My LJ Thread - A MrBlaine Spec'ed LJ Build for Daily Driving and Weekend Adventure

JamesAndTheSahara said:
Do you have plans to surpass 35” tires on the dana 44? Curious why the Dana 44 was trussed, not against it, just curious :D.
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The two small trusses on the 44's are part of the Savvy Mid-arm kit. Adding that truss or even a much bigger one won't fix what will fail on those axles if you run larger than 35's where it matters.
 
ObiWanWebWheelr said:
Thanks! I'm new to the forums and it is a funny situation. I actually mixed up the other forum for this one haha, so hey might as well have two build threads out there. Hopefully it saves somebody time and money or gives them some build inspiration.

The LJ build continues to march forward with the only snafu having been self inflicted. The hood that came with the LJ was all dented up so I needed to source a new one. I found the white one in the picture below at an auto recycling yard. Turns out I didn't notice a few imperfections when I picked it up. Blaine got it installed and I stopped over to have a look at things in person. Well it turns out the white hood was pretty straight but it had three areas with dents and dings. One of them was a bit of an oil can effect causing the center to pop in and out a little which means it would be hard to fix. It is hard to see in the picture but once I noticed the imperfections in person I couldn't stop thinking about it. I'm a perfectionist at times and just couldn't live with painting an imperfect hood. Naturally I'm also a moron sometimes and realized I never called the dealership to see if they could get a factory new hood. Turns out the local Jeep dealership was still able to get one and they could have it the next day. Live and learn... so I bought the factory fresh one and will have that installed and painted. The other Green TJ I mentioned at the start of this post has a pretty dented up and paint faded hood, I might end up being able to put the white one on the Green TJ. Duplicolor makes a factory matching spray paint for the Green TJ and I used that paint to do the steel highline fenders and rear corner armor. It has lasted well over almost 10 years so maybe the white one will end up being useful.

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Blaine was also able to get the new cross members installed at the transfer case. I'm going with the off the shelf Savvy engine and belly skid. This Jeep isn't going to see hardcore use on the rocks for at least 5 years which is the period of time I plan to use it as a daily driver. Blaine builds a really nice heavy duty belly skid out of 3/8 aluminum but it wasn't necessary for this build. If I was going to play at the Hammers I would go that way.

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Sure enough one of the most common things to fail on a late model TJ are the catalytic converters. The LJ came with exhaust which was marginal at best and on the way to total failure so it was a good idea to replace it. Especially with the planned forced induction from a supercharger. You can see the two sensors which have been added as well. These are for air-to-fuel ratio and exhaust gas temperature to help tune the fuel map when in boost.

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The automatic transmission is also getting a nice cooler and a temperature gauge to keep an eye on it. The cooler will live in front of the radiator in the grill area.

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The rear axle is coming back together as well and was painted up. It has been geared to 5.38 which works best with the automatic transmission. Blaine has done testing between 5.13 and 5.38 with 35" tires and the automatic transmission. He finds the 5.38s are the best with the automatic but would choose the 5.13 in a stick shift application. Again, another reason to work with somebody who has personally tried every combo of parts under the sun.

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The rear axle also got a nice set of alloy shafts from Revolution.

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Here are a couple shots of the new cable routing and body lift. I really like the way Blaine has designed the body lift. It retains the factory duromter bushings and adds a spacer. On other Jeeps like the Green TJ I've used various body lifts. The ones in the market all change the durometer to a stiffer bushing. When the rig is used hard and the suspension is cycling it tends to put more stress on the body tub. The Green TJ has had the tub bent around enough by the stiffer bushings to cause the doors to need some shims/spacers at the hangers to get it to latch and shut. I'll go with the MrBlaine design for any future builds. Savvy sells them.

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Here is the pile of parts removed from the Jeep and heading to the recycling bin. The joints on the lower control arms are totally shot and have quite a bit of free play in them. Having tried a number of things the only joint I'll use on any Jeep is the Johnny Joint from Currie. Just don't waste your time on marketing hype and experimentation with something otherwise. The JJs have been bullet proof on KOH race trucks so I just don't see the justification to try anything else. If it ain't broke don't fix it!

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So this post right here has answered my question. If @mrblaine says that 5.38 is better than 5.13 for 35’s, then I will stick with my 33’s and 5.13 gearing.
 
