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Tony's buggy build

I've been wheeling and building my XJ now for about 10 years, but have lately had the urge to build a buggy. It was something that I wanted to do, but I didn't think it was in the near future... until I found this guy
2012-06-14101731.jpg


A couple of text's and a trip with the trailer and it followed me home. I did a little trading, so its a cheap base to build off of.
2012-06-15104644.jpg


Got it home and started looking, was surprised to see how well it was set up
Chevy TBI 4.3. Was running when the buggy was parted out, so hopefully wont be too bad to get running again.
2012-06-15132217.jpg


Set up for full hydro. Has the orbital valve, remote filter and cooler installed already.
2012-06-15132224.jpg


Ac compressor is converted for OBA. All the solenoids and valves seem to be there, its just a mater of cleaning everything up and making sure its GTG
2012-06-15132237.jpg


Set up as a 4 seater. I'm going to try and run a XJ rear folding seat in the back so I can fold it out of the way when I don't need it. I think I can make it work.
2012-06-15132325.jpg


The chassis was built off of a Yota frame so the wiring is there for a Yota pickup dash, probably pick one up from the JY for now. Later I'll do a custom dash
2012-06-15132311.jpg


It was set up for a 3 link with panhard in the front and a triangulated 4 link in the rear. I got some PVC to mock up some links, and the set up looks pretty promising. I'll probably add some gussets to the link tabs and run them as they are.

Plans:

Chevy 60/14 bolt
14-18 inch air shocks on all corners
Fuel cell
Turbo 350 and twin sticked 205


It will be a slow going project until I get the XJ sold or parted out, but at least its a start!
 
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xjtony

xjtony

Well-Known Member
Location
Grantsville, Ut
It's been a long haul. Part of buying a used rig I guess. Plenum gasket, entire ignition system, complete rewire, all the sensors, fuel pump, fuel lines...
 
xjtony

xjtony

Well-Known Member
Location
Grantsville, Ut
Well I have been sweating it, but all the major work is done, I just need to reassemble the wheels. I bought a broken plasma cutter off of KSL, and couldn't get it running. Brought my torch home from work and ran out of gas. I cut one wheel oldschool with the sawzall, but I'm too old for that crap and it about killed me. Finally I stopped by the lawn shop and picked up a Lincoln pro cut 25 for $200. New gergulator and consumables and it works great. Took about 10 min to cut the last 2 wheels20181012_152504.jpg
 
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xjtony

xjtony

Well-Known Member
Location
Grantsville, Ut
Well, this weekend was pretty catastrophic. The buggy has been running great for a few months, but the engine is done. As soon as I got to Moab I started having power issues so bad that it was hard to get off the trailer. A little work got it running ok, but not too far into Pritchett, My full cell of fuel suddenly ran dry. Thanks to Gawynz we ran back to his trailer and got more fuel, but the motor was still a turd. Trying to get up Chewy I was really pushing it to try and get some momentum, and came down hard, ripping a rear shock mount off. I pulled the shock and started to limp back to camp with no power and riding a bumpstop. After a little ways I noticed my oil pressure was low so I pulled the dipstick and found where all the fuel had gone.... right into the oil. We managed to get back to camp under our own power and a bit of cable pulling, but that was our trip. Motor is done, but I have a clean low mile Chevy 4.3 crate motor sitting at home, so she will get a new heart this winter.
 
Herzog

Herzog

somewhat damaged
Admin
Location
Wydaho
xjtony said:
Well, this weekend was pretty catastrophic. The buggy has been running great for a few months, but the engine is done. As soon as I got to Moab I started having power issues so bad that it was hard to get off the trailer. A little work got it running ok, but not too far into Pritchett, My full cell of fuel suddenly ran dry. Thanks to Gawynz we ran back to his trailer and got more fuel, but the motor was still a turd. Trying to get up Chewy I was really pushing it to try and get some momentum, and came down hard, ripping a rear shock mount off. I pulled the shock and started to limp back to camp with no power and riding a bumpstop. After a little ways I noticed my oil pressure was low so I pulled the dipstick and found where all the fuel had gone.... right into the oil. We managed to get back to camp under our own power and a bit of cable pulling, but that was our trip. Motor is done, but I have a clean low mile Chevy 4.3 crate motor sitting at home, so she will get a new heart this winter.
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Crap, if I had known your power was still that low I would have offered to throw a strap and tow you out. We figured you'd only slowly riding back out from there with the bum shock. We were glad that we didn't see you on our way back out because we assumed you had a decent hobble back out.

Really sorry about the bad luck this trip. Just means the next one will have to be extremely successful.
 
xjtony

xjtony

Well-Known Member
Location
Grantsville, Ut
Herzog said:
Crap, if I had known your power was still that low I would have offered to throw a strap and tow you out. We figured you'd only slowly riding back out from there with the bum shock. We were glad that we didn't see you on our way back out because we assumed you had a decent hobble back out.

Really sorry about the bad luck this trip. Just means the next one will have to be extremely successful.
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No worries Shane. We only had to pull cable twice on the 2 bigger ledges and both had anchors installed. Flatish ground it had enough to chug along nice and slow. Any day that you can make it back on the trailer under your own power is a win in my book (at least a little win lol)
 
ID Bronco

ID Bronco

Registered User
Location
Idaho Falls, ID
xjtony said:
Well, this weekend was pretty catastrophic. The buggy has been running great for a few months, but the engine is done. As soon as I got to Moab I started having power issues so bad that it was hard to get off the trailer. A little work got it running ok, but not too far into Pritchett, My full cell of fuel suddenly ran dry. Thanks to Gawynz we ran back to his trailer and got more fuel, but the motor was still a turd. Trying to get up Chewy I was really pushing it to try and get some momentum, and came down hard, ripping a rear shock mount off. I pulled the shock and started to limp back to camp with no power and riding a bumpstop. After a little ways I noticed my oil pressure was low so I pulled the dipstick and found where all the fuel had gone.... right into the oil. We managed to get back to camp under our own power and a bit of cable pulling, but that was our trip. Motor is done, but I have a clean low mile Chevy 4.3 crate motor sitting at home, so she will get a new heart this winter.
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Wow, you have a great attitude for such a situation. It's cool to hear someone say, "I have an extra engine sitting at home" Good luck!
 
Coco

Coco

Well-Known Member
Location
Lehi, UT
Agreed, I folded some shock tabs on my buggy during the last OSRC. I went home, cut them off, and replaced them with 1/4" pieces, and a gusset. Didn't have any issues after that.
 
xjtony

xjtony

Well-Known Member
Location
Grantsville, Ut
Agreed. It's going to get beefed up more, I just haven't figured out how I want to do it yet. I went light the last time and you saw the results! I'm going to work on it some this weekend to get the other side burned in and I'll look at the best way to support them.
 
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