Latest / Jeep Talk Show / Ep. 31 This XJ Modification Ruined Everything

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Ep. 31 This XJ Modification Ruined Everything · Jeep Talk Show

0:34
Hello, and welcome to XJTalk.com show.
0:38
My name's Tony Mutteroy on XJTalk.com,
0:40
and this is the show
0:41
about Jeep Cherokees.
0:43
A lot of it recently has been having to
0:45
do with me having problems with mine.
0:48
But I guess that's part of
0:50
owning any vehicle, isn't it?
0:53
So tonight, this is episode 31, by the
0:56
way, and tonight we're
0:57
going to be talking about
0:59
those insane door locks on
1:03
the 97 plus Jeep Cherokees.
1:06
Now I don't know if there's problems with
1:08
the pre-97s, but boy,
1:11
the post-97s will drive
1:13
you nuts.
1:14
And that means the old DDM PDM.
1:18
You'll learn more about that
1:19
in a little bit, hopefully.
1:22
And MS Morinburg has
1:24
something blue for his Jeep.
1:27
That and more are coming up, so stay
1:29
tuned and we'll get
1:30
going here in just a second.
2:39
Hey, I just wanted to
2:40
tell you about XJTalk.com.
2:42
It's a great site.
2:43
There's no bashing.
2:44
Everybody's nice and friendly.
2:45
Great place to be.
2:48
XJTalk.com.
2:49
It's where you go
2:50
when you're not off-road.
2:52
Well it's Wednesday night, 8 p.m.
2:54
I guess it's like 8.04
2:55
now, but it's around 8 p.m.
2:57
Central time.
2:59
And that means it's time
3:00
for another XJTalk.com show.
3:03
So it's been about a week since I last
3:05
spoke about the new to
3:08
us 1999 Jeep Cherokee.
3:10
And so far we haven't
3:13
really had any problems with it.
3:15
My wife has been driving it.
3:18
It's her vehicle and she's been driving
3:20
it around here locally.
3:21
We haven't wanted to drive it very far
3:23
away because of some of
3:24
the issues that we had
3:25
with the problem with the alternator
3:28
going down to 9 volts,
3:30
which is basically zero,
3:32
at least on that gauge.
3:33
And the lower hose blowing, overheating,
3:38
and then having that
3:40
constant stream of bubbles
3:41
coming out of the radiator.
3:43
But it doesn't seem, and when I say
3:44
bubbles, I mean when you
3:45
have the radiator cap off,
3:46
you see these bubbles bubbling up, which
3:49
to me is conducive of a bad head gasket.
3:52
I've never actually had that problem with
3:55
a Cherokee, so I can't
3:57
say conclusively that
3:58
that's what that is.
4:00
But you would expect to see some other
4:05
manifestations of a blowing
4:06
head gasket, and I'm not seeing
4:08
any.
4:09
We drove, unusually, we went to go out to
4:13
eat the other night,
4:14
and it was early in the
4:16
evening but dark.
4:17
And we took the 99 instead of the 98 and
4:23
just get some more
4:24
miles on it and see how it's
4:26
holding up because it would be better to
4:28
break down with me and it than just her.
4:30
So we drove down I-10 about four or five
4:34
miles and got there.
4:37
I mean the temperature went up on the
4:40
coolant around 210 just
4:43
before, just like that sweet
4:45
one, just like it's supposed to, just a
4:46
half a needle's width away from 210.
4:49
And it would drop down when I got up to
4:52
speed 40, 50 miles an
4:54
hour on the back streets and
4:55
then we got out on I-10
4:56
and boy is this no problem.
4:58
It's a very nice, smooth
5:00
running, smooth feeling vehicle.
5:03
And I guess that's in stark contrast to
5:07
my 98 that's got the
5:08
4.5 inch lift and the 32
5:10
inch motor tires on it, the noise and the
5:15
vibrations that you get
5:16
from mine are radically
5:18
different than how that 99 feels.
5:21
Of course that 99 feels like a matchbox
5:24
compared to driving around in my 98.
5:29
But it's nice to, it's a nice feeling.
5:31
It's also a nice feeling to be able to
5:33
watch that temperature
5:35
gauge, engine coolant temperature
5:37
gauge and see it stay.
5:39
You know basically where God
5:40
intended it to be around 210.
5:43
But it actually did drop
5:44
from 210 when we got on I-10.
5:46
Now that's nighttime.
5:48
That's when the sun's down and that means
5:49
it's only 12,000 degrees
5:52
outside during summertime
5:54
in Houston.
5:56
I guess it was in the upper 80s I guess.
5:59
So still a pretty good test.
6:01
But so let's see, what did I do?
6:04
Oh for some reason when I got some
6:07
additional keys made for
6:09
it the other day I came out
6:11
of Home Depot with the two
6:13
spare keys that I had made.
6:15
And of course the first thing there to
6:17
try the key on is the driver side door.
6:21
And I put the key in and boy it just
6:24
didn't feel like there
6:24
was anything, there was no
6:27
force against it.
6:29
It was just really easy
6:30
to move back and forth.
6:31
I mean the key certainly seemed to work
6:32
but it wouldn't unlock the door.
6:34
So I tried the keys in the ignition.
6:36
They worked fine.
6:38
Tried it again in the driver's side door
6:41
lock and there was
6:43
just no friction there.
