Building a 2 Door Jeep JK to race in the stock class of King of the Hammers

[Impulse Off Road]

When Ultra 4 decided to add a stock and stock mod class to the Ultra 4 Series it got me thinking pretty serious about competing. I finally pulled the trigger on a wrecked 2008 2-door Jeep Wrangler. I wanted to do a JK because thats what I usually build and drive. I started working on this Jeep on Saturday. I will keep posting pictures as I make progress on the build. I also plan to compete in the W.E.ROCK Dirt Riot Endurance Series with the Jeep along with the Ultra 4 American Rock Sports Challenge held at Miller Motorsports Park next September. To get in as much seat time as possible in preperation for the Ultra 4 race I will also be driving the Jeep in all of the Lucas Oil Off Road Regional practice and race days held at Miller Motorsports Park as well.

I want to give a big thanks to the sponsors and friends who have helped me since we started Rock Crawling in the ARCAA days. Here are my plans as of today. (they are always changing alittle bit)

Suspension: TeraFlex LCG PreRunner 3" Kit with special Speed Bumps.
Shocks: ICON Vehicle Dynamics 2.5" Piggy Back front shocks and 2.5" Remote Reservoir shocks in the back

Performance:
I will add a Sprint Booster to help with the lag in the gas pedal. A Chip from Bully Dog or Diablo Sport, new plugs and wires, and hopefully some long tube headers from Ripp. The stock auto trans will be used with the addition of a deep trans pan and Redline High Temp ATF. I am looking at installing a performance torque converter to help make the transmission more efficient. A Magnaflow Cat back Exhaust will also be installed.

Front Axle: TeraFlex CRD 60 Front Axle. Sierra Gear 5.38 Ring and Pinion and chro moly axle shafts from West Coast Differentials, a Detroit Locker, and TeraFlex Big Brake Kit and larger Brake Master Cylinder
Rear Axle: TeraFlex CRD 60 Rear Axle with Sierra Gear 5.38 Ring and Pinion and a Detroit Locker. Chro Moly rear axle shafts are also supplied by TeraFlex
T-Case: Advance Adapters cant get me an Atlas built in time so I am going to run the stock 2.72 t-case with a 2.72 Rubicrawler from Advance Adapters.
Drive Shafts: I want to run 1350 Drive Shafts and am not sure who I will get those from
Steering: PSC Motorsports Hydraulic Assist Steering with PSC Dual Cooler System for the PS Fluid and for the Transmission

Exterior Upgrades:
A complete JK package from Poison Spyder BFH front and rear bumpers, Brawler Rockers, Fenders, HD transmission cross member, Light Bar Mounts, and more.
A 50" Light Bar from Baja Designs.

Tires and Wheels:
35x12.50r17 BFGoodrich Mud Terrain TA KM2
17x9 Black Rock Intruder Beadlocks



We will be building a 2"x.120 Wall DOM Rollcage with suspension seats and 5 point harness seat belts. A bladdered fuel cell will also be used. I will update the parts used as work progresses. This should be a pretty fun build and it should be really fun to get back into the competition scene after 4+ years away from it.

 

[Impulse Off Road]

The pics in the previous post are how the Jeep looked when I got it. I have pretty much gutted the interior, removed the axles, suspension, bumpers, and fuel cell. The fun will start tomorrow. The picture of the axles are my housings at TeraFlex last Friday.

 

[Herzog]

Subscribed!

 

[kungfufighter06]

Subscribed!

x2^

 

[TEAM FRED]

Good to see you compete again!

 

[SAMI]

:Like:

 

[cruiseroutfit]

 

[Paul R]

Too cool... I look forward to seeing this build

 

[Impulse Off Road]

Update time.
Well in the stock class of King of the Hammers you canstretch your wheelbase a total of 3". The limit is 98.4" for a stock class 2 door JK to pass tech inspection. I am shooting for 98.25". I decided that I wanted to get 1.75-2" in the front and around 1" stretch in the rear. To lengthen the front the right way I had to remove my coil buckets and track bar bracket and move them forward 1.75". I hope that the extra wheelbase is slightly noticable and that all of the work it took is worth it in the end. I guess it will be a cool feature that very few people would justify doing. The drivers side is all modified and welded. The passenger coil bucket and shock mount are removed and the frame is ground smooth, ready to install the coil bucket in the morning. The real technical part of the build is the frame tied roll cage. Hopefully tomorrow it is very close to being done. I also plan to start putting the TeraFlex rear axle in the Jeep tomorrow as well. I will post pictures tomorrow night also.

In these frame pictures you can see the frame ground clean, then a picture of the gear box mounted 1.75" further forward, and then a finished pre paint picture of remounted coil bucket, shock mount and track bar bracket

 

[Impulse Off Road]

In these next pictures you will see the fully disassembled dash and see how the cage goes through the dash, then through the floor. All of the mounting points of the cage go through the body and will mount directly to the frame. I am a beginner tube bender so I have to thank my brother Nate for lending me his tube bending skills to get this done. There are alot of different bends. Bends through the floor, matching the windshield frame, pretty much every part of the cage has a tricky bend to it. I am pretty excited to get the cage done and see how it all turns out.

 

[Venture13]

Looking good and sounds like a ton of work.. The 98"+ wheel base is a bit tipsy, but for the regs (+3") makes sense. I wished they had a LWB 2 door JK... The 5.38 gears are alot weaker than the 4:88s, 60s break just as well.

Keep it going, sure you have read all the fine print for the stock class.

 

[Bart]

Sweet. In.

 

[Impulse Off Road]

The seats are now mounted to the cage. The rear seat cross bar goes from the driver side to the passenger side and has to sneak over the transmission tunnel yet remain under the e-brake housing. Hopefully now that the seats are in the remaining bars of the cage will go in a bit quicker. Both the driver and passenger coil buckets are in and the frame is repainted. The steering box is mounted and I will be lengthening the steering shaft from the column to the gear box today. the dash is reassembled but still needs the GPS and PCI Race Radio System mounted.

 

[Impulse Off Road]

I went with the new dual cooler set up from PSC Motorsports. This is a newer product offered by them and the first time that I have installed or used one. It fit and should work great. I still have to tie a few lines up then it will be finished.

 

[Impulse Off Road]

The cage is finally starting to take shape. Nate said easy on the criticism as it is only the 2nd cage he has built in the last 3 years. I think that we will be pretty safe racing in this Jeep.

 

[Impulse Off Road]

We should be pretty safe from any sort of side impact. There will also be an aluminum half door on both the driver and passenger side of the Jeep.The goal for tomorrow is to remove the transmission and transfercase, fully weld the cage, and start on the installation of the TeraFlex Suspension in the back.

 

[sixstringsteve]

my only criticism on the cage is that it looks freakin awesome!

 

[STAG]

'scribed. Freakin sick.

 

[Impulse Off Road]

I removed the transmission and transfercase on Saturday. I am going to have the transmission gone through and have any stronger or high performance parts that are available for the 42RLE installed in the transmission. I provided the transmisison builder some stock JK dyno run specs so that he can build a custom torque converter for the Jeep. When I get it back I will be putting an Advance Adapter Rubicrawler and a factory Rubicon T-Case back in with the new trans. I probably wont have any more pictures until Wednesday sometime. Hopefully the trans is done by Friday.

 

[Greg]

Amazing progress John! You're getting a lot of work done in such a short amount of time. I'm really enjoying seeing a stock JK transform into a KOH Stock Class race rig. Thanks for sharing the progress with us.