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1979 CJ5 Build (Tank Killer)

220K views 1K replies 93 participants last post by  boarderofsnow 
#1 ·
Here is the step by step process so far of my 1979 CJ5 Build. It has been quite the long drawn out process. There is no method to my madness and I have learned al ot over the build so far. I still have many different mods coming for my rig.

I feel that we as Jeepers have a lot of knowledge and sometimes that information gets squandered. So I want to give some light to other who are looking to build CJ's with what I have accomplished on my rig.

Believe me this is a budget build and there were many different avenues I could have taken but the money wasn't there at times and I needed to make the best with the funds I had.

Feel free to ask any questions and I will do my best to provide any information I have available. The 4x4 Jeeping community is one of the best experiences I have ever had. I just want to give back to all those who have helped me going forward with my build.

Enjoy
 
#30 ·
A little patience and a whole lot of taping by Nathan, Mallory, and me and we were ready for primer and paint. The original blue had to go in my mind so I went with a Fire Engine Red.
 

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#31 ·
Now 10 cans of Krylon later and a whole lot of razor blading tape and clear coat and the final product came out as well as you could expect for spray paint.
 

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#32 ·
A new bushing kit was needed for disco'ing the swaybar and a new steering stabalizer was dropped in. This was the biggest difference maker in highway drivability. If you remeber before I sated that she didn't handle the best on the highway. Lots of play in the steering and would get jerky over bumps. This addition helped the most.
 

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#34 ·
I think you did a fantastic job on the your CJ5 build considering that you were working with what you had. Chevy 307, T350/NP208...SOA.

Just my opinion and not a criticism, but consider replacing the 2" spacers with Crabtree's shackle hangers, cutting the rear fenders for TJ flares and building tube fenders for the front. Dropping it a few inches and maintaining your tire clearance for what look like 35's will help your on road ride.

The factory exhaust exits under the tub corner to send the exhaust out away from the tub, re-routing the outlets will probably solve most of your problem.

Again...great job :thumbsup:

 
#36 ·
I think you did a fantastic job on the your CJ5 build considering that you were working with what you had. Chevy 307, T350/NP208...SOA.

Just my opinion and not a criticism, but consider replacing the 2" spacers with Crabtree's shackle hangers, cutting the rear fenders for TJ flares and building tube fenders for the front. Dropping it a few inches and maintaining your tire clearance for what look like 35's will help your on road ride.

The factory exhaust exits under the tub corner to send the exhaust out away from the tub, re-routing the outlets will probably solve most of your problem.

Again...great job :thumbsup:
Already a step ahead of you on that stuff but I am about 2 years behind on this compared to where my rig sits now. Still a lot more to come on this thread. Thanks for the great advice!
 
#38 ·
@ Stube - Any tips or advice I can give or pictures I can provide I would love to contribute. There is so much great advice out there. The problem I have always found is that the advice can be counter active to others advice. This is just the way of the beast though. Take any information into consideration and then make your best judgement call from there.
 
#40 ·
Well right before we left for Big Dogs in Sept of 08 I recieved my licence plate and the rig got its name. I'll give you a little bit of background on me. I worked on A-10 Warthogs as a Crew Chief in the United Sates Air Force for 6 years. The Warthog was always something I will continue to hold as a great part of my life. So it was only fitting that the rig get the name TANK KILLER.

Also one of the only redeming thing about Maryland is you can register your CJ as historic and not have to worry about a vehicle inspection.....:)
 

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#41 ·
So we headed off to Big Dogs for Septembers Main Jambo. Here are some pics of the first day of wheeling.

If any of you are familiar with Big Dogs you know the trail pinicle. Coming down off this trail I drove through a stump and blew out my side wall on the passenger rear tire.

Lesson #?

Always bring your wheel lock with you if you run locking lugs on your tires. Funny story. I had wanted to bring my tool box but my buddy ensured me he had all the tools needed for the trip in his rig. So I left my tools at home....(2 hours drive away) with my wheel lock in my tool box. Not good!

Luckily a rig comes along that many of you may recognize from Top Truck Competition. (I'm rig dropping LOL) He was nice enough to stop and help me remove my wheel locks without the key. Won't go into any details but if its happened to you, you have to get creative.

