2005 LJ

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Roman
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby Roman » Thu Jan 18, 2024 8:54 pm

So apparently the LJ isn't for the youngest minion anymore?

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tobyw
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Fri Jan 19, 2024 7:29 am

Roman wrote:So apparently the LJ isn't for the youngest minion anymore?


Well, truth be told, it never really was... she laid claim to it the moment she saw it and in a moment of weakness my response just wasn't emphatic enough to keep her from thinking as much. Further, because of the bevvy of other junk at my disposal, I initially saw no harm in keeping things tame so that she could in fact drive it from time to time. Fast forward a couple years and she's got a dedicated car of her own and my ADD just won't allow me to leave things alone :lol2
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Sun Jan 21, 2024 6:32 am

With the front fenders loosely relocated 3-1/4" up and the hood trimmed accordingly, it was time to address getting the rear fenders to match. This seemed simple, right up until I realized that the evap canister is hiding in the cavity behind the passenger rear tire...

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After some disassembly and a little ciphering, a plan was devised to modify the existing mounting shelf and simply push the canister back about 2":

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That looks better:

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I finished it up by making a splash shield out of an old plastic "mud flap" that was laying on the bench:

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The driver side was much less dramatic, only requiring a decision on how to handle the interference between the raised flare and the fuel filler. My decision was to modify the filler rather than the flare simply because replacement fillers are a whole lot less expensive if something went horribly wrong during surgery:

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Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Sun Jan 21, 2024 7:00 am

Now that all of the body modifications were complete, it was time to address finding new homes for everything that was displaced underhood. These include the battery, fuse block, air cleaner, horn, evap purge solenoid, and the wiper fluid reservoir... Oh, and in my case the ARB compressor that I had stuffed beside the brake booster.
Sheesh :?

The fender mounting bracket(s) were modified by simply cutting them in half and raising the section that engages the fender by 3-1/4". This gave me a relocated battery tray on the passenger side, and a relocated ABS tray on the driver side so I could salvage my ARB mount:

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With the battery on location I removed the fuse block from it's original mounting bracket and simply bolted it directly to the fender:

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Here is where my heart truly broke on this entire endeavor... there is simply no headspace for the factory airbox assembly, so I spent almost 2 hours at the U-Pull yard scouring all manner of vehicles for an OEM intake setup that might work. What I brought home, sadly, ended up not meeting my expectations so I had to do the unthinkable and head to the boy racer aisle at the O'Napzone and pick up a conical open element filter :deg

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The purge solenoid bracket was lightly modified and relocated, and the horn mercifully fit back in it's original location by simply rotating the head to reroute the wiring harness for hood clearance. What I haven't yet addressed is the fluid washer bottle, and while I picked up a small universal jug that will serve the purpose, I will need to make a bracket to mount it and I just didn't have the desire to do that today :|

The last item to address was how to keep the hood shut now that the latches aren't there anymore. I chose to go with hood pins:

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At this point, I had drawn many units of Unicorn blood and I was tired of doing so... The list was double czeked and everything seemed to have been addressed, so it was time to pull it out of the shop and really see what happened. Clearly this is just the beginning of the story here, as the axles and steering will need some attention to make things survive, but for now we have a drivable LJ on 39's:

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8)
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Roman
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby Roman » Sun Jan 21, 2024 1:34 pm


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TJDave
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby TJDave » Sun Jan 21, 2024 5:06 pm

Simply. Awesome.
I look forward to every one of your posts/mods/fabrications. Thank you for sharing. :thu:
2018 JLU Rubicon
Tow bar mount
Trailer hitch

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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby Roman » Sun Jan 21, 2024 6:23 pm

LOL, most of my MODS these days is just to keep my junk on the road...

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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby Roman » Sun Jan 21, 2024 6:25 pm

When I saw your pic of the PCM I instinctively went to WF website!

I fought the orange Jeep for a long time before finally coughing up the dough for their PCM

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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Jan 22, 2024 8:00 am

TJDave wrote:Simply. Awesome.
I look forward to every one of your posts/mods/fabrications. Thank you for sharing. :thu:


Appreciate the kind words Dave. I hope to have more coming...
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Jan 22, 2024 8:02 am

Roman wrote:When I saw your pic of the PCM I instinctively went to WF website!

