socal1200r

LOL...looks like all that time spent at altitude has affected the seller...good luck with that sale... However, when I was going on the base today, the Navy guard commented that "you don't see too many of these around here sir...nice truck!"...always nice to get a compliment on the MJ!

Not entirely strange...I think if you load up the circuit with LEDs, the end result is they won't work right. I bought some LED bulbs for the turn signals and brake light on my motorcycle, and when I had all 5 bulbs in, they didn't work at all. Replaced the two fronts with "regular" bulbs, and the three LEDs in the back worked, just blinked a little faster than usual. Apparently, the only way I could get all 5 to work correctly was to put some kind of modulator gizmo in the circuit, which to me wasn't worth it. I'm all about plug and play, so if takes anything more than swapping bulbs, I ain't gonna do it... Glad you found out what was causing your problem. In all actuality, it probably would be fine to put regular bulbs in the tail lights and an LED in the 3rd brake light, or vice versa, just not LEDs in all of them. Sounds like a simple fix...

I know I mentioned this in some other threads in here, but figured now that they're on, I'll post some pics and general info. I ordered the kit thru "truckaddons.com", item # A13 59503, for around $185, which included shipping. It looks like they placed the order with Airlift, and their part number is 59503. Here's a pic of the kit: The instructions were real easy to follow, and all the parts were there, so I was going to attempt the install myself. However, I couldn't break the lug nuts loose (no tire iron, just a 3/8" ratchet and 3/4" socket), so I decided to throw some business at a local Jeep shop. Good thing I did, because he had to cut the upper mounting bracket in order to clear a weld line on the frame. This pic was taken with my cell phone, so you'll have to excuse the quality. But it shows where he cut the bracket, just above the middle bolt hole, and you can barely see the weld line right above it: Took him about an hour and a half to mount the bags, and I told him I'll take care of installing the air lines. So he got $90 for his labor, but the brackets are on there nice and tight, and the upper bracket is flush against the frame. So I got the MJ home, and worked on installing the air lines. I noticed there were two holes on each side at the back, one under the bumper, and another pretty close to it, that I could route the air lines through, and mount the air valve. I stopped at Lowe's and got some rubber grommets to put on these holes, to prevent the metal from wearing a hole in the air lines. The grommets are 5/8 OD x 5/16 ID, and the air line and air valve fits perfect thru them. I sprayed the grommets with ArmorAll, to make the install go easier. The air valves are towards the outer edge of the bumper, on the inside, so they should be out of harm’s way: Here are some pics of the airbags from the inside. The air inlet at the top of the bag had to point towards the front, because of the bump stop on the frame. So I ran the airline under the bed, and in front of the bag, then looped it back towards the top of the airbag. I used some zip ties to keep the airline on the passenger side away from the exhaust, and on the driver side, just zip tied it to the wiring harness that was already there: Once the airlines were installed, I had to inflate them to 10psi, and check the alignment of the bottom of the bags, to make sure they were centered on the leaf springs. After they were centered, all I had to do was tighten the bolt under the bag and that was it. It was interesting airing them up, because they jumped right up when I first put air in them, and when I checked the pressure, they were around 25 psi, so I deflated them down to around 10 psi, and they dropped right down. The instructions say to keep a minimum of 10 psi in them, and no more than 100 psi. I bought a portable 12V compressor from Harbor Freight to use on these bags (and the tires too), which I plan on keeping in the truck. Only problem is I might have to change out the hose end, because it has one of those thread-on valves, which I’m sure I’ll lose some air when I go to take it off the air valve. A regular tire chuck would be much better, so we’ll see. Apparently, this portable compressor works this way: keep the engine running, plug it into the cigarette lighter, screw the end onto the air valve, THEN turn it on and watch the pressure gauge. Unless the end is screwed into something, when you turn it on, air will just run out the end: So there you have it. This airbag helper kit should come in handy should I haul or tow anything heavy, and will keep the back end from sagging. The placement of the air valves will make them easy to get to, and by keeping them separate, I won’t have to worry about air shifting from one bag to the other under load. I was going to put both air lines into a single air valve, but was convinced to keep the air lines separate. So the only other parts I had to get were the four rubber grommets, which cost all of $2 at Lowe's. I’ll take it for a test drive later, and see if the bags make the truck ride any differently… Oh, one other thing. The bags are mounted in FRONT of the axle, because of the shocks and e-brake cables behind the axle.

