Three-day (plus one) - 1999 Jeep TJ Wrangler

Saturday, 1:05 p.m. With the body lift installed, our engine fan was hitting the fan shroud, so we replaced the stock motor mounts with these 1-inch lift mounts. To install the mounts we removed the alternator and jacked up the engine off the old mounts. These Currie motor mounts use a poly sleeve instead of rubber, and though stronger, they do transmit a bit of the four-cylinder's engine vibration when at idle.	Saturday, 2:30 p.m. The front and rear Currie Rock Crawler II bumpers are made of 3/16-inch plate steel and bolt on easily where the stock bumpers attach. You will need a big Torx T55 driver to remove the front bumper, and the rear involves attaching some brackets to the frame first. With the optional rear tire carrier we can haul a spare up to 36 inches.	Saturday, 3:50 p.m. By the end of the day we also had Teraflex's new S/T sway-bar system installed. We've decided that this is the coolest, easiest sway bar we've ever used. When off road the unlocked end of the sway bar can pivot, allowing the axle to articulate. Then when you come off the trail, you twist the knob (arrow) and a pin locks the two ends of the sway bar together. We found the TJ could corner great with the new sway bar locked, but we did need to shorten the drop links since they are designed for a 3- or 4-inch suspension lift, and we only used a 2-inch lift.
Saturday, 6:00 p.m. With the bumpers and winch on, we also addressed some of the interior and top issues. Our TJ came from the dealer without a radio or back seat. Luckily Bestop has just what you need to revamp your TJ into a more comfortable commuter-wheeler.	Our pal Marty likes our new rear TrailMax fold-and-tumble bench seat (don't worry, rear seatbelts are coming), and the new Super Soundbar gives us some speakers for the aftermarket radio right near our head as well as two map lights.	DAY TWO Sunday, 10:00 a.m. The stock plastic windows on a Wrangler are fine for everyday use, but after five years, they were getting scratched and the zippers were wearing out. Since we were in rainy Portland, not sunny California, we couldn't just pull them out and toss them.
Again, Bestop has replacement rear windows and slider front windows. We opted for the tinted rear windows since they would help keep the cab cooler in the summer, and keep prying eyes from any gear in the back of the rig. The front slider windows reduced noise, make drive-in burger joints much easier, but still allow removal for half-door action in the summer.	Sunday, 11:00 a.m. Our friend James Tracy stopped by when he heard the rumors of free doughnuts, and we quickly conned him into helping us install a 2-inch Old Man Emu suspension. OME engineers its suspensions with performance as the primary goal, and lift height secondary. This is done by taking into consideration vehicle weight and stock handling characteristics and then designing and aggressively testing the OME suspension to give a feel as good, if not better, than stock. We also installed some Currie bumpstops within the coils, which required drilling and tapping the lower coil mount.	Sunday, 3:30 p.m. The rear suspension didn't require the use of the coil compressor, but we did need to relocate an upper track-bar mount on top of the old mount, which requires a drill. We also put Currie bumpstops in the rear, and these actually help lock the coils into the mounts so no coils will be lost due to overflexing. Next came the shocks, which are more important than the coils. OME engineers usually incorporate a softer spring than most aftermarket suspension companies, and then they spend up to a year getting the valving perfect for the shocks. We really felt the difference both on and off road at high speed where we had a more controlled yet smoother ride than the little Jeep had stock.

Monday, 11:15 a.m.
To help clear the 33-inch tires and to give the front corners some extra protection, we contacted Poison Spyder Customs about a set of its TJ tube fenders. These fenders are super burly, made of 1/8-inch steel plate and 0.125-wall tubing, but they come in raw metal. To make our install go quickly we had them sent out to Portland Powder Coating for a gloss black finish. The stock fenders are trimmed back to fit under the new fenders, which is easy since the kit includes a stencil. We found that a Matco straight die grinder with a cut-off wheel made short work of the job.

Monday, 2:00 p.m. The new fenders bolted on to all the stock locations, as well as being bolted to part of the old fenders. There was a fair bit of wrestling to get everything to line up perfectly, but the final look was awesome, and they are very solidly mounted. We decided to remove the flashing flare/side marking lights and install them under the headlights as turn signals. To do this we first made a stencil of the flare opening, marked the grille where it was to be cut, and then installed the lens.

Monday, 5:00 p.m. Finally, we installed a set of Currie Rock Sliders. These bolt-on step bars attach directly to the body and require drilling into the tub. We recommend first attaching two of the bolts on the vertical side of the tub before marking and drilling the bottom holes to make sure they are perfectly located.

Tuesday, 8:30 a.m. The weekend was over, but we still needed to get the gears and lockers set up for our stealthy off-roader, so we headed to Leonard's Off-Road in Hillsboro, Oregon. Leonard's is one of the largest ARB dealers in Oregon, and the shop has installed tons of gear and locker combos in TJs. We no sooner pulled into the shop than Leonard Trudel and Todd Haught had the kits laid out and were preparing to install them. After years of installing air lockers, they have found that mounting the compressor just in front of the master cylinder works perfectly.

Tuesday, noon
The install of the ARB Air Lockers and 4.88 gears from West Coast Differential could fill a whole story in itself, so we'll just touch on the fact that if you haven't done a gear install before, then we recommend either having a shop do it for you or working closely with an experienced gear installer. You will need to drill and tap your housing for the air lines, but once installed, the ARBs will give you the selectability to have either open differentials or full lockers, so that even with just one tire getting traction, you can pull yourself out of slippery situations. The 4.88 gears, when matched with the 285/75R16 Yokohama tires, resulted in the speedometer being within half a mile per hour off stock, so no speedo gear was necessary.