Enjoy!
 

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#42 ·
Also I learned a lot this wheeling trip on how my rig handles. I know its looked down on to turn a rig thats standard into an automatic but it really helps on the trails. The only problem with mine is I'm running 3.54 gears with a 7 1/2in lift and 35in tires. Not smart. I have been lucky enough not to roll it and count my blessings. Here are some more pics of wheeling Big Dogs.
 

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#43 ·
Now here is an instance that as mentioned above with high gears and large tires I was lucky to come out of and won't do again until the gears have been swapped. I rode the brakes all the way down and about half way down went into a slide.....not fun. Most Jeepers will tell you that on down hill climbs you rely on your gears perferibly 1st gear to get you down the hill and try and stay off the brakes. I don't have the luxory in this current set up so the fix is to stay away from steap hill climbs. The pictures of course don't do it justice but if any of you know Big Dogs you'll recognize this drop in right before the entrance to trickle.
 

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#44 ·
On the last day the temperature was too much for the Tank Killer and despite me trying to be easy she vapor locked from over heating. Here is a picture as it happened. We formed a club and wanted to take pictures together. Everyone had to push my Jeep into place.....funny now looking back.
 

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#45 ·
Going home that weekend the Tank Killer was back firing and stuttering any time I gave it gas. I was extremely frustrated when I got home and covered her up for the winter. I didn't start her again until the spring. I wanted to invest in a fix for the over heating so here is what I came up with.

I did the research and there were a few options that I looked into. One was an aluminum racing radiator that ran on average $500 to $600 bucks. The other avenue was an aftermarket electric fan. I had used one on another vehicle in the past and it didn't go well. It incorporated plastic pucture rods that held the fan to the radiator. These had to be pushed through the walls of the radiator and after a few bounces down a back road the radiator was leaking from the holes. I didn't want to go down this road with the next electric fan.

I found a dual electric fan for the radiator for CJs it was external mounted and I think ran me $320 bucks. It was a great investment but has been a learning curve. When I recieved it I chose not to include the thermostat that would turn it on automatically. I wanted to have it run through a switch I could use on the trail. Turn the Jeep off and keep the fan running if need be. This created a few problems that we will get to. First you can see the fan and its addition to the Tank Killer.
 

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#46 ·
The next area I wanted to work on was the area I mentioned above which was how the vehicle was running. It would back fire and was sluggish. No real reaction from the gas pedal but ran fine at idle. I took it to a mechanic because I have never had the greatest luck trying to tune an engine. After a few hours I got a call stating that the reason the rig was struggling was because it was a points distributer and these being something from the era of the motor needed to be tuned on average every 10,000 miles. My mechanic suggested I put an electronic distributer and I took his advice. This up grade cost me about $300 in parts. Here is the pics of old to new.
 

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#47 ·
The next trip to Big Dogs was much better. There were only a few areas that the Tank Killer still couldn't perform. It couldn't handle verticle climbs because of the carb and for some reason strated dieing out and wouldn't start. We had a battery jumper with us on the trail and were able to keep it running most of the time. We set the idle high to try and counter act the verticle areas where the carb would start to get flooded out. Here are some pics of the trip.

Also this was our first real event as a club. We decided to name the club Country Boy Crawlers. If anyone is in the Maryland area check us out.

https://www.facebook.com/#!/CountryBoyCrawlers
 

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#48 ·
Well some great things came out of this trip. I won two raffles and recieved a pair of BestTop Seats and a Warm 8000lbs winch. Great Day!
 

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#53 ·
Yes it was. I was just talking to some friends about my spiritual beliefs and pow my name was called. The Lord was looking out for me that day. Awesome testiment!
 
#50 ·
Well I have had a full size set of axles that came out of a 72 Jimmy that I was wanting to drop in eventually. A 12 bolt for the rear and a Dana 44 for the front. With everything I read on there was a full size axle kit offered by Blue Torch Fab (BTF) that would move your front brackets outside the frame and turn into a reverse shackle set up. I went with this set up and wanted to incorporate a stinger hoop, grill hoop, and winch plate. The total amount was right around $1000. Here is what came next.

The front BTF bumper full width kit bumper with stinger hoop.

Primed.

