1992 Jeep YJ, the Wrongler

In reply to CAinCA :

That's fantastic, thanks!  We can thank forum member Psteav for the name and Robbie for the poem :)

This parts jeep came along mostly because I wanted a stock, unhacked roll cage for the Wrongler.

The one that is in it now has been cut, welded, etc.  One of the "spreaders" between the main hoop and windshield is homemade and doesn't fit right. I don't have much desire to to work with what I have.

So I went looking for a parts YJ (again...I occasionally search) and this one popped up and the seller and I hit it off and he brought it right to me.  What's not pictured is a decent stash of extra parts (hood, grille/radiator, seats) and an entire extra wrecked tub (that part I still have to go get from a couple hours away).

So now I have the roll cage I was looking for plus a bunch of other stuff I need now or will in the future.  The engine is supposedly good in this parts Jeep (he sent me a video of when he had it running), it has a 5 speed transmission, most of a transfer case, a horn button, a neat front bumper and winch mount, seat belts, a "sound bar," and lots of little hardware that mine is missing.

Fun times, lol!

Over this summer I decided to do something I had not been very excited about and strip the doors down and paint them red.

I first hosed them down with some primer:

I picked out a stock red I'll call "Kubozke Edition Red Enough"

This is definitely a 50-foot quality paint job.  I don't like it.  I'm really only able to do it and tolerate the results because it's a rough-and-tumble jeep.  That's also why "red enough" was acceptable.  The jeep will become more red-enough as other little projects are tackled on the project.

The doors now have new seals and felts and wipes and such.  That's kinda cool.  This whole process has reminded me why I claim to not be a body/paint guy.  It's not that I couldn't be good at it but I definitely don't have the space, the proper equipment, and most of all the experience to pull off a high quality paint job.  The learning curve is very expensive with high-quality paint.

Hardtop to remain black, or will you make it red too ?

It'll probably just stay black (it gets used in the winter so the heat absorption won't be a problem (rather a good thing, I suppose).

Ideally, I would have liked to paint the window frame and inset of the door black to match the top...  But I wasn't willing to spend the extra money on yet another layer/color of paint at this time, lol.

You might notice in the photos in my post above that the roll bar/cage is not installed.  

Before starting the door project I started thinking about putting some nicer cavalier seats I had into the YJ.  When I did that I was going to need some new seatbelts as well.  The seat belts bolt to the roll bar and the roll bar in the Wrongler was a mess.  I wanted to put the unhacked roll bar from the parts jeep in.  

I was not surprised, when I went looking for the roll bar bolts that the mounting points had been covered up (along with about half of the rest of the floor) with a mess of polyester resin and fiberglass.  Years ago someone must have been thinking, "eh...we'll give this old junker one last go-round."  Obviously they weren't accounting for me to come along years later and pour cubic hours into this thing they had deemed a lost cause.

When I got to digging, and after a LOT of wire wheeling away at the fiberglass covering it up, this is what the base of the roll bar on the driver side looked like...

A large portion of the floor where the driver side seat mounts was rusty along with one of the braces underneath and the vertical portion where the roll bar mounts as well.

I ordered up about $300 worth of patch panels and got to procrastinating.

Once the doors had been enreddened, I decided it was time to start cutting metal and rust out of the floors.

Before long I had most of the metal cut out:

Then it was time to start fitting and welding patch panels. 

To my surprise, I was able to slowly motivate along and eventually I had all the metal welded into place.  (in this photo I still have one patch to make and weld in...but it's close ;)

Tonight I got out the seam sealer and rattle can and made my patchwork floor black

I dragged the parts jeep out of the woods and extracted (with some fuss) all the roll cage bolts.  Here it is ready to donate its cage to the Wrongler:

Whoa. That escalated quickly. 

In reply to Cousin_Eddie (Forum Supporter) :

It was quite a puzzle.  Before I made the first cut I took a LONG time overthinking how it should come apart so I could put it back together.

Clem!

I just got a 92 yj myself!   It's a little rough and I have a few small parts I'm looking for.  Any chance I could see if I could buy some from you?   Feel free to email me at my username at yahoo

In reply to jfryjfry :

That's cool!  I'd be interested in hearing how your project goes.  I'll send an email.  I don't know if I'll have much you need for parts...My parts jeep is REALLY rough and somewhat picked over already and I have a stupid idea to maybe build something out of it some day.

Yesterday I painted the roll bar/cage with Rustoleum.  Today I set it and the seats back in the Wrongler.

I painted half the driver side with my new "Kubozke Edition Red-enough" paint after patching the rust down in the "rocker" area.  It sticks out like a sore thumb, but in time I'll try to paint more parts and get it looking more consistent.  I'm not really concerned about the aesthetic details as much as the safety and mechanical ones.

I got the rest of the cage bars and seatbelts bolted in and took if for a quick drive up the road to literally blow the cobwebs out (as well as a bunch of other dusts, etc).

Spray enamel? Or roller? Looks good.

It's an acrylic urethane, I guess.  I applied it with a cheap, purple spray gun from the hammer store.  Kirker brand "Performance Red"  

But I like my name for it better ;)