balfred's 1997 Jeep Wrangler SE Build Thread

balfred

TJ Enthusiast
Joined
Mar 25, 2018
Messages
328
Location
US
My parents were gracious enough to buy a jeep for me to use if I got good grades and didn't get into trouble when I was 16. I drove the jeep for 5 years before getting married and having to buy my own vehicle. The jeep kind of just sat for the next 10 years, rarely getting used and when it did, it was usually me taking it for a joy ride or to get maintenence done. I finally decided to buy it from my parents and use it as a daily because my two young sons loved every trip we would occasionally take in it. It was always an adventure to them even if we were just going to the store. So now I was reunited with my baby, the first car I had driven.

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That's how it looked in 2002. Skyjacker 2.5 inch lift, 32 inch BFG ATs, and some random stuff. It was great to be back with it but I am a tinkerer and so things were going to be changing

Tire carrier
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Lights and jack
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Stuff
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Then was some new 33x1250x15 MTRs which really made my little 2.5 4 cylinder 5 speed struggle

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So naturally I begged my wife and she let me regear it...

But... All of the 15 year old control arm bushings were shot and seized in so for the price of repairing them I bought a 4 inch rough country lift (which is actually great btw) with all new arms...

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But... I didn't want to regear the flimsy Dana 35 rear end

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So I had a ford 8.8 swap done with 4.88s and an artec truss kit with limited slip oh and the lift that I ordered was delivered and turned out to be a 6 inch lift and I couldn't afford the time to ship it back so we went with it

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So onto post 2 because I really hope this one saves (crappy cell signal)

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Nice parents, that's for sure. I also like what you've done (and are doing) to it. Having two young girls myself, I totally know what you mean about the kids loving it. Our two daughters absolutely love riding in the back of ours!
 
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So I drove it this way for 6 months and loved the regear and new lift! I love the clearance of the 6 inch and it feels great with no driveline vibration until 70 when it's so so subtle. But... Then I felt the need to get a new bumper and winch

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We went to Moab a few times and took my wife's JK Rubicon

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Then I started getting a little rod knock paired with a bad clutch and a seized bearing in my transfer case that squealed like a pig. So logically I said well the engine is crap, the trans needs to be pulled as does the transfer case and have it cracked open so why not beg my wife to let me be stupid and take our perfectly good 99 Yukon and rip the engine out, rebuild it and put it in the jeep with the automatic 4l60e and rebuild the transfer case.

I decided to go with independent gauges rather than mess with the connection between the Jeep and gm computers. So I did autometer phantoms with an autometer dash

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Used a customized unimatic B&M shifter that is a super short shaft to have clearance around the dash

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So with a brand new bumper today to get better airflow in the Vegas heat and some JW Evolution 2s, this is how it sits today.

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I love the power of the Vortec 5.7,its pretty ridiculous with 33s and 4.88s lol. Like street ripping ridiculous. But the drivibility is so so good! I get about the same mpg but can go as fast as I want up anything I want. I think I will get 35s next to offset that a little bit. I will post the current specs in post 3

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1997 Jeep Wrangler TJ SE
Vortec 5.7 V8
4l60e Auto Trans
Dana 30 open with 4.88s
Ford 8.8 swap with Artec Truss and LSD
Rough Country 6 Inch Lift - short arm but still love it
Rock Hard Roll Cage
JW Speaker Evo 2s
Smittybilt Front and Rear bumpers
33x1250x15 Goodyear MTRs

By the way, all of my work was done at Orion Offroad in Salt Lake City, Utah. We used to live there 6 months ago before moving to Vegas and Robb at Orion is still worth the drive to have him work on stuff so anyone in that area looking for an awesome fabrication/offroad/other work check them out. OrionOffroad.com

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Nice Jeep and nice pictoral/story. I love the engine swap. It would be awesome to have a TJ with that kind of power and torque that comes from the 5.7 Vortec. Sure that would be a pricey swap though. The Ford 8.8 is sweet too.

You have a unique Jeep to be proud of for sure. Enjoy it!

If I had lots of dough, I could see buying a rough TJ with a blown engine/trans and doing a frame off resto with either a Vortech and Tremec trans or a Hemi...Ford 8.8, and a 4" lift on 33's. Completely custom interior, etc. I can see that becoming a $50k project.
 
Nice Jeep and nice pictoral/story. I love the engine swap. It would be awesome to have a TJ with that kind of power and torque that comes from the 5.7 Vortec. Sure that would be a pricey swap though. The Ford 8.8 is sweet too.

