Longwhitejeep LJ, 35's spec build

Irun said:

Nice work. Slow and steady!

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Thanks! Working when time allows. I also was able to get the exhaust back in this week too. Progress being made and hopefully the rear axle goes a bit quicker

Threw a little bling at the situation for motivation! These parts have been on the shelf for too long.

16" big brake kit with tie rod flip. Hopefully they fit the stock ravines.

G2 30 spline axles, and savvy arms. Need to torque it all down.

I'll drop the arms and paint the frame and clean it up with some krylon rust tough.

compressor also mounted in the abs tray.

very motivated to get this done. As always, @mrblaine makes a fine product and the instruction detail is the best I have seen in any product to date.



These are just a little bigger....


MERICA!

Lunch break wrenching. I am mostly proud of using wood from my scrap pile in the garage without having to cut anything. No wood was cut in the making of this cart.

Cleaning this thing up this evening and starting on regear and 35 spline arb.





Black maxx shocks came in as well. Going to give the front jk shocks b8575 a try. They measure just about the same as the popular 10.7 travel ranchos.

Dana 44 torn down. Oddly enough it had no oil slingers or baffle installed. It's a lower mileage lj with only 82k on it. Perhaps it just never came with the inner slinger or baffle or someone has been in this one before. I know not all of them come with baffles and its not a major deal. Outer one is there behind the pinion seal. There is a a thick shim under the bearing.

I may pick up a baffle and slinger if my shim stack works out to be thick enough.

I also ran a pattern before tear down for shits and grins. BL was also .005". I did this more to see what the factory deems acceptable, documentation purposes and for science!

Out of town this weekend so we will what I can get done in a few evenings this week.

hosejockey61 said:

The "baffle" between the tail bearing and seal is actually a thrust washer. I'm quite surprised that the backlash is .005 on a used set of gears. I don't see any, but were there any other carrier shims other than the two master shims? Looking at the pinion head bearing, I usually find a single OEM depth shim/slinger there, not a mix of thin and thick like in your picture. These might have been touched prior, but not certain.

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I was surprised too on the backlash because it felt like none or very tight when I checked it by hand. Bearings and races all looked really good. All timken as expected.

No other carrier shims between the masters. Left side carrier shim was .127" thick and right was .137". Pinion depth shim was .058" and one single shim.

Pinion preload shims totaled .068"

No oil slinger or baffle but there was a thrust washer.

Strange but it all seems factory. Gears are dana marked and pinion bearing was TIGHT!

It was flat towed at some point in it's life. I pulled the brackets and brake actuator from under the dash when I got it.




Need to make my set up race next.

All cleaned up though and ready for the fun to begin.


Quick Tool highlights! Build brought to you by Lufkin Precision Tools.


The Lufkin tape measure was my grandfather's who was a professional welder. I use it quite a bit for smaller measurements. It's still in great shape and readable, unlike some newer tape measures I own. Made in the USA.



Micrometer still works very well. It, along with the vintage Proto 9706 screw driver, were my wife's grandfather's, who was an aircraft engineer. It's an awesome one I use quite a bit. Much tougher than a lot of the new stuff. You can find these on ebay for around $20 or so. It removed the pinion seal. Both made in the USA.



I like using older, well made tools. The fact that these were used by our family makes it even more special. I hope to pass them along to my kids someday.

hosejockey61 said:

These look like shims

View attachment 523201

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I think it's the lighting and a light amount of oil. I promis, the shim in the photo below was all that was there. Weird right?

hosejockey61 said:

I believe you. Sometimes those shims stick together so hard I have to use a razor blade to separate them so I was wondering.

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Thanks!

Pinion preload shims were like that. All stuck together and took some effort to separate. That thick Pinion depth shim, I messed with it for a while to confirm it was in fact one thick shim.

Strange though with no baffle or slinger. I ordered spicer 30764 and 30765 for it though and will add them if my shim stack combo allows it.

Steeprocker said:

I have the jk front b8575 shocks on my lj. Love them! Also use a 2” bumpstop extension for those

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Thanks! It's your post in the shock resource thread that lead me to try them with over an inch more travel. When measuring, it looked like just a 2 inch extension would work. I need to finish the regear then I'll tackle the shocks.

Did you clearance the lower shock mount at all for droop?
What did your travel bias end up being with currie 4" springs right?

Steeprocker said:

Awesome! Glad it helped. I have 3.25” of lift using Currie 3” coils and an aluminum spacer. Travel is split evenly with 5.5” up travel. 5.25” down. Nothing done to the lower shock mounts. Are you talking stock length control arms binding at full droop?

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Thanks! Yeah I will be running stock style savvy arms. Measuring, I may need to clearance the lower mounts just a little.

Steeprocker said:

I have the Savvy mid arm so I can’t say about the savvy standard length arms binding point on the factory shock bracket.

Two examples of rigs with savvy standard control arm length with long travel shocks and modified lower shock mounts. Lower mounts as what comes with the poly performance towers.
https://www.polyperformance.com/poly-performance-universal-tj-lj-shock-mount-kit

Check out Starky480’s post, setting up front 11.5 travel shocks. His front axle already had modified lowers.
Post in thread 'Arizona Rock Crawler'
https://wranglertjforum.com/threads/arizona-rock-crawler.26000/post-1160715

Also I believe rasband has savvy standard length arms with 11” front fox shocks using the poly brackets

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Thanks. Did you modify your shock mounts up front?

The measurements on skyjackers sight compared with the rancho 55255 are very close. The black maxx seems to have slightly more travel with a slightly shorter compressed length and ranchos have slightly more droop. A lot of folks running the Ranchos on stock length arms just radius the lower shock mount a bit. I won't know with a 100% certainty until I get this jeep on the ground, set ride height and go from there. Given a lot of people run the ranchos without major issues and decent travel bias, I am hopeful it will work out. My concern is not compromising too much up travel.

I have the 4" recommended black maxx shocks en route b8525 in case this doesn't work without major modifications.

https://www.gorancho.com/products/rancho-rs5000x-rs55255-suspension-shock-absorber

https://skyjacker.com/shop/shocks/b...-shock-absorber/#kor_gamma_woocommerce_tabs|2