I fought the orange Jeep for a long time before finally coughing up the dough for their PCM


Thankfully I have no indication of any PCM issues at this point... :fear
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Jan 22, 2024 5:42 pm

Spent a couple minutes with the forklift to czek clearance, and I'm cautiously optimistic based on what I saw:

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:thu:
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Jan 29, 2024 8:22 am

To add switches to control things like auxiliary lights and the ARB compressor, I wanted to come up with something overhead because I simply love the "upfitter switches" offered by FoMoCo in their pickups and the 6G Bronco. After some research and mockup, I landed on a sweet little housing/bracket setup that I found on Etsy ( :oops: ) that mounts directly to the rollcage and allows the switches to be oriented exactly how I wanted them:

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To power the auxiliary equipment, I picked up an inexpensive (but waterproof 8) ) relay panel from Amazon, fab'd up a quick mount bracket, and landed it on some free space on the passenger fender where the airbox used to live:

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Success!!

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:thu:
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Feb 05, 2024 9:43 am

Good, bad, or otherwise the LJ isn't chalk full of creature comforts like the newer model Jeeps, and one thing I have grown to enjoy is wireless Carplay for running onX Maps on the big screen. To address the issue, I picked up a cheap head unit from Amazon along with a double DIN installation kit for the TJ/LJ dash:

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I'm still noodling on ideas for mounting a backup camera, but I pre-routed all of the wiring and have it tucked away and ready to simply plug in when I come up with a game plan...
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Feb 26, 2024 3:27 pm

I finally got around to fabricating a little bracket to mount a reverse camera, and at the same time relocate the license plate. It's just ridiculous how long that silly little things like this can take :roll:

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Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Feb 26, 2024 4:03 pm

The 39's are a big tire, at least for the TJ platform... That said, for my use case, I have little concern with the durability of the Dana 44 rear axle, particularly with the addition of some chromoly shafts and a full-replacement carrier such as a Detroit locker. With that in mind, my attention turnt to the front axle, the lowly Dana 30... Now, I fully understand the limitations therein, but I also respect them. That is to say, I'm not much of a driver, but I do my best to not be abusive and I'm not too proud to take a rope or winch line. So, in what may amount to the worlds shortest, and dumbest, experiment, I'm going to see just how far I can push a polished turd(y) :lol2

The factory Dana 30 in the LJ is of a low pinion design, which technically runs on the weak side of the ring gear. Simple solution here is to find and run a Dana 30 found in pre-99 XJ's, which are high pinion. This will do a couple of nice things for me: improve the strength of the R&P interface; and provide a better front driveline angle. So, step one was to find such a beast. Czek:

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After stripping it down and starting to clean it up, I found some damage to the passenger LCA bracket that will necessitate some surgery. No big deal, as some added beef in the LCA brackets won't hurt my feeling anyway:

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With the axle stripped down, I took a few minutes to fire up the CAD machine and develop a truss:

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The other big detriment with larger tires on the LJ is the brakes. They were pretty awful in stock form, but add a few pounds of armor and rollcage into the mix, topped off with 39's, and it's downright sketchy if you have to stop in any sort of a hurry. To address this, I sourced a pair of knuckles from a 2002 Grand Cherokee WJ, which will allow me to run the 1" diameter larger WJ rotors and dual piston calipers. Additionally, these knuckles have provisions for true crossover style steering to eliminate the factory inverted 'Y' arrangement. The first step in getting these to work is to glue on some 1/4" spacers to properly index the unit bearings, as the WJ uses an odd length, compact CV axle assembly and in order to use normal shafts, you have to push the unit bearing away from the knuckle so the steering axis lines up properly. Since the knuckles and the spacers are of different caliber base materials, some pre and post-heat treatment are in order:

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Smells delicious :lol2 After post heating (read: s-l-o-w cooling), I was happy to find no cracks around the weldment areas so I think we are good to press on with this operation:

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Next up will be replacing the LCA mounts, welding out the truss on the axle housing, and then mocking up the brakes and axle shafts to ensure everything is happy. Once that's done, it'll be onto gears and then swapping it into place under the Jeep... :thu:
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Tue Sep 03, 2024 9:26 am

Plans change... Particularly around the Wilcox Ranch... When the boy's Dana 35 catastrophically $h!t the bed on the Rubicon a while back, we were immediately on the hunt for a new rear axle for his XJ. The go-to options of a factory 29-spline Chrysler 8.25, a FoMoCo 8.8, or a unicorn XJ D44 were all on the table but honestly we weren't having much luck finding any of them for a reasonable sum, particularly when factoring in the need for a traction device.

