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The starting point for my '89 Jeep Comanche SCCA Retro Race Truck Project! It is a 1989 2WD 2.5L 4-Speed Short Bed California Truck with 243,00 miles. Body is straight and rust free, but the interior is a mess. Engine starts and runs well, expect for a lifter ticking. This weekend's work 1. Change Fluids and Filters 2. New plugs, wires, and distro cap/rotor 3. Check lifters 4. Pass CA smog check...#@$%* 5. Lower back 3" - change bushings to poly - 2" lowering blocks and shorter Cherokee shackles 6. Swap out dash gauge cluster to full gauge cluster with new oil and temp sensors 7. Remove the six wires "not connected" to anything, just hang out from under the dash. Or maybe that is why the radio does not work? Starting point video: https://youtu.be/L-XMvcR01sg

I will start with a brief introduction and storyline of my Comanche. I bought it as my first car at the age of 17 to have something that could go off-road with my family. That was 5 years ago and since then, a lot of things have changed. For the first 2 years, I fought gremlins caused by whoever worked on it before me not really having much time to modify while just fixing all the issues of buying someone else's build. About two years into owning it, I cut the roll cage that the previous owner built off so that I could build a better looking and stronger roll cage. It was at that time after cutting the old cage off, I decided to go on a couple trail rides and unfortunately rolled the comanche over without a cage on a steep off camber down hill. We pushed it over and it began to rain so I drove it home with no front windshield and a smashed cab in the rain. This marked it's first major overhaul in the first couple years. At this time, I straightened the window frame as best as possible to put a windshield back in it and pushed the A pillars back where they should be. After that, it was time for a new roll cage and a couple other parts like track bar that cracked in the roll over. I drove it like that with some minor modifications here and there for the next 2 years. At this time, a friend and I decided we wanted to race King of the Hammers stock class, as well as the entire west Ultra4 series so we then took action and cut the old roll cage off and built a new race legal cage, put new seats in, installed a fuel cell and many of other upgrades as well as safety requirements. After it was all built, we took off for King of the Hammers 2018 and races our first race. After KOH, we fixed what was necessary and affordable and then took off for the Sacramento area for the Ultra4 Stampede race and raced that race. After that is when things started to go wrong prepping for the next race in Ridgecrest losing my Codriver and teammate. That brings us to now, 3 weeks until the next race, but no codriver and a team that is now busy with work and other things. With everything going on and a busy life, racing will have to begin again when I am finished with college in a few years. That is where this thread begins, another rebuild, except this time it is to make a race truck into a street legal truck again. This will involve cutting off yet another roll cage and building another new cage, putting a windshield back in the truck, building a new custom fabricated dash, patching holes from racing, a new heater/possibly air conditioning, new doors, new back window out of plexiglass, a center console, painting it, building a new rear bumper, new front suspension 3 links and I am sure a whole lot more. Until I get busy with all of that soon, I will provide some old pictures and if anybody wants to know anything from the past, feel free to ask any questions. Here is a current photo from the last race in Sacramento. I will dig up some older photos and show them as well.

Hello, I have recently became the new owner of a 1989 jeep comanche pioneer. It's 2WD and a short bed. She's got a nice patina on her. And I kinda like it. But I also would like to bring her to her former glory. But seeing its 2WD it wouldn't be a good mud truck or a good off road truck. My plans are to turn her into a race truck. But my first question I have for it is how else could I lower it in the back. For the front I can get some new coilovers for it but in the back I do not know how to get it lower. Would I be able to put a "shim or spacer" between the axle and the leaf spring to make it lower?