It has been a little too long since my last post and this thread needs an update. With the holiday season here I've got a little time to kill and figured I would get some of the latest pictures of the project online. I'm quite pleased with the way it is coming together.

The front shock towers came out looking awesome. I like the way it blends in so well with the existing spring perch. It has that almost factory look to it having been well thought out.

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Same with the rear out boarding, gets the shock where you need it to improve the handling. Might as well dampen the spring-mass system closer to the outside where your lever arm is longer with respect to the suspension roll center.

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MrBlaine has the best brake kits in the business at http://www.blackmagicbrakes.com/

I've got to plug the website because the brakes are working very well for me on more than one Jeep. The Black Magic pads on the stock JK are a big upgrade. All he did was change the JK pads from stock to the Black Magic and I've got significantly better fade resistance. On long downhills towing a u-haul trailer I noticed quite a bit more stopping power even when they where working hard. The stock JK pads always left a little to be desired, I was happy just changing them to his formula made a big improvement. I was with my Dad in the JK out in Death Valley and some of the long sustained downhills really faded the stock JK pads. The Black Magic pads seem to have resolved that complaint about the factory JK setup.

For the LJ build it is the Black Magic Super 16 with the custom cast knuckle. It allows for running a really nice brake caliper with twin 54mm pistons and will fit inside of a 16" wheel. The shafts are the big JK u-joint ones Blaine came up with for the TJ44 front. His new knuckle is setup to work with the shafts right out of the box.

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Under the hood the jeep got some new terminals for the battery to replace some corroded stock parts. These new terminals are the military style which works well for a Jeep. The threaded post and nut makes it easy to add accessories and tap off the battery.

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The next under the hood modification is some extra ponies to get this rig moving. The Eaton supercharger is courtesy of Boosted Technologies. The new JK motors are great sporting 285 HP. I love the inline 6 4.0 but this will go along way to giving it some usable boost in the hills.

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This is a good picture of the front axle side shock mount. The factory shock bracket/spring perch gets trimmed back to make room for a cap off plate and the new mount.

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The rear axle is hung up under the LJ. There is a layer of plastic wrap and duck tape over the control arms to protect the powder coat. Everything has that optimized but stock enough look I'm crazy for lately.

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Here is the pile of stuff from Savvy back from the powder coat guy. It was a bit of an ordeal because his oven went down part way through the job but it turned out well enough except Blaine had to make a zillion trips back and forth. Murphy's law is inevitable, even if you make excellent plans the random possibility of some failure will eventually catch up with you.

The rocker backing plates are done in powder coat primer and being painted to match the body color so they blend in.

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Finally, catching up to real time the rig just got done at the paint shop! It's pretty awesome seeing it get some color.

Here is a before shot of the rig. I did a little paint to delete the background and emphasize the Jeep. Obviously I'm not going pro with the photoshop here but it It's solid black and one color but has a little bit of wear on the paint from wheeling.

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BOOM! Whoa, this was my Xmas present, seeing paint on this thing is just fun and the timing before the holiday was perfect. I'm always surprised how much paint makes a project feel like something new. I'm grateful for all of Blaine's help. MrBlaine is a professional in the true sense of the word. He negotiated everything ahead of time with the paint guy to ensure this would be done right and checked up to keep things on track. The end result speaks for itself.

I'm looking forward to giving the JK back to my Dad. The JK is great but I really love the TJ/LJ Wranglers. They are classic enough to bring back the lineage to the CJ5 and Willies but new enough to run at elevation and be have creature comforts. At least the JK still starts with a key turn, I'm not down with that push button start... probably a sign I'm getting old trying to hang on to the glory days!

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Wow, good choice on the paint, I love it! I really like where you’re going with this build.

I hear you on the TJs though. That’s why I never sold mine for a JK. And you’re right, that push button start on the JL along with the power top... it’s just crap waiting to break.
 
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t.franscioni said:
What a fun write up and project! What shock towers are being used for front and rear? Are they front/rear specific or just 2 sets of the same tower modified to fit front and rear locations?
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Poly Performance shock mounts front and rear. We modify the front to blend them into the frame and try to keep them clean and simple in appearance.
 
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mrblaine said:
Poly Performance shock mounts front and rear. We modify the front to blend them into the frame and try to keep them clean and simple in appearance.
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Wish I knew a fabricator over here that was half as good as you in terms of thinking things out & executing a mission without BS. Very well done, I'll do this mod someday.
 
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