jpnjim

Ebaying your taillights & tailgate could almost pay for the trailer. :smart:

Ouch. Joke retracted. :dunce: I had that happen to me... at Midnight... on a trail... in the middle of nowhere... in a freaking unbelievable rain storm... without a spare alt. :dunno: (belt melted off the engine when the alt froze up) all you can do is :rotfl2: . FWIW, I finished the trail, using my engine sparingly (no waterpump spinning), starting it only when necessary (no headlights, or wipers in a rainstorm, 4wheeling @ midnight :nuts: ). and got tugged back to basecamp once back on pavement. Hope your case of "GM Revenge" (assuming a GM alternator) went better. :dunno:

That's a fact. Most of the 'improvements' have been to either clean up engine oil based emissions in new vehicles. Trying to clean up that last .00000557% 'bad' emissions out of new vehicles costs us 'stuff' in the oil that our old engines were designed to work with. But in the end, 4.0L's are borderline tractor engines, and they survive pretty well under all kinds of adverse conditions. It's like when they took lead out of gasoline, everyone with cars older than 1973 (before hardened valve seats) was freaking out. In the end, under normal conditions, the old engines dealt with it well enough.

Not to laugh (much) at your tough day, but you had to stop to get parts, while on your way to get parts. :clapping: There's a joke in there somewhere. :cheers: (even with the tough time getting there, I'm still jealous. :yes: )

Mine does it when it doesn't start fast enough (long cranking time). I figure the injectors put more gas in during the long crank, and a few seconds of higher RPM's are the result. I've also had (Renix) XJ's that do this for 20-30 seconds, or more after starting, and that usually tells me to check out the idle air control (solenoid on the side of the throttle body). They get gunked up & crappy, a good cleaning works wonders. :yes:

haha, as of Friday 4/9/10, Zinc was trading at $1.0728 per pound. http://www.kitcometals.com/ So if that $10 4oz bottle was entirely made of zinc (I'm sure it's not), the total cost of precious metals in it would be just under 27 cents (a whooping $0.2682). How's that for markup. :rotf:

This has been a hotly debated topic since they killed the amount of zinc in oil. Lots and lots of newly installed cams have gone flat (burned up) since then, and many people are blaming the oil. Crappy Chinese lifters may equally be to blame. Most people seem to think if you already have a properly broken in flat tappet cam, the decrease in zinc won't hurt you, but there are ways you can add zinc to what you're using for oil now. Tho I find it funny that zinc is one of the cheapest metals known to man (they make pennies out of it for crying out loud :D ), but 4oz of a zinc additive is 10 bucks. :nuts: http://www.zddppluscentral.com/ If I were breaking in a new cam, I'd use the smear on stuff as always, and add zinc to my next few oil changes. I'd also use the highest quality lifters I could get my hands on. But for old, broken in cams, I'm not especially worried about it. :dunno: FWIW, I use the Valvoline Max Life high mileage oil in everything (even the 32k mile MJ :yes: ) because it's the cheapest semi-synthentic I can find.

Those of us that are too far away need to live vicariously through you. So please list what you bought (and.... if you're willing, roughly how much $$ it cost). I reeeeaaaaalllllly want to know what I missed out on. :( :typing:

for those that don't want to click: Image Not Found Image Not Found Image Not Found Minute Mount FTW. Image Not Found

If I had that, I'd use it for ice cream runs, and Sunday drives (not pushing snow). This: http://boston.craigslist.org/nwb/ctd/1684170516.html would be my choice for daily driver, and snow pusher. :yes:

Hi Zach, are these the corners you used to patch in the MJ rear bed corners? http://stores.zmjeeps.com/Detail.bok?no=134177 http://stores.zmjeeps.com/Detail.bok?no=134178 sku # 5764221 & 5764220 The same pic is used for both part numbers, I'd guess one page/number is for the left side, and the other for the right (the description on the pages don't say which is which). Is the angle of these pretty close to the angle of the MJ's rear corner? I'm thinking of closing off the MJ taillight openings to run a different type of taillight. Is this what you'd recommend using?

My floors were rotted underneath the floor brace, so I cut it out to get at all the rot. It seems like that brace holds in any collected water, and helps the floors rot underneath it. so I didn't feel bad leaving it out.