Painted.

Installed with winch and grill hoop. Came out pretty clean.
 

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#51 ·
Now the area we worked on next was my dieing battery. I knew cetain things in the rig were not working right electrically. The problem was we did the Painless Wire Harness too quickly and left a few loose ends. The other part that I mentioned was the the grounds. I went back and did individual grounds inside the fire wall to each of my electrical components. I scraped the paint away from each grounding point and used metal bolts, washers, and nuts. I then went and any electrical contact I had with a butt conector got removed and replaced with the heat shrink soder conectors. This was a pain stakingly long process. Mallory will tell you the two 14 hour days spent trouble shooting.

I then went and purchased a new batttery. I had heard nothing but good things about the Yellow Tops and wanted an area to mount the winch to. Here is the battery. I picked up for $200....OUCH Optima OUCH!
 

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#52 ·
Well a few days later I came out and the Jeep wouldn't start. I knew that something had to be wrong after I had been driving it around locally the lst couple of days. Sure enough the culprit was my new electric fan. It seems my stock distributer couldn't handle the juice that the electric fan was pulling. Steady 40 watts. The battery wasn't charging until I got up to about 3000 rpms. So it was time to purchase a new alternator.

I also got rid of the Yellow top at this point and got $100 bucks back with the purchase of a new cold cranking battery with front inputs for the winch.

I invested in a 140 amp Power Master alternator. Another $200 dollar purchase. Here are the before and afters.
 

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#54 ·
So with all of this I finally solved my electrical problem but I still shorted out 1 cd player and a cb from water getting in from the windshield area and AC vents. Here was the fix.

I pulled the CD player and CB out from under the dash. We fabricated a over head console that hold the CD Player and CB that attaches from the sport bar to the windshield. I will upload a pic of that later cause I can't seem to find it.

I also removed the AC and Heater system and patched the firewall from the inside, primed, and bed linered that motha up!
 

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#55 ·
I also patched the top of the AC vent on the hood and patched the inside AC vents from under the windshield. Withe the hood vent I just placed the black trim vent cover over the top of the patch and you really can't tell a difference until up close. I did this with sheet metal and 3m Body sealer. I also went and use the body sealer on the windshield and filled any holes I could as well as the long gasket that sits in between the windshield and frame. That stuff is no joke! Enjoy.
 

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#56 ·
Next I went and invested (or tossed money away, your choice) in an off road carb kit for my 4 barrel Edelbrock carb. This is a specialty item and isn't expensive. $14 bucks maybe. Well after I finished the kit I wanted to take the Jeep off road and see how she handled vertically with the new addition.

Lesson number 8
Bad things happen when your in a hurry and short on time.

We went out to a local area neither me or my buddy were familiar with. Didn't bother to tell anyone where we were going. Took one rig and no tools. You can already see where this is going if your a Jeeper. Well we got out on a power line trail and found a good hill covered in brush. My buddy was in a hurry to get to work so rather than get out and walk it first I powered up the hill.

Four large dug out tire holes were in my path covered with brush. I slammed into the first hole and it kicked the Jeep out and over to the right. A loud bang and a whole lot of thunking and I was rolling back down the hill. I broke a strap on the yoke of my rear drive line from the crash and the thunking was my drive line slapping on my mufflers.

The 2 hours it took us to limp back to the road, phone call to a buddy to bring tools and limped home in front wheel drive. Here was the damage.

A broken CV that was grinding on rotation and a damaged yoke. I also punctured a hole in my muffler. A quick trip turned into $300 dollars real quick! Lessoned learned is always walk it first or have a spotter on your up hill and down hill climbs!
 

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#57 ·
The next thing I wanted to purchase and work on was a roll cage. Since we had purchased a 120 Miller Welder I wanted to put it to good use. The bumper was the first part but the roll cage tested our skills with welding and fab'ing. I purchase a normal weld in cage kit that attaches to the original sport bar. I also wanted to add stability so I did a dash bar and two reinforcements bars across the driver and passengers heads. The last step was footing to be bolted into the floor and hand holds. Here is how it went.
 

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#72 ·
Your cage came out great, and I would like to do the same with our 5. Can you give details about where you bought the kit? Parts? etc?? Thanks.
 
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