Johnny's 94 yj "One Big Poop"

[jps4jeep]

Well, this has been a long time coming so I might as well start one, I have a sh!t load of photos to post and some are going to jump around and are not in any specific chronological order, but I will try to provide as little insight as possible and bore you with stupid commentary.
This will eventually where I put all my current work.
After I successfully destroyed my 77 blazer's frame due to inexperience wheeler stroker motor and too big of tires (still looking for a photo) I got my first jeep in 1998, it was a 94 sport SE (the gayish splash stickers down the side) this was my college budget build, it had taller home made shackles, 31” mud terrains on some chromed out rims and a welded front diff. that's all. It was a great little wheeler and probably one of my favorite set ups ever. In December of 2000, I bought myself a lift kit for Christmas. Three days before Christmas, this happened







The Jeep was parked in the driveway of my parents house, not in gear, with the park brake on, well, the park brake popped free and the jeep rolled 130 yards down a steep hill in front of their house and eventually hit a house. It was a total loss. I ended up taking as much off it as I could prior to the insurance taking it, Sold most of what I didn't reuse, ended up actually making money off it and then I bought the jeep I have now, another 94 sport SE that had Gayish.. I mean non-heterosexual splash stickers down the side (still looking for stock pics)
Since I had the lift kit I put it on and wheeled it with the 31” Mud terrains for a while (only pic I could find)




Around 2000, 2001 I added 33” Yokahama's on some cheap want ad black steelies







Then I got some TJ flares off ebay super cheap that were take off's from a brand new sahara. I seriously think I only paid $60







Then I fabbed up my own OBA set up, the only thing I had to pay for was a new clutch belt and idler pulley, everything else I made, rebuilt, or got for free.







Air tank was from a Mitsubishi-fuso air brake system I got for free from a friend of a friend that worked at Detroit diesel at the time.

 

[jps4jeep]

Why is the photo Icon missing?

What ever

 

[jps4jeep]

All the same time, I also had a number of jeeps I dragged home to either part out or fix up and sell, here are two of the worse one's I had.





Then I blew every last brake line in the jeep in Paragon so I finially replaced every single line and added a set of SS extended lines, which I ended up replacing a number if times because I would constantly over extend them and pull the crimp fitting out of the banjo.



Then I got some tractor lights from napa, 4 of them, at $5 a pop, plus wiring and switch I had Rock lights for about $30



Then I made this little gem, it houses switches for the OBA, Rock lights and the Dukes of hazard horn. Plus it had a transmission gauge for the T-case, Cyl head temp gauge, and a air/fuel ratio gauge.





Then I added a winch, front bumper and new rear bumper





Eventually the front diff got welded and a Aussie lunchbox in the rear on this jeep and it stayed that way for a season or two,
Then I broke the pass side intermediate shaft, 2 days later I broke my leg and couldn't drive a stick for a while, so I spent that time working in the garage and getting my axles set up and fabbing up some parts.
about a year or so earlier I scored a set of D44's pretty much for free, I traded a set of ½ doors that I had that I got for free from a junk jeep (they were junk) and I traded my old grill guard that I actually paid for new (stupid me)

 

[jps4jeep]

The D44's both go 4.88's, and Detroit.
The front got 75 Chevy knuckles that I had flat topped milled and drilled. KOZ hi steer arms, Poison Spyder diff guard, stock waggy hubs, 75 Chevy caliper mounts, calipers and rotors (stock waggy were junk, these were free) and eventually some 4340 chromo's. The rear got 99 C1500 Chevy rotors, 84 Cadillac calipers, home made diff cover, and cryo’ed shafts









I had saved a lot of parts from my blazer, these were on it back when it was still 6 lug, for what ever reason I hung on to them for 6 years, so I cleaned them up and used them



I also re-used the old rear drive shaft from my blazer as the front shaft in my YJ



It was literally about a inch too long, I know it appears shorter, but the pinion on the 44 is way longer than the d30



At this point, my leafs were all either bent, broken or beat. I bought a set of pro comps from a friend a couple years earlier for another project that never got used so I tossed those and the d44’s into the jeep, at the same time, I rerouted the brake lines so I only had one line to the rear axle then splits at the diff (stock) and one line to the front axle and splits at the diff (not stock) used the stock booster, master from a 85 E 350 and the proportioning valve from a 98 5.9 Limited Grand.
Out with the rear



Now for the front



Rear in



Front in



Made my own steering linkage from .25 wall 1.25” DOM with 1 ton TRE from a K30 Chevy.

 

[jps4jeep]

With the axles and new springs in, it sat way higher than it did before, even though the old springs were 4" skyjackers and these were 3.5" pro comps. So the 33" tires looks a little out of place.



