97+ xj rear bumper swap?

[Walkenvol]

Is it possible to swap the rear flares / bumper combination from a 97+ xj to a short bed MJ?

[dasbulliwagen]

Not directly. The distance from the edge of the wheel well to bumper end would have to be measured to see if it would even be the same distance... if not the bumper end cap/ rear lower rocker would either need lengthened or shortened, not sure which as Ive never measured. Also, the whole lower bed edge may need to be cut off to make room for the bumper end cap. And then youd also have to make adapter brackets to mount the bumper to begin with.... I made my own brackets to mount a 96 XJ bumper on the back of my 87 MJ... Just look for "Comanche Limited" in the projects section to see pics. I still havent figured out a permanent way to mount the plate, but I think a front plate bracket will bolt to the bottom of the rear bumper as a place for a plate and then run a pair of LED lighted bolts for a plate light.... I have done that, but have yet to update my build thread and pics (The bolt lights thats is). If you do it it will be a lot of work to make it look right, but might be worth it if youve done the front conversion already. Good luck.

 

Edit.... the rear flares will definitely have to be modified as the opening arch on the Mj is much larger than an XJ.

[jpnjim]

The rear overhang distance is longer on an MJ,

and like Dasbull said, the XJ rear flares themselves are smaller.

 

You can get XJ ft flares to work (flipped around, of course), but XJ ft flares look a little funny on the rear because of the way they widen towards the front (now towards the rear when mounted out back).

 

You can kinda see what I mean here:

 

 

I hacked part of the 97-01 bumper end cap off to make it's length work on a SWB MJ:

 

I was more, or less just seeing if it would work,

looks OK from this angle, but that's it:

 

Others have 'plastic welded' two sets of bumper ends together to get the right distance,

and adapted the smaller rear flares to fit, but I didn't want to give up the big wheel openings.

[Walkenvol]

Thanks for the info and pictures...obviously not an easy bolt on swap to match with the 97+ front end swap. What's the best rear flare option to go with the 97+ front flare?

[dasbulliwagen]

I think if I were doing it, I might try for a smoothed and painted to match original MJ rear flare, probably your best option.

[terrawombat]

I've been looking into this for my upcoming 97+ conversion on my MJ. I haven't found anything yet, but I'm curious at to how well the fit would be of a TJ Wrangler rear flare. The TJ does not have the rear bumper endcap to deal with, but I have no idea if the size of the opening on the TJ is anywhere near close to the MJ. My GF won't let me remove her rear fender flare on her TJ, either...

[jpnjim]

Lots of people have done TJ flares on the back of MJ's,

from some of the pics it looks like the TJ flare is a little shorter top to bottom than the MJ flare,

but that just might be because of the way they were installed/trimmed to fit.

(I haven't tried it myself).

 

Smoothing out the lines on factory MJ flares is a good solution too, but you have to be careful not to blow right through the flare when grinding the lines off.