Goatman

What's the reason for wanting to go to an open system? I know it has become a popular conversion, but I've never understood why. A closed system is more efficient. Most newer vehicles come with a closed system. Most, if not all modern pickups have a closed system. My Powerstroke has a closed system. Just wondering...

I saw in a previous post that you're thinking about cutting through the inner fender well to allow for a longer shock. As you're finding out with the crash damage, this is a unibody and all of the structure is important to the chassis rigidity. The strongest parts of the front section are the sides of the cowl, and the upper shock mount/spring seat area. If you're going to remove some of that area, have a good plan for how you'll add back in some structural strength. I would first consider lowering the shock mount position on the axle before seriously messing with the upper mount area. How much front suspension travel are you going for? What length shocks? Unless you're planning to run coilovers a shock longer than your spring movement is wasted. On our 4643 race XJ we ran 13" front shocks, no upper mount modification, but I designed a dual coil spring setup to be able to use a shock that long.

Don't remember exactly, but I think about two coil wraps. You can start with maybe 1.5 wraps and then trim more if you want it. Have to watch the bumpstop height, leave a bit of travel before it hits the stops.

Damn, I swore I was done with this thread. I have already way over made my point, let the reader decide. However, I feel obligated to respond the the issue about bumpsteer. Bumpsteer has nothing to do with the size or weight of a vehicle. Bumpsteer happens when the steering geometry and suspension geometry are not aligned so the vehicle automatically steers slightly when the suspension cycles, like when hitting a bump. When the steering and suspension are in alignment the steering does not move as the suspension cycles up and down. When they are not aligned, the steering moves as the suspension cycles and this change in steering direction is called bumpsteer. The typical bumpsteer cause on our straight axle Jeeps is when the track bar/panhard rod is at a different angle and/or length than the drag link. With the track bar, the axle moves slightly sideways as the suspension cycles, and if the drag link isn't aligned with the track bar then there will be a slight steering input change as the suspension cycles causing a slight movement of the tires and wheels. This slight change is called bumpsteer, there is a slight direction change as the suspension cycles...bumpsteer. A steering stabilizer does nothing to change this as it is a result of a hard relationship between steering and suspension. To eliminate bumpsteer, the drag link needs to be aligned with the track bar.

I guess it's just semantics. You have DW, you change something, now you don't. Based on your never ending argument, I'm betting most of us would rather have DW that we don't actually experience (no symptom) after spending $40 bucks than save the $40 and have DW that we do actually experience. I bet you don't take cold medicine, since it only removes the symptom (no more runny nose and cough) since it can't actually cure the cold. DW comes from an oscillation. If the oscillation is not allowed to start (even if it's just the dreaded shock) do you still have DW even though it never actually happened? Can you have DW and not know it, just because you don't experience any symptoms?

So, what if you get mud on your tires and they're out of balance. What if you hit a rock or curb and knock a wheel weight off. What if your tires are worn since they were balanced. Sure, I agree in a perfect world you don't need a stabilizer. Unfortunately too many situations aren't perfect. A stabilizer shock fights oscillation, just like a wheel shock fights normal spring frequency. A bad wheel shock might allow a tire to cup, and a bad steering stabilizer might allow an oscillation that can turn to DW. My race truck two weeks ago had DW on practice day. No looseness of any kind found in steering or suspension. Spent 40 bucks on a new stabilizer and we raced for 15 hours on Sat and Sun with no DW. I can give you many more examples. OK, I'll agree with you that something was causing the oscillation that led to the DW. If nothing is found, and we don't want to spend a bunch on new tires just to find out, I think most of us would be very happy to resolve the DW for a $40 shock. By no means am I saying we always replace the shock first, of course not. Many times we find an obvious problem. But when we don't, and the shock is questionable, we replace it, and sometimes that cures the DW.

Yep, they sure did, on F250's, Dodge 2500's, WJ's, and lot's more. Gotta fight that kick back when rock crawling...

Make sure the small plastic line from the throttle body to the MAP sensor (on the fire wall) isn't cracked or broken. If so, it will run very rough and rich.

So, you just don't believe me? My many experiences of fixing DW by replacing the stabilizer are lies or I'm just not credible? The factory engineers did put a stabilizer on your truck. Look guys, I'm not saying that a stabilizer fixes all DW. As we know, DW can come from so many things. I'm simply saying that when the cause is minor, a very slight tire imbalance, a very slight steering gear play, a very slightly worn bushing, etc., etc., that the steering stabilizer is designed to fight the resulting potential oscillation and prevent DW. Disagree all you want. Doesn't change anything. If everything is perfect, yes, no stabilizer is needed, but if something is slightly less than perfect, then the shock does it's job. I think you're taking my point for more than what I'm saying.

You're better off with a test light. Clip to a decent ground, then probe with the pointy end of the light. You can look for bad fusible links on the fender well. The soft insulation burns off and the wires burn in two on somewhat short sections of wire. If you find this you can twist the bare wires back together to make a connection and test the circuit. If the fusible link blew there is a problem somewhere.

We just cut the stock front coils to lower it, and used a block in the rear. We're going to relocate the front control arm mounts on the axle when we swap in the 2wd beam, right now it still has the 4x4 front axle, stripped out. We got lazy and limited the work we did to get it ready to race. We use offset upper ball joints to get some positive camber. We're running 245/45 17" tires, which are a very good size and look good. I like your idea of using XJ shackles, probably try that. I want to section the front axle to allow a lower ride height, and the UCA's will need to be lowered on the axle since they'll hit the motor mount bracket. We'll have to cut some off the front bumpstop tower to lower it more. We also run short Prothane coil inserts for bumpstops. Very fun to drive and handles amazingly well. We also have the Vanco big brake kit in front with Black Magic pads. And we run an 8.8 in the rear for disc brakes and 3.73 gears.

