[TreyXJ]

Originally Posted by Hudson

I've been reading forums for a while (and am quite new to this forum) and one thing i've learned is to go big or go home. If you want a 3" lift and 31" tires just for looks, but in the near future can see yourself going bigger, just save up and get what's better.

If you spend 500$ now on the lift, and x on the tires, then within a year get some money and buy ~1000$ish lift, and go with bigger tires, the money you spent on the 3" lift is essentially wasted. (i know you'll have fun with it, but i think you get the point.)

The thing is...I actually pretty much bought the lift for looks and don't plan on going any bigger anytime. I bought the 3" and 31"s because that fits my purpose the best and is cheapest/simplest. I do a little minor offroading, but never anything that is to difficult to handle with 3" and 31"s. And with 3" and 31"s, it was a really easy switch. I don't have to worry about SYE, Tcase drop, new drive shafts, regearing, axles, etc. If I had more knowlede and money, and did the extreme wheeling to justify spending all that money on the big setup...I'd do it...but I don't have any of that.

Originally Posted by Hudson

I didn't read through the entire thread, but i thought i should mention it. The Side trim on your jeep, is ugly, and most people would agree with me on that. The jeep looks a whole lot better (IMO & many others) without that on. If you want to take it off, just use a heat gun. (assuming from the first picture you have one because it appeared that you were in a body shop painting it.) If you don't just use a hairdryer. It will take longer, but will work. You'll probably also need a flat head screw driver to pry it off once the glue releases its grip. This makes the jeep look better in general, and almost makes it look more lifted.

For a 16 year old, you seem to know a lot, and don't seem cocky about it. I'm 16 myself, and hate just about everyone my age. They all get cars that they either don't know anything about, or get spoiled rotten, and never work for anything in their life. I know the feeling, my rage for them could go on uncontrollably.

For the other stuff you said, I agree with you. I've been meaning to take off the trim moldings for a while but have never gotten around to it yet. I work as a car detailer and have access to all the tools I need...I just haven't had much spare time. And I totally agree with you about the other people our age. At my highschool parking lot I park between a guy who got his dads Mercedes and a girl who drives a brand new SUV. Last week the girl left her headlights on and ended up with a dead battery and asked if I had jumper cables to give her a jumpstart. I brought them out and handed them to her...she didn't know what to do with them hahaha.

[Hudson]

Originally Posted by TreyXJ

For the other stuff you said, I agree with you. I've been meaning to take off the trim moldings for a while but have never gotten around to it yet. I work as a car detailer and have access to all the tools I need...I just haven't had much spare time. And I totally agree with you about the other people our age. At my highschool parking lot I park between a guy who got his dads Mercedes and a girl who drives a brand new SUV. Last week the girl left her headlights on and ended up with a dead battery and asked if I had jumper cables to give her a jumpstart. I brought them out and handed them to her...she didn't know what to do with them hahaha.

Oh god, i can already picture it. I'm surprised she even knew they were called jumper cables. I can see her standing there trying to put them on her battery while all her friends were aimlessly walking around the car cracking jokes making you totally uncomfortable. Rage Rage Rage. I hate spoiled kids so much, they know nothing, but have everything.

By the way coming from your expertise as a car detailer (im assuming you know how to paint metal) what would be the best way to paint a bumper?

I plan on welding together a bumper and then painting it. I think (correct me if i'm wrong)

-Weld it together
-Clean it with a wire brush
-Base coat it (like a primer)
-Let dry and paint over it.

By the way, i just went back and read the entire thread, and i'm quite impressed. As for your rims, i'd paint them more of a shiny black, i'm not liking the flat black look.

[TreyXJ]

Originally Posted by Hudson

By the way coming from your expertise as a car detailer (im assuming you know how to paint metal) what would be the best way to paint a bumper?

I plan on welding together a bumper and then painting it. I think (correct me if i'm wrong)

-Weld it together
-Clean it with a wire brush
-Base coat it (like a primer)
-Let dry and paint over it.