Notice the nicely painted rims.
SO on went the Q78's



Problem I ran into was that the stock pitman arm was reamed out for the 1 ton TRE, but due to the hi steer, it was contacting at ride height, ooops. So I took the steering box off thinking I woud just re-drill the frame. I decided to fab my own steering box mount and it moved the box forward 1.5 inches and out .5” away from the shackle (contacted if I just move the box forward)







I am still looking for pics of the bracket.
Then I wheeled it successfully for a couple years

 

[jps4jeep]

More to come.

 

[HiHood]

Looking good, Johnny, looks like it's getting there.

 

[SteelHeadz]

Awesome rig Johnny!!!

 

[blkrubi88]

Looking good! What are some other plans you have for it?

 

[jps4jeep]

all those pic are atleast 4 years old. I am compiling the rest now.

 

[jps4jeep]

couple years back I smoked 3 out of 4 of my rims at a local trail. I can honestly say I was not the hardest on my vehicle that day, but I did find the limit of aluminum wheels.



I had a set of 6 lug Chevy Rally Wheels I got for free from a friend that had been sitting in my garage for a couple years, I also had ordered a set of DIY bead locks a year or so earlier through A-Z fab through pirate. It was such a super deal I could not pass it up. So basically I would have bead locks for less than $160 bucks.







Primed



Be-dazzeled





All the mean while I had been collecting parts for the next stage of build

 

[jps4jeep]

Np 231-D300 Doubler from D&D Machine, Duffy from Pirate does awesome work. I already had a D300 from one of my old CJ’s and a 231 from a YJ project that I never used.

Cable shifters from North West Fab

Tube Notcher

 

[jps4jeep]

a little cut and paste from a previous thread here

Well.. I am in the last stages of stretching teh wheel base in my 94 YJ to 106", that's moving the front axle forward about 5.5" and pulling the rear back about 5.5"

The gauge said I had about 1/4 tank, but the bottom of my tank was so beat up, that the 15 gal tank really only held about 8 gal. so... this was in order.

Got me a RCI 2161A fuel cell of ebay for a screaming $150 shipped.

I got the -8 fitting from Summit. not the cheapest way to do it, the cell uses the same 37* taper that Hydraulic lines use and could have just got some at the local hose shop, but these are super bling.

Gonna be stretching to 106” wheel base with a Big ol’ 14 bolt rear, so this had to go, plus on the last trail ride I ran out of gas and it would only seem like a smart time to do it while it was empty.
What a way to waste a Friday.. Drinking beer and spending 2 hours to take out a out a gas tank that should have only been 30 minutes, but it is out!

Putting in a 2162A RCI tank
Mocked up

Re-use the factory pump and sending unit, mark for the cut

Thanks to a friend in the Jeep business for hooking my up with a junk Fuel plate flange, allowed me to make my retainer flange for the fuel cell with out actually having to pull mine out. Really made the installation move along quicker.

Tig welded up the original float assembally. I want to keep using the stock fuel gauge, so I would re-use the stock sender, but the float hit the side of the cell and needed to be shortened by about 1.5”

Tossed it in, fit like a glove

I will eventually sink the cell down through the body and in between the frame rails, but dues to lack of time, and desire to wheel it, this will have to do for now. So I found these poly swap bar end link bushings at auto zone.

Here is what I did with them, real nice vibration isolators if I do say so myself.

While I was at a local marine store buying these for my hood (pics to come on this)

I bought heat shrink water proof connectors and re-wired the fuel pump, replumbed the pump, while at west I also found a 3/8-1/4 plastic barbed hose bushing (you can kind see it in the third pic, it is white), I was going to run the vent up to the under hood area, I made a little splash guard for it and stuff, but now I will simply reuse the stock charcoal canister.

Finished her up just right

 

[jps4jeep]

The mounting tabs for the cell are not designed to hold the tank while bouncing up and down the trail. I made some straps that you can sort of see in some of the pictures, but here is a how I attached them.
in teh front of the cell, I just drilled throught the floor and I just took some 1/4 bar stock and made a flange for under the jeep to keep the bolts from ripping through the floor. for the rear of the cell, I didn't want to just drill down through the floor since there is no access under niether. plus I plan on cutting that part out then I stretch the rear so I made this

Just some 1.5x1.5 3/16 wall tube that I had laying around. I wanted to secure it through the sides of the wheel well.

Just welded some 2x2x3/16 angle I had hanging around on the ends

welded in some nuts, I know I could have just drilled and tapped, but for some reason or another, the tap was missing from my tap and die set, I already had the bolt, flat and lock washer, so I found a couple spare nuts and made this work.

