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I am! Are you on island?

Here is my .02: Use only rubber mounts as mentioned above if you go brown dog. The poly’s are quite horrible. Remember that you need flex at the transmission mount as well so stick with the one rubber mounts here. Personally, I went back to one rubber mounts for the engine as well. As for the radiator, same as others posted. The tank doesn’t diminish cooling by any significant amount. Keep in mind it’s plumbed through the radiator to also pre-heat the tranny fluid not just to cool it. BDS suspension is a nice company to deal with. You will have to mod their add a leaf to fit the MJ spring pack correctly but it’s not difficult. Rebuilding a spring pack is a task though, especially when it come to removing the factory bushings. Hesco is the opposite of BDS imo. Clifford is similar. Once great companies. I’ve had nothing but horrible experiences with them. Perhaps hesco can build a nice stroker engine still but who knows. KJ disk brakes are an easy swap on the 8.25. Possibly worth swapping. There is a thread on brakes in the DIY section that may help you decide. The firewall is pretty integral to the structural integrity of the body. If you did swap the entire firewall, you’d want to separate it at the factory seams and secure it exactly the way they do or even better. The better approach is to graft in the panel sections that are needed. You will need to have these welded by a competent welder. They could be mig welded but tig would be preferred, again to maintain as much structural integrity as possible. I’ve ran a variety of 4.0 headers and ultimately ended up using either the Gibson ceramic coated one or the late style one manifold with the flex connection for the front and rear cylinders. 2.25” single exhaust is easy enough for any shop to fab. Be sure they add a hanger or anchor point near the crossmember as well to relieve the weight of the exhaust on the header. If the header supports too much weight plus the heat, it will likely develop cracks. The next questions would be, are you swapping to the entire 99 powertrain and electronics? If so, you will need to sort out an appropriate fuel system among many other items. This is often overlooked in these swaps. You’ll need a way to run a turbine style pump and return less style fuel delivery from the MJ tank. You could also swap over the transmission, transfer case and axles but keep your jeep Renix. No dash swap either as that 99 receives a canbus signal from the ecu for gauges. The doors and front end could still be swapped if you like. Just some food for thought.

Nice project! And a very fitting title It’s so nice to have MJ specific build experience when disassembling parts on our trucks. Clean work as always. Can’t wait to see how your project turns out

Can you let us know what the lift is when you install them? Assuming you’re coming from stock springs that is

On the crossmember/lower radiator support

TJ shafts and any single piece XJ shafts will work. XJ’s with ABS tended to have single piece shafts even pre 97. ZJ shafts are mostly cv shafts but there are a few that had u joint shafts that work.

Just a note as well if you do end up trying to source another front axle, late production XJ’s also went to the low pinion Dana 30 axle which is less desireable. A KJ liberty 8.25 is a great axle but will require a decent amount of cutting and welding to get it to fit as will most axle swaps. A rear YJ axle should be pretty close to bolt-in as well but were also just D35’s, though up to 89 they had bolt in axles.

Me too. Truly have to have this finished within about 4 months. Should be plenty of progress starting in a few weeks.

Regearing is a bit of a trick but not horribly difficult. A few specialty tools needed like a dial indicator with magnetic base, a micrometer (not a caliper), a press and possibly a good bearing puller. If you're driving in snow or ice truetracs are the way to go front and rear. Lockers will try to kill you on icy roads . You could always go with some good quality 31's also instead of regearing. 31's are kind of a sweet spot on Jeeps of that era with a great cost to benefit ratio

A pair of shafts is cheap insurance to prevent that from happening. If you go with a torsion based limited slip (ie. Powertrax GripPro or Eaton TruTrac) they tend to be a bit gentler on axle shafts. Keep in mind though that if you break a shaft, even though you're wheel will probably stay on due to the pressed on rear bearings, the broken axle shaft piece can cause a lot of damage to your limited slip and or ring and pinion.

So this could be a bit of a rabbit hole. The BA10 is a delicate gear box for wheeling. I ran one for years but really babied it. If you want to start upgrading things, the combo you have will tend to snowball. If you stick with 33's and you're ok with 3.07 gears then repair what is needed and perhaps consider the mods listed above. Otherwise you're looking at gears, axles, transmission, possibly driveshafts, lockers etc. Keep in mind that your current light weight axles have significantly more clearance than most axle swaps. move up to a 35 tire and needed mods and you won't really be gaining any additional clearance under the diffs.

Swapping to one-piece axle shafts deletes the CAD system. So where the CAD system is on the axle, it's a solid cast iron part that includes the passenger side upper control arm bracket. If you go to a later style Dana 30 without the CAD, they used a flimsy stamped steel bracket for the passenger axle side of the upper control arm.

