Jake's 99 XJ continuing build

That looks awesome! Hopefully you will be able to make it out to MaBell!

Added brackets for the brake softlines





Finallllyyyy ready for paint. I have Por15 for it, but damn if it isnt a process to put on. Almost wish I was just rattle canning it to save time.

So I have all new pre-bent brake lines (front and rear from the distribution block). I'm reading that you want to avoid letting the reservoir go empty to make it easier to bleed, but I don't see how I'm going to be able to avoid draining the whole system?

Any suggestions on what the best procedure is? Probably one of those things that's so simple no one talks about it.

Hey Jake,
Just let it all run out but don't touch the brake pedal,, install new lines' tighten everything up except the bleeders.
Fill master with dot 4 fluid and let it gravity bleed until fluid comes out steady then shut bleeders.
Then get someone to pump the brakes so you can do a final bleed.
.

Looking good

Thanks!

Fresh axle bearings



Some paint


Replaced the main line to the rear, still gotta do the front lines.

One caliper went on last night. Slide pins are maxed out to one side.. bit weird but maybe ok? Doesn't seem ok to me though, and the pad rubs a lot when I spin it by hand.



See the gap on the right side




Thinking the pads might be too thick or rotor spacing is off? Weirdly got two different looking rotors from rockauto (should have been the same part) but they looked to be the same size when placed next to each other. Need to measure to confirm.

Are both calipers the same ??

They are mirrors of each other, but otherwise identical. Gotta double check the rotor, and see if I can find a spec for pad size?

Jake, put the wheel on and see if it is easy to rotate, if so it's probably ok.

Ya think so? I can spin it easily the way it is, it just makes a loud rubbing noise because the rubber boots want to center the caliper. Certainly seems like it would work fine, but I wasn't sure if something was off because it was so far to one side.

The caliper will start to move inward don't worry,, most likely it's fine, run it and see.

Yeah I think you're right Mark, other side came out the same. Thanks!

New gears arrived. ECGS shipped me Yukon instead of Spicer though, the Yukons are more expensive.. hmmm.


Gotta do somthing with the bonus brake line.. Luckily it all fits inside the truss so it still looks decently clean :p




Progress is slow but I'm almost there.. Just a few small things left:
Run new front hard and extended softlines
Hook up e-brake cables (need to loosen the cable adjuster but it's a ball of rust)
Swap a couple shackle bolts out for fresh ones
Figure out how to retain the new extended rear softline to the bracket on the frame
Fill/bleed brakes

Man that's coming along real nice!

Thanks Andrew!

Old front line, dangling (PO's work)


New front line



This thing broke:


And is not made by anyone, you can ebay a JY pull for $38 shipped but fuck that, came up with this instead.. $2


Its an eye bolt and a couple hose clamps to keep the hook thing from spreading.



Ended up using a random pipe fitting adapter to retain the rear softline


Not super pumped with the short softline routing but eh, they'll do



No pictures of the e-brake cables, but I have to say the e-brakes were the biggest pain.


Gravity bled the brakes (went really fast actually..), put the wheels on and went to fill the diff.. I need a different setup for sure, couldn't find any tubing so I ended up sticking a plastic fitting into one of the caps (this was one of those things were I was like hmm this is probably a bad idea but eh, we'll give it a try anyways), fitting worked but... eventually came off inside the diff. Tried for a bit to fish it out but no luck, gave up for the night. Do not want to pull the cover again but I doubt I'm going to be able to snake the fitting out. Did contemplate just leaving it in to get mashed, but I think I'd rather not. Always the the little things lol.

What do you guys use to fill your diffs?

At least its almost on the road again!

I bought a cheapie pump from AutoZone to fill my diffs, somewhere between like $9-15. It came with a fitting that attaches to either a small container or gallon container of gear oil (or whatever you're using really) with a pump and hose on both ends (in bottle and to the diff) and really cuts down on spillage. The only bummer is that the hose that goes inside the container itself doesn't quite get everything out of the bottle so you have to get creative with the little amount left in it. It was a cheap investment for something that I'm sure I'll be using and that will last for years. I tried filling one diff without it and feel like I lost as much oil as I got in (YJ is too low not being spring-over), so it was a godsend when I filled the other...and then again when I left a C-clip in the rear diff by mistake and had to pop the cover and take care of that situation. I wouldn't recommend doing that either.

