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Posts Tagged ‘Jeep #29’

Jeep #29: Wiring up Lights & In Cab Winch Controls

When I installed the rear fog lights, I did not wire them into the vehicles electrical system.  I wanted to wait until i had fully planned out my electrical system before tackling this job, so I only had to do things once.  The default Jeep rocker switches fade badly over time.  They might have looked nice when the Jeep was new, but no more…  My front fog switch looked like this:

Stock Rear Fog Switch

Stock Rear Fog Switch

I decided I not only wanted to install a rear fog switch, but also replace this old faded thing!  I looked around for alternatives, and finally found switches I really liked.  They are Carling Contura V Laser Etched switches.  These switches are sealed switches originally for marine applications, so not only are they great looking, they should last a long time, and bonus they are resistant to water, being rated at 30 minutes submersion under 1 meter of water!  They are a little expensive, but you can get tons of different options on the switch face, and color of illumination, and as John Hammond would say “Spared no expense”.

The stock mounting panel, seen with the switch in the photo above, has 3 switch cutouts already, only the surface material covers them, so I knew I wanted to install my new rear fog light switch adjacent to the existing front fog switch.  Hmm? What to do with the third switch location.  I decided to add an in cab winch control.

With decisions made on the switches I had to plan out the wiring.  Complicating matters is that after I installed the front fog lights, the stock headlight switch was showing its age and wasn’t dealing well with the new fogs.  The YJ has the front fogs wired such that they are controlled through the headlight switch.  The stock front fog lights will only work with the headlights on, but not the high beams.  After I installed the front fogs, I was testing them , and after a few minutes all the jeep lights would shut off for a bit, and then turn back on.  When I researched what was going on, turns out the headlight switch, when it gets old can’t deal with the extra chore of controlling the fog lights and headlights.   So I decided I would wire the front fogs independent of the headlight switch, so I could actually use them, and could use them no matter if I had the headlights on low, high or off.

My final switch wiring thus needed to be:  An ignition controlled power feed, so the switches only work when the ignition is on, A power feed for when the dash lights are on(to control the switch lights), ground wire( for the lights in the new switches), a front fog control wire(low voltage, that feeds a relay), a rear fog control wire(low voltage, that feeds a relay), A winch in control, and a winch out control (both controlling the winch solenoid).  Its a pretty good bundle of wires, and the power and ground feeds need to go to each switch.  I wired this up and made a mini harness, with a 9 pin plug. (7 wires, 2 extra spaces just in case 🙂

Switch Harness

Switch Harness

With the Harness made, it was a matter of running all the wires in the jeep to all the proper locations, and tapping into the correct lines.  Very time consuming task, but when finished I was able to feed the new wires either into existing wiring looms or where I had a lot of wires (running through the engine bay, I added a new run of split loom, so it looks like it belongs there, and keeps the wires safe.  With all of that finished, I wired these into the other side of the plug, so I can now unplug the switch panel if I ever need to work on it, or if I need to get into the dash for any reason.  With it all connected, I tested it and it all worked, so I reassembled everything.  Here are the final results.  Excuse the dirty dash as the Jeep hasn’t had a spring cleaning yet, its dirty from sitting most of the winter!

Switches Installed

Switches Installed

Switches Illuminated

Switches Illuminated

Jeep #29: Finishing Up Details

I’ve been tinkering with the jeep over the past 2 months, and hadn’t had a chance to update my progress here.  Mainly having fun during summer driving the jeep!!!

Keen eyed observers may have noticed on the jeep trip photos I posted, there was a winch installed and the rear fog lights were installed.  So, let me backup and cover those first.

