Lurch Posted June 14, 2013 Share Posted June 14, 2013 Hi Everyone - New to CC and a new MJ owner as of a few days ago. I've owned an XJ for a long time so I'm pretty familiar with the Jeep world. I'm over on NAXJA a lot and I recognize a few of the names over here already. I've been wanting an MJ since, well middle school and actively been looking for one for the last year. This one popped up on CL on Monday, and I met the guy Tuesday morning to take the keys from him before anyone else got to here. Now for what everyone wants, pics: First, my XJ - a '98 Sport: The MJ - a '92 Eliminator, 5 speed, 2wd: It's a very clean truck both inside and out for the amount of miles on the odometer (338,000!), but there's always work to be done. The previous owner only had it for about 6 months and didn't know much of the history, but I think it's lived its whole life in CA. The motor runs really good for having that many miles on it, lots of power and no weird noises making me wonder if it's been rebuilt at some point (stoker later??). I haven't had a chance to pull the carpets and check for rust yet, but will do so after I get done moving to Long Beach at the end of the month. Plans for this are pretty simple. Restore it to as close as OEM as possible. Minor body work, maybe repaint (definitely the flares and grill, PO painted them black), Eliminator and Jeep decals, etc. I would love to get my hands on some of the 10 hole OEM alloy wheels that it originally came with, but I'm digging the Moabs for now. Anyway, this will be a slow build as I'm moving into my first house this summer, need to finish prepping my XJ for a Moab trip in the fall, plus all the other things life throws at me, but I'll try to keep this thread updated as work progresses. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GirsMJ86 Posted June 14, 2013 Share Posted June 14, 2013 Welcome to the club. Very good looking truck, and a '92 Eliminator... jealous. Of course if I had it a 4wd swap would be required, otherwise it's perfect. Glad to hear it belongs to someone who respects it and will just be doing a resto on one of the rarest of the bunch. The flares just look like the factory unpainted ones from the pics, and the black grille looks good I think. I'm biased though, both my Eliminators had black front ends. In case you don't know, Spencer now has '91/'92 Eliminator stickers. Wish he had them when I had my '91 Eliminator, I had him make the '88 style ones for me because I couldn't get measurements for the newer style and used them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
randomguy310 Posted June 14, 2013 Share Posted June 14, 2013 very nice, nice shots in parking lot on pch.. I lived my whole life in the southbay.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HKB3 Posted June 15, 2013 Share Posted June 15, 2013 To bad you are on the wrong coast, I have the wheels you are looking for and would trade for the moabs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
'87 fuel-miser Posted June 16, 2013 Share Posted June 16, 2013 leave the moab's man ... that thing is just dead sexy ! . :MJ 1: . :banana: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lurch Posted June 18, 2013 Author Share Posted June 18, 2013 So first MJ noob question; what's supposed to go on the back of the cab behind the seats? Mine's just painted metal but it looks like a plastic piece might have clipped in there at one point. Is this where the jack is stored? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Minuit Posted June 18, 2013 Share Posted June 18, 2013 You're right. There is a plastic piece going across the top of that space under the window. The OEM jack is in the driver's side rear corner of the cab by the speaker mount. If it's not clear I can supply pics tomorrow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dirteatr717 Posted June 20, 2013 Share Posted June 20, 2013 Nice cherocar and beautiful manche! Welcome to the club! We have a CC pow wow in Moab September 13-15th if you're headed to Moab around then we have a few members meeting up and camping that weekend, XJs are welcome! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lurch Posted June 24, 2013 Author Share Posted June 24, 2013 So the guy I bought the MJ from called me up out of the blue and said that he found some parts to the truck when he was cleaning out his garage, just the parts I thought I was going to have a tough time finding. Made my life easier. Back cab panel + jack: Had a the original 10 hole spare tire too, now that I can see what it would look like on the rig I'm sold with keeping the Moabs. Pic of the pass side bedside and door. I'm hoping a good paintless dent repair tech can pull these. Only real body damage on the truck besides a little cracked paint on the tailgate. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Automan2164 Posted June 24, 2013 Share Posted June 24, 2013 Welcome to the club! Any chance the drivers door tag is still legible? We've been trying to track down the last MJ, and the build date on the door, or the last 6 of your VIN would tell us the ballpark of where you stand. Rob Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lurch Posted June 24, 2013 Author Share Posted June 24, 2013 Welcome to the club! Any chance the drivers door tag is still legible? We've been trying to track down the last MJ, and the build date on the door, or the last 6 of your VIN would tell us the ballpark of where you stand. Rob Build date was August 1991 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Automan2164 Posted June 24, 2013 Share Posted June 24, 2013 That puts you out of the running for last of. The last was rumored to have been produced in May of '92. From Jan 1st, '92 to end date, there were only 952 made. Yours came out early in the build year. Still, it is a '92, which is rare, and an Eliminator at that. A clean one to boot. Nothing to be ddisappointed about there. Rob Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shelbyluvv Posted June 28, 2013 Share Posted June 28, 2013 Lurch! Welcome to the addiction brother! Tell the Crew I miss them. Bo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lurch Posted