Patches, the '02 TJ

Hammer24 · Feb 9, 2019

Damn that looks good, I really like what you've done with the new fenders and how you've painted them

Jankoid · Feb 9, 2019

Last February I took Patches to Windrock (offroad park near Oak Ridge, TN) over Super Bowl weekend. Had a great time, but broke the front left inner chromoly shaft Saturday morning. Then kept wheeling the rest of that day and part of Sunday before realizing the shaft was broken.

I was having trouble with an obstacle that I should have made easily, and then my spotter told my to turn on my front locker. Uh oh. I have a Detroit locker...

I know exactly where I broke it, because it was the last difficult obstacle we did before I discovered the broken shaft the next day. Trail 54a Devil's Elbow. Doesn't look like much in this video, but it was pretty impressive in person. I have a video of a JK on tons and 40s winching up it. It was completely iced over that day as well.

Not me in the pictures, but this is the trail:

Jankoid · Feb 10, 2019

Unfortunately breaking that shaft also blew up the Detroit locker. For various reasons I'm not happy with the hp30 housing that is in the Jeep now (for example, it has C gussets that interfere with the brake calipers and limit my steering) so I've been wanting to build a new front housing. I was just planning to build a new hp30 housing and swap the guts over, but blowing a shaft and the locker means I'll have to spend a significant amount of money building a new hp30. Well, long story short, I ended up with a built Rubicon 44 nearly free. It has Alloy USA chromos and CTM u joints, 5.13 gears, and the factory air locker. So I've decided to swap that axle in, and while I'm at it I'm going to 3 link the front end. Patches still has the Rubicon Express radius arms, and anyone who knows anything about suspension design knows radius arms suck. I'd love to use the front half of the Savvy mid arm, but they won't sell just the front brackets, so I'm going to make my own very similar version of the Savvy 3 link. Stay tuned.

Chris · Feb 10, 2019

Holy cow... look at that shaft! That thing looks like it's melted.

Guess it just goes to show that even chromoly shafts aren't invincible.

Jankoid · Feb 11, 2019

Here's my attempt at shamelessly ripping off the Savvy mid arm kit. I used the Artec 4 link brackets when I stretched the rear, so I wanted the front brackets to match. Ordered the Artec 3 link brackets, then built an upper control arm mount off of the driver's side bracket to match the Savvy bracket.

Savvy bracket:

My bracket:

Not quite as photogenic, but I think it'll work quite well.

Jankoid · Feb 13, 2019

Old axle is out. Goodbye radius arms.

Chris · Feb 13, 2019

Ahh, gotta love those ol' radius arms

Jankoid · Feb 13, 2019

Ordered a Clayton truss, Blaine's raised sway bar brackets, and Artec lower control arm brackets for the new front axle.

Truss and sway bar brackets:

I'm not sure why Clayton included a safety thimble cover with an axle truss, but it's good that they gave me one because I'm going to have to splice in a new thimble in a week or two.

Jankoid · Feb 14, 2019

So a little back story on the front 44 I'm using. The Jeep it's from was wrecked and sold at a salvage auction. The guy that bought it wanted to swap the 4.0 into his 2.5 TJ. He kept the drivetrain and rear axle for his Jeep, but left the front axle because the passenger side control arm brackets were messed up. He assumed the axle was no good (he was wrong). After a few months of the wrecked Jeep sitting in his garage, his wife got fed up and told him to get rid of it. So he posted it on a local Jeep forum as a freebie to the first person that came and picked it up. I jumped all over that. I'll take a free rubi44 any day of the week.

So here it is (the doors belong to another of my Jeeps):

Got it pulled:

Damaged brackets:

Perfect for my needs. Those brackets are getting removed or replaced anyway.

Jankoid · Feb 14, 2019

Torched off the old brackets:

Did some grinding:

Fitted the truss:

Did some welding:

Sundowner · Feb 14, 2019

No C gussets, inner axle sleeves or outer axle seals?!?! Why, that housing is going to catch on fire, destroy your Jeep, and make you unpopular with the ladies!

Jankoid · Feb 15, 2019

Sundowner said:
No C gussets, inner axle sleeves or outer axle seals?!?! Why, that housing is going to catch on fire, destroy your Jeep, and make you unpopular with the ladies!

No chromoly ball joints either! What is wrong with me??

Sundowner · Feb 15, 2019

Jankoid said:
No chromoly ball joints either! What is wrong with me??

You should get one of those adjustable sets that lets you set preload. Those are, like, dope. And stuff.

Jankoid · Apr 22, 2019

Long time, no update. A lot of stuff happened, had some issues with the 3 link bracket not clearing the driveshaft, so had to remake the brackets. Then found out one of my motor mounts was busted. Not the lift block, the part that's welded to the frame. Yeah, that really sucked. Had to fix that, then I hurt my back at work and that knocked me on my ass for a couple weeks. So yeah, this project is more than a month overdue (I was supposed to go wheeling mid-March).

New drivers side 3 link bracket. Still similar geometry to the Savvy kit.

After getting the axle in and cycling it several times I burned the brackets on.

More pictures coming.

Jankoid · Apr 22, 2019

The track bar clears the diff cover nicely, but interferes with the driver's side coil bucket, so I had to trim the bucket to clear.

I just trimmed the corner off along that black line and now it clears nicely.

Then I plated it so the bucket wouldn't lose any strength.

Jankoid · Apr 22, 2019

Shock mounts are moved down to the control arm mount. I can now use a 12.2" travel Bilstein without needing do modify the frame side mount. And yes, the shock clears thought it's travel. I'll get better pictures later.