Rear Fog Lights: The original KCs can be hard to find, but a couple show up on ebay every so often.  I decided to go with new lights that are almost duplicates of the original KC lights.  They are by a company called Eagle Eye lights, they are the correct size and color, BUT they come in a chrome housing instead of black.  The ones I choose also had a thick plastic lens ring with louvers.  I removed the louvers from the lens ring and I used spray plastidip to convert the chrome housing into black.  The results look almost identical to the KC lights.

light2s

Winch: I knew I wanted a new winch instead of the 20 year old ramsey winches from the movie.  I read reviews and decided the superwinch lp8500 had good reviews and would look very similar to the Ramsey after I moved the winch solenoid.  At $300 it also came with the correct hawse fairlead instead of a roller fairlead so many winches come with.  I bought the winch mounting plate NOT made specifically for a YJ.  The mounting plate I bought would bolt right up to most trucks, But not the YJ.  I choose this mounting plate because it looked like the ones from the movie.  My neighbor has a drill press, so adding the holes to align with the YJ mounting holes for the tow hooks(which of course needed removal) was pretty easy.    Here you can see what the winch looked like during the offroading trip with the solenoid in the “from manufacturer” location.

winchtrip

Correct BFG All Terrains:  My old tires were at end of life, so it was time to get these as well.  New BFG All terrains from the local Discount tire in 235/75/15 size.

The BFGs and the winch were literally done in the last 3 days before our offroading trip.  I didn’t want to chance my old tires, or getting stuck, so it was as good an excuse as any to get those parts off my checklist.

Since that trip I have also completed the last items as well.

Remote mounting the winch solenoid:  I started this project hoping I could get it done in a day, but alas things went awry!  Mainly the fact that the auto parts stores by me only stock 4 guage cables, and the winch needs 2 guage.  I started by taking the solenoid off and figuring out where under the hood it would fit.  It fits very well over the wheel wheel in front of the stock jack.  I created some brackets from building brackets from the hardware store, and then I found a place online that deals mainly in batteries (marine and otherwise) and they made me up the custom cables I needed.  While waiting for the cables to come in from my online source I painted the bracket and installed the solenoid box, so all I would need to do was hookup the cables when they arrived.  (below pic is waiting for cables to arrive)

solenoid

To remote mount the superwinch solenoid you need 3 cables from the solenoid box to the winch.  I went ahead and also ordered a replacement for the original postive cable from battery to solenoid just to remove all the excess you see in the picture above. All cables need to be 2 guage (straight from the superwinch help line). Once the cables arrived the hookup was a cake walk.

Stock Front Fog Lights: I tried to order original equipment Chrysler/Jeep Fog Lights.  A website dedicated to factory parts listed them as available and also the special angle bracket.  But after placing an order and waiting 2 weeks, I got an email that these parts were no longer available and my $$ had been refunded.  Drat!  However I knew Delta makes some fog lights very similar to the stock original ones (delta 100 clear fogs with the stone guard).  But what about the brackets.  I could simply put a hole through the bumper and bumper mount them, but the originals sit back a little, and I like that look.  My neighbor offered to bring me home some brackets from his machine shop, so I gave him a template, and he delivered brackets about a week later.  Luckily the original fog light wiring was still under the bumper(since this was a sahara and someone had removed the fogs at some point), so wiring them up was simple, and the brackets my neighbor made fit perfectly.    Here is how the Jeep front looks now with the fogs and winch solenoid gone.  DSC_0016sThe old bumper ends were in bad shape and since the brackets to hold the fog lights attach to the same bolts, I also replaced those while I was doing all of the above.  I may need to repaint the bumper now as it looks a bit faded next to the new parts.

Mopar Light Bar:  The light bar for JP 29 has no light tabs and appears to be a solid piece (the originals may have been 3 piece bars, but during painting they may have filled the seam up, while removing the light tabs and painting it).  I had found a light bar on Craigslist, but it was for a TJ, so the mounting holes were wrong, and it had light tabs and was a bit rusty.  Instead of altering it, I opted to find a fab shop to make my light bar, by simply copying the one I had, and leaving off the light tabs.  Removing the old windshield bolts took a ton of work as they were seized up badly, one even needed an easy out after it sheared off.  The fab shop did a great job copying the one I had, and after priming and painting(with plastipdip), I got that installed as well.

DSC_0024sSo Jeep #29 Is now 100% complete.

