Our LJs

[joneill]

Figured I'd start a thread on our LJs as an intro. I'm Jim from Austin. I had a YJ (~3 years, 4 cylinder) and an XJ (13 years, 94 4.0 HO) back in the 90's, but eventually parted ways. I've been Jeep-less for the better part of 20 years, but now as the kids are getting old enough to drive we picked up two LJs over the course of a year. They are (for now) pavement princesses. My main goal was to get fun vehicles that we can wrench on and figure out how to get more mechanically inclined. Initially I was looking around for Scramblers, but we started to target LJs as a more modern and reasonable base platform. We found our first LJ (the yellow one - 78k miles) in December of 2024; it was modified by the PO - we liked the look and the pre-sales inspection went well. First day home:

It was in bad need of new tires, so that was our first update. After that it was a bunch of fluid changes and pulling of wires that we had no idea why they were there lol. Found a weird situation with the diffs. Rear was as expected, but the front has a locker in it that isn't hooked up. Guess the PO got a deal on an axle?

Also found a set of undercarriage lights that were not hooked up, so I installed an auxbeam and hooked them up:

After about 4 months I found a nice local manual white 06 LJ (104k miles) with minimal modifications, so we sold off the Mini Countryman and pulled the trigger on that one. I posted this pic to another thread with the two side by side (after a good bit of work on the white one):

They've both gotten full fluid changes. We serviced the differentials and installed lubelocker gaskets. I've swapped the OPDAs (one started ticking, so I went ahead and did both), radiators (one blew, so I just went ahead and did both), water pumps, thermostats, cleaned the fuel injectors, replaced spark plugs, and dropped the fuel tanks and fixed the rollover check valve issue. Built all my confidence reading posts here

Southern Jeeps, so the frames look great. I did power wash them and hit them with Amsoil heavy duty metal protectant. I'm going to run some internal frame paint through them this winter. I did have two bolts from the white LJs fuel tank skid that needed to be drilled out, but other than that they've been pretty easy to wrench on. Next big challenge is replacing the body mounts on the white LJ that are dry/cracked. I'm likely going to throw on a 1" Savvy body lift too while I'm in there - I'd like a bit more clearance for the 31's, but I don't want to change the look of it too much.

I'll make another post on cleaning up the white LJ tub - our biggest project. Lots of pics on that one.

Excited to quit lurking and share the results of all my reading of this forum.

 

[sab]

Welcome to the best forum on the ‘net!

 

[JMT]

Nice LJ’s @joneill! They are super clean, now that you spent all that time getting them in order. Really nice job!

 

[joneill]

Nice LJ’s @joneill! They are super clean, now that you spent all that time getting them in order. Really nice job!

Thanks for the kind words! Speaking of clean, was meaning to post this too!

Our biggest project to date was getting some old nasty sound deadening / heat shield out of the tub. The pre-purchase inspection noted "an oil spill" on the carpet in the front driver well. I didn't think too much of it at the time, so after the purchase I pulled the carpet to clean it, and oh boy did we find a surprise.

I'm not sure what product a PO used, but the tar backing had oozed between the seams and penetrated the carpet. The carpet was trashed, and we had a long weekend of peeling and goo gone ahead of us. It was a hot mess:

Step by step we got cleaner:

Then prime and paint:

I decided after all that work we deserved a floor upgrade, so we rolled with Armorlite. I eventually pulled the old stereo wiring - I wanted to clean up as much wiring I had not done myself as possible. I've been a bit paranoid about PO wiring jobs after I found this laying on the tub under the carpet of the yellow jeep:

I traced it back to the battery ... pulled it and that got me hunting down wires that didn't look factory.

Anyhow, figured I'd share this big old mess with everyone haha.

 

[JMT]

Thanks for the kind words! Speaking of clean, was meaning to post this too!

Our biggest project to date was getting some old nasty sound deadening / heat shield out of the tub. The pre-purchase inspection noted "an oil spill" on the carpet in the front driver well. I didn't think too much of it at the time, so after the purchase I pulled the carpet to clean it, and oh boy did we find a surprise.

View attachment 661475

I'm not sure what product a PO used, but the tar backing had oozed between the seams and penetrated the carpet. The carpet was trashed, and we had a long weekend of peeling and goo gone ahead of us. It was a hot mess:

View attachment 661476

Step by step we got cleaner:

View attachment 661479

View attachment 661478

Then prime and paint:

View attachment 661480View attachment 661481

I decided after all that work we deserved a floor upgrade, so we rolled with Armorlite. I eventually pulled the old stereo wiring - I wanted to clean up as much wiring I had not done myself as possible. I've been a bit paranoid about PO wiring jobs after I found this laying on the tub under the carpet of the yellow jeep:

View attachment 661530

I traced it back to the battery ... pulled it and that got me hunting down wires that didn't look factory.

