beater for when I get up there to Colorado in the spring. 

Eric has seen ONE XJ since the beginning of the year. I see at least four on my drive to work, not counting the 2-3 that are permanent residents. This is XJ country.

Today was a long, tough day. First, I installed the hatch lift struts. That was easy.

Then it was time for the lift. I started with the front, which looked easy enough. Lift the truck by the axle, put stands under the frame, pull the wheels and drop the axle back down. Now we have the front end off the ground. The shock comes out easily enough but the spring needs to be compressed in situ. Cue the suicide sticks.

A tip - if you lift the axle on the side you're compressing, it's faster. Got the stock springs out easily enough, but the new Old Man Emu springs are loooooong. They needed much compressing. And the removal of the Panhard bar. And a lot of fooling around. But I got it. There's definitely some suspension travel to be gained by changing that bar.

Seriously, the new spring looks so much longer in person. And yes, Fox 2.0 shocks. I do love Fox suspension and I don't particularly like Bilsteins on a vehicle where ride quality matters, so we went with the cool stuff. Interestingly, they're inverted. Just because. We chose the shocks intended for 0-1.5" of lift, expecting 1.5-2". I didn't want to limit bump travel with an over-long shock. I know droop is important while wheeling, but this is going to be primarily a bad road vehicle.

After about 2 1/2 hours of work, I took it out of the garage to see how it looked. Hmm, not done yet. Note the front wheels, I didn't replace the center cap. I kinda like that look.

Now the back. Man, leaf springs are weird. Their center of gravity is...I don't know where it is, I think it moves. They don't sit still. And they're heavy. Ugh.

Anyhow, these are Old Man Emu medium duty springs. They give about 3" of lift or so - but if you pull out a leaf, they become light duty springs and you get about 1.5-2" of lift. Perfect. I've never removed leaves before, this was interesting and very easy. Especially on brand new parts.

The actual spring pack looks pretty similar, but there's quite a difference in arch.

Note the shackle still attached to the old spring. The shackle-to-leaf bolt was installed in such a way that it could not be removed with the shackle attached to the vehicle. The trailer hitch was in the way. So I got to remove the unbelievably long shackle-to-frame bolt as well. When reinstalled, that lower bolt was the other way around 

Also, here's why you see XJs in Colorado. This is a 27 year old bolt that has probably never been removed.

I will admit that the front spring bolt on one side gave me some hassle. I had to get it out with careful leverage and lots of PB Blaster. It was undamaged, it just took a while. I tossed it in the bead blaster and cleaned up the threads with a thread file just in case.

As I neared the end of the job, humping around big heavy awkward springy weird-cg springs and a live axle, I lost my enthusiasm for taking pictures. And it got dark.  I did learn that you need to attach the shackle end of the spring first, then dink around with a jack and prybars to get the front bolt in 50% of the time. I also discovered that the Fox shocks were basically topped out at pretty close to ride height. Measuring the car back on the ground, it looks like I got about 3" of lift in the back and the shocks are intended for 1.5". Leaf springs are weird, I'm going to run them around for a while and see if they settle. Otherwise I may change out the leaves for a different combo. Leafs? 

By the time I was done, it was dark and I was tired. Pictures tomorrow!

Isn't that what all bolts look like when you take them out? 

Keith, my experience with xjs is that the back tends to get a little saggy and they end up needing a little more lift back there to look "right", especially with a hitch and full size spare. That said, if it does end up a little saggy from a ride quality standpoint I recommend a long shackle with the softer spring vs putting that extra leaf in.

My favorite thing about the earlier fiberglass gate xjs is the available factory spare tire mount for the outside.

It's funny, it only looks raked from certain angles. I'll measure it again tonight. The thing feels SO much better. Properly damped, no crashing over bumps - I'm really happy. There's still a lot to do to the thing mechanically but at least it looks the part now

So this really has nothing to do with building the XJ...but apparently these rear springs can settle. And the best way to make that happen is exercise them. So this was the way home tonight. This location is about 3 minutes from the FM shop. You can see the tracks up and down the ridges.

