AZJeff

I ordered a RockHard 4x4 front bumper to put on my MJ, and will be using it in conjunction with the OEM type front skid plate. My front fenders/grille are 97+ off of an XJ, so no cutting needed. The below photo from RockHard shows how that bumper mates up with the factory skid plate, and was part of my reason for choosing that bumper.

And yes, longer wheel studs on mandatory on all of the D35 and D44's used on MJ"s.

Yes, I am referring to ebrake issues. The standard cables used on most older Jeep ebrakes have an outer jacket that passes through a hole in the drum brake backing plate. There is a spring clip that is attached to the end of the jacket, and it contains prongs that lock the jacket into the backing plate. When those standard cables are used on the Teraflex kit, the casting that supports the caliper contains an "ear" with a hole that this ebrake cable is supposed to pass through, mimicing the way it does on a drum brake backing plate. It's intended to be locked into this "ear" with the same spring clip prongs as mentioned above. The problem with the Teraflex kit is that the casting where the "ear" is located is WAY too thick for the spring clip to have it's prongs pop out and lock the cable in place. And NONE of the cables available for MJ's or XJ's use a clip that is dimensionally compatible with this thicker "ear". I talked with Teraflex tech. support about the issue, and they claimed that this is the first they heard of the issue. But, they also admitted that none of their replacement OEM-type ebrake cables would lock into the "ear" on the casting, so they acknowledge the problem, but claim no customers have complained. Realizing I was wasting my time discussing the issue with Teraflex, I designed a retention bracket of my own, and drilled and tapped a hole in the casting to allow this bracket to be bolted on and retain the ebrake cable from the outside of the hole in the "ear". My solution is a secure mounting of the ebrake cable, but does not rely on a spring clip like an OEM system (like that used on my wife's KJ) would.

The Teraflex kit is “ok”, but if requires some “aftermarket engineering” to make it OEM quality. i am a retired professional mechanical engineer, and have been working on cars for 50+ years, so doing some “custom adaptation” is not beyond by skills. If you are looking for “plug and play”, the Teraflex kit isn’t quite there.

I put this Teraflex kit on my MJ, which has a D44 in the back. I encountered two issues: 1. the spacer needed to provide the preload for the wheel bearing (the one HOrnbrod talked about in the post earlier in this thread) is mandatory, and does not come with the kit. 2. normal XJ/MJ/KJ/ZJ type parking brake cables (with the spring clip that slides into the hole) will not properly lock into the lug on the brake backing plate casting that Teraflex provides. I talked to Teraflex about this, and they claimed I was the first to report the problem. I asked their tech. support guy to check his stock of these backing plates, since I assumed I got defective ones. After he did so, he admitted they are all machined incorrectly. I ended up making my own bracket to retain the out parking brake cable jacket on the backing plate, and it's been fine since then.

Yeah, the backup plan is to get some heavy gauge steel bent and I drill it, but that’s more work, of course. I am hoping for the easy route.🥴

I am looking for a pair of the OEM angle brackets that Go between the “frame horns” and the front crossmember below the radiator. I don’t want the ones that actually are used to attach the tow hooks themselves. I checked eBay, but no luck. Any suggestions for a source? Boneyards around here are pretty much cleaned out of this part.

There are rubber plugs in the floor of the cab that can be used to route wires to the back on each side.

If roll pins bother you, consider “spirol” pins. https://shop.spirol.com/viewitems/coiled-spring-pins/inch-sizes-heavy-duty

I used these in conjunction with relays: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B07MRB4R3D/ref=sspa_dk_detail_1?psc=1&pd_rd_i=B07MRB4R3D&pd_rd_w=3GNmU&pf_rd_p=60f4d8bb-ce34-4daf-9823-4864ac29e442&pd_rd_wg=XTY8q&pf_rd_r=TS7E10ANJCH1NDBMPKBD&pd_rd_r=ed70d297-09cf-4a43-8bbe-fcbbe6fb3d28&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUFJODI5RFVSU1RRQVMmZW5jcnlwdGVkSWQ9QTA0NDk1OTgyT1BXUlUzWjJRS1YxJmVuY3J5cHRlZEFkSWQ9QTAyNTE0OTYzR0Y0SlNWWlc4MUU1JndpZGdldE5hbWU9c3BfZGV0YWlsJmFjdGlvbj1jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ==

VERY good point. And the KJ discs are plug and play, once you adapt some appropriate parking brake cables.

