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[Mud Bug 94]

what about the zipper of a j**p soft top?

[colindo94]

What do you mean, please explain.

[Mud Bug 94]

if you could incoperate the zipper off a jeep soft top into ur canvas, you could screw and caulk it right onto the roof....then wen you wanna go toples....unzip the whole thing...

[colindo94]

Thats a good idea. It will help with sealing it too I bet.

[colindo94]

I bought the 1 ton tie rod kit from complete offroad. I am having a huge problem with setting up this steering. I got the nuckles and pitman arm all reamed out just fine. I welded in the tube inserts and now the two TRE for the tierod have completely locked up in the inserts. They both started threading by hand just fine then they got harder and harder to thread when I got scared and wasn't feeling right about the threading I tried to back up and they completely locked up. It took a 3 foot breaker bar to free one of the TRE and the other is stuck for good. the one that came out had no threads at all. Ill get a picture it's pretty amazing. The TRE on the drag link worked like butter. I have no idea what I could have done wrong. Do you think they will send me the new parts. I will call on monday. SO should I weld the inserts with the TRE threaded in the inserts. I always thought this would heat the TRE up to much and mess them up. They thread fine before I weld to it has to be the welding thats warping the threads. I am just very disapointed and pissed that I have to wait even longer to get the truck going. WHAT SHOULD I DO?????
Also my diff cover from ruff stuff didn't fit right also so I have to wait for a new diff cover also. Today was just a bad day

[colindo94]

On another not.....I think I'm going to get the doubler kit form D&D. I want a lot of feedback on this kit. Who has one? How well will it fit under my truck. I know rockranger has one. I picked up a manual 1354 tcase from the junk yard the otherday. I talked to duffy and he said hes waiting on the shafts to be made and then I can get one of the kits in a couple weeks. It seems like the install will be no problem. What should I get the front tcase out of? It needs to be a manual 1350 tcase.

[jrgaylor]

Originally Posted by colindo94

On another not.....I think I'm going to get the doubler kit form D&D. I want a lot of feedback on this kit. Who has one? How well will it fit under my truck. I know rockranger has one. I picked up a manual 1354 tcase from the junk yard the otherday. I talked to duffy and he said hes waiting on the shafts to be made and then I can get one of the kits in a couple weeks. It seems like the install will be no problem. What should I get the front tcase out of? It needs to be a manual 1350 tcase.

I got one of those kits from Duffy, kit went together fine and is good quality someday I will get it installed in the explorer
After welding in tube inserts i thought you were suppose to chase the threads

['97 V8]

happend to me so dont feel bad. Lets just say i have a trail spare now. as stated above, chase the threads with a pick. Also whatch your heat. You can coat the threads with vaseline so that doesnt happen again.

[ld50]

My thread inserts worked fine after welding, I didn`t even think to chase them or vaseline them or anything. That`s wierd it should happen unless somehow some spatter got in there, but the trajectory would be like the magic Kennedy bullet..

It sounds like you had different thread counts and forced it in anyway, when you do that the threads are gone when you force it out.
Is that possible? -doesn`t seem possible if it was a kit.

[RockRanger]

Any manual 1350 or 1354 will work for the doubler. Once you get a doubler it will open up a new world of wheeling to you. I had a similar thing happen when I did my steering. It got to hot when welding. People say to chase it with a tap after you weld it. By the time you buy a left and right hand tap you will spend a fortune on a tool you will use once.

[colindo94]

I know and they arn't the easiest taps to find. Any Ideas on where to pick these up at.
Rockranger- did you have any troubles fitting the doubler in under the truck? Was there any clearance issues?

[RockRanger]

I had to move the gas tank. I put a broncoII tank in where the spare tire was. You need about 7" of space behind the stock tcase to make it fit. I think I had a bit of clearance issue with the floor that I took care of with a sledge hammer. You will also need a new speedo cable. Get one from an aerostar. it is about 10" longer and works perfect. They were like $15 at Napa but were special order so make sure you pick it up a few days before the install. The shifters between the 1350 and 1354 are different so make sure you get the right one for your needs. For your shifter setup look for some posts on pirates by 4x4junkie. His shifter setup turned out slick. Much better then how I did mine. Mine works his is just better.

No idea on where to get the tap.

[colindo94]

Thanks. I think I have enough room so I won't have to move the gas tank.

[lifeguard379]

what is the tap you need?

[colindo94]

7/8 18 left hand and right hand

[lifeguard379]

i will ask aroud and see if i can find one. might wana try snap on. thats where i got the one i used for my RA's.

[colindo94]

Alright thanks for the help.

[colindo94]

Here are some pictures to keep my thread interesting. The first ones are from when I went to the rubicon the first time and ripped my trackbar mount out of the frame.

Had to do a little of this to get it off the trail. It was raining too.

Big tire behind me

Loaded it on this

And now how it sits since then. The steering has been fighting me along with a few other things.

Im working on the brakelines, steering, got new diff covers, but the rear doesn't match up with the holes in the diff so it has to be returned. Collecting stuff for the doubler, and clean up the chop job so I can start the cage. I have a lot of work.

[colindo94]

Manual 1354 and linkage


New rear bumper


Kinda blury, but you get the idea.

[colindo94]

A few more...


The top center bolt is off and won't thread for the life of me. Dan at ruff stuff is waiting on a new order so I should have it in a couple weeks.