It still has shiny metalflake vs correct low gloss base color, and the red is all plastidip right now.  When the stars align correctly I will be repainting her, until then its all about the fun!

Jeep #29: Jurassic Jeep Adventure – Off Roading

On July 5th , I went on a little Off Roading Adventure in Jurassic Jeep #29.

We went from Eagle, CO to Leadville on Forest Roads and Jeep Trails.  It was right around 50 miles of off road driving.  Here is our route, except the unmaintained jeep trails at point B do not show on the map I used to recreate our trail.  (there is a forest road a few miles away so for about 10 miles of that area the route was slightly different)

JeepRoute

IMG_0218s

The Roads at the start were basic Dirt Forest Roads.  Beautiful, but any vehicle could have made it over them.  We came upon a crystal clear lake, with a forest service campground around it.  My Wife wants to go back and camp there.

IMG_0122sIMG_0225s

After the Lake we drove along for a while and came to a “major intersection” where we could stay on “Eagle Thomasville rd” which we were on, or try out Burnt Mountain Rd.  The Terrain Map I downloaded showed a gap in Eagle Thomasville, so we switched over to Burnt Mountain Rd.  Just after we switched to Burnt Mountain Rd, we had the amazing mountain view pictured above, and shortly after that we drove over a bridge over the creek below.

IMG_0228s

Burnt Mountain Rd, was a rocky drive, with some tight places in the forest.  My wife was driving this section and she had to attack a tree with the whip antenna to avoid a rock.  the results are below.  I’m pretty sure we need a forest permit to remove forest products so we may be in some trouble with the forest service  😉IMG_0230s

 

Turns out the terrain maps I had downloaded to my phone for some reason didn’t have real roads on it as once we got off Burnt Mountain Rd, and started over to where the next trail was supposed to start we ran into a real paved road that was not on my downloaded map.  This was Frying Pan Road.  The next trail was supposed to start right about where we hit Frying Pan Rd, but we never saw a trailhead for it.  We stayed on Frying Pan road until it turned back into dirt.  The trail was missed was Frying Pan Ridge trail, but knew by this point Frying Pan Rd was going to the same place, so we just stuck with it.  Soon we made some switch backs and found the Top of Frying Pan Ridge trail.  If we had not skipped Frying Pan Ridge it would have been an extra 10 miles of off road, which would have put us around 60 for the day.IMG_0134s

 

Not far after the top of Frying Pan Ridge trail, we saw our next trail.  This was Diemer and Sellar Lakes Trail.  The trail up to the first lake was dirt up a ridge and back down to the lake, it had lots of dips and hills on it, but no rocks so a fun little trail.  The lake was a nice little stopping point, and we put the top down on the jeep.  This picture is on the road that also serves as the “dam” for the lake.  At the far end the dam just dips down and the water covers the road.CAM00255s

 

On the far side we could see the trail going steeply up the mountain.  The guide book had said that past the lake was unmaintained jeep trail, and boy were they right.  Going back up to the ridge that we dropped down from was all rocks.  Once back up to the ridge line the trail then turned back east and we followed it another 10 miles, which was unmaintained, with lots of water crossings and places were the water just followed and semi swamped the trail.  Loads of fun.  But if it had been heavy ran I could see this would be some serious trail to make it through.  One particular water crossing was a very deep dip, and I did scrape the rear hitch getting back up out of it.CAM00263s

CAM00268s

 

The trail proceeded up out of the trees and got up to a ridge and was a fun drive, and we stopped and admired the views and took a drive break for a bit.  My friends that went along were driving a full Size 2011 Unlimited JK in Dozer Yellow.IMG_0143s

 

 

Not long after the ridge, the trail merged back up with a forest service rd, and soon after that it turns into Hagerman Pass Rd.