At the same time, knowing I was neck-deep in the axle build for the LJ which would ultimately include things like chromoly shafts, gears, and lockers, the overall budget was quickly ballooning. As luck would have it, an option popped up for sale that would kill many birds with a single stone:

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What we have here is a pair of JK Rubicon axles with 90k miles, RPM aluminum steering links and 1-ton joints, FOX stabilizer, Currie Rock Jock track bar relocation brackets, and Powerstop drilled/slotted rotors and performance pads. For the price of this pair of axles, I couldn't even try to finish building the HP30/D44, and at the end of the day the overall strength of the JK axles would probably supersede even the biggest of upgrades on the old HP30/D44 given the new generation Dana 44's with higher spline counts, larger bearings, etc etc. So the plan now is to use these axles in the LJ, and the boy can have the LJ's rear D44 for his XJ. This will give him all of the rear axle strength he needs, rear disk brakes, and slightly better gearing (3.73 vs. 3.54). In time we may finish the build on the HP30 and swap that into his XJ and go to something like 4.56's all around, but that is tomorrow's problem :roll:

First order of business was to drop the D30 and mock up the JK44:

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To no-one's surprise, the test fit didn't exactly go well... the UCA and LCA mounts on the axle are setup for different geometry than a TJ, and the track bar bracket location is also way off from what might just bolt-up. Lastly, the coil mounting pads are in different locations both North-South and East-West, so at the end of the day there is no question that substantial work is going to be required to make this swap happen properly. This is going to get interesting :?
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Sat Sep 14, 2024 5:58 am

Spent a few minutes with the metal eraser and got the factory brackets off the front JK axle:

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As has been very well established, I am chronically cheap so I'm going to do my best to salvage and reuse the coil pads and LCA brackets. I may look into adding some doubler plates to the LCA brackets once I get far enough along in the process, but some quick cleanup should at least allow me to get them tacked back on the axle in their new home locations for the next round of mockup :thu:
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Nov 18, 2024 4:08 pm

Continuing with the cheap theory, and knowing where I stood on the front axle swap, I turnt my attention to the rear axle. For whatever reason, in my head, the rear axle should be a comparative no-brainer and as such, be much less expensive to swap. Well, as it turns out, if you are in the market for a swap kit you need to prepare yourself for bad news because the rear axle swap trusses are nearly double the price of the comparable front units, and that's true from the majority of the typical players in the industry such as Artec, Barnes, TnT, Ruff Stuff, etc etc etc. Adding insult to injury, these rear swap trusses have linear feet of welding that needs done, and the chances of bending a housing from all of that heat are pretty good if you are not very patient; and let's just clear the air here and let it be known that I am not :roll:

So, what's a girl to do? Well, in reviewing the years of footage I've got stored in my pea brain, one of the best performing platforms I've ever had the pleasure of piloting was the XJ, with it's flexy and compliant coils up front and long, supple leaves out back... Given the propensity of the TJ/LJ platform to wallow about, one fix is to outboard the rear shocks to combat the wallowing effect; but what if we get rid of what makes it wallow about in the first place... Yep, I'm talking about rear leaf springs 8)

The first step was to remove all of the offending rear linkage stuff and get ready to hang a leaf spring instead:

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The downfall to rear leaves is axle wrap, and to adequately combat that I'm going to run a spring-under arrangement. This gave me the opportunity to whip up some u-bolt eliminator style mounts to reduce low hanging fruit on the trail:

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In a hail Mary attempt to acheive both ride height and rate, I added a 3" add-a-leaf to an old XJ leaf pack that I had laying around. Again, cheap is my middle name :lol2

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And finally it was time for a mockup with the weight of the LJ on the leaves:

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While I can't say I'm mad at the stance, the unfortunate truth is that I lost exactly of 1" of static ride height, and that correlates directly to lost up-travel, which is already pretty limited with the 39's and comparatively small opening of the factory flares :cry:

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So, I'm going to be stuck looking to the aftermarket for a set of lift springs, which puts a damper on the whole budget theme. However, there are several reputable companies that offer leaves for the XJ platform, and the vast majority of them are still less expensive than a conversion truss, not to mention the bonus of not having to weld it all together and the potential for gaining some stability and predictability with the leaves... Overall, I'm pretty excited about the direction we are headed here :thu:
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Nov 25, 2024 10:46 am

After some debate on what spring height to go with, I landed on a pair of 4" lift spring packs that had good build characteristics for my use case: squeak-free rubber bushings; full-length second leaf for excellent support of the main leaf; bolt-style spring clamps rather than tightly wrapped sheetmetal clamps; and Teflon sliders between the leaves. I was initially nervous about the advertised light height when comparing them to my supposed 3" lift pack:

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However, after a quick mockup and some bouncing around on the rear bumper to get the new springs to settle even the slightest amount, I was very happy with the results 8) :

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The new springs netted me 1-1/4" of rear lift, which in the grand scheme of things is not upsetting and likely to diminish as the springs settle in with real world use. Further, adding a touch of height gains me some uptravel, which isn't a bad thing :thu:

With the springs ciphered, it was time to go about the business of making permanent connection points for the shackle end of the program. I didn't want to hang the shackles below the frame and instead wanted to run the bushing through the frame, simular to a factory YJ setup. Eyeballing the situation it looked like this was going to work out famously, but the only way to know for sure was to take the plunge. More Unicorn blood...

