Full Size Jeep Network

sierrablue wrote: ↑Sun Mar 05, 2023 8:11 am Sounds awesome!

Yeller, what're you running for wing windows? I would really like to keep the stock ones but I'm REALLY tired of the whistling, and I know the later gaskets won't seal it around the hinge (which is where it's leaking anyway, of course, why wouldn't it be?). Do I break down and get some later ones or is there a trick (other than ducttape) to fix it?

I’m not sure the answer. I did not change my wing rubbers. The originals were still soft and I don’t have any whistling. Reading the “does not seal around the hinge” was enough to not change them. I do have an air leak but it doesn’t whistle. I’ve though about using some rtv to make a gasket but it really hasn’t been an issue

It's funny that your bushings have springs on the core support--I looked on mine and that's the only set that has the double rubber like you did on the rest of your truck

I also noticed that mine has some rubber belt material on the passenger's side mounts to level things out I think I'm gonna look into poly bushings for mine, because I've read that rubber is exactly the wrong frequency for the human spine. I quite like my spine, and would like for it to not cause me pain, so I'm hoping to figure out not-rubber bushings

Having done a lot of body bushings I only install urethane if it’s the only option. Or I do like my bronco, the seats are bolted to the frame and there is no isolation of the body, but I designed it to be that way. Urethane is too rigid, same with leaf springs give me some good ol Clevite bushings, urethane is not compliant enough.

What I don't like about urethane spring bushings is they rely on a relatively thin flange to locate the spring. Some don't even meet in the middle. Give me the good ole rubber vulcanized to the sleeve.

Some of you may have seen my comments about ball joints. This past week I changed my failing drivers side lower ball joint, which was new in August of last year. Not sure if I failed on the install, was a bad part, had my steering stop in just the wrong spot, who knows….. Any way all fixed now. I did find I had a bad axle joint that was right at a year old, again not sure the deal but replaced it as well.

Since I was digging through my spare parts I snapped a pic of a D44 axle joint and a D60 axle joint, just a weee bit of difference

The big one's the D44 right?

I picked up some spare parts recently due to the price being right and they were really nice. Decided to make some wall art, it’s ready to hang after I make a trip to the hardware store. Still keeping an eye out for some headlight buckets, rings and marker lights.

The grill and pans are from brielly, here in the vendor section. And yes I know they are crooked

Back in the spring I managed to mangle my tail pipe enough to be ugly. Even though I was mostly happy with the tone I wanted to try a different muffler. Upon recommendation of a friend, I picked up one of these Dynomax mufflers. I’m really happy with the tone and the volume is great in the cab. It really cleaned up the tone as well. Couldn’t be happier with the end result. Also shortened the tail pipe and made it less vulnerable.

Looks like a nice muffler at a fair price.

I sort of wish I hadn't welded mine in so I could experiment with some other brands.

Currently running a single chamber Cherry Bomb I found on the side of the road lol.

That muffler was also recommended to me by a very savvy 4x4 shop owning friend and I've now used it on a couple of trucks with great results.

MISF came up with a leak-proof 3 bolt flange system that I've used a couple of times. They're a bit laborious to make and while not needed, access to a lathe makes part of the process go faster. If CAD is in your wheelhouse then Oshcut or sendcutsend can make the flanges with the two different ID's and save you some time. That is what I'll be doing going forwards.
It goes together like this:


The up-stream flange (on the left) fits the exhaust tube exactly and is placed ~1/2" up from the end of the tube. The down-stream flange has it's ID opened up to fit over a piece of exhaust tube that has been expanded to be a slip fit over the tube size chosen, and is welded at the end of the tube. No gasket required, a little high temp RTV in the 'corner' of the upstream flange and tube is all that it takes to seal the joint. Using these joints makes it possible to remove sections of the exhaust as needed to work on other parts of the vehicle. Another trick with these joints is to use Grade 5 bolts, but use Brass nuts with only flat washers. I never, ever use split lock washers on anything and I have never had one of these joints leak.