6:44
There was no push.
6:45
Like it wasn't hooked up.
6:47
So yesterday I had a look at that and
6:50
sure enough the little
6:51
metal rod that connects
6:54
the tumbler I guess that would be to the
6:58
locking mechanism in
6:59
the door was just not
7:02
hooked up.
7:03
So the little plastic, there's these
7:07
little plastic clips I
7:09
guess you would call them
7:10
that once you put them in the hole where
7:13
they're supposed to be
7:14
you rotate these clips into
7:16
place and it locks those, locks that
7:18
piece of wire, that rod into place.
7:21
And that clip seems to be fine.
7:24
It locked into place.
7:25
So we'll just have to wait and see over
7:26
time if just by driving
7:29
it it causes a change.
7:32
I don't think that it's going to but I
7:34
can't really see any
7:36
reason why anybody would be
7:37
in there messing with that stuff.
7:39
But you know it's a used vehicle, gosh
7:41
it's from 1999 so
7:44
that's 11, 12 years ago.
7:47
Who knows what all that Jeep is seeing.
7:50
So I've been having some ongoing issues
7:52
with Advanced Auto Parts
7:54
trying to get the Chili
7:57
Pepper Red Dupli-Color paint.
8:00
I went over there to find
8:03
another part of something else.
8:05
I can't remember what I was getting.
8:06
And I asked the lady about that paint.
8:09
Is that something you can order?
8:10
She said yeah sure.
8:11
And she took it down and she says yeah
8:13
warehouse has it and
8:14
it'll be here Tuesday.
8:15
And I think that was like Friday or
8:17
Saturday that I was there.
8:19
And so I ordered it and
8:22
went in Tuesday to pick it up.
8:25
And she wasn't there but these two guys
8:28
were there and one of
8:29
them I don't know seemed
8:31
to not be enjoying his job that night.
8:34
But that's neither here nor there for me
8:37
just giving my stuff.
8:38
And he looked around a little bit and I
8:41
gave him, he asked for
8:42
my number and I gave him
8:43
my number and he pulled up a list and he
8:45
didn't see anything that was ordered.
8:47
I mean my name wasn't on the list for
8:48
things being ordered.
8:50
And I said oh gee I don't know.
8:51
He goes are you sure you
8:53
ordered it from this store?
8:54
And I went yeah I know
8:56
I ordered it from here.
8:58
And he goes sometimes people order from
9:00
AutoZone down the street
9:03
and think they ordered it
9:04
from here.
9:07
Well at that I took great offense because
9:10
I know what store I'm in and I know where
9:14
I ordered this stuff.
9:15
And it just really
9:16
rubbed me the wrong way.
9:17
So I looked at him square in the eyes and
9:19
I said is that a mistake you ever make?
9:22
Do you ever go to one place and ask him
9:25
about something and
9:25
then you realize that no it
9:27
was a completely different store.
9:30
Not only was the location different but
9:33
the name is completely different.
9:35
Oh yeah okay they both have auto,
9:38
advanced auto and AutoZone.
9:40
He says no not me.
9:41
I said why would you
9:43
ask that type of question?
9:45
He says we're supposed to ask that.
9:48
And I took a pause and I said you've been
9:51
instructed to ask are
9:54
you at the right store?
9:57
He says yes.
9:59
And I said let me talk to a manager
10:02
because at this point I
10:05
want to find out what their
10:06
training program is like where they
10:09
actually want to point out
10:10
that they have competition.
10:11
We all know that there's lots of
10:13
competition for auto parts
10:14
stuff but I want to talk to
10:17
the manager, probably the assistant
10:19
manager because this is an evening.
10:21
I want to talk to somebody that would
10:24
know about the advanced
10:25
auto training program where
10:27
they say hey dude are
10:29
you in the right store?
10:31
Well if I'm going to be asked that
10:33
question apparently not.
10:36
And then the next thing I hear from this
10:38
guy I shouldn't have
10:39
been surprised was I'm
10:41
the manager.
10:43
And again I look at him and I long pause.
10:46
I said you're the manager because yeah
10:48
and I think I said I don't think so.
10:53
Okay if you're the manager then let me
10:59
talk to the owner or
11:02
whoever has this franchise
11:04
or somebody that's not you.
11:07
He goes well you can talk to my partner
11:12
that's here and I said
11:13
that's fine that's great.
11:15
So I spoke with him and I gave him kind
11:17
of an idea what was going on.
11:18
He says well he goes
11:19
I'm sorry about that.
11:20
He says let's see if we can't try to find
11:21
your part first though.
11:23
You're a smart man.
11:25
Let's try to resolve
11:26
the main issue first.
11:29
So he asked and I tell him I said look I
11:33
told this lady and she
11:34
wrote my name and number
11:35
down.
11:35
She says to call me back.
11:37
She said it was going to be on Tuesday
11:38
blah blah blah blah blah.
11:40
And he says well he goes
11:42
what number did you give her?
11:43
And I went oh yeah that's right.
11:45
I gave her my cell number
11:46
for the call for the call back.
11:48
So I gave him that
11:50
number and boom there it was.
11:52
There was the order.
11:53
So apparently she had entered the order
11:54
in not through my name
11:57
because I didn't remember
11:58
asking for my name.
11:58
She didn't ask my name.
11:59
She didn't ask what the phone number was.
