Little bit of an update:
A few weekends ago PilotBraden and I welded a skid plate to the Dana 44HD. For those that don't know, the Dana 44HD is a weird hybrid axle. The axle tubes are Dana 44 pieces, the ring and pinion are Dana 60, the axle shafts are 44, I think. The center section is the same unit from the Viper. That's fine and all, but the housing is aluminum. Hence the need for a skid plate.
Here's a few bad pics. I'll get more soon. 
Look at that penetration! That's what she sai...never mind
I also finally got the spare tire mounted in the Jeep. Looks like a 32" is about I can get back there
Time for another update. The Jeep is one step closer to what I envisioned.
I want to be able to take my family 'wheeling, AND know that I can return. So I'm building it a little more than 'needed' by most folks standards. Now that I have the tires I want (32" BFG Mud Terrains) I need some recovery gear. After much research on a winch, I decided to go with Engo. One of the guys that started Mile Marker decided to spin off on his own and develop an electric winch that would hang with the big boys, read: Warn. I found a 4Wheeler winch shootout from a few years back where they tortured some winches and the Engo stayed right up there with the Warn and MileMarker, but at a fraction of the cost.
Usually, with a winch comes a custom front bumper with an integrated mount. That means lots of money. I'm still trying to keep this grassroots so I found that Rough Country offers a winch mount for the ZJ that retains the stock bumper cover. Sweet.
My daughter and I set to work!
First get that bumper off.
Victory!!!!
That left us with the front of the Jeep exposed, and time for some light trimming. The two holes in front of the 'frame rails' need minor clearancing for the winch mounts. There are factory holes in there that the factory tow hooks use, so they are plenty strong. In the pic below the right hole is trimmed.
Here's a closer pic.
Here's a couple pics of the winch plate mounted on the jeep, minus the haws fairlead and D-rings.
The next step is to trim the bumper cover to clear the plate. The directions weren't great, but in the end, they got the job done. I totally forgot to get pics of the trimming, but here's a crappy shot of the bumper trimmed.
If I had to do it again, I'd trim it a little differently. If anyone is thinking about doing this on his/her ZJ, lemme know and I'll tell you what I would do differently.
And some finished shots.
Since I already accounted for the winch and mount in my budget post on page one ($660 for the lot) there's no budget update yet.
Looks great. I'm still seriously pissed off at what I've spent on my ZJ when I see pictures of your niner.
cdowd
Dork
5/25/18 10:57 a.m.
That turned out really well!. The combo with the wheels and tires looks great.
cdowd said:
That turned out really well!. The combo with the wheels and tires looks great.
Thanks, I think so. I'm happy with the offset that the wheels and spacers give me. The edge of the tire is RIGHT AT the edge of the fender.
ultraclyde said:
Looks great. I'm still seriously pissed off at what I've spent on my ZJ when I see pictures of your niner.
I came i to two good deals here, very happy about that.