The time is approaching to get this project completed. So here's what's on the horizon: Transmission: Picked up an AX15 rebuild kit for my original tranny I'm using along with some Marlin Crawler upgrades. The rebuild kit has all Japanese bearings and synchro king synchronizers. Also ordered the updated 5th gear and hub set from Aisin which has some sort of improved design. I'll do a comparison once I get the old one out to see what they did. Engine: picked up a full set of genuine GM Performance top end gaskets, lifter trays, head bolts, and LS7 trays. Also picked up the latest Che bronze rocker trunnions. Still undecided if I want to do any power mods. Axles: Ordered a new front and set of ARB's along with their black diff covers. Already have the full set of 4.56 gears for these axles. Also will be adding Artec brackets to the front D30. Will have to see how extensive this goes. Rear bumper: Settled on the dirtworks DIY manta bumper and also the hitch. Wanted the DIY setup as I wanted to customize some features of the bumper. Audio: Picked up a class A/B 4 channel amp which I'm going to use to power the front door 5.25's and the dash mounted tweeters and I'll be using the rear channels in 2ohm to drive a pair of 6.5" subs in the b panels and plan on tuning them as mid-bass woofers (around 60-150hz range). I have some thoughts on how I want to install those but let's see what happens. If they sound good enough, I'll run them as my subs. If the are just going to be used to fill in the mid bass area, I'll sun a dedicated separate sub. Misc: picked up a whole bunch of odds and ends. Oracle rear tail lights with tinted lenses, Holley low-mount ac kit, exhaust components etc.

What gears do you currently have and what tire size do have/plan to run? You can grab some one-piece front shafts and run your existing D30 up front. The cast in passenger side upper control arm is really nice on the CAD axles. For the rear, you can get some upgraded 1541 shafts. There used to be some 4140 or 4340 shafts available for non c clip axles but I haven't seen them in quite some time. If you go with a trutrac or similar rear limited slip and set it up correctly, it should last a good long time as a driver/weekend warrior. That and a front lunchbox locker have been a pretty great combo for many. Some good quality front and rear covers can help add some strength to the pumpkins as well.

Almost sounds like an axle swap was done at some point to something narrower

Thanks for the link! Just picked it up

Agreed, if not more. This was an inspirational build for my project as well.

Very true, depending on what's available around you, a swap may be a cheaper alternative with more upgradeability down the road.

I will say, I wheeled plenty on a D35 with a built 4.0 and 4.56 gears on 33's (Cooper stt pro's). There are a few things that can make them last: use a limited slip or truetrac style setup vs a locker such as a Detroit or any of the lunchbox lockers. The smooth engagement of a limited slip helps with unnecessary R&P along with axle shaft strain/shock. Second run some 1541 shafts. I used a set from Revolution axle and gear. And third, you can run a truss setup if you like. I used one from TNT and it was a lightweight yet well engineered piece that was easy to install in just a couple of hours. Fourth, make sure your gears are setup correctly. Some will say don't invest anything into a D35 but there are some advantages to consider: it fits the truck, they are light weight, they have plenty of clearance under the pumpkin, they have good aftermarket support, you already have the axle, most of the parts are fairly cheap compared to other axles.

The HVAC controls can move up easily with pretty much zero mods. The trick is that most full depth radios won't fit in the HVAC slot because of the defroster duct that is back there. The defroster duct has a factory molded design to accommodate the radio in the stock location. The JVC radio and subsequent Sony double din setup all had shorter chassis and could fit it that area with a bit of wire management and a 90* antenna fitting. The problem with most flip up radios is they must be full depth to accommodate the screen. Personally, I think @Limeyjeeper found the best overall modern radio that fits in the factory location and has all the features we've come t expect. It's the Joying 6.2 single din with a 6.2" floating screen. These are android based head units and pack a ton of features not found in most head units such as digital coax and optical outputs for an amp. The screen fits without covering the HVAC controls and has a volume knob. They are a Chinese brand but are not the cheap flea bay models you see floating around. There are some great reviews on them online as well that go over most of the features. Overall, I do believe the double din with the shallower Sony chassis can be the best looking modern radio setup on an MJ but it lacks a lot of the features compared to the Joying unit. I will say though, the Joying 6.2" singe din units are getting harder to find (I have one sitting in the box for my Tomahawk project ). Perhaps @Limeyjeeper can chime in on how his radio has been working since he's had it installed for some time now. If you decide to go the double DIN route, I was very pleased with the Sony setup. Its design uses just a single din shallow chassis that can mount in the old HVAC area and you can then modify the bezel and air vent area to get a clean finish. Ive seen some delete the center vent but that vent is the best one in the MJ cab as it is closest to the evaporator and gets the most air flow.

Unfortunately, he doesn’t make XJ or MJ door panels. I just asked him a couple of weeks ago

Yes to questions 1-3. You can use a hydraulic press or even an air hammer. The pin is already a pressed in piece. You're just pressing it in a bit further to take up any slack. Get your e brake assembly out and you should be able to identify what yours is going to need.

Awesome, thank you

Any one able to take a tape measure out to their truck and measure the space on the bed floor between the wheel wells? Also could use the dimension inside the bed from the front bulkhead to the end of the floor near the tailgate. My truck is thousands of miles away at the moment

I had considered this for some time. It’s a nice all around option: https://www.crutchfield.com/p_020M508/Clarion-M508.html