12:02
You know look at my
12:02
account that I've used.
12:04
I guess that they keep track of for sales
12:06
and so on and so forth there.
12:07
And anyway he was able to find it with
12:09
the cell phone number
12:11
and he says yeah they don't
12:12
it didn't come in.
12:15
So then I started talking about this
12:16
other thing that was
12:17
going on and he goes he kind
12:19
of halfway rolled his eyes about like
12:22
maybe some
12:23
understanding of the individual that
12:25
I was dealing with but he didn't want to
12:26
go too far you know
12:28
because you got to work with
12:29
the people around you.
12:31
And he says yeah he goes the lady that
12:35
took your order is like
12:38
the acting manager for
12:39
this store.
12:40
So if you just want to call back and
12:44
speak to her then you
12:45
know she'll be able to take
12:46
care of you with this complaint.
12:48
And I said okay great.
12:49
So not to drag this thing out too long.
12:51
It's kind of anticlimactic but a couple
12:54
of days go by and I gave
12:56
her a call and I explained
12:58
to her that I had heard that the advanced
13:01
auto policy is to ask
13:04
are you in the right
13:05
store?
13:06
Is this the store that you ordered from?
13:08
Because a lot of people
13:12
confuse us with AutoZone.
13:14
And she kind of laughed.
13:16
She kind of gasped.
13:18
Gasped?
13:19
Gasped?
13:20
And she says no.
13:22
And the individual and then I told her
13:24
about the you know I
13:26
want to talk to the manager.
13:28
And she kind of laughed and she says well
13:30
he was recently he
13:32
recently got a promotion
13:33
and that might have gone to his head.
13:35
He's not a manager per
13:37
se but he's in management.
13:40
And at this point I realized this lady
13:43
had bigger problems than
13:46
me being asked something
13:47
stupid.
13:48
So I said great.
13:50
I thought you might want to know.
13:51
It really rubbed me the wrong way.
13:54
And whenever I hear stuff like I was told
13:58
to ask this it makes me concerned for the
14:03
company because I don't
14:05
think that's a good policy.
14:06
I think that's a bad policy.
14:08
It's basically saying
14:11
you know are you okay?
14:13
You know that traumatic brain injury that
14:16
you suffered has it affected your ability
14:19
to locate yourself in space?
14:23
Do you know where you are?
14:24
Have you checked your GPS today?
14:27
So anyway I still have
14:28
not heard back from them.
14:30
It is Tuesday, yesterday would have been
14:34
a week from the day I
14:36
was supposed to get it.
14:37
Oh yeah this is worth mentioning.
14:40
When I called her and asked her about the
14:41
paint she looked and
14:42
she actually said hey
14:44
let me call you back.
14:45
I'll look that up and if you
14:46
don't mind I'll call you back.
14:47
Sure that's fine.
14:48
So she called me back and she
14:51
says well they can't find it.
14:54
The warehouse shows that they have this
14:57
color paint and they
14:59
have two cans but they can't
15:01
find it.
15:02
I said the warehouse, I said can't they
15:04
just, I mean it's
15:06
duplicolor, can't they just say
15:08
send some more?
15:09
And she goes oh yeah they can do that but
15:11
they're still trying to find it.
15:13
If you want to you can just come down
15:15
here and I'll cancel
15:16
the order and refund your
15:17
stuff.
15:18
And I said well that crossed my mind but
15:21
I can order this stuff
15:22
online but I can't get
15:24
it for $6.99 a can because this is the
15:26
duplicolor spray stuff
15:28
and it's for the $99.
15:29
And I have to pay a little extra for the
15:33
can and then some
15:34
shipping on top of that.
15:35
She goes yeah and she goes well we can
15:38
wait and if they can't
15:39
find it we can see about
15:40
them ordering it.
15:41
I said yeah let's do that.
15:43
Because I was kind of hopeful that when
15:44
she said they can't
15:46
find it that somebody was
15:47
actively looking that the duplicolor,
15:49
Sherlock Holmes was on the
15:51
case and was searching the
15:53
warehouse.
15:54
And she reiterated that she would call me
15:58
whenever they got the paint in.
16:00
So I think I'm hitting
16:02
diminishing returns here.
16:03
It doesn't seem like I want to be able to
16:05
get that paint and
16:06
it's really strange that
16:08
they don't keep that duplicolor paint at
16:10
least in the, well I only
16:12
looked at two auto parts
16:13
here locally for it.
16:15
So perhaps it has something to do with me
16:17
not looking very hard but still you would
16:20
think that they would have that color.
16:22
There's actually several, I've seen
16:23
several Jeep
16:24
Cherokees, several on the site.
16:29
Fireman Ray has one exact
16:30
same color, the Chili Pepper Red.
16:33
And I don't need a lot of it.
16:34
I just need a little to fix some
16:37
scratches on the doors.
16:39
You know some, I don't want to say road
16:41
rash, what do you call it?
16:41
A parking lot rash where people have
16:43
opened up doors which I
16:45
still don't understand how
16:46
people are able to hit the doors on the
16:51
XJ because the 97 plus
16:52
body styles has that big
16:54
bumper on the side, the
16:57
guard, the door guard, the trim.
17:00
I forget what you call it, the big
17:01
plastic trim, the ones
17:03
that tend to fade if they're
17:04
not painted.
17:05
But this one certainly has that.
