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88 comanche build


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Alright so I'm a little late with this but...  better late then never right?  so in September of 2015 i purchased this 88 comanche 4.0/5spd/4x4.  the po had already done some things i liked and some no so much.  but thems the breaks it was his truck before it was mine.  i was told it was a pioneer edition with the Olympic package on it, that it had a dana 44 rear with a high pinion dana 30 front.  he had put a 4in rustys offroad lift on and slapped 33s under it.  he also added that he blew up the pukegoat trans and had swapped an ax15 np231 tcase in its place.  now obviously i want to do some things my way  cause well he did some things that were to be desired to the truck.  now I'm not the best at remembering to take photos as I'm working on things so bare with me. but anyways enough taking here's some pictures.

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this is the interior of the Comanche from when i received it.  yes those are toyota 4runner seats he had in there.  they were actually pretty comfy and had tons of adjustment knobs.  to bad they were a horrible red color haha.  don't mind the a pillar gauge he told me he had a few and friends convinced him it was a good idea, it was a wide ban o2 gauge.

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I actually snagged a set of comanche bucket seats from a guy 20 mins away. For the great price of free. ( you can hate me later haha). The seats although fully functional were out in the weather for 2 years and we're tan. So I stripped the seat to bare frame and thew the covers away. From there I had to replace the rotted section of seat frame with a new piece. Then I got a set of cherokee Laredo seats form the local boneyard, than feed the covers and seat pan over to the comanche bucket frames, and cut the hole for the lever for the fold function. I bought a whole bench just for the feet and transfered them to the buckets with a cool write up on this site. Sorry I don't have any pictures of this process but they tuned out great!

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next up i tackled the wiring nightmare that was input by the po.  the reverse lights were rigged to work on a dash switch when he swapped in the ax15.  so with a little help from comanche club i found the missing piece i needed.  the jumper wiring from the trans switch to the factory harness was missing.  luckily i found one at the local junkyard but it was for a ba10 so it had to be modded to work. 

 

also the radio was wired with a homemade harness and not one bit was using the factory harness.  a quick search on crutchfield and i found all i needed to fix the radio.

 

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The header panel was was cracked and the front fenders were all smashed and dented from being a bush truck.  so you guessed it i had another trip to the junkyard and snagged all the stuff of twp different cherokees  i also got the chrome door handles and mirrors to match the grill

before:

 

 

 

 

 

after

 

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so after hunting around on this site for a while i saw that switching to an open cooling system would net a cooler running engine.  so i took a trip to the local napa and gathered everything needed for the swap. (hoses for the heater core, hose for the overflow, overflow bottle, and i replaced the thermostat and gasket).  the po had already put in a different radiator with the cap built in was i broke lucky there.

 

 

 

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the tailgate that came on mine was pretty trashed if you guys saw it in the above pictures.  so i picked one up from a guy that was parting one out locally.

 

 

when i bought the jeep the drivers side floor pan was rotted away and i actually put my foot threw it on the teat drive, whoops.  well i bought replacement pans, big mistake, they were like a rough idea of what the pan should have been like. so i spent most of the time beating the pan into shape to fit the contours of the floor.once i got it done, i used a piece of 1/4 inch flat stock i had laying around and used it for the brace part along the unibody.

 

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ok i think I'm just about caught up with the posts now. haha.  anyway i was planning on getting rid of the ugly tube bumper the po had put on.  so i bought a jcr one. and after looking of ideas i feel in love with the way the Daking made his so... at the risk of being called a copy cat i decided to model after his.

 

after the bumper being on for a day or two i noticed that the hitch was crooked so i still have to redo that part.  i don't have any pictures but my dad suggest drilling out the small 10 mill bolts and putting bigger bolts that go threw the frame and nut and bolt to the truck.  so i bought 4in long 7/16  grade 8 bolts and lock nuts. then i cut the back of the frame off welded pieces of 1/2 tube inside so the frame wouldnt crush when you tightened the bolts and then welding the back of the frame back on.  i have to say i was very pleased by the results of that. anyway now it will be as i do things that i update this thread.  thanks for bearing with me for that haha

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  • 2 weeks later...

so my brother turned me on to otrattw.com for their switches.  i looked in to them and ended up decided to go that route for all my light switches.  i went to ebay and got relay harnesses form opt seven. i only have a picture of the switches in the panel right now, but you can see why i went with them.

 

 

.  

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ok guys i received a box from ups today (napier flairs!!) so i pulled the jeep in the garage and got to work

 

i pulled the front flairs off and cut the excess fender off under the header panel

 

 

 

well after i got the fender marked up i started hacking away with a grinder with a cut off wheel on it.  it was a little difficult to get the fender rounded with in the corners with it but i made do.  the finished product came out pretty good i think.

 

 

i only got the fronts done tonight. i have to fab up some bed sides to get the rears to work.  stay tuned.

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is anyone even reading this anymore haha. 

 

well ill keep posting anyways.  i was waiting till i had the next part of the project done to post to here it is.

 

i stuffed the truck in the garage and got to it.  i removed most on the trim and things on the outside and got to work with some 220 grit paper and a da sander

 

then i got to work doing body work. both sides of the box are pretty hammered to i decieded to just try to hide the weld in patches from being seen.  its just gonna look dented when its done.

 

 

then i shot the whole thing i primer

 

 

then i got to work with the spot puddy smoothing out all the rough that was left over from the bondo.  and shot the whole thing in primer again

 

 

then after a quick scuff i hung plastic up and shot the truck in the factory color.  enamel Colorado red.  i got a few runs on the box where i started.  but for my first time ever doing this i think it came out pretty good.

 

 

and the finish product

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  • 4 weeks later...

i decided to go head and do the 5.5 inch budget lift off this forum.  the front end went pretty smooth.  i had it knocked out pretty quick.

 

 

the rear of the truck was a bit more complicated.  the p.o. had put lift leafs under the truck so i had to wait till they got here.

in the meantime i pulled the rear and got the old brake lines off it for some new ones.

 

 

one of the leaf spring bolts were froze to the sleeve in the leaf bushing,  so i got out the ball joint press to get the stubborn guy out.

 

 

got the leafs on and the mounts tacked on ans mocked up.  gotta say i though it was gonna be easier.  but its done and looks good

 

 

and here's the truck sitting on its own wieght

 

 

and a few more all done

 

 

 

i still have to get the 33's on her and the rocksliders from krustyballer!

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