01 ton TJ

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 01:49 PM

Starting the thread a little ways into the build. Honestly I never thought this build would take even close to this long. Hopefully this thing will be trail worthy again by September.

Been wheeling my 2001 TJ for years in modified stock form (HP30/LP44 w/ arbs, alloys, ctms, 231 jb ss sye, HD steering, short arms, etc etc on beadlocked 35's). Here's a __link__ to where it was prior to this current build. As it was the jeep was reliable and did pretty well.

Ultimately though I wanted deeper crawl without going to an auto. So I started dreaming of the deep 10:1 4spd atlas. The atlas would kill my hp30 and lp44 though so bigger better axles would be needed. Solid makes a mean HP60 but that meant taller tires to clear the big pumpkins, taller tires needed a longer wheelbase, and so and so on...

Biggest problem has been that my build started based on the 10:1 4 speed atlas and I did order one in early October. 205 days later, I had the misfortune of calling and asking AA how things were going (you see their gear cutter that did the 3.8 cogs for AA had died that fall and up until then they had not been able to reproduce his work with any quality). So I asked AA on May 6th (IRC the guy's name was Brandon] "Hey hows the new in house gear cutting going and have you guys been able to start shipping t-cases yet?" he replied "If you had ordered a case direct from us [instead of through an authorized AA dealer], you'd know the answer to that." Needless to say the conversation went downhill from there and I ended up cancelling my order with AA and ordered a stak 5.44 3 speed case on May 7th (which should be here any day). Other than that fiasco, the build has followed along well with my initial ideas.

Ok so onto the actual build up...

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 01:52 PM

First thing to get into was to make room in the back. I went with Genright's competition stretch kit (14 gallon tank, comp cut corners, and extended rockers).

Measuring from the edge of my psc cover guard on my 44 to the edge of the tank I have 8" clearance. Looks like a 6" stretch with a d60 should be no problem. I lengthened my lines but I think with some creativity I could have kept the factory ones.

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 01:54 PM

Yanked the rear 44 and started prepping the tub. My tub's been through a lot over the last 6 years and so this became more than just removing all the PSC armor and bolting on Genright's comp cut corners and extended rocker guards. I ended up welding everything together and into the tub (comp corners and rocker guards) as well as bolting things on. I also welded the rocker guards to the front tube fenders. This should really reinforce the tub.

Rolled a 35 in there just to see how it looked

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 01:56 PM

Welding plate to sheet metal makes me nervous so I didnt remember to take too many pics before primering. Here are the only ones I remembered.

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 01:59 PM

The awesome folks at Those Guys Rod and Customs.com/ bent up some tube flares for me to my specs.

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 02:00 PM

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 02:03 PM

The rockers and corners from genright move the wheel opening backwards 4" which should look really nice. The rockers however were too long to work with my Poison spyder front tube fenders so I needed to trim the rockers back on the side 3.5" to clear the flares.

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 02:06 PM

Northridge4x4 hooked me up with a killer deal on a set of

Passing time till the rear axle showed up I rolled a 39 in back to see how it compared to the front 35. Looks like a good fit so far.

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 02:11 PM

The rear solid hp60: 64"wms, 5.38s, arb, custom alloy shafts, discs, full float with drive flanges.

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 02:15 PM

I'm going with Claytons long arms and their dual triangulated rear so the track bar gets to go away.

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 02:18 PM

The Clayton's use a rear crossmember and the original control arm mounts are not needed. I cut out the LCA brackets but thus far have been too lazy to worry about the UCA brackets. The UCA brackets havent gotten in my way just yet.

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 02:22 PM

Taking a break from the underbelly I went and played with these.

Previously I had flushmounted LEDs but with the comp cut there just isnt as much metal left and I was hesitant to cut any more metal out just to have a little better clearance. Northridge came through again with the trick. I will need to go back and tweak their alignment but for now they work.

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 02:27 PM

Again Northridge4x4 come through for me (David is the best btw) with these trick 17" Walker Evans beadlocks.

I used airsofts to balance (6oz irc).

JIA · 07-27-2008, 02:32 PM

What's the new wheelbase going to be with those 39s?

cmoore · 07-27-2008, 02:34 PM

Dropped the t-case skid. Guess I didnt do all that great of a job cleaning my rig since its last time out.

Pulled the now obsolete 231. This tcase will be raffled off at PNWJeep's M&G this September. THe case has 44K original miles on it and maybe 8k since it was pulled apart for the JB Supershort Slip yoke eliminator.

Just for fun I put the new Clayton skid up to see how it'd fit. Overall I like the fit of it and with the 39's the lowest point of the skid is still 21" off the ground (the rig at ride height will have 24" from belly frame rail to the ground).