17:07
My 98 hasn't seen stuff like that.
17:10
But anyway, so that's that.
17:13
The 99 seems to be doing well.
17:15
I fixed the door lock.
17:17
I went ahead and grabbed a full size
17:21
spare that Matt M.S.
17:24
Mornberg had and said hey take this.
17:27
And so I put that in the back.
17:31
And though there was a space saver in the
17:34
99, the same hardware that mounts that in
17:40
the cargo area of the XJ fits for the
17:44
full size tire as well.
17:46
I had a tire cover, a full size spare
17:49
tire cover from the 99.
17:52
Now the interior of the 99
17:54
and the 98 are different.
17:56
You know of course that's the way it's
17:57
going to have to be.
17:57
You can't have everything the same.
17:59
But the 99 is kind of a charcoal gray.
18:03
I think it would be gray
18:04
but it's a charcoal color.
18:05
And the 98 is that light gray.
18:08
So the tire cover is the light gray.
18:12
Now the neat thing is that the tire cover
18:14
has the little hooks on
18:15
it or the little loops
18:17
so that you can attach the cargo cover.
18:19
And the other neat thing is in my attempt
18:22
a while back to come up with a cover that
18:25
actually fit the entire cargo area of the
18:28
98 without a spare
18:29
tire back there I thought
18:30
hey I'll get two of these covers and sew
18:33
them together like with a
18:34
flap on top of the other
18:36
one and it will look somewhat factory.
18:38
And I'll have a cover, a nice cover for
18:40
the entire cargo area.
18:41
Well things have changed since then.
18:44
Namely I have an Olympic Mountaineer rack
18:47
in the cargo area now which I love.
18:49
That thing is really nice.
18:51
So there will be no cargo cover and I
18:55
think you guys are familiar with that.
18:58
It appears that that doesn't come in a
19:00
lot of the XJs but it's
19:03
just a canvas cover that
19:05
is suspended over the cargo area.
19:09
And it actually deadens the noise coming
19:11
in from the back of the vehicle.
19:13
It's pretty nice.
19:14
It looks nice.
19:15
So anyway a friend from XJTalk sold me
19:20
his unused cargo cover
19:21
and I said is it gray?
19:23
He says yeah and I said great.
19:24
And I paid him through PayPal and he sent
19:27
it to me and it got
19:28
here and it wasn't light
19:31
gray.
19:31
It was charcoal.
19:34
So I really couldn't use it.
19:36
I mean I guess I could but I think the
19:38
two dissimilar colors
19:39
this wouldn't look right.
19:41
And like I said I move forward from that
19:42
now and I really have
19:44
no wish to use the cargo
19:47
cover on my 98.
19:49
But what's really cool means I have a
19:51
perfectly nice like
19:53
new charcoal cargo cover.
19:56
And if I can get a charcoal tire cover,
20:00
full size spare tire
20:01
cover with those little loops
20:03
that it hooks to I'll have a pretty nice
20:07
little 99 set up there
20:08
for my wife with the cargo
20:10
cover and the proper colored spare tire
20:14
cover and so on and so forth.
20:16
So I still have plans on getting the 99
20:21
set up a little more off road-ish.
20:23
I can't go too far with it because my
20:26
wife will not be a happy
20:28
camper if it starts getting
20:30
a lot of vibrations and loud.
20:35
But we'll see.
20:36
We'll see how that goes.
20:37
Right now I'm in the mode of
20:40
getting it mechanically sound.
20:42
We need to get some tires for it.
20:45
There's a big post up on X-Tree Talk
20:47
about my search for
20:49
tires, NTB discount, so on and
20:53
so forth and trying to use tire crawler
20:58
to get better prices at
21:01
discount and so on and
21:02
so forth.
21:03
So that hasn't really worked out.
21:06
There's been a few people that have said
21:07
that discount will match
21:09
the price from tirecrawler.com
21:13
but as it turns out they have, each one
21:17
of them that I've
21:17
spoken to has said, "Oh yeah,
21:20
well how much is that with shipping?"
21:23
Interestingly, there was a store that
21:28
said they couldn't
21:29
match tire crawler even with
21:31
the shipping.
21:32
I was looking at some BFG80 30x9.5x15
21:38
tires and I think that
21:41
we figured out that it was
21:43
$146 per tire which was less than what he
21:47
could sell them for
21:48
and that was coming from
21:49
tire crawler.
21:50
I did call tire crawler because discount
21:52
tires basically, and I
21:54
know how things work, they
21:56
tell you anything over the phone to get
21:57
you in there because
21:59
once you're there you're
22:00
likely to put up with whatever
22:02
kind of a deal they give you.
22:04
But being positive and not that negative
22:10
of learning from past experience.
22:12
Discount tire was very interested, the
22:15
store here locally was
22:16
very interested in having
22:18
my business and said that you come over
22:21
here and we'll work the
22:23
price and you'll be happy
22:25
with the price.
22:26
He goes to bring the paper, I print off
22:31
the ad or print off
22:32
whatever I saw on the screen,
22:33
to bring that with you so I'll have
22:35
something to work off
22:36
of and I say, "Great."
22:37
My question to him was, "Hey, if I get it
22:40
from tire crawler, yes I
22:41
do have to pay shipping
22:42
but I don't have to pay sales tax.
22:44
I'm supposed to.