Jake wrote:

And is not made by anyone, you can ebay a JY pull for $38 shipped but fuck that, came up with this instead.. $2


Its an eye bolt and a couple hose clamps to keep the hook thing from spreading.

Sneaky, I like it!

Did you get the idea from someplace or is that an entirely new design? If so, kudos, as many before you have gotten pissed off by their proprietary rusted POS.

Someone mentioned using an eye bolt on some forum, though I wasn't sure what they were talking about until after I had cut off the bracket thing that holds the T-bolt (the bracket is actually what I broke when trying to adjust the cable tension. Once the bracket was off it was a pretty obvious solution. I added the hose clamps though as it actually needed them.

Thoopy, I actually have one of those pumps but I've only used it to pump out old fluid, not really sure about cleaning it.. maybe I'll just get another one.

Got the front gears apart on Saturday, unfortunately time was limited so that was as far as I made it this weekend. Picked up a harbor freight press so I could safely remove the old bearings.

Not sure what these white rings are, was not expecting them, they're not the seals.




We had a borrowed snap-on bearing separator, however via miscommunication ended up without the puller that's designed for it. Had to get a little creative  on strong things that could fit between carrier and puller


Also thinking about new knuckles because I don't like how these look, hard to know how much material is coming off.


Right now have all the shims and bearings labeled and measured. Hopefully get the rest of it done tonight.

Holy hell those knuckles corroded pretty good...how do you like the HF press? My buddy was just toying around with the idea of getting one

Right? I don't feel comfortable wheeling it hard the way they are. The dif housing is in great shape but both knuckles look miserable, its kinda weird. I should be getting a new set from a guy on cherokeeforum soon though.

HF press is a POS, welds look awful and the general construction is in no way confidence inspiring. That said, I don't think you can do better for $100, and it does get the job done.

Jake wrote:Right? I don't feel comfortable wheeling it hard the way they are. The dif housing is in great shape but both knuckles look miserable, its kinda weird. I should be getting a new set from a guy on cherokeeforum soon though.

HF press is a POS, welds look awful and the general construction is in no way confidence inspiring. That said, I don't think you can do better for $100, and it does get the job done.

Sounds like every piece of equipment at HF haha it looks cheap as hell and isn't going to last a lifetime - but for the money invested it does the job pretty damn well

Even if you got the gears set tonight you wouldnt be able to make OFR right? I've never regeared but I always thought there was a 'light driving' break in period of 500 miles or something

I totally agree on HF, lots of junk but there are a few good things. I've actually been pretty happy with most of the stuff I've bought from them tbh, just need to be sure your expectations aren't too high lol.

As to gears, I was concerned with that myself, its hard to say. A lot of people out there claim that especially for front gears its not a big deal. That said, I would rather do it right. Luckily for me I have a 242 so I can run full time 4wd so they actually see load on-road. Without 4wd engaged only the coast side of the gears would see much action on road. Pushing it to make OFR is probably not the best idea but we'll see if I'm able to get it done tonight (I'm guessing that I'm being overly optimistic). Depending on how soon I hear back about the new knuckles I may just leave everything apart til they show up.

Forgot to mention that I got it driveable, took it out for maybe 15 minutes before parking it to get started on the gears lol. Things seemed to be in order but I didn't take it above 35 mph.

The bad:

Carrier bearing



Slightly different spiders? One has a bigger chamfer and appears newer


Spider pitting



Hard to see in this but cross pin has some wear - missing about 1 thou where the gears ride



Old slinger is smaller in diameter and thicker than the new one.. hmm. Also, there were no shims behind the inner pinion bearing race. Not sure whats up with that.


Axle shafts both have wear from the seal? Deep enough to be very evident with a fingernail.

The good:

New ring gear slid right on to the carrier which had been in the freezer for a couple days



Next.. well I sent some pictures to ecgs to see if they thought I should get new spiders, still waiting to hear back. Probably will run those axle shafts til they stop working, or I notice oil leaking from the tubes. New knuckles are hopefully on their way. Gonna order some ball joints tonight, may as well do them while I have the knuckles out.

Chances are ecgs will tell you to order up new spiders (just because), if they were mine I'd clean them, deburr if need, and run them.