The pass was named for James J. Hagerman, builder of the Colorado Midland Railroad. The Colorado Midland railroad crossed the continental divide through one of two tunnels (initially the Hagerman Tunnel, later the Busk-Ivanhoe Tunnel at lower altitude) near the top of Hagerman pass. It traverses the Sawatch Range west of Leadville, connecting the headwaters of the Arkansas River on the east with the upper valley of the Frying Pan River.  The tunnels are no longer open, but one was used by auto traffic for some time in the early 1900’s.IMG_0147s

Hagerman pass was rocky and unimproved, though somewhat maintained by the forest service.  The first thing we came to was a water crossing that had me worried.  I got out to see how deep it was since it was very wide.  A lifted truck came to the other side just as I was about to check it out and he drove right across, and parked in a wide area of the water crossing.  With fear of depth behind me, I headed on across.IMG_0148s

 

The white truck is back there on the right.  and my friends are following my through in their jeep.  After we got through the crossing, the trail turned around a switch back and we got the see the truck make speed runs through the water, turns out they were just playing in the water crossing.

The trail continued up to Hagerman Pass.IMG_0154s

IMG_0155s

Just after the pass as the trail headed back down the other side we drove through a huge snow drift, twice as tall as our Jeeps, that the forest service had plowed to open the pass road.  I would hate to be the plow driver that had to get a plow up there, as the road on both sides of the pass was a rocky bumpy slow going affair.  The way down was very rocky, though all small stuff, still it made for a bumpy end to the trip.

The road winds around down the other side of the pass and you go right by the end of the old Hagerman tunnel, we were exhausted and starving, so we didn’t get out and explore, nor get any pics of the rocks on the last section of the drive.  The road after the old Hagerman tunnel was well maintained flat dirt road but it felt like heaven after the descent from Hagerman Pass.  When that turned into pavement, I thought we were riding in a Rolls Royce it felt so smooth.

Colorado is a beautiful place to explore and my friends want to make it a monthly trip to do an off-road trail and explore some back country.  When off roading be safe, cautious, go with another vehicle in case of issues, and leave no trace/tread lightly so our back country can remain open for all to enjoy.

On other notes:  I installed a new Rampage soft top after ordering  the parts I was missing from the used frame I bought, and replacing some broken parts from it.  I also installed the winch I decided closely matched the original Ramsey.    I still need to remote mount the solenoid to get it off the front of the winch to make it look exactly like the Ramsey, but I didn’t have time to do that before this trip.

Jeep #29: First Photos in the Wild

Next to my neighborhood is this amazing overlook.  On a clear day you can see Pikes Peak in Colorado Springs.  I took the jeep over there and took some pics.  Weather didn’t really cooperate, but thought I would share them anyway. 

Jeep #29: Rear License Plates

Mounting both replica license plates in the stock locations means you are no longer legal.  Some states require both front and rear state plates, so check your local laws if you are concerned about being illegal.  Rear Plates are required in all states, and rear plates must be illuminated at night.

My jeep has a hitch, which adds another surface on the back of the jeep.  The hitch is farther back than the stock jeep rear bumper plate (the piece that the bumperettes attach to).  So the tube for the hitch would get in the way of seeing the plate from the rear if I mounted it to the rear bumper plate I had to mount to the hitch tube.   I decided I didn’t want to just screw the plate into the hitch tube, as there would be very little support for the plate, and I thought it would get bent too easy.

To deal with this situation I came up with the following solution:

An all metal license plate frame (I got mine from O’Rielly’s for $10)  mounted to the hitch tube.  A set of “bolt lights” (I got mine from amazon $7).  Since my jeep had a rear hitch, the trailer wiring was in place, so I tapped into the trailer harness for power for the bolt lights.  I used a 2 pin trailer wire($3) to allow me to disconnect the lights if I have need to do so.  Here’s what is looks like.  The plate fit perfectly between the center hitch and the bumperette.

Plate Bracket

Plate Bracket

Illuminated Rear Plate

Illuminated Rear Plate

Jeep Plates

Jeep Plates

You can also see I got my vanity plate from Colorado, and there in the right side of the last shot is my garage “couch” made from the ripped/nasty rear seat I replaced.

