The Poor Whitey Project

[Dogman]

I was gonna wait a while before I started a build thread but while changing the oil today I noticed an issue that is bigger than I thought. So we'll start off with the basics:

'97 XJ
4.0L Auto Trans
104K miles when purchased in April 2008
126K miles now (Feb 2009)
D30/Chrysler 8.25
Receiver - Homemade HD Hitch Hauler

Did some initial maintenance:
Flushed the coolant system
Changed the oil 2X in 1000 miles
Lubed
New front brake pads



Needed tires bad
Got a good deal from Dean (4lowdigital) on a set of 5 BFG AT 30x9.50 on Canyon rims



Rear springs are shot but it still runs.

[Dogman]

Had a little "incident" back in Sept. - why do they put those mailboxes so close to the road....I mean....with driving...txting....eating...looking at the scenery...the poor mailbox never had a chance...neither did my fender flare.





But the lights still worked.

[Dogman]

So today I'm changing the oil and I knew there was a little rust on the rocker panels....well, after sticking my hand through the panel - I decided I might as well bang on it and see what falls off....the thing was loaded with road dirt and...salt - thank you very much PennDOT.

The driver's side wasn't so bad.



But the passenger's side - well there's not much remaining.



I was planning to add some rocker protection. So I guess now I'll be replacing the entire rockers with tubing in the near future.

[Hydra]

It's the curse of the rusty rockets on white jeeps!!!!

[Kyle]

Do you still have the stock wheels? If so i am interested.

[Dogman]

Wheels and tires went the first day I set them out along the road.

[Dogman]

The weather is getting nicer and I'm looking for some things to do with the jeep. A few days ago I took the grinder to the rusty rocker panels and cut them out. Now the installation of tubing appears quite doable for an amateur like me. After searching and reading how others have done this, I came up with the design shown below.



A few questions though:
Is 1/8" thick angle going to be strong enough or should I go 3/16"?
Is the bracing necessary between the rocker tubing and the frame rail?
What material would you use for the bracing? square tubing? flat stock? angle?

Also thinking of taking the doors off if I get time this afternoon

[Hydra]

that design looks solid, make sure you get your hinge pins before you take the doors off, that way you dont hve to leave your jeep doorless in a hardware store parkin lot

[CumminsJeep]

fawkin PA roads man....terrible

[Mel]

fawkin PA roads man....terrible

Try route 78 on the pa/nj line. You'll be lucky to have shocks after that section of the road! Along w/ the salt and dirt shit they put down.

[Dogman]

I believe PA has more miles of roads than any other state....and over 4000 bridges currently considered "deficient".

Obama - where is our infrastructure $$

[Dogman]

So I haven't posted much lately but I have been working on Poor Whitey and spending money as quick as it comes in. Inspection killed me with needing loads of brake work and a few other things. I did most of the work myself to save $$ thankfully.

So now I've added:
New rotors and pads
New steel brake line from MC to the rear
New YJ brake line for the rear (and upcoming lift)
New adjusters for the rear brakes
Some U-Joints up on the front axle

Painted the stock fender flares for fun - look good from a distance
Tore out the carpet - gonna bedliner inside soon

This past week I finally installed the rocker tubing with help from my uncle. We modified my design slightly during the process but think its gonna hold up real well. Might add some flat stock bracing from the unirail to the tubing in the future...but that's in the future. While installing the tubing we also plated the unirails with 3/16" steel. Overall the rockers and frame stiffeners made a major difference in the ride and feel of the jeep.





We welded a small piece of 3/16" flat stock into the lower front fender opening. The height is about even with the top of the rocker tubing. My thought here is that the lower fender seam is currently below the rocker tubing and will take abuse so I added the support and will bend/cut/weld the lower fender up against the new flat stock support instead of letting it get abused. Then the rocker tubing will be the lowest body parts on the sides from front tire to rear.



Rockers have since been painted black and everything underneath has been undercoated. Think I might use bedliner on the lower door panels and remove the crappy plastic molding/strip - and hit the rocker tubing with bedliner as well.

Picked up set of decent stock XJ leaf springs for $20 and a set of Chevy S-10 leaf springs for $40
Dissassembled and cleaning them up this weekend then it'll be time to combine for the bastard pack. I'm thinking of keeping it about 3" of lift since I purchased used 3" coils a while back but I'm tempted to use enough leaves to net 4" - maybe just add a spacer up front then to level it out. Really don't have money for a SYE at this point so I'll resort to a homemade TC drop if necessary.

GOAL = Lift installed before June 1.

Other stuff to come:
Homemade skids - or reinforced JY skids off a ZJ.
Homemade front bumper - tubing already acquired
Locker in the D30
Limited Slip in the 8.25 (Daily driver of 25K+ miles/year)
Gonna need bigger tires sooner or later - my 30 inchers might look funny with 3"-4" of lift

Slowly we're getting there

[Rowdy XJ]

Looking good keep dem pix coming

[XJLI]

I'd lock the 8.25 with an Aussie... lots of people DD their trucks with them. If you're scared of the snow it behaves almost exactly like a tight LSD in the rear, but offroad is 100000x better. You'll get used to it like any other thing.

the main leaf from the XJ pack will get you 1-1.5", the S10 main will get you 2-3." If I were you, I'd add the XJ main and second longest to your existing pack. Good to add more leafs and progressively get higher than add one big one that makes a lot of lift. You can always mix and match and try different combos as well.

[Dogman]

From what I read on NAXJA - using an XJ main coupled with the full S-10 pack will yield a little over 4". So I'm thinking either I take one of the S-10 leaves out for 3" or leave it in for the full 4".

I thought about using the 2nd XJ leaf but my reasoning for using the S-10 leaves is because I tend to haul quite a bit of weight and also pull a trailer. There's quite a difference in weight, strength, and arch between the S-10 and XJ leaves. I was quite surprised how heavy the S-10 leaves were when I picked them up.

My reasoning for the LSD in the rear is two-fold. First being a daily driver and then I was also thinking this jeep may see some time in RCRocs Class I where only one locker is allowed and LSD doesn't qualify as a locker so that would allow me to put an Aussie or Lock-Rite up front.

Just thoughts for now as I change my mind as often as a ____ but I'm always open to suggestions - Thanks.