XJ Build

Just shy of two years ago now, I embarked on the largest rust repair job I’ve ever done on my XJ. It took me several months, but I was able to replace the entire rear cargo floor including the crossmembers, gas tank bracing, and unibody frame rails along with welding in rear frame stiffeners over my newly made frame rails. Read more...

# Preface I’ve been driving my Jeep around for almost 6 months now with no rear bumper. I know, I know, not the safest choice but I don’t drive far. Why? Read more...

# Delaying the Inevitable When it comes to my cars, I like to bunch up my repairs / mods into batches where I’ll focus on one small sub-category of tasks before moving onto the next. Read more...

It’s hard to explain, but driving a car at night that has an auto dimming rear view mirror is a real treat. It’s one of those things that you’ll never notice when it’s working, but as soon as you don’t have it you’ll notice its absence immediately. Read more...

The epoxy primer I used on the underside of my repairs is some pretty good stuff, but I wanted just a hair more protection down there. And after all can you really say you did a rust repair job on your Jeep if bedliner wasn’t involved? Read more...

The least exciting portion of this project by far was closing up the two holes left in the floor directly below where the rear seat goes. I initally cut these holes in the floor way back at the beginning of the project because I needed to remove the original frame rails. Read more...

One of my biggest concerns about my custom fabricated frame rails was the vertical welds joining the frame sections. Vertical welds like those are a big no no when it comes to frames because they’re especially prone to failing. Read more...

# The Fuel Neck Housing I’ve been ignoring the gaping hole around where the fuel neck passes through the interior to travel down towards the gas tank. I had a feeling it’d be easy to fix so I never put much thought into it. Read more...

# Building Out The Cargo Floor I didn’t want to try to salvage the original cargo area floor from my Jeep. It had rusted through in several spots, and I kinda chopped it up into several pieces because I only removed bits of it as a time when I was fabricating the new frame rails. Read more...

Directly below the floor of the XJ in the cargo area sits the gas tank. Tucked tight between the frame rails it rests a mere 1/2" from the floor. The mount for the gas tank is also what braces the floor in the cargo area. Read more...