Jeep Grand Cherokee Truck Build

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PostPosted: Thu Nov 25, 2021 11:37 am
DarrelK wrote:WOW, my eyes hurt! Can you imagine how much time that all took???...... :shock:


I tried to find a decent photo of the guy who won this year's Las Vegas Super Show event but couldn't. Someone posted tweets of it but the photos are really small and not that good. When you see that one, it will really blow you away.
1968 Coronet R/T


ACTS 16:31

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PostPosted: Thu Nov 25, 2021 11:50 am
Here it is:
Custom Paint 1.jpg
1968 Coronet R/T


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PostPosted: Thu Nov 25, 2021 1:23 pm
DarrelK wrote:WOW, my eyes hurt! Can you imagine how much time that all took???...... :shock:


If you watch any auto TV show or follow Chip Foose it takes 2 weeks form junk yard to show car.



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PostPosted: Thu Nov 25, 2021 5:34 pm
For a very short time there was a Kit Car building 1/2 hour show. They did this elaborate Porsche kit on a Porsche Boxter base. They build it in like 2 shows without about 4 or 5 guys. I had looked into that build myself in the past and I knew there was at least 500 hours of fitting, fabbing, on that mess. It was also going to run about 40 to 50 grand by the time you got it looking "right." I've had several builds over the years that have run over 1000 hours.....
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 05, 2021 12:16 am
PROGRESS.... So that is the word for today. The 3 of us got together for a good 8 hour day. We pulled down the headliner completely this time. If you are doing one of the these conversions I think it's worth it to just pull the whole thing down especially when tracing wiring that is running under these headliners. The Jeeps especially have kind of a strange system of taking all the wiring down each side to the back but then they loop it through another harness to power that command center that's in the front roof.
Okay, so we feel confident that we are also going to deviate on another point.... we are adding an additional 5 inches of interior space within the cab for either side mounted jump seats or possibly a jump bench. We do not need to move the bed.....just the front cab wall. It will cause us to shorten the fender boxes but it should work. We are going to use self drilling screw to tack/mock all this up before making the final decision.
After getting the headliner out we removed the rear seats, seat belts, and a crap load of interior trim, including a decent sized stereo amp and CD disc changer. Then it was on to unpluging and removing the tailights (these are lightly trimmed and reused), the rear hatch, and the two rear doors.
And, then we started cutting. We used a diamond edged circular saw for the roof top and demolition blade on a reciprocal saw for the sides of the roof. Next we sawed through each pillar and did a rough cross cut which allowed us to lift off the entire greenhouse. I picked up a cheap small body saw on sale awhile back....man that thing has been a time saver especially when combining it with a pistol type air chisel.
So where are we.....we will have just about 1 more hour for some fine trimming and we should be good to start our mock up for mounting the bed. That will go much more rapidly than my Charger build as the Jeep floor structure require almost no additional bracing. And on that subject.... very impressed with the Jeep structure, thing is a tank. Looks like a lot of crush safety built in with tripling up stress areas. And man, when the guy I got this thing from said it was rust free, he wasn't kidding. ALL of the original seem sealer is intact and I haven't even seen one rusty bolt yet..... Sorry, not much in the way of pic.s , this just moved along fast.... I'll slow me down and get more pic.s next time..... The plan is to meet and do another full day next Sunday.
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Headliner coming down.... see what I mean about loops of minor wiring harness.....
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Riley and Dalton removing wire harness and more trim.... lots of trim.....
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So Grandson doing some final marking for our next round of cutting.
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PostPosted: Mon Dec 13, 2021 12:00 am
In for a full day again with the 3 of us..... We had a lot of minor trimming and grinding for the beginning of the bed fitting. Are you familiar with the term that something will "snowball" on you? Well when we decided to go for 5 extra inches of interior space, let the snowballing begin. So what we have done is keep our bed length stock/static where it would normally be. We left 5 extra inches of roof stick out up top and moved our bed wall just about 5 inches toward the rear. That of course makes the bottom of that wall miss it's origianl anchor point. We do have a fix for that by adding some additional aluminum to tie back into that original support. Just took some thinking and a review of a few of the original build videos. It's kind of amazing how just adding that extra room behind the seats makes the jump seats more than possible and when they are not in use they will fold up along the side walls out of the way. Okay, so we now have started bundling up and water proofing uneeded plugs and wires. We also adjusted and got the sunroof secured in its' tracks. So our rivet gun hadn't been used for a few months and got sticky inside and was fouling on us. Got that apart and fixed, and we were back in business. So the bedsides are permanently in although we might add a few more bolts to those. Next, we'll get our aluminum stock so we can set that front bedwall permanently, then begin waterproofing. We all have to get our work schedules and holdiday schedules to see when we'll do our next session.
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IMG_20211212_113031105 - Copy.jpg
This is my grandson illustrating the fact that this is just too small back here for jump seats in the stock position....
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Dalton was using the air body saw to clean up the fiberglass on the window top cap. This is just a test fitting.
