Project Lay-Z-Boy

[Scoobienorth]

I wanted to start this build thread off with some of my history so you can understand why this build is the way it is.

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First up right out of high school my best friend and I tried to save this old cj-6 with a 289 in it. The ford power mixed with young exuberance meant a continually failing t-90 trans. In fact it got so common my buddy rebuilt it in 3 hours still in the jeep while waiting for me to get off work. The pic is from the last time when it blew every gear clean out of the housing.

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Next up was an 03 rubicon. I lived up in Hudson’s Hope and a local guy wheeled his 04 rubi a lot and built mine to perform the way I wanted it to. It had a 2” body lift, 4” procomp lift with a flat belly,even bolt heads were sunk into the skid pan. Every anchor underneath it was trimmed, tucked and relocated. Mixed with 21” of belly height it was a beast. I found out it wasn’t lift or lockers that made the rig but all the small things. I beat this thing really hard. I lost a lot of money on this one.

[Scoobienorth]

Next up was years later I came into the TJ-6. The builder of this rig was very meticulous and talented. I got lucky with it and it excelled with a gentle driver. Spin the tires and it would not move. Crawl and it would embarrass very expensive rigs. This one got me into snow wheeling but also taught me about road manners as we did take this to Moab.

In the end it never felt like my Jeep and I wanted to build my own. Life got in the way and the right buyer cake along and I sold it. Then I realized I could neither afford to or even find someone to bike my rig and I had a lot to learn. So I bought a common cheap platform that I could make mistakes on. I didn’t want to follow the internets build advice. I’ve wanted run it as is and only change the shortcomings I came up against. This rig would turn into an offroad only highway trip fearing budget beast that makes do with very minimal parts. I’ve come a long ways in what I’ve learned. If I were to redo this now with my knowledge base it would be very different. But it’s almost done as far as building and I’m keeping my eyes open to my next project.

[Scoobienorth]

I’ve got over 2500 pics and videos over 3 years on my phone. It’s to much to go through and redo a build thread but here’s the stages of build from walk around videos on YouTube.

This was when I got it finally dialed in on 33’s after taking it the Sandhollow Utah.
https://youtu.be/E7d9n-JJS8M

Up next was when the 36” iroks came into the picture. On 33’s the wj worked really well and punched way above what it had any right to do but in the snow it no where near enough as it could get itself into lots that it could not get out of. I picked the iroks because I felt it was the absolute biggest tire I figured I could get in there. This was the next evolution of rigging the Jeep up to be easier and more effective.
https://youtu.be/Oj4UIEUJDsM

The third video is mostly the wheel tubs and massive cuts to the rear end to get wheel travel back that I lost. https://youtu.be/8GLlV5Yo0po

[Scoobienorth]

The 10 wide wheels with 3.75” backspace make my steering parts groan and cause issues. My parts are to light for what I’m running. I’m ok with it and just drive it to what it’s capable of. Sometimes I can’t steer. The locker has made that worse. My gearing sucks and I need to drive accordingly. Most times I need to stay 2000-4000 rpm which means I hit the odd thing a little hard and I need low range getting up the hills in the mountains. Without sway bars it’s a handful on the road. I need stiffer springs and shocks and with my front axle stretch my track bar hits the dif cover. I need a bend to clear that so I can add uptravel to the drivers side front. That’s my main issues currently. Most I can live with.

[Scoobienorth]

I did not have the skills to do this when I started cutting the wheel tubs out. I stretched them back as far as I could and raised the outside body higher than the tub so it could clear my tires when flexed. It’s helped a lot. A good friend does body work and did the structural welds around the inside wheel tubs so it was safe and showed me what to do. The rest was all me. After what seems to be several hundred I learned lots about making sure the welds are clean , metal fits well and how to be careful on the super thin sheet metal the factory puts in. I didn’t much care how cleanly the body work care out. This was skill building and proof of concept for me. I think it’s funny that so many people are willing to cut all their steering and suspension off and build new stuff and seem to be scared of cutting some sheetmetal.

[Scoobienorth]

The finished inside before my cargo system got reinstalled

[Scoobienorth]

Here it is ready to roll next to my daily which is a right hand drive wj, with 2” lift and 255/70r17 and fender trim.

[Scoobienorth]

After the shakedown run I had some death wobble. This spring last trip out I hit a rock under the snow and bent my track bar and broke my steering box. So I swapped a heavier track bar that I had to cut down to make it fit in. Maybe I drilled one of the bolt holes a tiny bit large so I’ll check that. I’m going to add some caster up front. I’m just at stock spec for jk front axle but my driveshaft is close to its limit. But I think I can get a little out of it. The shake seem to be induced from my tires being out of round and not balanced. Way home it was almost nonexistent. I’ve spun almost all of my iroks in the rim. Think I need balancing beads or something inside and pull the weights off. I’m also suspect of my factory jk tierods as the tubes flex under the strain of the offset from the big tires. I’m thinking of trying to sleeve them a bit.

[Scoobienorth]

After writing all this out I should check my rim and alignment. It looked ok to the eyeball but it was a hard hit and could be out a little bit.

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

After writing all this out I should check my rim and alignment. It looked ok to the eyeball but it was a hard hit and could be out a little bit.

Yeah, doesn't take much of a bent rim to set up a harmonic... And then it's death wobble!


Nice job on stretching out the wheel tubs. It's such a pain in the ass to weld those back in and have things come out half decent.

[Scoobienorth]

Crawled under it today. Checked the wheel, is round and not twisted to the best I can see. Track bar is tight. I noticed on the side that got hit almost all of my wheel weights got removed. Both fronts have been off the beads and the side that took damage was in water so I could have crap inside the tire. I pulled all my wheel weights off as both rear tires have spun in the rims and both fronts have been debeaded and spun. Whatever I’m chasing is pretty small. I was a little light on air pressure. 26 instead of 31-32 I normally run and in the past at times that’s caused some wobble issues. Might try and run it like this or add a tiny bit more caster to see if it improves.

[Master Yota]

I run air soft bbs in my 35s to balance them on my cruiser. About 8 oz. per tire. The bbs are about 12 dollars for a 1kg bag from Princess Auto. Way cheaper than actual tire balance beads.
I've also used about 8oz of antifreeze to do the same job. Probably even cheaper and easier to come by than the beads...

[Scott Cee AKA 2drx4]

I run air soft bbs in my 35s to balance them on my cruiser. About 8 oz. per tire. The bbs are about 12 dollars for a 1kg bag from Princess Auto. Way cheaper than actual tire balance beads.
I've also used about 8oz of antifreeze to do the same job. Probably even cheaper and easier to come by than the beads...

I did it with lead BBs on my first Comanche. They eventually broke down and coated the entire tire inside with lead. So I think the airsoft ones are better, even if they cost a bit more.

[Scoobienorth]

I was contemplating antifreeze actually. Antifreeze is handy because of the moisture the air compressor puts into the tire. Regular balance beads don’t like it and I’ve had a habit of taking tires off the beads. Since I want to pop both front tires off and check them anyways I may do some duct tape while I’ve got it off.

[Scoobienorth]

I run air soft bbs in my 35s to balance them on my cruiser. About 8 oz. per tire. The bbs are about 12 dollars for a 1kg bag from Princess Auto. Way cheaper than actual tire balance beads.
I've also used about 8oz of antifreeze to do the same job. Probably even cheaper and easier to come by than the beads...

I did it with lead BBs on my first Comanche. They eventually broke down and coated the entire tire inside with lead. So I think the airsoft ones are better, even if they cost a bit more.

Ok that’s funny.