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Project Blurple

142K views 830 replies 71 participants last post by  green50gt 
#1 ·
After parting out my Scrambler project due to cost I knew I wouldn't be happy not having anything to build and I REALLY want to get back out wheeling. My biggest financial focus is still buying a house this spring, but I also decided to build another much more budget-minded rig to enjoy until I get a better opportunity to go all-out. Realistically I expect to go in stages, where I do the mild(for me) budget build now, wheel and enjoy it for a while, and do various upgrades over the years. It'll be more expensive in the long run, but it's worth it to be able to get out and enjoy it rather than being in the garage forever and out of funds. For now I came up with a very specific plan and a very specific budget to do it in and I intend to stick to it.

Here's what I wanted:
-4.0L 5speed soft top TJ in decent shape. Something running and driving, or at least damn close so that I don't get nickel and dimed to death doing another scratch-built rig.
-Built 1/2 ton axles. I had a set of 1 tons halfway built already but not what I wanted. Those would've been close to $4k all said and done, where I can find well built 1/2 ton axles for under $2k. Plus the weight savings is nice, I didn't want quite fullwidth, and I want to give myself a glass ceiling of tires I can safely run. I know with 1 tons I'd end up running at least 40s and going overboard again. Plus I want to run a twin stick D300 so wanted passenger drop. I want to stick to 37s for price, weight, and streetability, and being limited by axle strength while wanting to be very reliable will help me do that.
-Custom longarm suspension with ~100-102" wheelbase. I kept the links off the Scrambler to use on the new rig. 2.25" .375" DOM lowers with Johnny Joints, 1.5" .25" DOM uppers with Ballistic flex joints and/or heims. Triangulated 4 link rear, 3 link front with panhard.
-Custom cage with frame tie-ins

I just got rid of the bulk of the Scrambler last weekend and I was really in no huge rush to find a TJ, but I ended up finding one near Pittsburgh, PA for a good price. 98 TJ, 4.0L, 5 spd, dark blue, high miles, for a pretty low asking price. A college/wheeling buddy of mine who lives near there was kind enough to go check it out for me. Long story short, it's got some issues that are fairly minor to me but were major enough for most people that I was able to get it dirt cheap. I went down Friday night and picked it up:





I made it a whole 6 days without having a Jeep project at home:lol:

Now the reason for the project name: It looked dark blue in the pics I saw, looks dark blue in most light, but if the sun reflects the right way it's definitely got a purplish tint to it. Chrysler called the color "deep amethyst" but over the past 12 years the sun has turned it a little more blue and a little less purple. So what color is it? It's blurple. It'll be getting lots of armor and upgrades that are planned to be Blitz Black, so it'll only be about 50% blurple.....I still like the name though!

Definitely got some miles on it:

I got it home and spent about 20 minutes bombing through the yard and into the woods a little bit and it's already a blast. Definitely like a little go-cart compared to anything I'm used to.

The whole underside and frame is in great shape with only this exception:

That's no problem for me considering I built the entire frame of the last project, but it was enough to get the price knocked way down. I'll cut it out, patch it, and probably plate over it to be safe.

The body is pretty good overall. Front fenders are cracked but those will become highline tube fenders anyway, there's a bad spot in the tub by the passenger side rear body mount that I'll cut out and weld in a new panel even though it'll be getting covered in armor, then just a couple hinges, eventually a windshield frame, etc. Nothing bad at all. It'll be getting banged into trees and rocks in no time but I still want it to look pretty good.

And of course, the retarded driveway poser shot:


I'll be building it over the winter and fully intend to have this phase done and ready to wheel spring 2011. The cheap purchase price saved me enough to do some extra upgrades and I kept some parts from the Scrambler to use as well. The specs of what'll be happening shortly:
-4.7L stroker (I'll have the crank and rods this week)
-Rebuilt AX-15
-New upgraded clutch
-Twin sticked Dana 300 (got it already and in great shape)
-Triangulated 4 link rear, 3 link with panhard front (got links leftover)
-Coilovers at all corners (looking for 12-16" travel, 2" body, remote resi's for sale for a good price, let me know if you see any)
-37" IROK radials (picking them up for a good price in the next week or so)
-15" beadlocks (shipping to me tomorrow)
-Full cage, harnesses, suspension seats, etc. I plan to be able to use a back seat but won't have it in most of the time
-RCI 2161 fuel cell behind rear seat(would love a GenRight setup but not for $900)
-Black soft top to replace the fugly worn out tan one, and got some 1/2 doors already that I'll run most of the time.
-Passenger drop D44 front from mid 70s FSJ widetrack Cherokee, 65" WMS, rotated knuckles, 4.88s, Detroit, Yukon stubs, Yukon Superjoints, stock inners machined for full circle clips, mid 80s Dodge outers, flattop knuckles. Probably gonna get full Alloy USA shafts and keep the existing ones for trail spares. Might get Longfield joints, or might run the Superjoints in the new shafts and throw the Alloy USA(heat treated Spicer) joints in the spares.
-Mid 70s Ford 9", 65" WMS, 4.88s, ARB, disc brakes. Gonna run stock shafts for now, hopefully these'll last till I can upgrade the front to some variation of built 9", at which point I'll put 35 spline alloys in the rear too.

Got em for a great price from a member on here:


:beer:
 
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#341 ·
Agreed on both counts. And LP, it's not IF I back into a rock, it's WHEN.....I just hope I don't take out the shock in the process!
 
