I bought a TJ because why????

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

It turns out this housing wasn't machined for axle seals on both sides. I guess some were, some weren't. There may be a seal available that is a proper axle shaft seal that fits, but I see lots of people just put normal lip seals in and paid the price. It's not immediately obvious if it leaks, as it has to fill the CAD housing up before it comes out of the tube.

It's 2" on one side and 2.120" on the other. Going to do more digging into what seals are available, but it's not ideal regardless as you're going to be installing it into an unmachined tube, so it may or may not be an overly true bore.

Maybe I'll go back to the other housing.

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

Decided to just go back to the original housing.

It always amuses me when the ball joints come apart like this.

Stripped basically.

I am debating taking this housing to be sandblasted because I don't have time to do what I did with the 8.8. We will see.

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

Got some work done on the front housing. Not as much as I'd like, but that's life.

The track bar (panhard) on these things uses a super stupid bracket that binds out on droop, plus the previous owner boogered up the steering stabilizer mount real bad. So it was going to get some reworking.

Trimmed a bunch off:

At this point I realized I was annoyed with the rust and just got the whole thing sandblasted. RCJ did it super fast and did a great job. Should have just done this with the 8.8 too.

Factory plug welds are cracked, and some of the other factory welds are terrible:

Making new bits and welding them on, along with welding the inside of the bracket up a bit more:

It looks pretty terrible but it's way stronger than it was and will allow for more travel. I went to a 1/2" hole for the track bar, which I previously drilled out. I may put a bit more material on it before I call it done, or not.

I still have to plate the other mounts and weld up some other damage.

[arse_sidewards]

how much did the sandblasting cost?

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

how much did the sandblasting cost?

200 loonies, no tax.


He said he'd do a regular axle that didn't have brackets for about $150, since there's a ton of time wasted trying to do the inside of the brackets. Something super simple like a bare Toyota or 9" housing would probably only be $100. It's just based on how long it takes his blast flunky to get it done.

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

I did what I could to straighten the LCA brackets back out and plated them with some generic tabs. I closed in the passenger side UCA bracket and welded it to the housing more too, I am debating adding a bit more material to it but I'm guessing it will be fine for the very softcore nature of thus build. Also welded the tubes to the housing and piled more weld into the plugs. Some of the other random brackets got more weld thrown at them too. Not my best work on any of this, but at least I am keeping the quality consistent.

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

Got the Spartan in and the gears set up:

Honestly this gear set was a bit of a pain in the ass, going deeper was worse and shallower ran off the top, so we're calling it good at that with .006" BL. The paint was a little extra runny, it looked better on the bottom but changed a bit by the time I took the picture. The new carrier from Spicer was kind of a pile, I had to do a bunch of work on the center pin hole to get the pin to go through even with a hammer, it's like they missed a final reaming step on assembly. Eh, she'll be fine.

Other annoyance was I treated myself to a new cover from TMR. And they didn't mill the mounting face after welding it.

I tried tightening it up and it's just too much to be happy. I will try to take a skim off it and get it closer. I would have thought that they would have a fixture and would at least got it closer than that, either by preloading it before welding, or by just grinding or milling the surface after.

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

I thought I took more pictures, but apparently not.

I wound up removing the logo off the cover and welding a piece of HSS on to it so I could hold it easier. Then milled it mostly flat.

This wasn't a very rigid setup and I just used an end mill. It didn't come out great but it fit flat on the housing, so I'm sure RTV will seal fine. If it doesn't I will try again and do it more right. Still annoyed about it.

And I forgot to drill and install the flip insert into the knuckle before I painted it. Buddy at work lent me a 3/4 spiral taper reamer and it did a nice job with it just strapped to the table. Still have to weld it in and touch the paint back up.

Slowly coming together.

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

Cover on and sealed:

I bought the RC ball joints because they were cheap. They grease on a 45 degree angle and you need to make some clearance for the zerk.

As an aside, they must be dimensionally a little different from normal ones. My ball joint cups wouldn't fit these, and I had to do a bunch of monkey business and malarkey.

Cleaned up before paint.

Black.

[Snowracer]

thats a fully polished turd right there

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

Turns out that RC gave you a pair of flush needle style grease fittings too. So I did not need to grind the Cs. If I had looked farther in the bag I would have seen them, they did not mention it in the instructions. Oh well.

As far as I got today:

Here is my WTF problem. The V8 ZJ tie rod (DS1312) will not fit in the TJ drag link (DS1430).

Everything I have read says it should. It is a bigger thread and taper than any of the other ones. It looks like a 9/16 UNF nut threads on it. The nut they supplied in the hardware kit doesn't fit it. Did they screw up and install the wrong ball/stud in it when they made it? I'm at a total loss. I can ream the drag link so it fits, but nobody has anything to say about this. I thought they had just chowdered the taper and cleaned it up a bit with a file to get it that close, but it's nowhere near going. Nobody in town has one to compare to.

I will decide what to do tomorrow. Worst case I mangle the drag link to try to make it work and wreck both parts.

[Scoobienorth]

I’m curious to watch the zj tie rod setup. It’s one of the few mods I can do steering wise as they are available for the rhd.

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

I’m curious to watch the zj tie rod setup. It’s one of the few mods I can do steering wise as they are available for the rhd.

I did it on my 88 Comanche. Was a complete bolt in affair, save that I flipped the tie rod end.

Why it is not bolting in on the TJ is a mystery to me.

Setup on the Comanche:

xq91MSNl.jpg (37.24 KiB) Viewed 309 times

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

I am wondering if they changed the steering arms a bit on the later knuckles, because this is not fitting.

Forgetting to put the flip insert in was my brain trying to save me from myself. Arrrgh. It would be fine if I hadn't done that.

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

I think the steering arms cast into the knuckles are about 1/2" longer on the early "windowed" knuckles with the separate caliper bracket. Not much, but enough that the tie rod would clear the swaybar bracket.