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Project “Tomahawk”


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Prepping the cab. Stripped down the problem areas I had on my old MJ along the back cab seams. Sprayed some epoxy down any place I got down to bare metal then replaced all the seam sealer. FYI, a great tool to remove the factory seam sealer is an oscilating tool with a scraper blade on it. The factory seam sealer was a very cheap one part sealer that has a tendency to crack. Poor application made the mater even worse. Fixing all the seams in both window frames is critical to keeping water out permanently. 
Also sealed all the joints from the new rocker panel and the striker reinforcement plates.
 

 

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Time for some updates! Cab is now fully prepped and all body work complete. Ready for sealer. Had som “oil canning” in a damaged b pillar that took a lot of work. The metal had been stretched and did not want to cooperate. Learned how to use heat and controlled cooling to strategically shrink the panel back into place. Worked perfectly and eliminated the panel flop. Had to reconstruct the compound corner though which was a task and a half. Did one final retouch of all the critical seams in the window frames along with the firewall seams and windshield drain. Finished by skimming the panels in glaze to get them perfect. Will be sealing and painting in the next day or two. Just a few more small body panels to be completed before reassembly. Bed and glass can be installed and electrical can start. 

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The window sealing surfaces have been taped off now. Almost no body shops follow this practice but window urethane is supposed to be adhered only to epoxy sealer/primer per the TDS. Even the factory ignored this. There should be no base or clear under the urethane. 

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Very well could be. Adhesives like this are quite picky when it comes to adhering (ha) to the proper specifications especially in such an important role as a car window. It might have worked fine for a few years after the truck was assembled, but as the urethane aged, it being stuck to paint could very well have made the difference between a leak and a non-leak. Certain years of Volvos had major issues with the front windshield adhesive, and I'm wondering if something like this is to blame.

 

It's nice to see all of the shortcuts that Jeep took making our trucks, and as an engineer it's interesting to see the ramifications of those shortcuts 30 years later. I knew they made some, but damn. Great to know when I'm trying to sleep at night :laugh:

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Good points. I’ve noticed that the seams is where I’ve always had issues. Factory seam sealer was 1k air dry and cracks with age. There is seam sealer in the bottom of both window frames on each corner and I suspect that to be a big factor. I removed all the factory seam sealer in the window frames along with most of the cab. Got down to clean metal, epoxy sealed it and used a 2k seam sealer. Either way though, the factory urethane should have been applied straight to the primer. 

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36 minutes ago, USN_JeepMJ said:

Wow, excellent work! This thread is making me want to go back and do a better job painting mine. I wish I would have broken my paint job up more instead of trying to shoot the whole thing at once. 

This paint has a ton of pearl and metallic so shooting it all at once is preferable to have uniformity across the panels and gaps. Since I’m doing mine in sections, I’m shooting a final “guide” coat where I drop the gun pressure and increase the distance to essentially shoot a fine mist of texture that will settle into the partially flashed base coat. That helps keep things nice and uniform when shooting individual panels with these types of paints. Imo, the number one benefit of tearing these apart to this level is to repair all of those horrible factory seams 

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Electric tailgate lock. High powered actuator, 3/16 locking pin with beveled guide. The pin is guided by 3 pints of contact before going through the actual handle. The handle has almost no play when locked and the actuator arm doesn’t have to bare any of the pressure from the locking pin due to the guides. 
 

And yes, you can replace the actuator through the tailgate handle hole. Though there is no way to build the additional pin guide without tailgate disassembly. 

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  • ghetdjc320 changed the title to Project “Tomahawk”

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