#348 ·
These showed up Monday but I haven't had time to go work on the rig yet:(


Rear swaybar also showed up Wednesday. It's gonna be a tight fit for everything back there, I'll either have to bend the arms outboard of the airbumps or shorten them a couple inches. I'm thinking shortening them a bit won't hurt much since the 42" bar in the back is gonna have a bit more twist to it than the 36" bar up front.
 
#350 ·
3" front, 4" rear. I would've preferred 4" all around, but with only 5" or so front uptravel 4" seems overkill.

...But the 3" can easily be converted to 4" later, which is a big part of the reason I chose them. If I eventually go to a V8, triangulated 4 link, and full hydro I can gain some uptravel. Trying to keep it pretty street friendly for now. I work 40 miles from home and *really* want to be able to drive it there regularly in nice weather. If it sucks on the street it's not gonna stick around for long...I've already been dreaming of a small lift(not that the current 4" lift I'm running is very tall...), moderate 33-35" tires, and a souped up LS motor.
 
#352 ·
Yeah that's definitely an option if I need to. I'll probably crank the coilovers up an inch or two for dune running, but we'll see. I wanna keep it low, but it's not like going to 6" of lift is gonna make it unstable with the setup I'm running.
 
#355 ·
After being a lazy ass all day I finally went out this evening and started on the rear airbumps. Made good progress.

Brackets:


Approximate ride height:

sbcrichie is probably right and I'll reduce the travel....we'll see. Easy mod to make later.

Full bump. About 1" from the truss/UCA mounts to the floor, .75" from truss to frame, 1.5" from fully compressed shocks.



Just shy of full flex:


I should've made the bump pads a little longer for better contact under flex. I'll fix that when I gusset them later.
 
#356 ·
Looking good! You may not need to change the travel as my front bumps are about like that. All depends what pressure you will need to run in them for your vehicle and driving conditions. Dunes obviously will need higher pressure while street you will have little in them.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
#358 ·
What do you mean a shock mount? Like a heim style? I've never seen those, only 2" body or 2.5" body in varying lengths. Only difference I've seen is the Schrader caps. These just have the plain silver steel ones, my front bumps came with nice black aluminum caps.
 
#362 ·
That's the plan!! I wasn't gonna spend the coin for air bumps, but for as much high speed ripping around as I wanna do I figure the rest of the suspension will be way too soft to work well for both crawling and dune running. If only I could afford triple bypasses:sonicjay:


like these
Interesting....I wonder what the benefit of those is. Obviously a couple tabs are easier to mount than bump cans, but you'd still need something to keep them from pivoting off the mounts. I wonder if that's a production part or if somebody just replaced the top cap with the one from their 2" shocks for an oddball application.
 
#363 ·
yea just better mounting, you just run a short can on the bottom and some tabs on top. my bumps are a pain in the ass to remove from the cans, after I welded to the cans they distorted a bit (shitty foa bumps). kings are nice too they a run a loose fitting can and a large nut that holds the bump in the can at the top.
 
#364 ·
Yeah mine distorted a bit too, but nothing too bad. I did a lot of welding to them so no big surprise there. I just need to pry them open a hair at the tabs and the bumps come in and out just fine. They were really tight when I first got them too, I gouged up one of the bumps test fitting it at my kitchen table when they first arrived. A little deburring and pry bar massaging and that was resolved.
 
#365 ·
Got the rear swaybar in.

Simple tabs at the bottom, which also act as a nice gusset between the LCA bracket and truss:


Approximate ride height:


Full droop:


Need to trim the tub to get to full bump:


Crappy part is, I was only able to make the link mount about 12.6" from the center of the torsion bar. I would've liked more, but there's just no room. The bar is mounted just over 1/4" from the tub, the arm is just over 1/4" from the bump can, and the bumpstop is close to the coilover at full droop. Hopefully being a fairly long sway bar (42.5") it'll have enough twist to still work well. If it ends up being too stiff I can always pull it off for technical wheeling and just use it for street and dunes.
 
#367 ·
Yep I very easily could and may shorten them slightly.....but I'll be reworking the wheelwells anyway for the coilovers and bumpstops, so it's really a non-issue. I'd rather play it on the safe side with the links since the sheetmetal will be getting cut anyway.
 
#368 ·
Random fun post:

Last time this thing wheeled, November 2010(the only remaining parts are the engine, trans, most of the transfer case, wiring, etc:fish:)

 
#369 ·
I did some work this past weekend to maximize bump travel up front. I probably gained 1" or so of usable travel. Nothing exciting....

Passenger side notched to clear track bar:


Driver side notched to clear truss:


Truss notched to clear harmonic balancer:

(obviously this will get cleaned up, plated, and finished properly)


I started mounts for the front airbumps but haven't been able to work on it since. I did something to my elbow and have some extreme pain and swelling going on. I see the specialist tomorrow, hopefully it's nothing too major and won't require surgery or anything like that. I'm already pissed to be unable to make progress for a few days, I was planning to have the bumps and sway bar done by now :(
 
#371 ·
Yeah I guess. I'm just pissed. I'll be struggling enough as it is to finish this thing by summer, and these kinds of setbacks don't freakin help!! The vicodin I'm currently on is making it feel much better but until I know what's wrong with it I don't want to go out and make it worse. Hopefully they can give me good news tomorrow.
 
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