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I stepped back to take a look at what I'd done:

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:thu:

Having that monkey off my back left me feeling like a new woman, so I spent a few minutes mocking the front axle in place trying to reuse the JK brackets I had scarfed off, but placing them in the TJ locations:

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While this mockup was technically a success, it confirmed a few suspicions that I had regarding bracket placement. Specifically, the relationship between the coil perches and the track bar mount... The TJ uses an inverted-Y style steering while the JK uses a more traditional draglink and tie-rod, commonly referred to as high steer. The issue is that converting the TJ to this high steer arrangement means the track bar needs to be relocated accordingly to avoid bumpsteer, and to make it right the track bar bracket needs to be moved up higher on the axle and outboard toward the steering knuckle. However, moving it outboard means it would interfere with the coil spring perch... It's the proverbial 10lbs in a 5lb bag... So the ciphering continues on the front axle, but thankfully there is a turkey coma in my immediate future so maybe some good ideas will come my way through osmosis :lol2
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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tobyw
Posts: 1936
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Location: Under the hood...

Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Dec 16, 2024 12:51 pm

As much as I'd like to spend hours trying to carve up and dial in the factory JK brackets, the fact of the matter is they are paper thin and the whole locating process just takes a lot of time and mock-up effort. Additionally, the JKD44 is well known for having weak inner C's and thin axle tubes, both of which are typically combatted with truss and gusset systems... Good, bad or otherwise, the right answer to get the front axle properly located in a reasonable amount of time and within an even more reasonable budget was to use a conversion truss system. Thankfully this epiphany hit me just as I woke up to Black Friday deals flooding my email inbox, so after some shopping and research I settled on the truss system from Artec, along with their tidy 25% off sale. Another quick session with the grinder to finish cleaning up the front axle, and it was time to mock up the truss:

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The fitment of the Artec stuff is impressive, right down to how the ends of truss top plates are angled to match the sloped plane of the spring perches... It would have taken me days of trial and error to try and make my own truss setup that fits half this good :oops: All that's left to do now is add the booger welds.

With the plan for the front axle figured out, I also wanted to address the ability to keep the overall stance where I wanted it, and most importantly the attitude. I'm not a fan of having a really nose-high or nose-low look, my preference is dead level, and knowing the new rear leaves would likely change a bit over time I wanted to be able to adjust the front accordingly, without a lot of disassembly. The answer comes in the form of the Adjustable Coil Over System from JKS, which is essentially a threaded tube that slides over the factory bumpstop mount and has an adjustable collar that acts as the upper coil spring locating surface. Very simple, very effective:

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With the holidays here and a few other things going on, the project as a whole has sort of taken a secondary role in terms of priority. At this point, the list to get it back on the trail is daunting, but I'll keep plugging away over the next couple of months and hopefully have it ready for a springtime debut :thu:
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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tobyw
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Joined: Wed Mar 14, 2007 10:00 am
Location: Under the hood...

Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Dec 30, 2024 11:40 am

The aforementioned booger welds were added over the span of several hours to help mitigate any warping of the axle tubes, and the pumpkin itself was treated to pre and post-heating to avoid cracks. When it was over, I wrapped it all up in a welding blanket and let it sit overnight to cool as slowly as possible:

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With the majority of the brackets on location and at least heavily tacked in place, it was time for the next test fitting:

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Overall, not too bad... the coil towers line up nicely with the new axle pads and with the axle roughly eyeballed on center under the Jeep, the control arm joints are well positioned in the mounts and do not appear to be stressing the joints or the brackets. The shock mounts are going to require some finagling though, as my plan all along has been to repurpose some old Rubicon factory FOX shocks that I've had on the shelf for years... Similarly, the track bar is going to take some additional effort, as the factory mount is in the way of the larger D44 pumpkin at full compression, and to be honest I just don't like it all that much anyway so I'm going try and use a double-shear setup on the frame-end and do my best to match the angle and length of drag link. But let's be honest, I'm just a pharmer :oops:

