Look what decided to finally show up.






I wish I had more time to pu them on but first a healthy coat of primer than fitment and then I will give them a coat of paint and finally install. Man these things are sick. I had a really hard tiem deciding to order them rather than make some but I'm glad I orderred these up. I am convinced I could not make ones half as good for half the money.

 

Quick update. Shock relocation + repurpesed sway bar link/bar pin eliminators = bottoming out shocks. Flexed mesured needed a 14"ish colapsed shock in the rear stock JK's still do the trick, just need to keep th bar pins. oh well live and learn. Sliders are primed, just need to mock them up and drill so I can slather them in pretty paint to rub off on rocks out in the woods. hopefully more posts and pics soon.

 

Its fathers day! Been tough on the jeep front lately its just been doing its daily driver dutys and the 13mpg and constant issues were getting old. I finally caught up with some Jeeping friends and got the Jeep lovin feeling. I came home and streached out a awesome flex on my favorite rock in the drive way and the warm fuzzys are back. Anyway like I said its fathers day and the wife asked me what I wanted to do with my day and I've only been staring at these *****in sliders for over a month so it was time to install. All I can say is make sure you have a good drill and some sharp drill bits. I still have a little tweaking to do and a couple more holes to drill but these things are a work of art.

 

front ends been feeling sloppy and been wearing out front tires faster than I expected. Thought I had bad ball joints turned out the drag link and inner tire rod are spanked and the tie rod end of my track bar is wasted. Starting to look for steering and trac-bar options. Not sure if I want to get a 1 ton setup or hiems or what guess I will figure it out.

 

Ordered up this



and this




and this




From BLee offroad. I like it because it looks solid, its rebuildable, and with a little fab work can be run over the knuckle. Hope to see it for the weekend.

I have to throw some Props out there to BLee offroad for getting back to me about my track bar concerns and to JCR for reaching out to me out of the blue to ask how I like the sliders. Great customer service and I hope great products for my Jeep for years to come. Thanks guys

 

Sweet another delivery



In typical me fashion all parts must be inspected with good beer.



I very surprised by the quality and fit and finish of the RE tracbar and mount. Definitely a nice piece. The steering setup from B Lee is BEEF. I got the HD setup with the 1/4 inch wall tubing, I should've known is was going to be that heavy but it did catch me off guard when I went to pick up the box. The threaded inserts are nice and deep and welded well. I am very happy to say steering will not be my weakest link, you could probably jack up the front of your jeep by the tie rod with this thing on. These heims are huge.






Anyway, I had some time in the garage tonight and decided to dive into the tracbar install. Removing that not so much of a score clapped out terraflex piece was a PITA. No flag nut and a bolt that was way to long made removing the axle side interesting. so not only was the tie rod end giving me some wiggles and pops the rubber end was getting squashy too.



the RE1660 went in pretty smooth. Its nice to have some steering response back. I got a real good fle going on my favorite rock but it was to dark for pics. I was pleased that I had plenty of room at the diff side at full stuff.

 

Hey man just read through here and I like what I see. The jeep looks great, I like the direction you went. Those wheelin pics and videos are cool too.

 

Thanks man, hopefully more wheeling to come and with any luck the steering will be in tonight. Stay tuned.

 

Steering is in. Not a hard install at all. Drilling out the knuckles and pitman was easy not nearly as much material as I thought to drill out to 5/8.





I'm happy to have a solid steering system with no slop that doesn't flex or pop. But I do have my concerns.

First the tie rod does hit the tracbar bolt at full lock. It doesn't seem to limit steering sweep but I will have more updates as I drive it more and get out an wheel this thing.



Second on my quick test drive I did catch a bump at 40ish MPH in a corner and got I little wobble that went away as fast as it came. More miles and time will tell if I've opened another can of worms I guess.

glam shots









Here's the arms at flex.

 

Drove it to work this morning and ran it down the highway for kicks. Huge improvement over stock feels much more responsive and stable at high speeds. Still haven't had any bump steer issues and I've gotten close to catching air, could be that at around 4" of lift the drag link is pretty flat. Happier today than I was with it yesterday. Might try tightening up the steering box a touch. If I can manage to sell some crap maybe adjustable control arms and uca bushings will get rid of all the clunckies, oops not possible its and XJ

 

Well you may have seen a post a few pages back about me having a Ford 9" rear. Well I paid $100 for it like five years ago and never did anything with it so, I traded it for a set of adjustable control arms, a steering box brace and spare set of dana30 axle shafts. As usual here's a bunch of pics.









as you may have noticed, got me a set of teraflex monster lowers and some no name uppers with flex joints. I took a little time tonight and cleaned up the uppers. Can anybody ID these?



the flex joints are kind of beat but went together with no slop, but can be moved around by hand with a bit of effort. This was the worse of the two sides for wear.







Sorry thought I got a pic of the ball too but i must have forgot. Nothing to eventfull mostly clean just a bit pitted down the middle. Next will be the felx ends on the LCA's. One is a bit sloppy and the other seems to be frozen and had a broken zerk fitting. I'm hoping I can get away with just doing new cups, but I guess I will have to open them up and find out. Cant wait to get these bad larrys on, were going to start with a 1/2 inch stretch based on the control arm length grids I've found here on the forum

 

pulled apart the lowers over the weekend. both flex joints were totally shot, one rusted inside and the other all flerpy and full of dirty grease. ive ordered up metal cloak flex joint replacements that should be coming in soon and scooped up a few things at the napa. more pics and good stuff coming.

 

my sixth sense for torched U-joints is both a wonderful and annoying thing. another on bites the dust. hopefully the metalcloak flex joint will be delivered tomorrow

 

Got the control arms in today. The ride is AWESOME! its like a whole different Jeep. Its noticeably smoother on and off road and no more terrible clunking noises. Here is a pic of the lowers after I installed the metalcloak flex joints. No pics of the joints themselfves but they arent much to look at.


and as promised a 1" stretch


this is what the tire looked like in the wheel well at before.


and after


was hoping to do some wheeling tomorrow but I cant get anybody to play with me.

 

All these new parts and everything was awesome for the first couple rides but I now have a wicked pop! turning at slow speeds. I put a steering box brace in it last night made a difference in responsiveness but the popping is still there. You can feel it through the floor board. Going to loosen and retighten the track bar mount first. then on to checking the steering box and spacer. hopefully is something stupid and not a roached steering box or cracked frame.