Yup. A KJ 8.25 is just as usable as one from an XJ once the spring perches are changed to accommodate MJ springs.

Yes, it's a Dana 30 on all MJ's with 4WD. And yes, the "carrier" must be removed to remove/install the seals, and sometimes is referred to as "the pumpkin".

Have you confirmed the oil pressure by using a mechanical guage? This is the first step, because oil pressure senders are known to go bad relatively often.

Oil pumps are pretty cheap. They run $25-75, depending on brand, on Rock Auto. If there is any doubt, spring for a new pump.

Most PS pumps are incredibly simple devices inside. They have a series of vanes attached to a central hub that are spring loaded to rub against the outside of a cylindrical cavity. The vanes are often made out of some sort of plastic-y material, so they don't wear the inside of the cavity. The vanes will drag when dry, but when the pump is filled with some sort of oil (PS fluid or ATF), the drag will drop down, but will never be totally zero. (You cannot spin the shaft and expect it to continue to spin more than a quarter of a turn after letting go.) Put some PS fluild in the pump, and see if it's any easier to turn.

Nice color!👍

Rotate the shaft by hand. It should turn smoothly and easily.

You might want to secure the new, much larger capacitor. In the electronics assembly biz, we used "elephant snot", a kind of adhesive that is semi-pliable. A hot melt glue gun would do nicely.

Actually, when I am working on something where I know I won't be dropping big parts (like instrument panel stuff, or lighting) I often wear sandals in the garage. Of course, when it's 110* out, sandals are more comfortable than regular shoes. To the OP--the drag you are seeing on the wheels seems normal for a disk brake setup. The pads always drag slightly on disk brakes, and what I see/hear does not seem abnormal. If there were issues with the hub bearings, those are best detected by removing the wheel and caliper, and turning the hub by hand. Even better, when possible, is to remove the axle shaft, so as to eliminate any friction/noise from any source except the hub. A good hub will turn smoothly, with no noise. It won't "spin" if you give it a good turn, so don't' freak out if it stops quickly after you turn it.

Concerning that rasty looking master cylinder reservoir: I would place bets that the stuff you see in the reservoir is probably scattered throughout the brake system, and none of that will help make the brakes function as designed. As "Minuit" mentioned, that is some of the nastiest looking brake fluid I have ever seen, and is a good indication of the condition of the rest of the hydraulic system. I would take the MC off the vehicle and disassemble and clean it. If the seals and bore look OK, then reassemble and reuse. If you see damage inside the bore, then get a new MC. While the MC is off, now is the time to flush all of the lines with compressed air, to push out the old fluid and the crud that is probably floating in it. I would also give serious consideration to replacing the front calipers and wheel cylinders. I would also consider removing the rear load sensing bias valve and clean that thing as well. Putting new pads/rotors on a brake system that had that much crud in the MC is sort of like painting over the rust holes in the body.

That is VERY impressive. Those rails are better than many of the commercial aftermarket creations I have seen. NICE WORK.

When they are dangling, I just tie wrap them to the parent wiring harness to keep them out of the way as best as I can.

If the production volumes for a particular suite of options was low enough, the cost of making a special wiring harness might be more than just throwing in the wires and connectors into all vehicles. AMC was, in general, making a whole lot less cars than the "big three" back when they were around, so this is probably their logic (and is probably backed up by some bean-counter's analysis.)

Let’s go back to specifications—what is the STEADY STATE draw of this fan you have chosen? Then add 20% for start up surge current to figure out peak current. Now how long are the wires from the 12v source to the fan motor? Now figure out the voltage drop for a given wire gauge and wire length using the below simple calculator: https://www.rapidtables.com/calc/wire/voltage-drop-calculator.html you want your voltage drop to be 0.25vdc or less, so adjust your wire gauge accordingly.