75 CJ6 Not Really A "Build"

Do they say Firestone on the anywhere? My guess is they are Firestone. I have a set of those as well. They are reversed wheels meaning the tire goes on from the back...Sort of a poor mans bead lock.

 

I don't rememember any name brand on them but I can look again.

 

I got to spend some time working on the Jeep over the last several days while Mother Nature turned my place into a mud hole. Put a new timing chain set, water pump, and rear main seal in the 304. Got it all cleaned up (and trashed my floor). Still need to clean, paint, and install the intake and all accessories. Would like to get it in the chassis soon to free up some more floor space.

Rolled the tub back inside. Got it as square as I could and braced it up pretty well.


Flipped the tub over and cut out most of the floor.

I started to work on my donor floors but was not happy with the condition of the edges of the floors where it needs to weld to the tub. They were also pretty warped and pushed down. I ordered new floor pans from Classic. They shipped a few days ago. Now I run outside like a kid at Christmas looking for the parts truck every time the dogs bark.
I cut the hat channels off the donor floor.

I hope to spend some time today with my drill, scraper, pliers and hammer removing all the strips that are still spot welded to the body and channels.

 

O'Boy all that work looks all to familiar! You need to built or borrow a rotisserie........makes that job much easier. Looks Good!

 

I made a rotisserie out of 2 harbor freight engine stands.

Your "bad" floors are better than i have ever had.

 

I actually feel bad about ruining the floor I took the hat channels from. I toyed with the idea of patching mine but the area where the floor lip touches the tub was pretty bad between the two pieces and I couldn't figure out any way to deal with it short of removing the floor.

 

Don't feel bad, its your jeep. look what i did to mine

 

Bolted on the engine mounts and then set the engine in the frame mainly to free up floor space in the barn.

My new floor panels came in from Classic.

It was fun to lay one on the jeep but there is no way it is close to being installed, mainly because of this....


Thought about ordering new side panels from Classic but I really need to slow my spending down a bit. So I used one of my tables, some clamps and angle iron, and a hammer to make the lip that runs along the bottom of the side panel.

I found it easier to bend the flange a little long and then cut it down.
The tool box face was rotted at the bottom so I salvaged the face from my donor floor. I tacked some small square tubing in where the face of the box meets the top so I would have something to clamp to and to strengthen it up a bit. Did the same for the seam area on my side panel patch. Sprayed weld through primer on...

Pieces going together...


Bent up the piece for the driver's side. Used it as a guide to cut out the rotted section.

Here it is in the process of getting my sloppy tack welds applied.

I hope to get all of the patches in this weekend and get the welded in portion of the transmission hump reinstalled. Then maybe I can start messing with the new floor panels and the hat channels.

 

Looks great. you WILL melt those clamps. I have.

 

I did too.

The engine cleaning was pretty simple. No real tricks. Unbolt most everything that can come off. Stuff all important holes with paper towels. Go to the store and buy a case of the cheapest brake cleaner and wire brushes for the drill. I mostly used the cup shaped brushes (as opposed to the flat wire wheels) The bigger ones work well on most of the engine and the little ones (about one inch diameter) work really good for jamming into small areas. The main thing was lots of rinsing with brake cleaner. I even used the wire wheels when it was wet with cleaner. I expeted to blow up but I didn't. Helps to have it on the engine stand. You can clean it as good as you can, rotate the engine 180 degrees and find all sorts of stuff you missed. I painted it with Chrysler Green engine paint. Was very close to the original color (really really close). I did not primer it. I don't really have a good reason for skipping primer other than I have done several engines, with engine paint, without primering and they all have held up well. The only bad thing bout cleaning it this way is between the engine oil, the brake cleaner, and the crud from the engine, the barn/garage floor gets really trashed.

 

I got my side panel patches in with some decent warpage from the heat. Tried using heat and cooling to shrink the metal but didn't have much luck. Decided to leave it alone for awhile since I will be applying heat again when the floor panels get tacked in to the sides.

Got the floor panels, and transmission hump mocked up with many sheet metal screws. The panels are really nice but there is a lot of trimming involved. Part of the extra trimming and fitting I blame on this being an intermediate Jeep. It would have been easier if the transmission hump bolted to the firewall.


Now to take it all apart to trim the inside pieces and to strip paint and gunk off before reassembling and welding.

 

Looks great.

 

Looks Good.................Now you get to weld it all together.

 

Sooo...after nearly a year of no CJ6 progress, I am gearing up to work on it again. Had one career come to a close, starting another one, had a grandbaby come into the picture, lots of reasons why the CJ6 got mothballed. Hopefully by posting on here I will motivate myself to do a little something every day. One of the sparks that helped reignite the flame was the recent Craigslist find of a roll cage that was made to fit the 6 and was less than two hundred clams.

 

The second, and biggest motivator was the acquisition of Haighfam's rotisserie. I made the trip to Paradise, CA. I got to meet a really good person and see a beautiful CJ5 project. When I got home I had to move a couple of CJ frames out of the barn and haul in the CJ6 again. The orange tractor helped quite a bit.

 

I got it back inside and under my custom built wooden hoist thingy (which I had originally built just to pull a boat motor but now I can get by without it). Lifted the body off the frame. Got the frame out of the way and got it bolted to Haighfam's rotisserie with very few issues. This is how she looks sitting on the spit.



and this is how she looks tilted up...

 

Very Nice.............you'll like having the ability to rotate that body into different positions.

 

Haven't accomplished much lately. Been chipping and scraping crud off the bottom of the tub and sanding the parts that aren't cruddy.

I have decided to go with a Chevy 350/700r4/NP241 setup. Kind of have mixed feelings because I was originally set on keeping it very stock. I have decided to aim for a little better on-road driver and want the overdrive and fuel injection. I already ordered Advanced Adaptor's motor mount setup for Chevy to CJ. I am wondering what people who have done similar swaps have done for the Trans/transfer case crossmember. Many of the aftermarket ones seem to be built for two wheel drive use.

 

Is the 241 passenger-side front output? Or are the axles getting swapped too?