Finally, I have pictures to add!
I rerouted my exhaust last week thanks to a decent but short-lived odd job, running it stock location, and added a second catalytic converter, and exchanged the muffler for a cherrybomb
. Pics of that toward the bottom.
I had been sitting around on my 300 dollar supersprings that came off my cherokee, trying to figure out a way to make them fit. I started making a bracket since I'd misplaced one of them, and it was an essential piece of hardware. Laid my foot open to the bone in the process when it spun around and clipped me just above the top of my shoe, so now I have seven stitches in my foot
I did manage to make them work, without using anything but the leaves themselves. I dropped the rear axle, cut off the alignment dowels for the leaves, then drilled a hole in each of the leafs. I then positioned the SS's under the Eagle leaf pack, and put a bolt through, after rounding off the head enough to fit through the spring perch, then stuck a nut on top to tighten it down, and reinstalled my axle. I would recommend getting the best set of metal drill bits you can find, it was NOT easy to get through the leaf, I broke or dulled nearly all of my bits, and had to use a Dremel bit to further widen the hole. Here's what they look like, and what they did
The picture is not the greatest quality, but you get the idea. I couldn't mount them up above the leafs because of the swaybar end links and lack of that bracket. I would have had to purchase longer axle U-bolts to make it work by lifting the end links. And I didn't use ANY hardware, even the metal piece that led to my emergency room visit. Sometimes less is more
It lifted the back of the car a good two inches:
Before:
After:
And, the exhaust... I made it emissions friendly, since I'm going with the cheaper crush bent elbows and couldn't route it correctly for their tube. I ran it along the stock location, added a second cat and replaced the muffler with a cherry bomb. I also divided the piping into two sections by welding three hole flanges from the street hookup kit that came with my outlet flare, and using a gasket between them. Unfortunately the two flanges warped from the heat of welding and I had to add a little exhaust clay. The piping is held up by the inlet to header at the front, and mechanics wire wrapped several times through the old exhaust hanger at the back, around the bottom of the cherrybomb. The piping is very stiff because of all of the welded sections so it hangs and swings like a factory system.
outlet:
Rear section (cat and cherrybomb)
front section (first cat, to header)
It's not exactly quiet, but it's not deafening either. It;s just loud enough to set off cheap car alarms in Wal Mart parking lots (as I found out earlier
) and remind you that it's a bigass torquey American straight six with a few modifications
It actually gets really quiet at highway cruising speeds, in low part throttle.
The power steering belt took a trip again, so I realigned my pump and made sure it matched up, but decided to just disconnect the power steering lines and drive it wouthout power steering for a while. The smaller wheel makes it pretty difficult, but it seems to be getting easier every day, probably the box breathing a bit. I may drain it and put gear oil in it, but I"m not sure yet. The box is in bad shape, there's about two inches of free play in the wheel, and my alignment is bad on top of that. WIth power steering, it was too vague, I couldn't tell when there was dead play or steering, from just the steering wheel alone, now however, I can feel where the play stops, making it much easier to drive smoothly on the highway.
Topic: The 1300 dollar fixer upper surprise project (Read 98235 times)