Norcal69's Common Sense Build.

Thats real nice work right there on that rad.

 

That's amazing professionnal work. Bravo.
When I first saw your Jeep, with the green color (mine was this green, before repainted by the PO) I though : what a nice Jeep, this is a bargain.
Then, according to what you discovered, I was surprised.
Lot of things were made wrongly by the PO.
And you have all to rebuild.
It seems that you know a lot.
About speed, this is not a sport car. Moreover it is quite dangerous to drive it at full speed!

 

Thanks for the compliments guys. This has defiantly been allot more work that it was supposed to be. I got the heater outlets and ducting buttoned up last night. I'm pretty happy with how it came out; IMHO it almost looks like it could have been some sort of a dealer installed option. I can shut off the lower vents and direct all of the air toward the windshield if necessary, but it puts out more air in the windshield than my Tahoe when the passenger vents are open.

 

What heater did you use?

 

I'm using http://www.summitracing.com/parts/sum-991102-1/overview/ from summit. The vent is vintage air http://www.summitracing.com/parts/vta-63016-vul
I took one hose from the heater and ran it straight to the defrost, The other heater hose runs to a y and then dual into the vent.

 

Very nice work. Where in NorCal are you, I might have to drop mine off, lol.

 

Thank you guys for the compliments. Everything on the jeep is perfect except for the body exterior. It is about a 7 out of 10, but I wont be upset by the trail rash, and it still looks great from 20' away.
I'm in cottonwood, 20 mi south of Redding. I have done tons of work on friends restorations over the years, Nova, Camaro, Chevelle, and pickups. I have also built a half a dozen circle track cars too. This is my first street vehicle build that is my own.

 

I bought another brand the vintage air heater gen 3, but if i would have to do it again i'll go with the one you put. On mine outlet are 2 inch and on you're its 3" so much be a huge difference.

 

Got the jeep out of the bay for the first time today! Drove it to the post office and back. 1 mile or so each way. Ran great, I love this motorcraft 2100.
I still have to install the headlight rings, master cylinder hold cover, paint my rocker repair, fabricate roll bar, install front shocks and my tie rod flip kit.

 

I am ready digging the paint combination, that is something you don't see everyday; teal on grey.

 

I had a very productive weekend on the jeep. I installed Herm's HD tie rod kit and new manual steering pitman arm. When I talked to Herm, he told me that I needed new reinforced knuckles to go with my new tie rod. My knuckles that came on the jeep are far heavier duty than the ones that Herm sent me, so I sat those aside and went to work installing the tapered bungs. Total time to drill out the knuckles, weld in bungs and re assemble with new HD steering was 2 hours. I am very pleased with how nice the jeep steers now vs before with the heim joint setup that the PO had scabbed on there. After test driving the jeep to Redding and back (20 mi each way), I decided that the Rancho springs weren't cutting it. I removed the third leaf up from the bottom all the way around. Before removing the leaf, the shackles were straight up, and my 210lbs could barley budge them when jumping on the bumpers. Now, I have a little angle on the shackles and I can bounce the front end.

 

How close to parallel , looking down from above ( or a side view ) is your tie-rod and Drag Link? in one of your pictures it looks close between the two............under suspension travel compression / bump , with steering straight ahead as pictured the front axle will travel forward on the shackles about 3/4" +/- , so if you are to close now they will impact during that event...........I like to set that all up under full compression.

 

Tarry, I Have already run into that issue. Everything was good until I took the leaf out of the front springs. Tonight I am going to take the right hand tie rod out and bend it the opposite direction of factory. I should have about 3/4-1" of space after that.

 

What?..........Are you saying bending the factory Tie Rod end? Not sure I would do that........perhaps there is a better solution. How much if any clearance do you have now if you were to hang a plum bob off of the end of the Pittman Arm? And what length Pittman Arm do you have C/C ?

 

I agree with Mr Tarry

 

Tarry, I have the manual pitman arm from Herm, it is 7" ctc. There is a ton of room on the end of the arm where it is cast flat and reamed for the drag link. I could possibly relocate the hole for the drag link in the arm and make it like 6" ctc. I think that I have the correct reamer at the shop. We run asphalt modifieds locally and in a traveling series, we chop up pinto spindles, weld new spuds on the ends for adjustable tie rods, heat and bend pitman and idler arms to correct bump steer.

 

Another option would be to put a dog leg in the pittman arm which would make it shorter, or move the steering box ahead an inch or so.

 

Did not mean to rain on your Parade here.........just wanted to point that out!

I hear you on doing that stuff on the track..........and if you were going to use that Jeep off road 100% of the time and it is not registered here , Hey that's fine also.

But if that baby has California plates and it's insured here and you do drive it on the street , heating & bending steering arms and such if you were to ever get in an accident and hurt yourself or someone else I'm sure there would be a large group of not so friendly hungry attorneys that would love to crawl up your butt and tell you what ya ate last week.......if you get my drift.

Shortening the Pittman Arm is an acceptable method..........although in some case's it may shorten the total travel from stop to stop meaning that in turning radius it may not turn as tight. Although I have done that before with no issue.........in fact I went from a 7" to a dropped 5.5" while still being able to hit the stops with no issue............that can be checked by just taking your drag link off at the Pittman arm and cycling the steering to full stop and see if that 1 inch minus position can still be obtained by just visualizing where the new hole would be........... You would also have to make sure that degree wise the steering arm never gets close to being straight at the spindle..........it does need some angle for leverage.
Perhaps even a tapered insert might be better at the Pittman arm if there's not much room between the two holes?..............

Now if you were going to do a Power Steering change over you could solve all that by just moving the box forward.

 

Tarry, I just went out and looked at it. It would be easy to move the box forward, and just extend the steering shaft slip joint out some. From the pictures that I posted earlier, do you think that I would benefit from having a drop pittman arm as well?

 

In the Picture I see from the front , you would probably have some bump steer during braking and articulation .............Not much but some. Yes, a dropped Arm would correct that. Parts Mike east of Sacramento used to have about the best inventory of arms I have seen..........but not sure for a Manual Gear Box.........most were for Power the sector shaft size is a different OD.