Maybe automotive engineers learned something? Anyway, always check the steering stabilizer if there is DW, as well as checking for anything at all that is loose.

Actually, no, it's there to fight DW in straight axle vehicles. You're rack and pinion steering Honda (and everything else) doesn't have one. All of your straight axle trucks do. Straight front axle vehicles are susceptible to DW as parts wear and so they come from the factory with a stabilizer shock. I own an auto repair shop and off road shop, and we fix many DW problems with a new shock, and we always use a stock replacement. Sure, also many times it's something loose in the front end, but many times the new shock fixes it.

We fix quite a few DW problems with a new stock stabilizer shock. Simple and inexpensive, and a good place to start unless you know for certain that the current one is good. The shock is there for only one purpose, to fight DW as parts get slight wear, or tires get slightly out of balance, etc. A few weeks ago we raced our new MJ race truck. Fri at practice we got some DW, a weird feeling at speed on a track. We put a new shock on it and raced all day Sat and Sun with no DW. No guarantee, but a good place to start.

Keep in mind that the lower priced more "budget" lift kits are lower priced for a reason. You get what you pay for. Spring rates, shock rates, bushing material all make a difference in how nice the truck will be to drive. Also, you don't have to do any fender trimming until you go 35's with a small lift or 37's with a big lift, other than some slight trimming on the lower insides of the wheel wells where you don't even see it. These young guys seem to cut fenders before they do much of anything else.

Wish I would have seen this sooner. I'd highly recommend the Deaver Jeepspeed front coils, if these don't work out, or for anyone else thinking of doing the same thing. Also, check out PAC coils, they make an assortment of progressive rate coils. We successfully competed with both the Deaver and PAC coils. We started with Deaver and then I made a dual spring setup on the front with PAC coils and a coilover shock slider on the bumpstop tower. We slide a piece of 2" OD tube over the bumpstop tower for the slider. The dual spring setup worked very well. We also used much longer Deaver F150 rear leaves on the XJ, which would be a good length for the MJ, but we ran them spring over on the 4643 XJ and don't know if that would work on a a spring under MJ. That car hauled @$$ with the really long Deavers in back and the dual coil PACs in the front. Also, if you want to save some money, the Prothane front bumpstop inserts work extremely well on the front.

I found a front air dam for a mid '90's Nissan Hardbody that we made work. It was the closest thing, since the Nissan front bumper is mostly straight like the MJ's. We put it on with tech screws and had to trim it some on the ends to get it to fit, but it worked. Don't want to steal your thunder, I should post up in another thread about this truck. We just finished the build and raced it in Sept in LeMons. Squeaked into class C with 5 penalty laps, and won the race by 10 laps. Here's a pic of the front air dam. Hope you have a blast with your project!

I'll take 5 also. Need new ones on the Street Comanche.

Well, thanks to this forum, we've hooked up and I'm picking up an original Street Comanche ground effects kit next week. That gives me the one part that I need, and spare parts if they are ever needed. The paint shop will get going on the new paint job next week, and #16 will be back on the road in late July. In mid Aug we will be driving the MJ in the west coast LeMons Rally and attending the Concours de LeMon's afterwards in Monterey. The rally starts in Monterey, then to Crescent City, next day to Bremerton WA, then to Bend OR, and the last day to Santa Cruz, then the Concours in Monterey next day. We'll be coming and going back to Bakersfield. This will be a real nice road trip for the old truck, hopefully it will do well.

Too bad on the black one posted here. It's missing the ground effects behind the rear wheel wells, which is the part that I need.

Just posted on that thread with my contact info. I had called awhile back on the that old thread but no contact. Thanks!

Hi. I'm very interested in picking up spare ground effects parts. gandgautorepair@att.net 661-706-1600 cell Thanks!!

Unless you know how much oil to add, and how much refrigerant, and have gauges to measure the high and low pressure, I'd let the shop do the charge on the system. No sense spending the money and doing the work and then short changing yourself on the charging. Since it's all new, it needs die also so you can see if anything is leaking after all the install. Good luck with it all, AC is nice.

That's pretty awesome, hope you post up plenty of pics (or video!) when it's done. ZJ rear coils are the same as MJ/XJ/ZJ/TJ fronts, only a lot shorter. Might be worth trying some uncut rear lift coils instead of the cut down front lift coils if you came across a set. I've used them + spacers in the front of XJ/MJ's when I wanted stiffer than factory springs, but not a higher ride height. The goal is to actually cut the coil shorter, since that raises the spring rate of the coil. I would look for the stiffest, longest coil and then cut it down to make it much stiffer. Spring rates are one of the few things (and sway bars) we can really experiment with to balance the handling front to rear. The combination of the cut Rancho coils front and a couple leaves added to the stock leaf pack rear ended up making the XJ very balanced. It would understeer or oversteer based on how it was driven and not much simply because the car wasn't balanced. The MJ has stiffer rear springs, so I'm anticipating wanting to try a stiffer spring in the front also. It's trial and error, we'll need a track day to figure it out.

Can you expound on the brakes a bit, maybe a pic or two? It's the Vanco/Black Magic big kit for 17" rims. Ours is the prototype kit for the 13.25" rotors, Blaine thought putting it on the race Jeep would be a good test fit for the kit. Unfortunately we blew the motor and haven't raced since so he got short changed on feedback from us on the kit, but needless to say it works great, you can't make them fade. http://www.shop.blackmagicbrakes.com/VANCO-17-Big-Brake-Kit-with-BMB-Pads-for-17-Rims-BBK-N17.htm