22:45
I'm supposed to call up the state of
22:46
Texas and say, "Hey, I
22:47
got these tires online and
22:49
I didn't pay taxes.
22:51
How do I pay you the taxes?"
22:54
Yeah, that's going to happen.
22:55
And that's substantial.
22:57
It's 8.25% I believe
22:59
and for $100 that's $8.
23:03
And the tires were up around 607 from
23:10
tirecrawler.com for four of the...
23:13
And that was with shipping because those
23:16
tires were like $126 a
23:18
piece and then you had $25
23:21
shipping per tire.
23:22
So it was a little over $100 to ship
23:24
them, which all in all isn't bad.
23:27
The problem is once you get them, how do
23:31
you get them mounted?
23:33
And I think that I could get them on the
23:36
wheel but then I got the
23:37
problem of getting them
23:38
balanced.
23:39
So I don't know.
23:42
I've heard and spoken to several people
23:45
on the site about the
23:47
bead using the... was it
23:49
the bead soft, the
23:50
airsoft beadies and the tires?
23:52
So it dynamically balances the tires as
23:56
you're going down the road.
23:57
But I don't know that I'm ready to try
23:59
that on my wife's vehicle.
24:01
It sounds like a great idea because you
24:03
can get these tires
24:04
real cheap online and mount
24:07
them yourself.
24:07
And basically with this dynamic
24:09
balancing, it's going
24:11
to make the ride better.
24:13
It's going to make it...
24:15
It doesn't matter how the tire really
24:16
wears because actually it
24:18
should wear better because
24:19
it's always in balance.
24:20
But even at that, it doesn't matter how
24:22
it wears because it's
24:24
going to be dynamically
24:25
balancing as you're
24:26
driving down the road.
24:27
And you have a nice sound of the ocean as
24:31
you come to the stop as those beads shift
24:35
and settle.
24:36
So anyway.
24:38
So as I mentioned in the opening, M.S.
24:42
Morinburg has
24:42
something blue for his Jeep.
24:45
Or better yet, I should say.
24:48
I don't think he's got it yet, but he's
24:50
got something coming.
24:51
And that is...actually he posted a
24:55
picture of it today on xjtalk.com.
24:58
And if you do a search for M.S.
25:02
Morinburg 91 XJ Rebuild, he posted up a
25:06
picture of a...well he
25:08
says, "So here is a sneaky
25:11
peak of my new addition to the Jeep."
25:14
That's kind of poetic.
25:16
And it's blue.
25:17
It's welded.
25:19
It's metal.
25:20
It's got some big a** bolts.
25:22
BAB.
25:23
And it's actually a cross member for Iron
25:28
Man Fab 4x4, or as I
25:31
like to say, Iron Man
25:32
Andy.
25:33
His very nice long arms.
25:37
As you may recall, I have a nice set of
25:41
Iron Man Fab 4x4...or is it 4x4 Fab?
25:45
Anyway, I've got a nice set of lower,
25:48
upper and lower control
25:49
arms, adjustable, upper
25:50
and lower control
25:51
arms from Iron Man Andy.
25:52
And boy, those things are nice.
25:55
I painted them red and the lower control
25:59
arms even look pretty.
26:01
So it's funny, just looking here on the
26:04
side, it says, "Orange
26:05
XJ" says, "Okay, I give
26:07
up..." what is it?
26:08
A track bar?
26:10
And Matt gives it up.
26:13
Matt is in his Morinburg.
26:15
Matt gives it up and says, "Iron Man X
26:17
member for long arms."
26:18
And of course, the contingent in the
26:24
Australia, New Zealand
26:25
area says, and specifically JC
26:28
Cat says, "It should be green."
26:30
So I don't know.
26:32
Matt has a white jeep.
26:33
So I guess black
26:35
would be the better color.
26:37
Maybe even white.
26:38
But I think I'd have a hard time even
26:40
painting my parts white
26:42
that go under the jeep.
26:43
The painting them reds, they get dirty
26:46
enough just painting them red.
26:49
So Matt's got quite a
26:50
little project going here.
26:51
He's got the SYE for his, I think he's
26:57
got an NP-242, but he's
26:59
got the SYE from Dirtbound
27:01
Off-Road XJ Talk vendor, paid vendor.
27:06
And they pay us.
27:06
We don't pay them.
27:07
When I say paid, that means they pay to
27:09
advertise on XJ Talk.
27:11
So God love them.
27:12
And he's got that to put on.
27:14
I don't think he's done that yet.
27:15
And now he's got the
27:18
cross members to put on.
27:19
So he'll have a nice
27:20
little jeep going there.
27:22
And the thing I'm really enthused about
27:24
is it looks like Andy is
27:26
from Iron Man, is zoning
27:28
in on his cross member
27:31
design for the long arms.
27:34
Andy's had these long arms for a while
27:36
and they're really
27:36
nice, but that's kind of the
27:38
problem for us folks that don't have the
27:41
metal and don't have
27:43
the, you know, TIG, MIG,
27:45
whatever welder to make our own cross
27:48
member to attach the long arms to.
27:52
There's nothing to, we don't really have
27:54
a way of getting those
27:56
long arms attached to
27:57
the jeep.
27:58
Because as you may already know, the long
28:01
arms, since they are
28:02
longer than the control
28:05
arms that are the standard ones on the
28:07
jeep, have to be
28:08
attached to the unibody further
28:10
back.