Okay, if the three "wires" that I had going to the CAD are all vacuum tubes, then that ain't gonna work to make the 4wd indicator light on the dash come on. Guess I'll just have to rely on the 4wd lever, and trust that the indicator on the console is accurate, since I locked the CAD.

Spacers ($35): http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayI ... 0389138143 Greaseable shackles ($49): http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayI ... 0199449189 (even though they say "lowering", someone on the forum used them to LIFT the back of an MJ) This would be a budget lift I'd consider on my MJ, and at 2", shouldn't need longer shocks, drop arms, or any other hard parts. Just install the spacers on top of the front coil springs, put the shackles on the rear of the leaf springs, and you're done. Probably be a good idea to check the wheel alignment afterwards though...

To me, in a truck like the MJ, bedlining the floor is the only way to go! These things leak water, so bedlining the floor, with proper preparation beforehand, will go a long way towards keeping rust off those floor pans. Carpet and vinyl won't be able to do that. Yes it might be a little louder inside the cab, but I think the tradeoff is well worth it.

From reading this NAXJA thread, it sort of all makes sense now. The donor cluster came out of an '87 XJ 6-cyl, so that explains why there wasn't an adjustment screw on the back of the tach itself, it's on the small circuit board like what was mentioned, and what I found when I did it. Most likely, if the donor gauge cluster came out of an '88 or newer model, there would've been the adjustment screw on the back of the tach, and it sounds like adjusting it to work off a 4-cyl would've been MUCH easier to figure out, as opposed to the hit and miss method I had to use. This was all a very frustrating experience for me, from getting the test tach to work (just where is the freakin' negative terminal on the freakin' coil?!), to adjusting the gauge tach to match the test tach. But, at least I can say I now know where all these things are, and I know how to do it. I probably would've easily spent over $100 having a shop recalibrate the tach, so at least that's $100 I kept in my pocket. I'm going to attempt to install the Airlift airbag helper kit I bought, and try to save some money on that as well. I've read thru the instructions several times, and it seems fairly straightforward. I bought a new electric drill/drill bits, and a portable 12V compressor to air up the bags, so I should have everything I need. If I was able to get this tach recalibrated, these airbags should be a snap...

I locked the CAD, and removed what looked like two vacuum tubes on the CAD housing, and removed the wire that was on another part of the CAD cover. However, now that those three "wires" have been disconnected, I'm not getting any indication up on the dash that the truck is in 4wd. I should be able to just reconnect the one wire, and that'll send the signal up to the gauge lights on the left side to light up a 4wd indicator, right? I crawled under the truck, and there isn't anything left to connect to on the CAD. Does anyone have a picture of what the stock CAD looks like, with these wires still connected, especially the one that doesn't look like rubber vacuum tubes? If you could remove the one wire, so I can see what it supposed to connect to, that would be perfect.

The only problem I see with those Euramtec lights is they still use those funky old-style bulbs. I replaced the stock b-pillar lights with some universal rectangular interior dome lights, and replaced the stock incandescent bulb with a 3-LED bulb, and boy do those two lights do a good job of illuminating the interior! But you did a GREAT job in finding those Euramtec lights, and painting them to match your panels. Very stock looking, and at first glance (and second and third!), I doubt anyone would know they're not stock MJ lights. Nice find and great writeup!

The only problem I see with those Euramtec lights is they still use those funky old-style bulbs. I replaced the stock b-pillar lights with some universal rectangular interior dome lights, and replaced the stock incandescent bulb with a 3-LED bulb, and boy do those two lights do a good job of illuminating the interior! But you did a GREAT job in finding those Euramtec lights, and painting them to match your panels. Very stock looking, and at first glance (and second and third!), I doubt anyone would know they're not stock MJ lights. Nice find and great writeup!

