76ish cj 5

Picked this up two weeks ago

Looks a lot better in pics than real life. It has a 4.2 wich was run with low oil so sounds bad. I have an 83 with a weber lined up. Floors are gone and sides are mostly bondo so I picked this up yesterday
that's my lil helper in the pic. It's a 75- minus fiberglass tub with dash ,windsheild, pedals, etc. I understand I'll have to move some mounts to get it to work on the newer frame. No big deal, I like that kind of thing. Bought a set of tube fenders a few days after the jeep.

Got them off CL. They were ugly and cheap.

The sheet was galvanized and the shady stitch welds drove me nuts. I only have stick welder so it was interesting welding them up. Ground down the welds and used a little glazing compound to fill in. Turned out decent enough for a woods jeep.


That's about as for as I have gotten. Hope to get it torn down to the frame this next week or so.

 

Looks like a fun project! What are your plans for it?

 

I only have the passenger seat with the fiberglass tub. It is split on the inside. The 76 came with two older bestop seat. Driver is cracked pretty bad. I'm probably going with a seat that can accept harnesses. I don't plan to make an extreme rock crawler out of it. But I do like going to rausch creek and hitting blue and black trails. For now I just want to get it going without opening up too many cans of worms. Once I sandblast the frame I'll box the rear section and reinforce anything that seems sketchy. Hoping to find a t18 at a reasonable price. Eventually swap a 4.0 head to ad FI. Axles are up in the air. Sometimes a good deal pops up and you have to change plans around that. I want to run Q78 swampers while staying as low and narrow as possible.

 

The jeep I found 15 min from home. The tub was a 7.5 hour round trip to West Virginia . Guy made me a good deal though. My boss just shook his head when I told him why I needed to take a half day.

 

Sounds like a good plan! I see a Pa License plate! woot woot.....I'm from Pa too! I'm from Central PA.....You?

 

South east I guess. Pottstown not Pottsville. I actually spend a decent amount of time in central. Love bald eagle state forest.

 

Cool that pretty close to me... Im near the Williamsport area

 

Made a little progress getting the multiple layers of brushed on thick paint off the tub. Tried a sander, it wasn't cutting it. Went to wire wheel on a grinder. Much better results but as soon as it through the paint it would start to gouge the fiberglass. I'm not going for show finish since it will be used but I don't want it looking like crap either.

Took about 2 hours to get this far.
Some gouging I'll have to fill

 

Picked up the motor tonight. My buddy hooked me up. He is swapping to a 350. It's and 83 4.2 with a weber. Looks pretty clean. He tried REALLY hard to make me take the t-5 too. I've got enough junk laying around don't need a crap trans too.

 

Other than collecting parts have not made a lot of progress. Located a full power steering setup from an 80. Getting disc parts from another guy. Bought an old line mountain race jeep cage and parts of a body.

It upside since that's the only way it would fit in my truck. Has seat mounts, harness mounts and even came with window nets. I'm cutting the door bars off since I don't need them for a recreational wheeler. The rest will fit inside the tub. Here it is before i put it in the truck.

The guy I got it from wrapped a chain around a tree limb and pulled up with his tractor. My engine lift won't go high enough to reach. So I'm Sanford and son it for awhile. I cut the cowl off. Going to borrow a portaband to cj the door bars off. Don't want to use a cutoff wheel and throw sparks all over my truck .