28:11
And in the case of Andy's long arms
28:15
system, it attaches all
28:18
the way back to where the
28:20
transmission mounts to the cross member.
28:23
So that cross member that you have going
28:25
across underneath the
28:26
transmission supporting it
28:27
and attaching it to the rear of it to the
28:29
unibody, that piece is
28:31
replaced with something,
28:32
well I don't guess it has to be replaced,
28:34
but most people I think replace that with
28:36
a cross member that has
28:38
connection points for the long arms.
28:40
And that gives you a much longer angle
28:43
for the pivot point of
28:45
the long arm and it means
28:47
that the, and since the upper and lower
28:50
control arms are all on
28:52
that one attached to that
28:54
one long arm, it really allows the
28:56
suspension to drop and
28:59
articulate a lot further because
29:02
now it's not attached at the top to a
29:04
point that's not going
29:05
to let the axle drop.
29:07
It'll really drop down.
29:08
And in fact, one of our other members,
29:10
Scott, XJ4IV, has some
29:14
good pictures of his system
29:17
with, his Ironman long arm system, took
29:20
it off road and his 4.5"
29:23
coil springs kept popping
29:24
out.
29:25
So it's good to have articulation and
29:29
then it can be bad
29:30
because hey look at me and
29:33
then hey look, there goes my spring.
29:34
So anyway, that's how I learned about
29:37
limiting straps was by
29:39
watching Scott in his off road
29:42
pictures.
29:43
I think he is, I think he's going towards
29:45
a larger spring
29:47
because he was actually doing
29:48
4.5" springs with 2" spacers I believe.
29:54
So I think it was a combination of the
29:57
increased articulation
29:58
distance and the spacers.
30:01
So the coils really didn't, weren't able
30:03
to expand as the axle drooped.
30:09
So the 6.5" coil spring probably would
30:12
have expanded longer and stayed in place.
30:16
But we'll see.
30:18
I think he's, I don't
30:19
think he's done anything.
30:20
Well Scott's been rewiring his Jeep since
30:22
he had a mild
30:24
electrical fire in it so he's
30:25
been busy with other things.
30:27
Haven't seen, I don't know if he's gotten
30:28
the 6.5" coils on
30:31
there yet but that'll be
30:32
interesting to see how that turns out.
30:34
But anyway, Matt MS Mornberg has or will
30:38
be getting soon
30:39
something blue for his Jeep and
30:41
boy that is a, that's a pretty blue.
30:43
And he told me the other day about that
30:47
it was blue and I was kind of like why?
30:49
And I don't know, it was something, I
30:53
think it's a powder coat
30:54
that Andy put on there.
30:55
I just, I don't know
30:56
how he came up with blue.
30:57
Certainly ought to be pretty and like I
30:59
said with a white Jeep
31:00
it doesn't really matter
31:01
what color it is.
31:03
You know black is a good all around color
31:06
but white certainly wouldn't work out too
31:09
well underneath there.
31:10
At least in my not so humble opinion.
31:14
So anyway, things have been
31:18
going pretty well on xjtalk.com.
31:20
We've taken a little dip in visits but
31:26
it's coming back up and
31:29
we recently have started
31:31
doing what I mentioned last week was a
31:35
product or I'm sorry an
31:36
affiliation with amazon.com.
31:39
And boy that is working out great so far.
31:42
The deal is we have a little banner up on
31:46
the main page of
31:47
xjtalk.com so if you just
31:49
go to www.xjtalk.com you'll see that
31:53
there is an amazon.com
31:57
banner right below the chat
32:01
box if you're logged in.
32:02
If you're not logged in
32:03
you won't see the chat box.
32:05
But you know I guess up towards the
32:08
middle kind of towards
32:09
the top of the page right
32:12
above the pictures of the
32:14
various Jeeps and things.
32:16
Anyway there's a banner there and
32:18
underneath the banner it
32:18
says help support xjtalk.com
32:21
click above to make
32:23
your amazon purchases.
32:24
And the way this thing works is really
32:27
clever and you know maybe
32:30
I just don't get out much
32:31
on the internet but this is
32:33
kind of a new thing to me.
32:34
You click on the banner and then it takes
32:37
you to amazon.com and
32:39
it looks just like it
32:39
would always look if you go to amazon.com
32:42
but if you make a purchase on amazon.com,
32:47
xjtalk.com gets a little piece of that.
32:50
It doesn't cost you anything more but
32:53
xjtalk.com gets a little
32:55
percentage off of getting you
32:57
to go to amazon.com to buy something.
33:00
So it's like we're the salesmen you know
33:02
out there trying to push vehicles.
33:06
Here's this nice $40,000 Jeep we'd like
33:08
for you to buy and if
33:09
you buy it the salesmen
33:10
gets a percentage of that sale.
33:12
So yeah it's your money but you don't pay
33:14
anything different for the product.
33:16
So when you go to amazon.com and make
33:17
your purchase you get the
33:19
same thing you were going
33:20
to get for the same price you were going
33:22
to get but xjtalk.com
33:25
gets a few cents off of
33:26
it.
33:27
And it's really cool because well
33:30
xjtalk.com likes money.
33:34
Don't we all?