With some help from the local 4wd forum, I was able to locate the "-" terminal on the coil, after removing it and looking at it. So the standalone tach now has an rpm reading, and it's significantly different from the gauge tach. For example, at idle, the gauge tach is reading 800 rpms, but the test tach is at 1500. So I removed the gauge cluster, turned it around, and maybe it's me, but I'm not seeing any kind of "pot" switch to rotate, in order to adjust the gauge tach. I even went thru the trouble of removing the gauge tach, but didn't see anything on the back of it either. Not wanting to give up just yet, since I got this far, I removed the small circuit board that has two wires going to the tach (the three screws above the two that hold the tach in). And low and behold, on this circuit board, there's a small white wheel that can be turned left and right. Since I didn't know which way to turn it, I turned it all the way to the left, put it and the tach back in the cluster, plugged in the main wires, and then turned the engine on. The gauge tach wasn't reading anything, and the test tach was around 1000 rpms, so I unhooked everything, pulled the board and tach from the cluster, turned the white wheel in the opposite direction, not quite all the way, put everything back together, and tested it again. This time I got a gauge tach reading, but it was off from the test tach by about 100 rpms. So one last time, pulled everything, adjusted the small white wheel, put everything back together, and now it was pretty much dead on, matching the test tach perfectly. Put the other wire harness on, secured the gauge cluster, put everything else back on, and now it's done. Looking back, seems like the only way to have avoided this was to install a full gauge cluster from a 4-cyl XJ. But those weren’t available around here, so knowing what I know now, this would’ve been the last step when I did the gauge cluster swap a few months ago. So yes, for the tach to read correctly, it MUST come from a donor vehicle with the same engine! And recalibrating the gauge tach is a PITA, but it can be done. If I can do it, just about anyone should be able to do it! Now to install that airbag helper kit (maybe tomorrow)…

Trying to get this standalone tach to work is kicking my arse. Can someone look at these pics of the "coil", and the wires that are in and around it, and tell me which wire I need to connect the green tach wire to? I got the red wire to "+" on the battery, black wire to "-" on the battery, white wire unconnected to anything, so that leaves the green wire:

If you want something with room and is economical to own (to include maintenance, insurance, mpg, aftermarket support, etc), I'd HIGHLY recommend a Scion xB. I had an '05 xB with the 5-speed, and put on a front strut tower bar, 4-point chassis brace, TRD lowering springs, 22mm rear sway bar, 4-2-1 header, roof rack, drop-down DVD system, etc. I got over 30 mpg consistently, and the car was an absolute hoot to drive, handled like a go-cart. The newer xB's aren't as boxy as the original ones, have a more powerful engine, rear disc brakes, LOTS of room inside (especially the back seat!), can easily accomodate another adult and two dogs. The xB was one of the few Toyotas sold in the States that was actually still built in Japan. I would check into VW, and see where most of the US models are made. I think most of them are made in Mexico, very few are made in Germany any more, at least the ones sold here.

Eagle Just tried to make this other tach work, no joy. I had alligator clip wires going to the ground and the green wire, and I pressed the red wire to the + battery terminal, and left the white wire unconnected. The needle moved ever so slightly, like it was getting power, but that was it. My problem is connecting the green wire. I followed the coil wire from the distributor, and it went underneath this black plastic cover thing on the passenger side inside fenderwell. I removed the black plastic cover, and the coil wire ended at this square block looking thing, with no obvious positive or negative terminals, just two wire clips at the bottom. One had one wire coming out of it (I think it was black/yellow), and the other clip had four wires coming out of it. Why can't these things ever be easy?! At least I remembered to remove the back of the tach I was using, and make sure the switch was set to 4-cyl (it wasn't, it was set to 8-cyl). So I need more detailed instructions on where the green wire is supposed to go, because I can't find the "-" coil terminal, or the "tach output on the yellow diagnostic connector under the hood". Thanks!

Eagle - just remembered I removed a tach from the bottom of the dash, the PO didn't wire it up (along with one of those 3-gauge clusters). Anyway, I guess I have a tach that I can use to calibrate the one in the cluster, but need help with the wires. It has 4 wires, red / green / black / white. I'm assuming one is to light up the tach (white?), and ground (black?), but where do the other two go (red, green)? I know I don't need the light wire connected to do this calibration, but if I can hook up this other tach, I'll compare it to what's on the tach in the gauge cluster, and calibrate it as needed. If you can tell me where these wires are supposed to connect to, I'll give it a try. Thanks

That makes sense, but I don't have another tachometer to use in order to calibrate it. So I guess it's going to read wrong for now...

