Mr. Green's Surgery

[Mike]

How thick is the wall on the square tubing? The increase in leverage will be negligible but a hard landing might buckle thin wall.

Wall thickness is 1/8". I couldn't find anything thicker walled in 2" square.

[aw12345]

How thick is the wall on the square tubing? The increase in leverage will be negligible but a hard landing might buckle thin wall.

Weld sleeves in where the bolts go.
By thew way 2"x2"x1/4" wall is available. Pattons should have it, or IMS in Riverside. It's what I made both rear crossmembers of

[dirtman13]

Wall thickness is 1/8". I couldn't find anything thicker walled in 2" square.

I think I still have some 1/4" left.

[Mike]

Weld sleeves in where the bolts go.
By thew way 2"x2"x1/4" wall is available. Pattons should have it, or IMS in Riverside. It's what I made both rear crossmembers of

I think I still have some 1/4" left.

Thanks guys. Ryan brought me a piece of 2x2 that is 1/4" wall. After I finish the transmission mount, I'll switch out the 1/8" walled stuff. I appreciate the input. It seemed a bit sketchy to me with the thinner stuff.

[Mike]

Whew! Finally done with the first welding project. Some thanks need to go out to several people that helped to to get me to this point.

But first, since my last post, I have gotten to the point that I "think" that I am finished with the drive train lift. The Tummy Tuck did not get Mr. Green a flat belly, but the end result is a transmission crossbeam and T/C (with clearance) that is only 13/16" below the frame. Once a skid plate is on, the total drop should only be 1" or a hair over. Even then, it will only be for a short area overall.

I recycled one of the only parts that I liked about my old ProComp lift: the transmission support. I cut out the crossbeam mounts and fabbed a new mounting method:




The cross beam had a 1/2" rise in the center, so I reduced that to a 1/4" and reinforced the center weight bearing section:


The final result was what I wanted. This should give me clearance to get the Catalytic Converter through the space and use my original seats like I want:


The end result is that the drive train will be at an angle of 5.5 degrees. This is only 3 degrees from the stock angle of 8.5. Hopefully this will be good enough to prevent any vibration at speed when I am done.

I replaced the first 2" motor mount spacers with 1/4" walled square tube and I am much happier with this arrangement. I also changed the design a little to give them a little more strength.

Now for the list of 'Thank You's'. These folks were very helpful to get me this far:

Scott (Dr.Dirty) for letting me borrow a REAL welder (Damn, that thing is COOL!).
Ryan (HookandLadder) for giving me the 1/4" wall square stock.
Chuck (Dirtman13) for talking me through the various tummy tuck options.
Art (aw12345) for telling me to JUST DO IT! It will be okay.
Kurt (RAT) for LOTS of advice. Details like cutting out extra space to get to the CPS and more.
My wife for understanding that this is just the beginning!
And lastly, I'd like to thank my agent and the Academy for....

Uhh, sorry. Too much of the Oscar's in the news this week. :bonk:

I have been so focused on getting to this point that I am not sure where to go next. I plan to start cutting off the old frame mounts next, but what is the next step after that?

I think that I want to start with the rear axle suspension. Or should I go with something else?

[aw12345]

Do the front stretch and steering first, is the most complicated part of the whole endeavor

[dr.dirty]

Looking good Mike!

[Mike]

Do the front stretch and steering first, is the most complicated part of the whole endeavor

Sounds good. I think that I will follow your suggestion. I'm sort of anxious about the front anyway, so I should probably knock that out first.

[aw12345]

Come peek under my jalopy this afternoon, to kinda get an idea what needs to be done

[Mike]

Come peek under my jalopy this afternoon, to kinda get an idea what needs to be done

Art, Thanks for letting crawl around under your Jeep. It was good, but I was a little depressed the next day trying to digest all of the work that I am getting myself into that I didn't think about. But I am good now, in fact, I am more determined to take my time and do it right.

I just may need some help on determining what is right!

I finally have all of the original mounts off. That track bar mount was a PITA!! Grinding everything down was quite monotonous.

My poor old Dewalt angle grinder met its end in a spectacular way today. The guts of the thing started glowing bright orange and then started smoking with a nice burst of flame shooting out the side.

It was quite exciting (well, compared to grinding), until I realized that all work would be at a stop until a new grinder was procured. I've never had a cheap grinder until today. There is a huge difference. It made some interesting smells as it heated up, and got so hot that I had to wear leather gloves to use it. Even so, the thing did the job eventually.

The axles and the frame are clean. I left some bumps of weld at the upper control arm mount points. I smoothed them down, but I don't plan to completely remove them unless they get in the way of the new equipment.

[Mike]

Well, wouldn't you know that my paying job has gone crazy lately, so progress has been slow. It didn't help that I ran into an odd problem too.

I have started putting the D60 back together so that I can begin positioning things. I'm guessing that this thing has something to do with alignment:


I didn't take the D60 apart (I bought it cleaned and disassembled), so I had no reference as to how this should be positioned. I checked my F350 and the key hole is facing out, so I put the knuckle back on with the do-hicky like this:


If anyone has some insight on this, it would be welcome.

Now for the problem that I ran into. I always seem to get the weird :poop:! I replaced all the wheel hub bearings and the seal, but when I went to slide the hub on, the inner bearing would not go over the spindle. Tight as it could be!

I went to three different parts stores and all of the bearings were too tight for the spindle. Today, I stopped by Randy's Off Road with the spindle in hand and asked if they had ran into this before. They tried their bearings and had the same result. In the end, they recommended honing the inside of the bearings to fit. I did, and it worked. I also buffed off a bit of the lip on each spindle to make it slide on easier.

I was so happy to get the hubs on that I almost posted a pic, but you guys have seen hubs on axles before.

When D60 progress was stalled with the bearings, I started putting tires onto the beadlocks. Just sayin', out of all the jobs that I will be doing to this Jeep, I'm pretty sure that mounting beadlocks will be one of my least favorite! Not as bad as grinding off the mounts, but not a big joy.

The tires and wheels look great though. Unfortunately, I still have three more to mount:

[RAT]

The thingie is a adjustment for caster. You won't need it cus yer doing a link suspension and will afjust caster when you install the CA mounts. Not hard to do. Need an angle finder or can borrow mine. When yer ready I'll come by to help.

[Mike]

The thingie is a adjustment for caster. You won't need it cus yer doing a link suspension and will afjust caster when you install the CA mounts. Not hard to do. Need an angle finder or can borrow mine. When yer ready I'll come by to help.

Cool. Thanks BFAM.

[Ol Man]

They are pretty inexpensive at HF

http://www.harborfreight.com/digital...uge-95998.html

[aw12345]

That bushing/ cam does 2 things it gives small camber and caster adjustments, mainly camber since on a leafsprung truck the caster would be set with wedges under the spring. Either way it isn't a big thing to pop it out and turn it later if camber is of