View attachment 661531

Anyhow, figured I'd share this big old mess with everyone haha.

I think Jeep’s in general are some of the most modded vehicles, and the mods are usually poorly done. There are many threads on here about heat and sound deadening the interior. I’m sure many will be fine, but I never put anything sticky in floorboards for the very reason you highlighted. It can turn into a holy nightmare.

Nice job. The paint job really went a long way.

 

[GoldenGorilla]

The floor on the white one looks great. Strange the sound deadening broke down. It must have been some dubious quality stuff.

 

[joneill]

The floor on the white one looks great. Strange the sound deadening broke down. It must have been some dubious quality stuff.

Thanks! I don't have any experience with sound deadening material, but the entire time I was peeling that stuff up I kept thinking this looks a lot like window flashing. I kept wondering if this was a DIY job using the wrong materials to save some money while not really considering the long term fitness of the material.

 

[GoldenGorilla]

Thanks! I don't have any experience with sound deadening material, but the entire time I was peeling that stuff up I kept thinking this looks a lot like window flashing. I kept wondering if this was a DIY job using the wrong materials to save some money while not really considering the long term fitness of the material.

Usually it is a mix of butyl rubber, asphalt and a mastic adhesive akin to bituthene. Very durable stuff and they use this in production vehicles covered with an aluminum skin. This stops the panels from vibrating like symbols or drums. Then a closed cell foam goes over it all to reduce noise further. On the extreme end, mass loaded vinyl goes on top of the closed cell to create a second weighted layer that is decoupled from the rest.

 

[joneill]

I only saw a thin foil layer and that tar. Didn’t see any vendor markings or anything. Definitely no layers of foam.

I’m with @JMT after all this - nothing sticky is ever going on my floor again lol.

 

[joneill]

The fan clutch bolt is now my most hated piece of Jeep hardware (at least until the next project).

Backstory - the white LJ's PO appears to have replaced the radiator and main hoses (along with the wrong hose clamps - worm drive instead of continuous tension) and they seem to have given it the college try on the fan clutch but gave up (they left the nut pretty mangled). The water pump gasket gave up the ghost and started leaking coolant. I have a new water pump, t-stat, fan clutch, radiator and hoses ready to go. I'm prepared. The fan clutch thought otherwise.

I've been pouring over this thread for two weeks (thank you TJ forum!) trying and ordering more tools to support ever escalating removal techniques. I tried the wrench and hammer. No luck. Let it sit with penetrating oil for a week, then bolted a steel bar to the pulley and used two long pipes to try and lever it off with a wrench. Nope. Tried heating it a bit with a torch. Finally tried an air hammer with an air hammer wrench and this thing won't budge. The air hammer wrench deformed the nut after beating on it so much. Finally at wits end, I had my son hold a 3 foot pipe over the bar bolted to the pulley to stabilize, then I rage struck a wrench with a 2.5 lb sledge and bingo, off it came after multiple blows.

My water pump, thermostat, thermostat housing and new radiator are installed. Waiting on new hose clamps to finish up the project right.

So raise a glass with me as I bask in the glory of beating this stupid fan clutch. Single malt over ice (I'm staying hydrated).

 

[joneill]

Finally wrapped up the revamp of the cooling system on the White LJ. This all started when I found a puddle of coolant under the Jeep one morning. The water pump gasket had failed, so I started ordering parts. I had trouble getting a radiator in over the holidays - the first one was bashed up in transit and had a puncture in the box - I returned that one for a replacement, so that slowed me down by two weeks.



Maybe I could have gotten away with that bit of damage, but for my peace of mind I waited it out. Got the replacement installed today along with the new water pump, fan clutch and thermostat. No leaks...so far. I had cleaned the fuel injectors a few months back, but with the cooling system out I could reach a few more places to clean up.



I have noticed though that there is a slight clunk from below my feet when shifting. I don't have a lot of experience troubleshooting, but based on my reading so far I'm thinking I should have a look at replacing the U joints. I don't feel any vibrations when driving, just a clunk when shifting.

If you guys think I'm on the right track, should I be thinking of more than the U joints? When looking around under there I'm looking at the drive shafts and wondering how much rust is too much rust, and at what point should I replace those too? This is just a DD for now, so I'm not going to stress it crawling, so maybe I just should start with the U joints and go from there? Or would you guys recommend replacing the drive shafts too while I'm in there?

Front:



Rear:



Some of the weird coloration and drip marks under there are from a MP spray I applied on the frame. Appreciate the continued advice!