There is a potentiometer on the back of the cluster, next to the tachometer. It's a small, round thingie (technical term) with a plus-shaped recess in it for a Phillips screwdriver. I don't remember which way you have to turn it to go from 4 to 6 cylinders or 6 to 4. Hmmm...maybe someone else will chime in on this one...what about switching it to the other setting from where it is now? Because if the donor vehicle was a 6-cyl, and it's now on my 4-cyl, I should just have to switch it to the other setting, right? I'm not going to remove the cluster until I know exactly what I have to do to get the tach adjusted from the 6-cyl donor vehicle to my 4-cyl, and pics would be VERY helpful! I'm not looking forward to wrestling with that speedo cable...

Thanks for the advice! Changing out a t-stat should be simple enough, and if I can get the gauge reading down to where it's supposed to be, and get better mpg as well, sounds like a no-brainer! Before I swapped the cluster, the water temp idiot light wasn't going on, so I'm not too concerned with it reading in the 240-ish range yet. But if installing a 180 t-stat will make the temp drop on the gauge, I'm all for it...

So what's the easiest way to recalibrate a 6-cyl donor tach to read correctly in a 4-cyl? I'm not looking forward to pulling the cluster just to calibrate the tach, so if it's difficult, I'll just leave it. Wish I would've known that beforehand, 'cuz I'm sure it would've been easier to do before I put the 6-cyl donor cluster in. Guess these plug and play gauge clusters aren't smart enough to recalibrate themselves!

If you put those size tires on stock 15x7 Jeep alloys, you'll be fine. With the lift, they shouldn't rub the fenders at all during normal driving, but you'll still rub the lower control arms at full lock. Either put washers behind the stop, replace the stock LCAs with WJ LCAs, or just don't turn your steering wheel to full lock, and you'll avoid rubbing the LCAs. If you have 15x6 stock Jeep wheels, I wouldn't go any bigger than 30x9.50 tires. So, if you want to run 31s, but have 15x6 rims, you'll either have get wider wheels, or keep your 15x6's and run 30's instead.

If you have a tow hitch with the trailer connector, you could do what I did, and just get one of those 3rd brake lights that fits into the hitch and is wired to the connector. That way, you can still have use of the cargo bed light. I don't have a cargo light, or a third brake light up above the rear window, so this trailer light is a good substitute.

What Eagle said...31x10.5 will fit fine on Jeep 15x7 alloys, and should NOT bottom out on the fenders at stock ride height...by "black soft 8s", I'm assuming those are aftermarket wheels, which most likely have a different backspacing than Jeep wheels, and also most likely will bottom out on the fenders at stock ride height...

If you live near a WalMart, check out their AT tires. The Goodyear Wrangler Authority that they carry looks pretty aggressive, along with the Uniroyal Liberator, and they're a LOT less expensive than BFG ATs. I think these tires are made specifically for WalMart, so most likely you won't find them on the Goodyear or Uniroyal websites. If I remember correctly, I think WalMart charges something like $18 per tire for balancing, road hazard, valve stems, and tire disposal (mounting is free). I happened to get a deal on my Firestones, buy three get one free, so I got all four mounted, balanced, valve stems, and road hazard warranty for under $500. This should be a link to the Goodyear Authority tire at WalMart, $130 for 31x10.50: http://www.walmart.com/catalog/detail.g ... =undefined

Is this the thread you were looking for? viewtopic.php?f=2&t=20758

I got the kit from here: http://www.truckaddons.com/Catalog/subp ... ontrol.htm It was $182, shipping included. One of the local 4WD accessory places was listed as a dealer for Airlift, and they've worked on an XJ I used to have, and they're the ones that installed the WJ LCAs on my MJ. I asked them for a price on this kit, and their price was almost double! Not sure why, maybe the one they were quoting me had an onboard air supply or something, that's the only justification I could see for their kit being $350. I plan on buying a portable 12V compressor, and changing out the end to a regular tire chuck. I did a search on Amazon for a portable compressor, and none of the inexpensive ones I saw (under $50) had a tire chuck on the end. I have no desire to go all high tech and put an onboard compressor with a controller in the cab, so a portable compressor should work just fine, and keep the costs down.