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*****MTY Mouse XJ Build*****

17K views 108 replies 31 participants last post by  MTY Mouse 
#1 · (Edited)

The madness all started early 2007, I did not know jack crap about cherokee's and had previously lightly wheeled a DD 02 durango on 33's.


So late 2006, I was on Ebay and made a late night impluse purchase of a 91 XJ that was in New York, I was like what the hell am I going to do!!! How do I get this thing! Never a real plan. So luckly I called my Buddy who was Drunk at the time and asked him to help me go get it!!! He had a Duramax and could get a trailer.... a couple weeks later and well after a 12 hour day on the road thru Canada this is what I ended up with.

Guy told me it had electrical issues..... When we got it home, we tried to roll the motor over manually and it would not budge... so pulled the motor.

and this is what we found. So this is a little worse then a electrical issue..

I also started to do some cutting, had big plans, 2x6 rock rails and clearance the fenders


Mean while, my father in law and I started to rebuild the motor and while I was finishing the motor up, My brother called me out of the blue and said throw that black XJ away, I found you a red 89 XJ with a bad motor, he told me it was in great shape for a great price!!!!
So then this one shows up at the house!!!
Now we go something to work with!!!

So had to pull this motor and get my new one in!!!!


Well now that the motor is swapped, I have to swap over the small 2" lift that needed to go into the red one! Plus the black one had two good 31" Courser MT's which needed 2 more to complete the set, Then Dad comes across a set of rims behind his buddies barn, got the rims and tires mounted up and 2" lift in.....



Action Photo taken august 2007
 
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#8 ·
Still trying to catch up to where it is at today!!!

I needed to go bigger so started to order parts
6.5" rough country lift, SYE, tom wood rear shaft, 33" MTZ


We picked a weekend and heading north, A friend of mine from my home town has a great setup!!! Trade off to use his shop was a keg of Miller Lite, some pizza, and clean up!
This is how it looked after selling the 31's the day is really went under the knife. I was ready to have a few beers when I got there, because on the way up on 75 it started to death wobble, worst thing that has ever happened to me on the road, scared the shit out of my wife who was following me up there.
:confused:

The adventure begans, we even tried to split up tasks....





After a long weekend this is how it rolled out!!

from this

to be continued..............
 
#15 ·
Yup the time machines moves on!!!!! So I wheeled it around Silver Lake and the Cadillac area...... Then, I decided to do some cutting and tucking. Trimmed the front, then sliced and hammered the shit out of the rear!!!




Then added TJ rear flares all the way around. Well, if you want to do it right, then it has to take at least 12 hours or so.... did not keep track of time, but a lot of it, was spent on these. :(
:fish:The normal guy would have found 4 rears for cheap, but I decided to cut into a brand new set of 4 TJ rear flares and it kinda went like this. Photo's are not in any particular order, but you get the idea!!!!

















Then...........





































This is how it turned out!!!!!
 
#21 ·
So, I wheeled some more


and then made the mistake of going to twisted trails,




now I was hooked, everything had to be bigger, locked, and better. SO I picked up a 8.8/D30 combo with 4.56 gears locked in the front and spool in the rear,



problem was the locker in the front had the springs and pins in backwards and broken. The spool in the rear was broken as well.... so I fixed the locker issues and then went to limited slip in the rear. Orginal 8.8 I bought was all set up for a TJ so I sold that housing and got a bare one, then added UBE.






Now that I got the right gear and a little better axles it time for some new meats.
35x12.5x15,SSR's and had to go with wider rims also.....


Added some ACOS in the front to level it out after the 1.5" UBE added some height in the rear. This is how it turned out!



Action Photo from blessing



ppkaprince98 helped a ton getting MTY Mouse to the point you see it in the above pics. Seemed like he and I were together every weekend changing stuff on his or my rig. Or we were wheeling the shit out of them, had a blast.!!! AND A FEW COCKTAILS ALONG THE WAY!!!



Not sure this is normal build thread info, but alot of times it is all about the time you get to spend with your buddies, family members, and your kids that makes this worth all the time, effort, and expense................. SO I WOULD LIKE TO TAKE THE TIME TO DEDICATE THIS BUILD THREAD TO THOSE THAT HELPED ME OUT AND GIVE YOU THE OPERTUNITY TO CHECK OUT A COUPLE OF THEIR RIGS......
PPKAPRINCE98, He no longer has this Jeep because things got a little complicated and he has not been able to wheel for a year or two now, but he will be back!!!! Thanks for all the help on MTY Mouse!!



rockstarryan and one of the jeeps he used to have....

My Dad and Father in Law also helped a ton!!!! Thanks Guys!!!!!!

to be continued............ up next rock rails and bumper build up!!
 
#23 ·
8.8 is out and sold, it did work great for me and keeps things simple because of bolt pattern and all, almost caught up to where the jeep sits now (Jack Stands) :naughty: I will be putting in 60's this winter/spring, always go big!!!! Learn from the guys like me, who do it three times. I guess it all depends what your ultimate goal is, A wiseman once told me, make a plan and no matter how long it takes stick to it, just tell yourself the end result will be worth the wait:rock:
 
#25 ·
So now that I was starting to hit parks and bigger obstacles, it was time for some protection. Old man always told me that was important:teehee:

Got a couple 2"x4"'s, some 1"x3", and some 1"x1" angle iron. Started to go to work....
Mock up

Capped the ends


Paint

Hardware and mouting (drilled and tapped the framerail)



Finshed Product




I do use them, probably more then I should (see avatar), the 1x3's should have been thicker... I should have also added one more outrigger to the framerail. they did bend a bit in the front and rear after a few hard hits, all in all-other then the locker, these are the best add on that I have on the XJ!!! if you build some of these overkill is advised:rock: going to have to cut the rockers out this winter..

:beerbang::beerbang::beerbang::beerbang::beerbang:
 
#32 ·
going to have to cut the rockers out this winter..
You are going to love this when you get it done. I think it looks a million times better too. I know people do what they have to do based on what they have available, but I hate the look of the sliders hanging down.

Nice build, my first XJ was a red '91 Laredo with chrome everything.
 
#30 ·
That is what I keep thinking, going to get this caught up and then it is going to really, I mean really slow down.......
Well lets keep it going.

ppkaprince98 hooked up with Clint357 and let him use his sandblaster on a bumper he had just built, he told Chris that he had some steel to put together another XJ bumper, So agian I should give a majority of the credit to others, Clint designed and had the peices cut and built a few bumpers for people, this time he just sold me the pieces and gave me some simple drawings to help put the stack of steel together, work out good, plus gave me a change to work on my welding skills, as you will see not the best, please keep comments to a minimum... This was around April 2010

Pulled the other bumper off.


Started with mocking up the frame attachments


And more puzzle to put together..




Weld time... Need to build a table :confused:


Clint did a great job thinking this out, sorry my welds make it look worse then it should.





To protect it, I decided to have it sand blasted and Line X'd. Turned out really cool!!!

 
#31 ·
That Jeep has come a looooong way. Its been lots of fun building it, there is a lot of good memories in this thread. But all kidding aside, its time to go big and get nasty with it. :rock:
 
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