Best part is it offers some support from to the cell as well as holds it firmply inplace. I just bent up the straps from some 1/8"x1.5" aluminum flat stock I had. to isolate it from the cell, I used some garage door sealing strips, they fit perfectly.

Then I wheeled it pretty much the rest of the year as is.

 

[jps4jeep]

Time for some cage work. I got a great deal on some Race line suspension seats off pirate.
first get some measurements. so I marked the center points of both seats, and then the shoulder location on the drivers seat. Yes I am short.

Seats and seat belts are out

stripped her down to bare minimum

Took some modding and grinding and bending and drilling, but I got the factory sliders to not only fit, but work on the suspension seats. For now I am using 2.52.5x3/16 aluminum angle as a seat base. It is what I had. I will probably be clearencing these a lot to get the seats with the same seat heght and rake as the originals, but this was just the first one. I evetually got all 4 mounted. I will be welding full circumfrance tabs to the cage to hold the seat to it. after throwing some tube at the jeep, I might flip the angle and g a bit wide to get a lower pofile.

This was my first and fail method to mocking up the new seats for general measurement. I did not photo the second, and successful method, but what I did was put some 2x4's across the top of the cage and suspend the front with one strap and 2 on the rear, made it way easier to center the seat and fine tune the heights.

No need to comment on the filthy work bench... but here is the JD2 notcher. Thing works the balls, little less than a minute to notch the tube. and this was my first set up, I as getting a lot of vibes so I took the base off, spun the vise 90* and secured it that way. much better.

It was getting late, but here is the begining. I used the mini sledge to "clearence" the transmission tunnel about a 1/2 inch might need to persuade it down another 1/4 or so.

 

[jps4jeep]

All the tube is .120 wall 1.75 DOM


Look at the difference between the .120 wall and the 16ga tubing.

Since I am pretty much out of tube, and no desire to spend another hour grinding, the front of the cage will look lke this I think. I was playing with masking tape looking at how a load with be distributed through the cage on a side load, and while this is not Ieal, it is sufficient I think. I might switch it in anticipation of redoing the front of the cage though, here is what it looked like (this tape is just holding the tube up)

I replaced the rear support and added these two bars that will tie into the front section. before anyone coments... "if you rework the front these will be ended nodes," already took it into consideration, more on that when the front gets re-worked. I am going to make some cool ass speaker pods to mount in the space inbetween these bars, thats on the dry erase board for next weekend. you'll have to wait and see.

Made a passenger OH'[censored] bar, not the original design, but getting a piece of tube that had the radius I desired wth a 180* bend was not gonna happen with the provisions I have at my disposal, so this will work, also, this is not the actual location, this is where the tape would hold it. ;D It is hard to see, but the ends are mitered 15* and I will entually cap them and smooth them out.

Added gussets just above the Drivers and passengers heads, the other two photo's show future gussets, need to put a couple bends into the tube to make them look good though.

this is the A pillar hoop

this is the rear of the B piller hoop

Too add, I have done plenty of tube work before, always using the grinder method... Go buy a notcher, makes notched tighter than a bulls ass in fly season, god I am loving this thing!

I will be bending more tube up tonight, and I am also waiting for a shipment from ruff stuff, so I will have more updates soon, I am also almost out of tube, hard to think that I threw almost 40 feet of tube at this.

 

[jps4jeep]

I initially wanted to paint it that Gold spray paint, but the store only had one can and I knew I was going to need at least 3 so I ended up painting it with chrome spray paint. didn't come out exactly as I wanted to. Looks more like aluminum than chrome, but what ever. this is only temporary color.

Like mentioned before, I will be eventually 4 linking the rear and will mount the air shocks off the cage. so at that time, I will probably back half and the entire rear cage will get reworked



So I actually finished the cage in June (disregard the photo dates, they are wrong) I wheeled the **** out of the jeep all summer. haven't rolled it, but I flopped it hard once, I had zero damage or deflection in the cage.

I got more to take pics of stuff I have been collecting I will get up later.

 

[jps4jeep]

Terry, why no pics for me?

 

[TerryMason]

sorry, I've been MIA a bit. I ended up making a change to the build section. You have to attach photos to your message. It's more frustrating up front, but will make sure that the pictures are always there for people to see.

From the faq:

One thing to note, you can't attach images from remote sites here, you must attach the photos directly to your post. The reason is that over time, these linked images tend to get lost. For an example, take a look at this thread. Please note that youtube videos are allowed if you have one of your Jeep.

You've done alot of work on this thread, so give me a few to see how I can fix things up.

 

[jps4jeep]

figured it out