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So Riley popped up to help Dalton continue to check the alignment of the window top cap.
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Riley and my grandson are adjusting the driver's side panel while adding rivets.
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PostPosted: Mon Dec 27, 2021 2:52 pm
So we are doing all that fun holiday stuff here and getting our "planning"together. Meanwhile, the rest of our minor parts are about all in. We got the small box of tailgate parts on Friday and on Sunday the tailgate made it's appearnce. Last item we still need is the Colorado rear window.
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Tailgate 1.jpg
So this was out front when we got home on Sunday.
Tailgate 2.jpg
These are Ford Ranger tailgates drop shipped directly from an OEM supplier. This is the exact same tailgate I run on my Charger truck....
Tailgate 3.jpg
The upper portion (on your left in this pic.) is open so you can mount the latch and control arms which attach to the locking plunger which are on each side of the unit. Once all of that is in a large aluminum plate covers all of that with an additional aluminum L shaped stiffiner that goes on the outside top of the whole tailgate....
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PostPosted: Wed Dec 29, 2021 12:42 am
And this was our last outstanding part which came in today......
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Rear Window.jpg
Colorado rear truck window, same model we used on my Charger build.
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 09, 2022 12:03 am
So the wrecking crew is back at it again for a whole 8 hour day for the 3 of us. We got a few hours in for a little bit of pre-prep. yesterday. This Jeeps wiring is not requiring much of a rewire of anything in particualr you just have to make sure you've got the several loops of plugged in wiring harnesses going together and battened down in the right places. Since this Jeep also had the factory tow package that is another plug in loop that must be properly managed.
So, remember the snowballing thing from moving that bedwall 5 inches back? Well, the snowball continued to grow as we now had to cut about 5 inches off our wheelwell boxes. We were able to recycle these cuts by reattaching them internally to retain and strengthen the front of each box. Something different that is kind of evolving with these builds is the alternating use of rivets and stainless steel bolts. You kind of go bolt, rivet, rivet, bolt when attaching panels. I also am now using stainless steel rivets in select areas for more strength. Again the movement of the bedwall also had us using an extra attachment plate at the bottom. That plate made it a little harder to get in and insulate. We did go ahead and mount two new speakers (my Christmas gift to Dalton) in the bedwall facing forward. This allows the wheelwell boxes to serve as a ported box chamber to increase the bass response of the JBL drivers. We plugged back in his factory Infinitey amp.....sounds pretty good, we'll upgrade the lower front 6 x 9s later as well as the dash tweeters.
Well, we probably went a little overboard on the bolting of the side panels and bedwall but this Jeep will probably see some off road trails/camping so I'd rather see it sturdy/stiff. I can tell you this....we figured my truck conversion probably lost in the 300 to 400 pound weight range when we built it. This Jeep feels like it lost every bit that much. Just tapping a little too much on the go pedal had me spinning all 4 tires in my driveway....Hmmmmmm...... the boy is going to have to watch himself......
Attachments
8690.jpeg
Well, yes, I do hate crawling into tight spaces.... waterproofing with sealers and foam under the bedwall here.... And, my grandson as seen through the access hole panel....
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IMG_20220108_094552763.jpg
This is a "now modified" wheelwell box. That cutoff flange is reinstalled, makes the box super stiff.
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Here is the drivers side box being installed over the wheelwell. We are putting 6 bolts through the bedwall and into the inner flange.
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So wiring is roughed in, speaker is installed in front bedwall, ready for wheelwell box.
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Bed side boxes, bedwall, all secured... lower panels are just laid in place for now. Rear large bed plate will hinge up for spare acess.
Big Difference.jpg
So was 5 inches of extra room worth it?... Yep, we can now have fold down jump seats on the sides....
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PostPosted: Fri Jan 21, 2022 11:04 pm
Well, we are all getting used to the 2022 so we have not been able to get together as much as I had wanted but we are still progressing. Riley and I got a pretty decent day in during the week as we were a little slow in my business and so, I can only take so much of working on taxes right now. We are still finishing up metal work by attaching the forward bed floor and getting it ready for a continuous hinge in the middle. This will allow the entire back half of the bed floor to be lifted up by cam lock handles to get to the spare tire. We did a lot of hammer and saw trimming of the underlying bumper support to prepare it for the new rear aluminum trim panel that closes that area out.
I did do a dry fit of the bedside panels just to see how much ajustment/trimming those will need. They really aren't too bad at all. I think by flexing and properly supporting them we can get the door gaps to near factory tolerances. We are figuring we will still be in "metal mode" for at least two more full day meets gettng the rear floor panel in, the rear tailgate hardware on and tailgate mounted, and finally the placement of the upper metal winglets and their supports on the upper roof side. Then, we should be into body panel fiberglass prep. and mounting...... Still shooting for mid to end of March for completion.....
Attachments
IMG_20220120_174139346.jpg
So this is just hung up with a couple of self driving screws. Not bad fitment for no ajustments, huh?
Metal, wood, fiberglass, we work it all... www.furniturephysicians.com We can restore the irreplaceable!
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