Considering my plates, I did also pick up a pack of “security” license plate screws as well.  The pack I picked up had long bolt style, short bolt style, the style that screws into plastic, the plastic tabs, and the special tool.  So all three of my plates now have these special screws/bolts in them, just in case someone thinks they can get a quick souvenir.  😉

Jeep #29: Version 1 – Complete

This week, my vinyl guy came through and handed me the door logos.  The door logos are the same ones #18 is using.  With my stripe being a slightly different color than his (his are paint, mine are plastidip) the red in the logo doesn’t match the stripes perfect.  However, being as this is “temporary” until I save up enough to do a full repaint, I’m not going to worry about it.  But he accidentally printed another hood JP18 instead of my JP29.  Instead of having him redo it, i decided to just make a stencil and plastidip the hood logo same as I did on the side numbers.  I got that done friday night.

Today, I installed the Whip CB antenna.  Since I don’t have my light bar on yet, and may not until I do full paint, I attached it to the windshield with some zip ties for now.  Not elegant, but functional.  There was no actual CB in the movie cars, and I don’t have one, so at this time I am not worried about the antenna grounding.  I’m not sure if I will get a CB or not, so for now (as in the movie) the antenna is just for looks.

I also installed, and wired up a license plate relocation and lights for my rear plate Colorado plate, which my custom JP 29 vanity came on friday. I will detail what I did for that later.  For now here are some images of JP29 in her Version 1.

In these images, you  can see some of the existing paint issues, and why I need to do a full paint job on it.

JP 29 Ver 1.

JP 29 Ver 1.

JP 29 Ver 1.

JP 29 Ver 1.

JP 29 Ver 1.

JP 29 Ver 1.

Jeep #29: Stripes – Temp

Money has been tight, and I don’t really trust myself with painting in my garage. Between Fumes and knowing that painting can be tricky. I figure painting is like drywall work, sure I can do, but I’m not as fast or a good as someone who does it for a living. So I have started saving out of each paycheck till I have enough to paint it 100% correct. Since my jeep is currentl champagne, which is very close to the correct sand beige, I could get away with only painting stripes until I have enough to do it correct.

I stumbled across people using plastidip (you know the stuff you dip tool handles in) in cans or sprayable gallons to paint cars. It is quite fascinating really. I decided to give this a go. I researched on youtube and on the web and found a place dedicated to using plastidip on cars, dipyourcar.com. You can order all the supplies from here and I got good customer service as well as dedicated forums to share information about using plastidip on cars. You can also special order colored plastidip from lowes and probably home depot, but I didn’t ask at HD, only Lowes, you have ask at the custom service desk at lowes, and a manager actually had to figure out what needed to happen, but I wasn’t ready to pull the trigger yet when I found that out, and ended up ordering from dipyourcar.

I plastidipped my wheels 2 weeks ago as a test. They came out really well.

Wheel "Painted" with plastidip

With my test done, I decided to give the stripes a try. Using plastidip is very different from paint. If you screw something up you wait an hour or so and can peel it off. Or if you know you messed up and its still wet, just wipe it off with a paper towel and start over. It is temperature sensative in that it will behave slightly different at different ambient temps when applying. Getting the right coverage per coat is a learning game. Lots of the tutorials suggested 3 coats, I ended up having to do 5-6 light coats to keep from getting runs. You also have to pull your masked line WHILE the stuff is very wet, otherwise it wants to peel off all of your plastidip.

There isn’t as much overspray as using spray paint, which made painting in the garage much easier, not having to cover every spec of the garage. Also as long as I kept the garage door cracked about a foot, the fumes didn’t migrate into the house. I spent a long time laying out the stripes to get them “right” in my book, and then masking everything. Then I got too thick a coat on one back stripe, had to peel it and respray it, and the other back stripe I got to thin and then when I pulled the masking it didn’t leave a clean edge, so I had to peel it and respray it. In all I probably spent 12 ish hours on getting my stripes on. So.. Here they are:

Stripes are Done

After getting the stripes done, and painting the mirrors, I installed the replacement seats.. wow they are sooo much more comfortable than the nasty old ones. I have talked to the guy who did JP18’s door logos, and he is making me a set of door logos and the hood numbers. I did the side numbers as a stencil in the plastidip.

