ilovemybike

My old faithful Cherokee is getting rusty beyond what I want to repair. I'm still driving it around, but I was looking around for a two door Cherokee or a Comanche. One of the parts guys that I deal with at work had an MJ that he was going to scrap if I didn't buy it. I took a look and it looked pretty solid, so I took it home. A friend of mine was parting out a CJ project and I grabbed some parts from him. I now have a AX15, a Novak adapter, a Chevy bellhousing, clutch, pressure plate, and all the necessary hydraulics to swap in an LS motor. He also threw in a wiring harness and an ECU tuned for a 5.3L with a standard trans and cable throttle body. Bonus. I bought the parts before I even picked up the Jeep, can't resist a good deal. Anyway I took the bed off to check the frame out and pulled the carpet and seats out. Even though the truck was oiled it's whole life the floors were largely rotted. > Some photos.



This is the XJ that is donating it's suspension, axles and tires to the Comanche.







Rocker panels and 13 gauge floors? Overkill.











Press brake I made one drunken night.





Sorry for photo quality, I am lazy when it comes to dragging a backpack full of lenses and flashes.



Almost done with the floors.



Look at that classy interior.





The old chop. I tried out a carbide DeWalt framing circular saw blade, worked like a charm.



Mocking up the engine tonight, we'll see how it goes. :yay:

Hung a junk 5.3 tonight.





Built some motor mounts off of Jeep's handiwork.





Trimmed truck manifolds to fit.





Looks like a car manifold is in order. :

ilovemybike

Cut 11" out of the bed today.

























Putting some work in on the bed. Did a half *** job of gluing it back together and then brought it over to my cousin's shop for some more bodywork.
















Today we started on the bed corner, which was dented pretty badly and rotted as well. Nothing a flat piece of metal couldn't fix, once it was power hammered, planished and whatnot.

















What's this little toy over in the corner?




















We only had an hour, but I think we got quite a bit done. By we I mean Johnny, although I did cut the offending rusty corner off.

ilovemybike

[img width=800 height=533]http://sphotos.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash4/305950_551596725071_149000144_31116987_589361950_n .jpg[/img]







A little more metal shaping. 8)

I busted out the 50mm 1.4 for the close up welding shots, turned out really well I think.




'd

Cut a piece out of a keg and TIG'd the EGR hole up.



Sandblast the ol money pit door.



Exhaust has clearance!!



Stripping paint is not as cool as real stripping.







Bought some product, more stripping and paint prep first though.

ilovemybike

White!!





Dents and all.



Dimples FTW






Look at that... welder.

It's not mint, but it's white. :yay:

ilovemybike

I've been heming and hawing over when to take my Cherokee apart so I can swap stuff over to the Comanche. It would help to have axles and suspension underneath it to mock everything up. Well..... I took the Cherokee out for a little romp today and flipped her onto her lid. I guess it's time.





The most comfortable roll ever. She just leaned over. I'll say this, harnesses are awesome, and the Comanche is going to have more cage.

ilovemybike

Anyone need a boat anchor?



I love that grill.



Screw you brackets.






Getting somewhere.

ilovemybike

Yay hole sawing through unibody rails!



Welded in inserts for long arm brackets.



and I got tired of taking photos and put the damn thing together.



I like it. 8)



It's looking about right, maybe lower it a bit.



The Cherokee had a Marilyn stencil on the hood that my friend and I did in college, I wanted to do something similar on the Comanche so he designed this



Of course it started a theme.



Gun gussets!

ilovemybike

Finally some progress.

Picked up a blown up LS1 from motorhed and swapped the intake and accessories onto my LM7, then lobbed the hot mess into the 'manche bay.







The power steering lines even bolted right up. They look a bit pretzel so I'll be modifying them.



Manifolds fit.





I guess I'll cancel my order for a four inch cowl hood. Damn pro street lifted Jeeps are in too. :bacon:



:yay:

96 Z-Ragtop

iTrader: (3)

Looks like an awesome project.

ilovemybike

Thanks man, its coming along

i r teh noobz

iTrader: (4)

Looks good so far. I like the mismatched color scheme. Gives it a funky bit of character.

classiccaprice

iTrader: (2)

Great fab work

ilovemybike

Thanks! Lots more metal work to come.

Mishimoto

Great build. You and your cousin have some awesome fab skills!

ilovemybike

Made up the second tail light housing yesterday, it's amazing how much time these little suckers can take. Damn them. I'll throw it in the oven sometime this coming week. I took a sawzall to the radiator support of the Comanche so I could fit a Cherokee grill and radiator on it. I have two stock fans as well and I think that's about it for cooling. If it overheats I guess I'll add more fan, or pull some plug wires.




Look at all that room!!



All normal looking, I want to put another S15 grill on this thing but the Jeep die hards are such haters.



Organic prop rod in full effect. The intake seems to not quite fit.



:yay: For clearance and fresh air reasons, I think I'm going to run the intake backwards into the HVAC/cowl area. It means more work so why not?



Damn you tail light.

ilovemybike

I decided that the next order of business was to figure out a transmission crossmember, so I grabbed the slip yoke eliminated t-case out of my XJ and tried to put it up to the AX15. Then I remembered something, they changed the input spline count from my XJ trans, BA10, to the AX. Damn. Then this happened.



I had a broken NP231 lying around which happened to have the larger input, so I did a speedy-dry swap and put the newer style planetary in my old case. Happily it fit. Now I have to decide how I want to support the trans and t-case. I'll take some photos tomorrow and post them up in hopes that someone will have a better idea than the weird ones floating around in my head.

ilovemybike

Excuse the grossness everywhere. Note the passenger exhaust is down to the framerail.

Crossmember ideas, GO!

ilovemybike

Did a bit of work this week on the poor bastard.







Bit of a crossmember.



Pig nose. Pig.... bacon! Mmmmmmm....





Tied the mounted plates into the lower control arm mounts which are through bolted with sleeves through the unibody rails.



Even a blind squirrel....



Dimples!





That doesn't stand out does it?



Painted my new fuel tank in some paint over rust chassis goop, seems rugged.



Mounted that hot mess with new straps.



Radiator and electric fans all mounted up.





Painted the booster and swapped in the clutch master.



Lightening.



Interesting....



Mounting posts for radiator.



That's how it its.

ilovemybike

Radiator and electric fans all mounted up.





Painted the booster and swapped in the clutch master.



Lightening.



Interesting....



Mounting posts for radiator.



That's how it its.

ilovemybike

I ran a fuel line, bent up some 3/8" line with vice grips and a hammer. :yay:







You can see the other end poking up by the intake. Made a wee hole for the throttle body. Ordered up an elbow and some connectors . I plan on welding a piece of 3.5" to the new firewall section that I make and using that as a bulkhead for the intake.





Bouncing a flash in a red cab makes for an interesting whitebalance, all the more reason to paint it white.