Today she got 40 bucks in gas. An about 50 more miles.

 

i went to a cherokee forum meet last night in fox lake dog n suds. kept the jeep recovery team presence. lol. those guys have some sick cherokees. we have to combine forums one day and have a mass driving and mudding somewhere.

 

Today i decided to get off my butt and fix something i did a half *** job on months ago. I shaved my body line with bondo a while back and it pitted and chipped. I grabbed my heat gun,a butter knife,and in 3 hours time i got all the 1/2" bondo off,sanded it smooth,then primered it back up. Looks better now. I REALLY need to learn how to paint,or do the prep work and just pay macco to paint it.

 

Nothing really new, the blaze has been sitting in the parking lot for awhile. I'm thinking about taking a trip up to Uwharrie soon though.

 

just for maint purposes, on monday morning I ordered
Raybestos {pro} front rotors and ceramic pads,
two MOOG lower ball joints,
Monroe Sensatrac front shocks,
1 SKF hub cause I thought it sounded a little hinkey on left turns
AC Delco tensioner pulley and
Dayco belt

Yesterday i psyched self up..
Today I started with the tensioner. The old one was singing and made things a little noisy under the hood. I replaced it without removing the arm, just req swinging tens arm down to get clearance. The old one was just singing, not sloppy or grinding. Quieter now. While under there I spun the idler, AC, alt and waterpump pulleys to see if I could hear anything.
Quiet and some 'free spin'. Good for now. AC clutch pulley brg on my agenda for spring. Just to be safe. Only 20 bucks and a couple hours.

Went to put on belt wont fit.. out of all the belts on RA's list for W/ AC, I picked the short one.. all rest spec 95 5/8, Dayco 95.08
ARRGGGH! oh well. Old one has life left. No ribs missing just cracks.

Next up, Front Shocks.

#@%!@#$@!!! If GM could just have located that lower bracket hole 1/8 higher would make things LOT easier. Spent 1/3 of total work time on figuring out how to get the first shock out. Finally figured out proper wrench combination and got bolts out but fun wasnt over...Because you see, those Delphi shocks still had ALL the gas in them. Anyone want good used Delphi shocks cheap? I reckon about 1 year old, still pretty, no rust, and about 5000 miles max
20 plus ship for the pair.

Okay.. THAT finally done, on to brakes. I never liked the way the rotors looked, the truck obviously had sat on a lot quite a while but they never cleaned up the way I'm used to.
WooaaaaaaH. the outer side had looked bad, the piston sides were toast!

I've never seen anything like it.. esp as the car never really stopped that bad. no grinding or any other obnoxious noises as you would expect with rotor faces that horrible.. pix coming up later.

Other than that, Brakes went together fairly easily. 'course I have some experience in getting rusty rotors off and once you learn that it's pretty easy even if it's years between.
Driver's side pistons didnt want to retract at first. Must keep eye on that. Not used to that.. My tbirds single-pistons went back in with little more than hand pressure.. could not keep clamp tight.

Caliper pins nice, calipers slide nicely - always check for that before pumping them full. And always pump them full before going to other side.

- need I mention NEVER have both calipers off at same time? No I didnt, and never have. But I knew a few people who did.

Well now i gotta shower then go out to store and bed in the brakes by taking the scenic route.
- more-
Bedded em in, started out real spongy.. then got consecutively better. Still a little more than I like but acceptable I guess. Now it's up to the old lady.
I'm still pretty sharp I guess.. the passenger side hub bearing IS bad, like I thought by the rumble in the right front that got worse if you turn slightly left.
There's no slop but you can feel a catch when you turn it just a little. Get it done this week, would have worked late to replace it but found out I dont have the socket for it anyway.. one of those things that disappear.. or maybe I loaned it out.

The Lower ball joints have been replaced already {unless the factory used bolts}.. odd, 106 Kmiles when I got the car. Checked em for slop, seem okay. Uppers still have rivets but they seem okay too. Think I'll order uppers and do em both next spring.

I like the sensatrac shocks over the Delphi's. A little softer ride and dont feel the pavement joints quite as much. A little softer on corners but I can deal with that. Oh.. remind me I need to order new sway bar link bushes. The upper ones are showing definite large cracking.
Oh.. and my snubbers are totally gone. As in missing due to being broke off.
8.08 each at RA.

 

overcame another problem after problem after problem after problem....lol
was fun though.....love it

 

I bought new oil, filter, spark plugs, plug wires, rotor, distributor cap, air filter.

Topped off all the fluids and slapped some new stickers on the back window hehe.

Sadly it all isnt installed just yet..

Working on that pesky #3 plug..

 

have you tried pulling the tire and splash shield, replacing it from inside the wheel-well? its still not easy, but it is a bit more accessable that way.

 

Worked on my ball joints. Well....tried to anyway. Bought the lowers as they are usually the ones to go first, pulled the left wheel off and found the top joint was so bad it scared me to think I was driving it like that. Top of the tire moved in and out over 2 inches. So I drove (carefully) back to the parts store and got the top ones also. Took the top joint off and found they gave me the wrong parts. So.........put the very bad top joint back in and went and got the right parts. Only got the top one done after all the running around I did. Next weekend I'll do the bottom on that side and hopefully do the other side. A die grinder makes quick work of the rivets

 

Yep thats how i got all of them out but the number 3 is very hard to get too since its behind the steering column.

even from the buttom