5.2 Magnum Swap Part 4: All About Brakes

motor-swap-week-04-02

This has been a big week for the parts department. We finally have all of the tools and parts to rebuild our overdrive and hopefully fix reverse in the 46RH. We ordered a new Grant 414 wheel and Grant quick release, because why not. Also our new CNC dual master cylinder pedal assembly is finally in. We are ditching the stock brake booster to eventually make room for more shocks...

Continue Reading

5.2 Magnum Swap Part 3: The Last of the Stock Components

motor-swap-week-11-07

Over the years we have been slowing replacing, and in some cases, flat out removing stock parts that we didn't need. While some parts have been upgraded like the driver seats and axles, we have removed little things we don’t find necessary...

Continue Reading

5.2 Magnum Swap Part 2: Out With the Old

IMG_6025

This week we started out with a simple goal, remove the old 4.0, transmission and transfer case. On a typical WJ this is easy enough and the motor and transmission can be lifted out together after removing the headlights, grill, radiator and anything else in the way. The TTB WJ is a little more difficult.

Continue Reading

5.2 Magnum Swap Part 1: It’s Finally Happening

IMG_5127

It has been a long time coming and we are finally ditching the trusty i6. We have been wanting to do a v8 swap for years but it's hard to throw away a perfectly good 4.0 i6 with less than 70K. These motors are reliable and with proper maintenance can last 300,000. Our i6 has never let us down, but it is time for more power under the hood.

Continue Reading

Tierra Del Sol 2015

10172752_10104788350803501_4208620358387767093_n

The Tierra Del Sol Desert Safari, TDS for short, is always one of our favorite weekends. Not only is it one of our last trips before the heat of summer but this weekend bring thousands of people and rigs from all over the Southwest and packs them all into a few square miles of what […]

Continue Reading

A New Year And New Broken Parts

00559_image

“One last time.” The words we never say, or even think, before going out for a final attempt at anything. It may just be a superstition we brought over from our days of racing mountain bikes, but everything seems to head downhill just after someone announces that this is their last try at something. Not […]

Continue Reading

Halloween 2014

IMG_7172_HDR-2

Halloween is normally the first trip of the winter. Summer is typically too hot for any real desert trips so we devote our summers to building and upgrades. This summer, along with switching from 33’s to 35’s, building a new rear tire carrier and bumper, and raising the ride height about an inch we completed […]

Continue Reading

New Dash

00551_IMG_7177

Building a new dash is something we have been excited about for a while but we have always preferred performance over looks and the center mounted stock gauges and small Garmin GPS had been doing the trick until now. With the recent suspension upgrades and shock tuning we have been driving faster and covering more […]

Continue Reading

New Bumper and Tire Carrier

00024_image

With our new 35s it was also time to rebuild our tire carrier and bumper.     The first step was to remove the old bumper and any surrounding metal.     Happy with the mock up location we built the new tubes around the tire.     Couldn’t forget to add hi-lift and shovel […]

Continue Reading

Tuff Trucks 2014

IMG_6914-color-sm

The San Diego County Fair, known to the locals as the Del Mar Fair, is a staple of summer time in San Diego, California. Along with the endless supply of fried food, vendors, and carnival rides the fair offers a number of offroad events including monster trucks, a demolition derby and Tuff Trucks. We have […]

Continue Reading