I am calling this JP29 Ver1, since I will be updating this to correct paint in the future.

This photo does a little more justice to the red color of the plastidip, as the sun angle was a bit better, but I didn’t have the doors back on in it.

Jeep #29: License Plates

Celebrity Machines makes Jurassic Park Plates, in #12, #18, and blank.  Since I am doing #29 I had to order the blanks.  I received mine a few weeks ago, but I was waiting to be sure my “vanity” plate from the state was approved.  I got the letter yesterday that JP 29 is now my license plate, so I went ahead and finished off the blank celebrity plates with #29.  If you order blank plates from Celebrity Machines, tell him what number you want and he will include the 3m numbers you will need.

The numbers are 3″ tall by 1 1/4″ wide.  The yellow section is 3 1/4″ wide(from red strip to emboss).  So 2 1/2″ for numbers and 3/4″ for free space, and you get 1/4″ free space on each side and inbetween the numbers.  For height placement, with the screw hole it seemed better to have more “gutter” at the top the above the lettering i.n. C.R. (Isla Nublar/ Costa Rica).  It ended up about 3/4″ at top and 3/8″ at the bottom.

They look great, now I just need to wait for my state plates to get made.

Jeep #29: 20 Year Old Hoses!

Last Month we had a batch of nice weather on the weekend.  Since I had not driven the jeep since winter started I decided to pull the Jeep out of the garage and drive her around a bit.  I pulled her into the driveway and let her idle for a while making sure she sounded alright and checking for fluids.  Nothing in the front.. That’s weird there is something dripping right by the rear axle on the left(driver) side.   FUEL.. Ohh no.

I inspected all the lines.  There is a rubber fuel line from the gas tank that goes between the body and the frame and then connects to the hard lines before the fuel filter.  The leak was coming from one of these lines just after it passed the frame/body grommet.  The lines had deteriorated and sprung a leak.

The next day after researching what all was going to be required of fixing this, I dropped the fuel tank.  Dropping the fuel tank was quite difficult, as there is very little clearance to drop the 20 gallon tank of the sahara.  Here are the steps: Remove the license plate and plate frame. Remove trim around filler. Remove plastic cover under rear corner to access internal area of fuel filler. Remove filler and vent hoses from tank to filler. Support tank with jack. Remove 4 nuts along rear of gas skid plate (only need socket wrench on nut), and 3 along front of skid plate(will need monkey wrench on top of bolt and socket wrench on bottom). The tank is now Free of the vehicle. Slowly lower the tank with your jack.   Try to look on top of the tank and make sure all the hoses and electrical to the tank are free and long enough.  Some write ups say you have to unplug the wiring, but my wiring was long enough that I didn’t have to unplug it until after I got the tank to the floor.    However my vapor line was way to short and it broke the vapor T being stretch as the tank was dropped.  (It will get stuck at this point. just a warning!) The passenger side gets hung up a bit on the exhaust hanger/exhaust pipe, and the driver side fill/vent nipples get stuck on the frame rail. I just wiggled and tilted the tank and pushed the exhaust pipe out of the way until it came out.  I wanted to get the tank semi empty so it was easier to handle, so I siphoned out 6-8 gallons of fuel, this was a pain, as the bends in the filler hose are very tight and the hose kept getting caught on the fuel tank’s nipple.  I ended up having to siphon gas after I had removed the filler and vent hoses so I could actually access the tank.   That made this take a lot longer than it probably should have.  I spent 3 ish hours on this.  Penetrating oil was required on the bolts to get them started.

Not only was the fuel line old and destroyed, but the filler hoses were getting bad too.  I ordered the 2 custom hoses that go from the tank to the filler.  (There is a fill hose and a vent hose)  $25 for both hoses.