You have a unique Jeep to be proud of for sure. Enjoy it!

If I had lots of dough, I could see buying a rough TJ with a blown engine/trans and doing a frame off resto with either a Vortech and Tremec trans or a Hemi...Ford 8.8, and a 4" lift on 33's. Completely custom interior, etc. I can see that becoming a $50k project.
Thanks I appreciate it! Unfortunately it was very costly and in hindsight the v8 swap wasn't necessarily worth the time/money but I certainly enjoy it now that it's done! The dumb thing is that a 4.0 swap wouldn't have cost a lot less, maybe a grand or a little more less so I went for the v8 obviously. I will love it even more when the AC is finished in a few weeks to prepare for Vegas summers which I know can be brutal.

That project would be sweet. For 50k you could build an absolutely insane daily driver or rock crawler. The 8.8 is probably my favorite project so far because it's just such a beast + the regear made it so much better and it was fairly inexpensive relative to the engine swap. I have floored this thing and roasted the tires and it just takes the abuse. It's a nice axle with the disc brakes too because it helps stopping power a lot

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@balfred - any chance you could post a pic of the 5.7, would love to see it!
Sure thing, I will snap some up tomorrow. Be prepared to see a whole lot of crap stuffed into a tiny engine compartment lol

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Wow, absolutely love this build! Well done!
Thanks Chris, it has been a shuffle of emotions because I was without it for 6 months for the swap and other stuff but finally it feels like it's coming together with a few big things left like the AC work and maybe some 35s. The rest of this build I think will be me tinkering on this core jeep

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Thanks Chris, it has been a shuffle of emotions because I was without it for 6 months for the swap and other stuff but finally it feels like it's coming together with a few big things left like the AC work and maybe some 35s. The rest of this build I think will be me tinkering on this core jeep

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What do you think you ended up paying for that engine swap once it was all said and done? I’m considering doing a V8 swap to mine at some point.
 
What do you think you ended up paying for that engine swap once it was all said and done? I’m considering doing a V8 swap to mine at some point.
Get ready for it because it's pretty rough... Look down








9k!!

BUT to be fair, it was a full rebuild on the engine with good quality parts, I am adding AC because mine was just an SE, and there was some expenses that were trial and error or mid process upgrades.

The AC cost was 1k in just parts and about 800-1k in install so almost 2k. Also the full rebuild ran me about 2k. So realistically I would say 5-6k without extra stuff like that. I put a lot of trust in my fabricator and his shop to pull off every aspect and so far I'm not disappointed in the slightest!

I would recommend leaving a running engine/trans alone until after its fit and working in the new home because the rebuild although awesome did add complexity and more diagnostic. The more you change all at once that is untested then the more that can have quirks or problems that end up hard to trace

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Also I should add that had I known that I would be doing this swap at first, I would have saved myself the 1k in regearing to 4.88s and stayed at 4.10 for better street manners. The 4.88s are so low that I'm at 2700 rpm going 70 which doesn't sound like a lot but that v8 in this little jeep could pull those speeds well at 1500-1800 rpm. Oh well, live and learn

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Honestly, I was figuring around 8k, so I’m not that shocked. That’s what I was expecting to pay.

Of course my hope was to find a relatively low mileage engine that didn’t need a rebuild right away, swap it in, get it running, and if it did need a rebuild, I would do that down the road.

I can totally understand how rebuilding an engine swap might add to the complexity and diagnostics for sure.
 
Of course my hope was to find a relatively low mileage engine that didn’t need a rebuild right away, swap it in, get it running, and if it did need a rebuild, I would do that down the road.

I can totally understand how rebuilding an engine swap might add to the complexity and diagnostics for sure.

Many many people have opted for the LSx swaps over the vortec swaps but I used what I had available to me. A good LS1 in my area with low miles and a transmission with drive accessories was at least 3k and my pockets were already stretched thin doing what I did and couldn't afford that. Plus I got a full rebuild for less than a well used LS1.

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Many many people have opted for the LSx swaps over the vortec swaps but I used what I had available to me. A good LS1 in my area with low miles and a transmission with drive accessories was at least 3k and my pockets were already stretched thin doing what I did and couldn't afford that. Plus I got a full rebuild for less than a well used LS1.

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And all that matters is you got that extra power under the hood!
 
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And all that matters is you got that extra power under the hood!
Lol, that's right! Awesome power and terrible mpg! But I wasn't expecting to get any better

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