Out back, the fuel tank crossmember wasn't playing nicely with my shackles during droop travel, so I whipped out the butter knife:

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Replacing the rear fuel tank mount will also allow me to raise the tank and push it back slightly for better clearance with the pumpkin. I now have unimpeded travel for the shackles and far more travel that my shocks will allow, but creative shock mounting could provide some additional droop over what was previously available:

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Onward :thu:
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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tobyw
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Jan 06, 2025 9:00 am

The JK front axle I bought came with a 1-ton steering upgrade kit from RPM (https://www.rpmsteering.com/steering-drag-links.html ) that incorporates a flip kit for the drag link. This keeps the drag link angle very shallow which is beneficial, but presented some challenges for me trying to package a proper track bar... The key to good front end geometry and bump steer characteristics is to have the drag link and track bar follow the same arc as the suspension cycles, and that means they need to be as similar as possible in angle and length. The ARTEC conversion truss kit came with an optional raised track bar mount that would indeed help me match the angle of the drag link, but it's placement on the axle itself left the track bar woefully short in comparison. I had already intended to convert the frame-end of the track bar to a double shear mount that is slightly outboard of the frame rail, gaining about 1-1/2" of track bar length, but that was still too short in comparison to the drag link to keep my eye from twitching... After many, MANY, mock-ups and revisions, I finally ended with a cobbled together mess of bracketry that netted a nearly perfect relationship:

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At this point it was time for yet another round of travel testing:

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IMG_9473.JPG (1.41 MiB) Viewed 2966 times


Mercifully, things seem to actually work and clear, although it's admittedly very tight between the drag link and the axle-end track bar mount when turning hard passenger under passenger side suspension compression:

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I'm satisfied there will be contact from time to time in real world use, but given the flexible nature of the aluminum drag link I'm not too worried about it.

The final element up front was shocks. I've had a set of factory take-off Rubicon FOX shocks on the bench for years, just waiting for the right project to utilize them on. As it turns out, this is it 8) I whipped up a quick set of upper mounts that convert the pintop style arrangement from the LJ to a double shear tab setup to match the FOX shocks, and this also allowed me to dial in the relative travel range of the shocks to my link geometry and bumpstops. I was ultimately able to take full advantage of the relatively short 8" of travel these shocks have:

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:thu:
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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tobyw
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Jan 06, 2025 9:08 am

After many weeks of the LJ taking up space on the lift and the shop just flat suffering from my lack of an apprentice to keep it tidy :oops: , it was time to put the tires back on and push it outside to allow a broom to hit the shop floor, and to see what I'd actually done to the poor LJ in broad daylight:

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Still have a ways to go, but the list is getting shorter and the finish line is in clear sight :thu:
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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tobyw
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Location: Under the hood...

Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Mon Jan 13, 2025 8:43 am

With the front end finally at a point that I could convince myself to leave it alone for a while, attention was turnt to finishing up the rear. Specifically, shocks. Simular to the front, I wanted to use a pair of FOX take-offs and some initial travel testing showed they should work, but I'd have to get creative with mounting due to interference between the inside of the tire and the chassis during articulation:

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Having been down this road before, the answer is to simply french the frame section where the shock needs to live. There are dozens of kits for this sort of thing on the market, but that's not my speed, so out came the arts and crafts accouterments to clearance the frame:

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Next was the upper shock mount. Again, since I'm cheap I didn't have the pre-fabricated upper shock mount arrangement that comes with the typical frame french kit. Besides, that is boring :lol: So I came up with my own design after a ton of mockup:

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The axle end was pretty simple, with just a couple of tabs glued to the housing:

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Overall it's a pretty effective setup that gives a unique look peeking into the rear wheelwell:

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IMG_9594.JPG (1.28 MiB) Viewed 2445 times


:thu:
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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tobyw
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Re: 2005 LJ

Postby tobyw » Sat Jan 25, 2025 11:31 am

The final details are tedious and boring; stuff like finishing the fuel tank relocation, brake lines, pinion yokes, paint, etc:

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The final bit of "fabrication" came in the form of a rear driveshaft, as the Jeep is now capable of significantly more droop than before, and when combined with the tummy tuck and slightly taller stance it was a recipe for killing the OEM rear shaft. Quick and dirty cut/re-weld job:

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And with that, we are back to a mostly functional LJ on 39's:

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:thu:

It still needs some minor exhaust work, as the passenger leaf spring is now taking up the space previously occupied by the tailpipe, and once that is cobbled back together I can slap the skid plate back under the belly and go try to break it :wink: 8)
Yep, I've wheeled one of those, too...

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