Here are the old hoses the cracking filler hose on the Left and the dual fuel hoses(supply and return), with the cracks just past the bend on the top hose :

With winter and 2 jobs I wasn’t in a rush to deal with this,  it wasn’t too cold today, so after work I got busy replacing all the hoses.   First I removed all the old lines.  Basic stuff here, hose clamps, and then prying off the hoses.  NOTE:  Make yourself a diagram of which fuel line from the tank to the hard line connects with what.  You don’t want to cross up the supply and return lines.  Be careful when removing the hoses from the hard lines so you don’t bend a hard line by yanking to hard. Getting the old lines out of the frame/body grommet was a lot of hard yanking,  I didn’t do it, but I should have cut the lines as close to the grommet as possible to make this easier.

If you ever drop your tank, and it has never been done before, replacing the filler and vent hoses is cheap insurance and you have to take them off when getting the tank out anyway.

If you didn’t destroy anything these are the Supplies Needed:

  • 2 Special Order Filler/Vent Hoses ($25 for both) They are formed hoses, and special sizes to match the tank and filler.
  • Several Feet of 5/16 fuel Hose
  • Several Feet of 3/16 Vapor/fuel Hose
  • 4 small hose clamps
  • 4 medium hose clamps

I took my hoses and hose clamps with me to make sure I got the right lengths and sizes.  I bought my hose clamps at home depot, the special hoses online, and the generic hoses from the local auto parts store.  Since I broke the T of the vapor line, I also had to buy a new T, but both local stores didn’t have the size I needed  3/16 on the solo side, and 1/4 on both the other sides.  I had to buy a 3/16 all around T, and then straight connectors with 3/16 on one side and 1/4 on the other.    Ugh why weren’t all the vapor lines the same size!

Reassembly:  Basically the reverse of all of the above.  Getting the hoses through the grommet, use some dishwashing liquid or some other lubricant.   The vapor lines the auto store had were a bit thicker on the outside than my originals and were a pain to get through, but the fuel lines were identical so not to bad.  One of the barbs on the fuel tank is bigger than the other one.  Getting the new line on this barb was a real pain, and probably took the most time of anything.  With the hoses reconnected I then had to get the tank back up, I jacked the jeep up to get more room for the method I wanted to try to get the tank back in(which i left it stock height when removing it).  Then I used a jack on the driver side and lifted it diagonally upwards, then reconnected the wiring, and then I then lifted the passenger side with another jack.   It went in with this diagonal method much easier than it came out.  I then shimmied it around until it lined up with the mounting holes, and the started the bolts, but did NOT tighten them.  I then reinstalled the filler and its vent hose.  I was afraid of tightening the tank in case I needed to move it around while getting the filler hoses back on.  Once back on, Tighten it all down, get all the trim back on, and DONE.  About 4 hours tonight (not counting trip to store for supplies)

Started the jeep up, running good and no Leaks!

Jeep #29: Hard Top is Gone.

I bought my jeep with the hard top, thinking I would want to use it during the winter….  I decide to sell the hard top for a few reasons.  1 – My Jeep is a spare vehicle, and I don’t have to drive it during the winter.   2 – I can use that money towards other Jeep parts I still need, IE the soft top, and fog lights..

The Hard top left my house tonight, so Now I get to convert the lift I made for the hard top into a bike hoist to get the bikes off the floor for the winter.

I have not done any other work on the jeep, but have been driving it here and there… that ends for the winter now until I get a top.

During October my family made a trip out to Orlando and went to Universal and Disney.  I got to check out the vehicles in the Jurassic Park section of Universal’s Islands of Adventure park.  The vehicles were not screen accurate anymore.  The Jeep has been repainted, and is close, but has differences if you know what to look for. (font is wrong, stripe is off a bit, missing some parts, etc..) The explorer is completely the wrong color, its purple/maroon not red.. weird.. and the Lost World Mercedes is stripped out (but it is open to weather, so that is to be expected)

The Jurassic Park visitor’s center, supposedly built replicating the visitor center from the movie was really cool though.  I picked up a Jurassic Park ball cap. (not screen accurate, but nice none-the-less) most of the other stuff didn’t catch my fancy.

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