1971 cj5 frame question

Ok I took off the front bumper of my jeep and noticed that the front of the frame rail on both sides is cracked and broken pretty bad. I have seen folks that have cut off the front 12"'s or so and welded on a new front frame. which year frame can I take the frame from so it matches my original one? Just exactly is the process to make this a strong fix? Any suggestion or direct me to a previous thread will help. Thanks in advance.


Julius

 

Do you have saginaw steering? The front frame graft has been more for providing a steering gear mount than for fixing cracks. The cracks are usually where the spring hangers mount to the frame. If you want to simply fix your Jeep, find a professional welder to weld up the cracks and add some reinforcement for the repaired frame. That will be better than welding complete frame horns.

The front bumper on an early CJ is needed for structural rigidity, so don't drive without it.

 

Right now I'm doing an frame off restoration. My plan is to put a power steeing box on it so I will have to strengthen the frame. The cracks start from where the front bumper is and goes back about 10" in the lower corners of the frame on both sides. Where the front bumper attaches to the frame the frame widens out and that is all broken on both sides. The bumper must of hit something hard because it is all bent.

 

Salvage the originals if feasable because frame splicing if not performed carefully will weaken the structural integrity.
You can use the frame horns from any 1957-1971 CJ-5 or CJ-6.

 

Like Tim has mentioned above...........get it fixed...........more than likely it is un-boxed right now and if your talking about the lower corners that is about where the first cross member is.......straighten the main rails if they need it and box the frame on both sides as you will need to do that anyway in preparation for a Saginaw Power Steering box mount anyway. If your bumper is out of square you either need to fix it or replace it .............in either case a temporary brace needs to be in place up front when you do the crack repairs and boxing to keep it all at 90 degrees.

 

Is this what you are thinking of?



This is a 1972 frame. I have seem the front of one of these frames cut off and grafted to a '71 or earlier frame. This has some advantages, in that it already uses a bracket for Saginaw steering, and it replaces the structural front bumper with a beefy front cross member. Grafting this onto your frame is not an easy job, and it would be very easy to screw it up. Frame welding has its own rules, part due to welding skill and part due to mechanical engineering. If you don't design and execute the splice correctly, it's going to break later.

The safest way to approach this is to take the Jeep to a frame shop and have them straighten it, then hire a professional welder to fix any cracks and add some reinforcement to the existing frame. Once it's fixed, you can add Saginaw steering ... there are lots of resources about that here.

 

Why not weld repair what you have? Remember that the reason that the bumper was riveted on is that it was a support member of the frame, not just a bumper. A lot of your steering control is affected by a misaligned, missing, or wobbly bumper.

A well done weld repair could be stronger than new...

We used to repair high pressure vessels on jet engines with weld repair and that worked well enough to stand inspection and be reinstalled.

 

Thanks for all your help. Now to find a good frame shop here in Wyoming. I may take it to Calif. and find a good frame shop.

Julius

 

Julius,............If you have it down to a bare frame and have a level flat piece of concrete or least one that it can be leveled on.............all you need to do is take your tape measure and measure across the corners from the rear forward in an "X" pattern...........a good point would be the factory rivet holes in the front and rear corners where both bumpers attache as these would have been punched in a fixture at the factory and would be most likely a real close starting point...........on your drivers side frame horn forward of the radiator / steering cross member it is doubtful the frame is bent to the rear of that point and most likely just forward of that cross member on the one side only...........

Get some help and get out your tape measure you'll see where the problem is. Your goal is to get the frame horn up front straight and at the same time getting the suspension / spring hangers both front and rear running parallel to each other so that the suspension is tracking straight ahead. This can be accomplished by hanging plumb bobs at the rear suspension points and doing the same in the front and check those parallels between both sides .........we normally just snap a chalk line between those points on the shop floor.

You'll need some heat and the ability to secure the frame solidly to something that will resist the pressure when you start to bend it back against itself. Take some pictures of that area near that cross member. Good Luck!

 

Tarry99, the frame horns are not bent. There are cracks though I will post some pics. Thanks

 

Better yet...............hard to tell from your one photo.........fixing that bottom radius in the channel is really no big deal ............either by putting a sleeve inside or wrapping it outside. The main concern would be to get a temporary brace in place up front to replace the bent bumper and then keep the position of the spring hangers on both sides in proper alignment with the rest of the suspension while doing the fix.

 

http://i252.photobucket.com/albums/hh38/juliusvatalaro_photos/frontofframe003_zpsad4efd00.jpg
http://i252.photobucket.com/albums/hh38/juliusvatalaro_photos/frontofframe004_zps8bafdc2e.jpg
http://i252.photobucket.com/albums/hh38/juliusvatalaro_photos/frontofframe002_zps4187b16e.jpg
http://i252.photobucket.com/albums/hh38/juliusvatalaro_photos/frontofframe001_zps50b8b844.jpg
http://i252.photobucket.com/albums/hh38/juliusvatalaro_photos/frontofframe004_zps8bafdc2e.jpg



Here are a few pics of the front

 

Renegade II, Looked at your pictures.......that's an easy fix for someone who has fabrication skills and the tools..........I would probably do something like this:

Jack it up and get all the pressure off the front suspension put your jack stands on the frame right at the large cross member and then loosen the front shackles on both sides......If you know the dimension between the frame rails a temporary brace should be installed there to replace your bent bumper to keep the rails at 90 degrees to each other.............clean up the cracked metal with a powered wire brush or sand blast it.
What someone needs to do is get the existing metal ( cracks & bends )closely back where it needs to go and tack weld it in a few spots..............then perhaps lay a short vertical brace across the open side of the frame rail near the spring hanger and tack weld it temporarily into place to help support the spring hanger and the frame rail.

Then I would remeasure and X the suspension to see how close it is, if it close then you can slowly skip weld the cracks back together both outside and inside ............If everything stays straight I would just gusset it with some square vertical gussets fitting the inside of the frame rail from top to bottom that will keep that corner tight .........three gussets from the front to the first cross member should be fine.............Once you box the rails up front that will also add additional rigidity to the rail..............Keep in mind if your going to do the Saginaw steering box upgrade up front this work should also be incorporated into what your doing here to fix the cracks. Things like boxing the frame there and adding the new steering gear mount should be at least considered or done right now..............Once this is all welded up as a last resort if the front hangers are not 100% straight I would just cut them off and re-weld new ones into the correct position.

If your in Wyoming there has got to be some good fab people working around the Oil , Gas or Farm industry to figure this out .........not hard just common since & Time.

 

Renegade II,
This looks like a straight forward repair from the photos. I don't know where in big wonderful Wyo. you live, but if you can't find
someone to weld it, I live in n.w. Colo. 160 miles from Laramie Harley, and 180 miles from Rock Springs Harley, rides I take quite often
and 40 miles from the border.
It's probably on the way to Cali. anyway, you can bring it by and save yourself the 30 hr's drive time, I'd be glad to weld it for you.

 

Nice jeep this looks like the renegade II that was on ebay from golden CO.

 

It was actually in Colorado Springs where I picked it up. It was on ebay though.

Thanks for the offer Willy s flatfender.

 

I should post a pic of my frame horns for yall - my Jeep was driven for almost 10 years (not by me) with no front bumper and the horns both torn up with cracks but also bent. I think people need to remember these Jeeps are getting driven around 30-40 mph. I think people tend to overreact the second they hit a forum.