1987 Jeep Comanche Project RGM-79MJ

got my MJ back in February. Picked it up to replace my XJ which rotted away. She's got a 4.0 with the BA/10 trans for now. Plans were to swap over my IRO 6.5 Long Arm lift and run it as is for a while. Which worked for a little while.

But on to the pics.

How she was the day I brought her home next to my XJ.


Old company decals off and fresh paint.


After I had the front diff explode on me on my way to work. I spent that weekend swapping over the axles and suspension from the XJ under the MJ.

Wound up being a little taller than I had planned. WIth the factory springs in the back and a spring over conversion, it had about 8.5-9" of lift in the back so I had to throw some 8" lift springs in the front. All sitting on used 34x10.5 Super Swamper TSLs.

Just to mention that all this was done 4 days before heading out to NAXJA Winterfest in Attica, Indiana.

Special thanks goes out to Erik and Joelle at Sticky Geek for the sweet vinyl



Get everything finished up in time and had a blast out at Winterfest. Always a good time with some really cool dudes.




After the trip I tried to drive it into work and one of the front control arms sheared a bolt and dropped the arm while I was doing 70 down the highway. Talk about a fun ride! Got it towed back home and immediately decided it was never going to see road duty like this again! That's when my mind really started turning.

I have an old 87 Dodge pickup that I was going to use as a cheap truck challenge rig for a little contest we were going to have at work( I work at Iron Rock Off Road if I hadn't mentioned that yet).
After doing some measuring, I decided to swap over the entire drivetrain from the Dodge into the MJ. So i got to work stripping down the Dodge.


That's about as far as I have gotten on it so far.

Overall plans for mods are as follows:

8" Lift grown to like it
Front Dana 44
Rear Dana 60
Dodge 360 V8
727 Torqueflite
NP208
~119" Wheelbase
3 Link front
Maybe a tube bed

I'll be updating this with more progress as I get time to work on it. Been doing some housework and the garage is just full of stuff so there isn't any room to work.

If anyone has questions or suggestions, feel free to throw em out.

 

MOAR PICTURES!!!!!

Beware the upcoming picture dump with little text. Gotta make up time!



So much less wiring than the other Jeep











Something is about to happen....



Yep. Sometimes you've gotta come up with redneck solutions











And that brings us up to tonight's progress. Planning on getting the engine pulled tomorrow night once I dig the rest of my engine stand out of the shed.

Hoping to be able to get the axle pulled Thursday night and get the Comanche into the garage for teardown over the long weekend.

 

I haven't forgotten about his yet! Been pretty busy lately and haven't had much time at all to work on the truck. I did manage to pull the stock exhaust manifolds off the engine yesterday which was a big relief for me since the bolts were stupid rusty. The new headers should be here by the end of the day on Tuesday so I should have everything I need engine wise for mock-up purposes.

The axles are pretty much prepped. The rear axle will be a pretty straightforward affair and I'm not too worried about it. The front axle is another story. I will probably be building a truss to mount my coil spring mounts and upper control arm mount to. The lower control arm mounts might get a little tricky but I will have to see how things line up under the truck.

I will be pulling the truck in for tear down after we get the drywall up on the ceiling in the garage. Hopefully we can get that done on Saturday. Once the truck is in the garage it isn't coming out until it is swapped over

I will try and get current pics up tomorrow when I have some time.

 

So, since I keep forgetting I have actual build threads started, there will basically be a giant photo dump to try and catch up to current progress.

Ready...
...
...
...
GO!













Test fit #1




Test fit #2














Started the frame plating using 1/8"steel:










In again on it's own mounts!






Trying to figure out where the front axle is going to sit:




Patched some floor rust so my feet don't fall off from the cold


And that's where she is sitting right now. I'll be tackling a new transmission crossmember since the one I was planning on using won't work with my transfer case. Followed by the front axle truss and link mounts.

 

Good job!!

 

How is the Jeep doing?