This is the new up-stream flange in place under my FSB:


And this is the old one, from before I replaced all of the system with the correct emissions legal parts:


This the system for my old '65 Valiant sun curing the bbq paint before going under the car for good:


As can be seen, I also use the flange bolts to also attach the hangers

With the now easy availability of the Marmon Flanges (commonly known as "V-Band" flanges) some might wonder why go to all of this trouble? I've used the Marmon flanges on a couple projects and I like them, but they do have one feature that is both a blessing and a problem. They have no fixed rotational orientation. Great for twisting something to align it, bad when something wants to twist out of alignment. On one application of Marmon flanges I 'keyed' them so that they could only go together in one orientation, but that needed a mill to make happen easily and it compromised the sealing of the flanges (in that case it was only cold air and we could stand the leakage). I wouldn't do that with exhaust.

Not much building right now but did manage a Christmas morning run to Disney OK and play on a few rocks for a bit

Looks like fun.

That's about as good a Christmas as a man can ask for! Aside from time spent with family and friends of course.

Sent from my Pixel 4a (5G) using Tapatalk

Harry Dawg wrote: ↑Mon Dec 25, 2023 2:43 pm Looks like fun.

That's about as good a Christmas as a man can ask for! Aside from time spent with family and friends of course.

Sent from my Pixel 4a (5G) using Tapatalk

Thanks Harry!

I told everyone, your welcome to come and hangout, but bring food, I wasn’t doing anything that rated a required to do, my brain needed that for one day and this is the only day available

As some of you know I have a pile of used winches…. Well the 20+ year old abused Ramsey winch on my J Truck had decided it was done. I assumed it was because it’s been swimming a few times and it was full of water, it was not, brake and gear box was clean as new. Other than some serious corrosion on the terminals I couldn’t find anything wrong with the motor. But it certainly didn’t function. I did an exhaustive search and found a replacement Prestolite motor for a very reasonable price. As usual I did a very poor job of pic taking. So the winch is now ready for installation and should be good for another number of years.

Looks almost like a starter motor...

Always awesome to find old school parts to keep your existing stuff going

The armatures for both winch motors and starter motors really aren't all that different. A trained eye can likely tell the difference, but I can't.

For that matter, the armature out of a generator also looks very similar. Remember when cars had those? Neither do I, but I've worked on generators off of farm equipment.

Yeller's old armature's commutator looks really good. That it doesn't work leads me to think that it has some shorted windings. It could be that they're simply shorted between the commutator segments. In which case the solution is easy. Grind all of the set out of a hacksaw blade and use that to carefully 'saw' down between each segment pair roughly .03"-.05" deep.
My mentor grandfather used to have a side gig rebuilding starters and generators that he still occasionally did long after he retired.

I was really surprised how good it all looked. I was expecting the brushes to be stuck and everything to be corroded. The only thing corroded were the terminals on the outside. I know if I took it to a shop for repair it would have cost as much or more than a new motor, the replacement motor was well under $200 and it’s not a cheap Chinese knockoff, but a real Prestolite, made in Mexico, not the USA, but at least it’s North America.

Yeah, copper accumulates stress and fatigues. Unlike steel, small stresses are cumulative, regardless of their magnitude. The wire experiences as much force as the armature and field lams - Newton's third law. Any magnetic device with copper windings will fail eventually. If one armature pole goes open, you can find it by measuring between the two brush contact spots (opposite sides of the commutator) for every pole. The field can go shorted or open and fail that way. Or you could lose continuity to one of the brushes. Field going open seems most likely.

Well….. been a bit since I’ve had the opportunity to do much, life stopped for a bit (work stuff that I open mindedly volunteered for and look forward to the next same opportunity to create a great facility for folks to earn a living and grow a career). Anyway, J Truck has been down for a couple of months with yet again another cracked radiator tank. So scrapped the mounting and completely redesigned the entire system. Added a crossmember to the core support, drilled it to accept rubber radiator grommets. Then made a plate that attaches to the radiator with studs on it for the grommets. Then reinforced the core support in the center on top with a single grommet on top. Still need to do a bit of welding and painting but she’s drivable once again

And in no particular order a few pics, cu what good is all this typin and readin without pics

And the rest