When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
Went to go play in the snow, only to find my rear brake line sploded all over. Sad day, so I ordered some crown extended lines from quadratec. I almost have all the goodies to begin the rear bumper and drop down tire carrier. It will be something a little different than others have done, so I hope it works. Stay tuned.
Decided to get a little dirty last night and start on the fabrication of the main beams of the rear cut and fold bumper. That's basically done minus the bracket to beam 2x3. 2x5 box steel, apparently is hard to find in a steel yard. I found these two scrap pieces and got them for scrap price for 37 bucks.
The idea of this bumper is to match the design of the Nates 4x4 long version as a cut and fold rear bumper, which will also have a tire carrier. (that part comes a little later)
Got a little more done on the rear bumper. Removed hitch and cleaned it off and cut out some rusty spots and will be welding it back and reinforcing the patches. I got the holes notched out for for the rail tie ins, but I need to open them up a bit more so the plates are flush to the cross member.
Not a whole lot accomplished this week so far. I was able to get the rear inner tie ins to fit in the holes, and I begin patching my old hitch. Against my better judgement after the 2 big patches and began a smaller one, I realized that whole length was pretty well rotten. I filler welded where I could and slid some 1/8th" High carbon box steel (none hot rolled) in there and welded it to the end of the cross beams. Ready for paint now, and hope for the best, had I had the correct size box steel I would think it would have been easier just to cut the plates off and start over. It's much stronger than it was, but probably not as strong as when it was new. I picked up some brushes today and plan on dipping it in POR-15.
Small update. I got the hitch painted and complete. I also installed the swing down tire carrier brackets installed. I got the channels cleaned and read for paint for the tie ins, and will assembling some of the rear some time this week. I bought all the stuff for the rear main seal replacement, including oil pump and pick up tube. I also ordered new transmission and motor mounts. Brakes are still a bust, my buddy came back with the new line made up, but we used the wrong size on the abs pump so we had to pull the old one off the jeep to match it up. The struggle continues...
-add another update. I bartered with a another friend to get a stock, but brand new moog track bar, and we got that installed last night as well. I also managed to break off a shock at some point and began that repair, but as usual the shock bolts broke off, so I'll be making a quick and dirty bar pin bracket at some point this week. The water pump is still broken, and will be changing that out soon.
This month's word is : Struggle. Some updates. We finally got the brakes brought back to life after replacing all the hoses with the blue Crown ones above. Mike helped and had a guy at his work make up a new steel line to the abs pump for the driver side and after a few days of soaking a struggling with the passenger side front line (lines haven't been removed since this jeep was built in '93) I broke her free. After a good long gravity bleed and a 3 pass manual bleed we finally have some tension in the brake system after about 2 quarts of brake fluid. The floor is soaked in brake blood, but we have brakes again. The hitch install with the nates 4x4 tie ins and JCR nut stips didn't go as planned. One of the nutserts ended up breaking free so we ditched it for the hardware the tie ins came with. The hitch is hung, but not mounted fully yet, and I may still have to removed the driver side jcr nut strip, but finally something is working...Once the hitch is on the bumper fab will continue, and water pump will be installed soon.
Update on Bumper build. Looks like I'll need to trim the holes in the main beam as it's not lining up with the side pieces. I got the real stiffeners in and bolts down with 10 bolts plus 2 on the shackle brackets. Hopefully I'll have it roughed in by the weekend.
So after tweaking and grinding and cutting and ratchet strapping, and clamping I finally stuck the 3 pieces together using about 90 amps and 7018 rod. I brushed off the welds and knocked the rust off the beams.
01-11-2017, 10:55 AM