By the way, i just went back and read the entire thread, and i'm quite impressed. As for your rims, i'd paint them more of a shiny black, i'm not liking the flat black look.

You've pretty much got it.

-Weld it together
-Clean it with a wire brush
-I like to wipe stuff down with a acetone just to be extremely thorough. You don't have to do this if you don't want to...but it will help clean stuff up if you accidentally miss a spot with the wire brush. Wear gloves tho.
-Prime it (Use a self etching primer)
-Let dry and start your actual painting
-From there you can sand it if you want a smooth finish, or just leave it once the paint dries for a more rugged appearance.

[TreyXJ]

I didn't have anything planned today so I figured I'd take my side moldings off. Here are a few pics

This was what I started with


This was what it looks like under the molding


And heres how it turned out


Unfortunately, I didn't get to get it completely finished because a circuit blew causing all the lights and outlets to not work anymore, and the door to the electrical room was locked since it was a weekend so I couldn't go and reset the circuit breaker. So right now it looks really nice from far away, but when you get up close there is still a little bit of glue left on.

[Hudson]

That looks a lot better. It looks as if it's standing a bit higher now too.

[Cherokee-at-16]

Originally Posted by TreyXJ

Last week the girl left her headlights on and ended up with a dead battery and asked if I had jumper cables to give her a jumpstart. I brought them out and handed them to her...she didn't know what to do with them hahaha.

Originally Posted by Hudson

Oh god, i can already picture it. I'm surprised she even knew they were called jumper cables. I can see her standing there trying to put them on her battery while all her friends were aimlessly walking around the car cracking jokes making you totally uncomfortable.

Lets forget all the spoiled stuff....You guys wouldn't help a girl jump her car? Find another girl that has never jump started a car before and see if she knows how to do it. I have jumped a car like 5 times in my entire life and I'm around them all the time. Furthermore, jumping a car can be dangerous if done wrong, You would be amazed at how much stuff is not common knowledge. If it were up to me there would be a "sh*t you should know class" in every school. But, there's not. So Lets be real here, how did you learn or did you just know? I would think most guys would be glad to help a girl out with her car troubles anyway. You don't know how many times I have slowed down next to people stopped on the side of the road to see if their a good looking girl and in need of my services.

[TreyXJ]

Originally Posted by Cherokee-at-16

Lets forget all the spoiled stuff....You guys wouldn't help a girl jump her car? Find another girl that has never jump started a car before and see if she knows how to do it. I have jumped a car like 5 times in my entire life and I'm around them all the time. Furthermore, jumping a car can be dangerous if done wrong, You would be amazed at how much stuff is not common knowledge. If it were up to me there would be a "sh*t you should know class" in every school. But, there's not. So Lets be real here, how did you learn or did you just know? I would think most guys would be glad to help a girl out with her car troubles anyway. You don't know how many times I have slowed down next to people stopped on the side of the road to see if their a good looking girl and in need of my services.

The whole thing was a joke... Me and her are good friends. Obviously I ended up jumping her car for her...

[Hudson]

Originally Posted by Cherokee-at-16

Lets forget all the spoiled stuff....You guys wouldn't help a girl jump her car? Find another girl that has never jump started a car before and see if she knows how to do it. I have jumped a car like 5 times in my entire life and I'm around them all the time. Furthermore, jumping a car can be dangerous if done wrong, You would be amazed at how much stuff is not common knowledge. If it were up to me there would be a "sh*t you should know class" in every school. But, there's not. So Lets be real here, how did you learn or did you just know? I would think most guys would be glad to help a girl out with her car troubles anyway. You don't know how many times I have slowed down next to people stopped on the side of the road to see if their a good looking girl and in need of my services.

Quite honestly, if i don't like the vibes someone is giving off, or if i don't like them in general i refuse to help them. Most people don't talk to me unless they need something from me. Why should i go out of my way to help them, when beforehand they didn't even notice my existence?