33:35
So it was pretty funny I'd actually put
33:37
in one of the posts
33:37
it's a win-win and then I
33:39
thought about it and I said well actually
33:41
it's a win for amazon and
33:42
it's a win for xjtalk.com
33:44
but it's pretty much a wash for you
33:46
because it doesn't cost
33:48
you anything but you're not
33:49
getting anything extra out of it you know
33:51
you're not getting a
33:53
sale price or something
33:54
but then of course if you go to
33:57
amazon.com if you've
33:58
ordered anything from amazon.com
34:00
you know how cool it is because it comes
34:03
to you quickly it's
34:04
what you ordered and it's
34:06
always a good price.
34:08
I mean I've just done blind Google
34:12
searches for like Jeep
34:14
parts or some obscure Jeep parts
34:17
and up towards the top of the list will
34:19
be amazon.com and I'll
34:20
go over there and check
34:21
it and its price.
34:23
I'd say at least 8 times out of 10 if not
34:26
more is a better
34:27
price and depending on the
34:31
affiliation of the vendor that's with
34:34
amazon if you're
34:36
ordering something that's $25 or
34:37
more it's free shipping.
34:39
Actually I got my super winch a couple of
34:42
years ago from amazon.com and it was free
34:47
shipping.
34:48
So the winch was $499, $500 and the
34:53
shipping everywhere else
34:55
would have been $70, $75 because
34:58
the winches are very heavy and they're
34:59
not so big the box isn't
35:01
so big but they're very
35:02
heavy and so for $500 I got a the suit
35:08
I'm trying to remember
35:08
the model number and I
35:09
can't remember right now but anyway it's
35:10
the 9,000 pound super
35:14
winch and it's great it's
35:17
a great winch.
35:18
I mean it's a super winch you know so
35:20
it's not like amazon
35:21
made it they just got it and
35:23
sold it but for free shipping which was
35:25
great I mean that made
35:27
a huge difference in the
35:28
overall price and then again no tax.
35:32
So $500 got a winch and it's been
35:36
flawless so far I've used
35:38
it a few times maybe a dozen
35:41
times but the thing I hate most about the
35:44
winch is getting the
35:45
cable back in there getting
35:46
it all lined up and look nice.
35:48
In fact I need to pull it out and the
35:52
winch cable I need to
35:52
pull it out and wind it back
35:54
up on there to make it look
35:55
nice and pretty and factory.
35:57
Yeah I'm that way.
35:58
So let's see what else did I tell you
36:00
that we were going to talk about.
36:03
The 99 is doing well so far.
36:06
The temps are staying good.
36:09
Matt's getting a long arm system from
36:11
Ironman Andy Ironman 4x4
36:13
fab and if you haven't been
36:14
over to his site go have a look.
36:15
He's changed the format of the site and
36:20
he's got the stuff kind
36:21
of more easy to get to
36:24
although the pictures of the various
36:27
jeeps that he builds
36:29
things for are gone which I
36:30
kind of like looking at those but I guess
36:32
after a while you look
36:33
at the same thing every
36:33
time.
36:34
Before he has some great stuff.
36:35
I need to buy more Ironman Andy stuff and
36:39
of course he's a vendor
36:40
on XJTalk.com as well.
36:42
Again a paid vendor.
36:44
Pays us not the other way around.
36:45
So in full disclosure I need to make sure
36:48
you understand that I may be swayed in my
36:53
opinion of Ironman
36:54
Andy stuff but I'm not.
36:56
It's really good stuff.
36:58
I remember I took the upper control arms
37:01
whenever I first got those.
37:02
I took them to a local area Houston meet
37:05
and greet and I was passing around to the
37:09
guys that were there and they were just
37:10
you know it's big
37:12
heavy honking stuff and you
37:16
know Andy has a guarantee on those.
37:20
He was telling me about that.
37:21
He says you know you bend them I replace
37:23
them and you break them
37:24
I replace them and then
37:26
he told me candidly he goes if you bend
37:28
or break these things
37:29
the least of your concerns
37:31
will be the upper control arms because
37:36
your Jeep will be
37:37
trashed and I don't doubt it.
37:41
They're awesome and I'm kind of hoping
37:43
that I can work into a
37:45
set of long arms for my
37:47
98 my nice red Jeep and those upper and
37:52
lower control arms well
37:53
I guess you'll know where
37:54
they're going.
37:55
They'll be going to the 99.
37:59
Because you know that doesn't really
38:01
change how the car how
38:03
the Jeep would ride as far
38:05
as vibrations or really anything.
38:08
It just is a much
38:09
more solid configuration.
38:12
I do need to check with Andy and make
38:14
sure I can still use
38:15
those on a Jeep that isn't
38:17
lifted but maybe I can I'm still working
38:21
on my wife because I'd
38:22
like to lift that Jeep
38:23
too.
38:23
There's a few things
38:25
that I want to check prior.
38:27
I want to make sure it's stable in the
38:29
way you know it's
38:30
running temperature wise.
38:32
I want to make sure that I have some good
38:35
accurate measurements of
38:36
the OBD2 data specifically
38:40
what the oxygen sensors are reading
38:43
because I'd like to try to
38:44
use the 99 to help diagnose
38:46
my mileage my gas
38:48
mileage issue with the 98.
38:50
And even though it's not a one to one
38:53
comparison it'll be closer
38:54
at least from the standpoint
38:55
of the readings I'm getting from the O2
38:57
sensors on the 98 with
38:59
the readings I'll get from
39:01
the 99.