I wanted to both work out the suspension and see how it worked. So I may have maybe taken the approach road a bit quickly. Like 40 mph or so. Truck ate it up like a champ, this OME/Fox combo really, really works. These potholes are probably a foot deep in places.

The ride height didn't change, we're still looking at a 3" lift in the back. It looks fine, but I'm concerned about the rear shocks. They seem to do well at speed over this crap, but I do want to put the car on a lift and see how much droop I have.

After driving in the dust, a secret message appeared on the rear window.

Love it. The secret message is very fitting and rather awesome 

You guys just like it when I post pictures of it out in the dirt.

Yesterday I yanked the engine out along with part of the wiring harness.

Oh, no wait. Wrong car.

So, a couple of times when I went to drive the Jeep recently, it had some sort of odd buzzing/flashing thing going on. It only happened on start and went away after a few minutes. It felt like a low voltage situation, and Eric does not like to screw around with batteries. So I installed a big box of electrons, as had been the plan from the start.

That didn't help. All the parts that were flashing were also involved in the headlight switch, and the dimmer function wasn't working correctly. So I picked up a new $20 headlight switch (shared with the Renault Alliance, of course) and went to put it in. It's remarkably easy to create this sort of chaos. I was also chasing a few other little lights that got sorted out.

Well, that fixed the lights, but not the behaviour. I did find a couple of interesting things, though. First, a box that looked aftermarket stuck in between a couple of connectors. And another box with some matching numbers on it attached to some wiring that didn't look factory and attached with a self tapper. I removed both and nothing has stopped working yet.

Unfortunately, I also found the cause of the flashing. A bloody alarm system. The remote unlocking doesn't really work and the exterior locks are buggered, so I've not been paying attention to the lock/unlock status of the car, and when I tried to start in "lock" mode the apart freaked out as much as it was able. I pulled the alarm and the car didn't mind. I hate alarms.

Now, about that locking.

Pulled the door apart and replaced the driver's door lock so at least I can lock the thing up. The big orange connectors for the window/lock switches are weird, they're like big gummies. Some sort of translucent polyurethane.

So that's a decent day's work. I'll get pictures of the mystery boxes I pulled out to see if we can identify them. The part numbers don't seem to tell me anything.

This part is partially for fantasy fulfillment, partially for protection when parking in an urban area. An ex-cop push bumper originally for a Chevy. I'll build brackets for it once I figure the best mounting position. I can also move the center bar up and down. Here are a few mockups.

It's so cute. This puts the size of an XJ into perspective pretty well.

I really like the way this build is going. Useful trail/bad weather rigs are what i enjoy more then skyjacker lifts and 40s. It helps that this bodystyle jeep looks really good with a mild lift and a 31-33 inch tire.

OK so this is the Owner To Bo (OTB) Eric, I was travelling last week so I'm late to chime in.

Let me start by saying it was a long path that led us to the XJ, since really I was just on the hunt for "another fun car" from rust-free Colorado and there were few restrictions other than budget. It was in fact a modified Jeep Comanche (MJ) on Craigslist that triggered this, Keith stumbled upon it the weekend he was stuck in San Bernardino. That made me deep-dive on XJ/MJ and I figured out what would make a perfect street-parkable winter vehicle for a city that gets 88" snow a year, with 9" of snowpack for three solid months.

Now for the look I'm aiming for with this XJ: Late 1980's Baja Contender/Support. What might be surprising is that is a picture of a class winning 1987 Baja Racer:

No massive lift, extreme bumpers, 35" tires, etc. Just a small lift and a push bar on a completely stock paint job. If you want to see more pics here is a story on Bangshift about that Blazer

So the XJ is getting pretty much the same treatment, that's why the sun-burnt paint is being left as-is for example.