[TreyXJ]

We got 6-8 inches of snow yesterday...so I had a little fun with what was left over

[ChiliPepperXJ]

Awesome build man! Keep up the good work! Rather than the black, I think a gunmetal gray would look pretty good on those eccos

I have been considering removing my trim as well, I'm tired of the way it looks and don't wanna deal with it anymore, you may have just convinced me

[TreyXJ]

I installed my Kicker ZX350.4 a while back but never got around to updating this.



It pushes about 75 watts RMS x 4 channels at 4 ohms. It powers my 4 polk DXI650s. The difference in clarity and volume is insane. I've got the gains set well below half and it is still plenty loud. Best $150 spent on the Jeep so far IMO.

My next goal for the Jeep is to paint the bumpers. When I bought the Jeep the bumpers were all scratched up in the back and the front had tons of paint chips.




I'm going to paint them both black. Later on once I get my passenger rocker panel installed I'll bedline the rockers black.

[TreyXJ]

I've been working on fixing my rocker panel and rear quarter panel lately and I finally finished today. My rocker panel was really bad, and while I was working on it I decided I might as well fix the quarter panel while I was at it. Heres a picture of what it looked like before


So you can obviously see the huge hole in the rocker with all the rust, but theres also a rust spot above the rear fender flare thats kinda hard to see. It wasn't a really bad rust spot, but I decided I'd knock it out while I was doing all the painting at the same time.

Heres how it turned out


I broke the bracket when I was taking the fender flare off and it hasn't came in yet so thats why I had to leave it exposed. The bracket should come in soon so as soon as I get it I'll put the fender flare back on.

And me and my dad are going on a two day fishing trip tomorrow so I'll get some pictures of that. It'll be my first time offroading in the XJ so it'll be a good opportunity to test her limits.

[TreyXJ]

Just got back from the fishing trip. It was really fun...even though we didn't fish any AT ALL :/ Its been a pretty bad drought here in VA, and the river was really low. The streams where we camped by were extremely low and didn't have any fish in them at all, and they usually are stocked with plenty. I still got to go kayaking and mudding though so that was pretty fun.

I started with this

Then I met a bunch of these

And came out looking like this

[ChiliPepperXJ]

Nice work on the rust issues, it looks good.... How did you go about fixing them, just out of curiosity? Also,
do you have any issues with rubbing with 31's on a stock rim? I will be going down that road soon and I want to know what I'm getting myself into first ha

[TreyXJ]

Originally Posted by ChiliPepperXJ

Nice work on the rust issues, it looks good.... How did you go about fixing them, just out of curiosity? Also,
do you have any issues with rubbing with 31's on a stock rim? I will be going down that road soon and I want to know what I'm getting myself into first ha

Well I work at a car dealership that has a body shop so I got one of the guys that works in that department to lend me a hand with some of it. First I had to take the fender flare off. I bought a replacement rocker panel from our shop distributor and then we cut out the existing and replaced it with the new. I've never welded before so the guy helping me had to do the welding. It turned out really good. Then we just primed it and color matched it to the Jeep.

For the spot above the flare, you have to take the fender flare off. I had already taken it off for the rocker panel so that was one step already done. Then you just grind away with a grinder at the rust to the bare metal. There were only a couple of tiny rust pinholes, so we knocked them in a bit with some fancy kind of hammer that people in the body shop use. Then we put some body filler on to smooth it out and sanded it till it was smooth. We painted it to match the body from the bottom of the factory stripe down.

And as for the 31s, they don't rub too bad. I've only been wheeling once and that was this last weekend but I never had any trouble with any rubbing at all that weekend. The only rubbing I get is I rub my LCAs a bit up front when I'm turning as sharply as it will let me left or right. So its a tiny bit of a pain to park because I can only turn the wheel about 80% to the left or right before I start to rub. But its not a problem at all doing regular driving.