July 1, 2013 Author Share Posted July 1, 2013 Hi Bo :waving: Lurch! Welcome to the addiction brother! Tell the Crew I miss them.Bo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lurch Posted August 1, 2013 Author Share Posted August 1, 2013 Finally getting settled in at the new place, time to start working on Jeeps again. Pulled the carpet to check for rust...Sweet, I love native SoCal cars. Only problem is when I put the carpet back now none of the back lighting on the dash works. Not a fuse or headlight switch, thinking i might have knocked a ground loose, haven't had time to check it yet. Annoying. Also, the seats had been switched around for some unknown reason, when I switched them back so the adjustment controls were on the correct sides I found out why. Something is broken in the drivers seat causing my left @$$ check to slide into the door while driving. Need to fix that.Replaced the coolant temp sensor and oil pressure sending unit so now I have working gauges. The 4.0L has a pretty healthy oil leak, need to replace the OFA, rear main and oil pan gasket. Hopefully since its 2wd it won't be as big of a pain in the @$$ to get access.Also picked up a brake booster and master cylinder off a '96, need to swap that out. The brakes are straight up scary on this thing, I've almost ended up in someone's trunk on several occasions.Unfortunately I've been spending money like a drunken sailor on my new house so fixing the body panels might not happen as soon as I'd like, but there's plenty to do in the meantime including prepping my black jeep for Moab. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lurch Posted November 16, 2013 Author Share Posted November 16, 2013 Been a while since I worked on this, mostly because I was getting my XJ ready for a Moab trip and got married, in that order, but finally had some time to wrench on it the last two weekends. Installed a few parts that I had sitting around for a while; Hella H4 lamps and an old Putco harness that I had laying around, a ZJ 28mm swaybar and the master cylinder and booster out of a '96 XJ. The truck brakes and corners so much better now, it's a lot of fun to drive. I'd love to get the Addco rear swaybar as well to tighten it up even more in the corners, but no way I'm dropping $200 on it. Also been getting around to this for a while. The previous owner painted the grille, headlight bezels, flares and cowl cover black. It looks fine but I'm a big fine of color matched parts and wanted to bring it back to stock. I found a cowl cover in Colorado Red at the junkyard and swapped it out but was having trouble finding the rest of the pieces so I ordered up some spray from automotivetouchup.com and went to town: Before: During (I figured out why he painted them, faded and chipped): After: Also, I finally fixed my dash light problem. Turned out when I pulled my carpet to check for rust I shorted a wire running underneath the carpet. Nice to finally have dash lights again. I'll be changing the rear main seal in a few weeks and plan to throw some ZJ rear coils and a modified MJ pack on to bring it a little closer to the ground...stay tuned. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drase Posted November 18, 2013 Share Posted November 18, 2013 Looks great! I like the matching too, I'm going to do that to my MJ also. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lurch Posted December 12, 2013 Author Share Posted December 12, 2013 Grille with more coats of paint, plus I shot it with some clear: Also hit the tail lights with some rubbing compound and shot them with clear as well. Plus my jeepsticker.com decal which I actually put on a while ago. :chillin: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ComancheKid45 Posted December 13, 2013 Share Posted December 13, 2013 :drool: Very Nice! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
collkid Posted December 13, 2013 Share Posted December 13, 2013 Those stickers really do change the look of the truck. Best $ I've spent on it so far. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
91Pioneer Posted December 13, 2013 Share Posted December 13, 2013 All that's left is to paint the flares red and put these on: http://jeepsticker.com/comanchesidestickers.htm :thumbsup: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ComancheKid45 Posted December 14, 2013 Share Posted December 14, 2013 Should look awesome! :popcorn: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lurch Posted December 15, 2013 Author Share Posted December 15, 2013 All that's left is to paint the flares red and put these on: http://jeepsticker.com/comanchesidestickers.htm :thumbsup: I know, just have to get the dents pulled on the passenger bedside and door then I'll order up the Eliminator decals. Need to start looking for a good paint less dent repair guy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lurch Posted July 10, 2014 Author Share Posted July 10, 2014 Long time, no update. I actually did this a while ago, stripped the flares down to the original Colorado Red. They aren't in the best of shape, but look okay for now. Used acetone like I did for the rest of the paint stripping, worked well. Now everything is back to OEM colors for better or worse. I have dreams of getting it painted a sweet metallic gray, but that's not in the cards right now. Next step is to get the dents pulled and get a quote for Line-X. The DIY bedliner that the previous owner installed is fading off bad. Also picked up this MJ44 from a local NAXJA/CC member. The gears and spiders were toast but that's okay. I picked up a set of 3.73's with a trac-lok from a Wrangler guy. Should be a nice pairing with the 29" tires that are currently on there. The D30 has 3.07's in it now. The axle didn't look like this when I got it... full of leaves, grease and cobwebs. Going to get some discs off an 8.8 at the next half off day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnnyc Posted July 10, 2014 Share Posted July 10, 2014 Looks great Scott. I like your truck red. Let me know if you find a good Line-X deal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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