If you have enough down travel, you can pop the coils out & back in without a spring compressor. I was able to get the stock springs out of my (2wd) MJ, and the 1.5" lift (formerly 3" lift Rusty's coils that collapsed to 1.5") back in, just by disconnecting my ft shocks & sway bar links. That's with the stock LCA's that limit down travel by bottoming out on the coil spring bracket. FWIW, you can grind down the part of the coil bracket that overlaps the LCA, and gain some down travel.

Thanks. :cheers: I meant this one: This was a concept version, not an actual production version of the XJ. ewps, :doh: :fool: guess I'll have to brush up on my Chinese. ;) :thumbsup:

I think they did a good job of muting the 3rd gen's horrible looks with the 4th gen, amazing that the 3rd gen's can look so similar to the 2nd gens, while somehow looking 100x's worse. :ack: :ack: As far as reliability, that's my #1 reason I don't have an extended cab, or 4dr 2nd gen as my daily driver. Nice size, shape, design, but the reliability complaints scared me off.

I like the new body style Dak's, nice choice :cheers: Tho it would be my 2nd choice after the style you're trying to sell (those 'baby Rams' just have nice lines :yes: ). My least favorite is the style between the two (3rd gen) :ack: They had a really funky orange color last year, I was 'building' one of these Dak's the Dodge site, and that was the color I liked best. The beefed up 4.7L V8 is pretty bad too, tho I don't think you can get a 5spd with it anymore (can you?).

Especially for anyone building an MJ715.. M101 trailer: From this thread: http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/showthre ... 210&page=2 Pics above from: http://www.whiteowl.com/trailers.html There's actually an M101a1, an M101a2 & an M101a3, I'm trying to find the correct dimensions for all, some say 76" long for the a1, others say 96' (one source even said 55" long :nuts: ) Either way it looks like it would be pretty easy to cut down. The width between wheelwells seems dead on for us (~43")

:eek: :eek: :eek: Wow, looks like I missed an amazing game. :cheers:

Thanks. :cheers: I meant this one:

Ooops, I knew I missed something. :( If I add it to the list, it will re-start the poll.

I'm slowly moving back to the original 10 slot grille as being my favorite (from the 97+), just wondering where the rest of you stand on this controversial & pivotal topic. ;) I did not break down the 88-90 vs 91-96 difference (since visually it didn't change much). ....and for those that just can't bring themselves to pick one single 'favorite', the poll is set up so you can make two choices if you need to. :nuts:

Early rear's are supposed to be 2-piece shafts (pressed, or 'friction welded', as the story goes), they certainly *look* different than later shafts, but the beefier 87-89 D35 shafts swap right in. (87-89's use a larger axle seal, so you should change that when swapping shafts). The ft axle is also slightly different. You know how the track bar bolt has an access hole behind it to reach the nut (with that sheet metal tab welded to it)? Early axles do not. (there is no access to the nut). Not a big deal, but worth mentioning. :dunno: :wavey:

MrN is correct. Both springs have main leaves that measure 57" long. They both have a center pin spacing of 26" X 31", and they both use 9/16" I.D bushings on the anchor and shackle bushings, so you could use some of the leaves to repair yours. Keep in mind though that a full-size Jeep is much heavier than our trucks, so you probably would not want to use all of the leaves. :thumbsup: -Tom Thank you for the timely & informative post. :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :cheers:

Yeah, I was hoping calmer heads would prevail, I guess they have not. MJ's are a small niche, and need to keep the manufacturers that will cater to us...... but JCR isn't exactly Currie, or Rubicon Express either, in the end we're just two little guys that hopefully can be in a situation to help each other. I don't plan to buy a rear MJ bumper from someone, but I liked that one was being made. I also liked the thought of them making tail light boxes (and planned to buy those). But to be honest, it was questionable at best to make a loose fitting hitch like the OP's pics show. Tho I kept my opinion to myself to see how JCR would deal with it. I'm still hoping JCR will rethink their stance on this, and realize that to those not directly involved in this (like me, and I'm guessing others reading, but not posting in this thread), this could've been handled better. You guys seem to have a very good reputation on all the XJ boards I've seen, so I'm not sure why you'd choose to 'take your ball and go home' now, instead of dealing with a valid customer complaint. :dunno:

x50 bazillion. I'd really like to see what the rockers look like. Since the factory sheetmetal dried up (some say crushed :eek: :fs1: ), I haven't seen any available with all the right bends (like the neck down section that fits under the ft fender).