39:03
And then the other thing is I just want
39:06
to establish a good
39:07
baseline of how the 99 is
39:11
working how it's operating in these
39:13
various areas gas
39:15
mileage cooling all things that
39:18
I've experienced issues with whenever I
39:21
raised my 98 and put
39:24
the larger tires on it.
39:25
So once I've established that baseline
39:27
then maybe I can make
39:28
those changes to the 99 and
39:31
then I'll have a way of definitively
39:33
saying yeah going from a
39:36
stock lift to a four and
39:38
a half inch lift causes an increase of
39:43
you know 20 degrees
39:47
driving on the highway and
39:48
cooling system or you know that it's not
39:53
if it's an air flow
39:54
issue it has to do with
39:55
the body being that much higher off the
39:58
ground and the air dam
40:00
not functioning as it did
40:01
before or especially if I just lift it
40:05
and drive it with the
40:07
regular tires that would
40:09
mean that the additional weight and the
40:12
additional friction that is being placed
40:14
upon the transmission
40:16
causing it to heat is not the issue for
40:18
the running hot on the
40:20
freeway or running hot
40:21
in traffic and so on and so forth.
40:23
Anyway so basically establish a good
40:25
baseline before I start
40:26
making changes and then maybe
40:27
I can help identify what's plaguing
40:30
several of us on
40:32
xjtalk.com with this whether it's
40:35
running hot on the trails, running hot in
40:38
traffic or like mine which mine does fine
40:42
on trails and stuff it's on the highway
40:44
that it starts getting
40:45
hot and it's not overheating
40:47
but it's running hot and I don't want any
40:49
additional heat that
40:51
you have in the engine
40:52
or the engine bay or on the transmission
40:55
reduces the lifespan of
40:58
it and of course can lead
40:59
to failure especially on very very hot
41:01
days and the whole idea
41:04
behind my lifted jeep is
41:06
to have a vehicle that will take me
41:08
wherever I and my family
41:10
need to go and if I cannot
41:12
rely on its ability to cool itself then
41:16
it's more likely to fail
41:18
and I may have a perfectly
41:20
capable vehicle that's able to get across
41:25
or over an obstacle
41:26
but I can't do it because
41:28
the engine isn't working properly or I
41:30
can't do it because the
41:30
transmission isn't working
41:32
properly so it's an all thing you can't
41:35
just look at well I've got
41:36
the big tires it articulates
41:38
well blah blah blah blah but I have to
41:41
put it on a trailer to
41:42
get it to where I need
41:43
to go because it runs hot on the highway
41:45
that's just not acceptable
41:46
to me. So anyway we needed
41:50
a vehicle and the 99 presented itself and
41:53
I'm really happy that
41:55
we got that let's get
41:56
a few things out of the way and I'll be
41:58
able to feel a lot more
41:59
comfortable about my wife
42:01
taking it a little further away from the
42:04
house than what she has
42:05
been and I think that will
42:08
help her feel better about taking it a
42:13
little bit further away
42:14
and me as well and because
42:17
of all the things I've learned with the
42:20
98 I feel comfortable
42:21
that I'll be able to get
42:23
the 99 in the same shape that the 98 is
42:27
in, mechanical shape
42:29
because other than some of
42:31
the parts like the starter or some of the
42:35
stuff that's
42:36
literally 13 years old I would
42:38
have no problem driving this thing across
42:41
country. I know enough
42:42
about it mechanically
42:44
I have a good feeling for driving it
42:46
daily 40 miles a day
42:49
back and forth to work that
42:50
it's going to be fine but again I don't
42:54
feel comfortable with the
42:55
running hot on the highway.
42:57
I use back roads to get back and forth to
42:59
work so it stays
43:01
around 210. But I'll figure
43:04
that stuff out and of course I'll share
43:05
it with you guys on
43:06
XJTalk.com. So anyway that
43:09
wraps up another show finishing up a
43:11
little early tonight and
43:14
there may be some changes
43:15
coming up to the show here I'm still
43:17
thinking about it but we may
43:19
be doing something a little
43:20
different. May not be having the live
43:23
version of the show on
43:24
Ustream and then the recorded
43:28
video of the show up on YouTube and
43:32
Ustream. We made this to go
43:34
back to the original audio
43:37
only idea. We have a pretty good audience
43:41
of about 15 to 20
43:44
people and I really really
43:45
appreciate the time that you guys spend
43:47
listening to this. I hope
43:48
you do find some value out
43:50
of it and please feel free to give me
43:54
some feedback as to what
43:56
you're hearing, what you
43:57
don't like, what you do like. Maybe this
44:00
is fine but I'd like
44:01
to know more about this
44:02
or let's have some guests and maybe even
44:04
some ideas for guests.
44:06
We can do the show because
44:08
it's really for you guys not for me. I'm
44:10
just trying to promote
44:11
XJTalk.com and get a little
44:15
information out and a little
44:16
entertainment out there for
44:17
you guys. Anyway, so for all
44:20
of us at XJTalk.com, thanks for listening
44:23
and we'll see you
44:24
again next week, Wednesday
44:26
8pm Central Time.
44:57
XJTalk is the best f***ing sight in the
44:59
f***ing world and if you
45:01
think you know a better f***ing
45:02
sight, f*** you. By the
45:04
way, this is Big M350. Bye.