Between 705 & 1200 SQ/FT Roboto's Garage

[rharman]

You might want to consider Type-X drywall for the door cover. Add some fire resistance to the attic opening.

 

[zmotorsports]

Very nice job on the ladder access and mount assembly.

 

[nicholam77]

Looks like a great functional improvement

 

[Mr. Roboto]

You might want to consider Type-X drywall for the door cover. Add some fire resistance to the attic opening.

Very nice job on the ladder access and mount assembly.

Looks like a great functional improvement

Thanks all! I sort of finished this hatch up. I added a layer of drywall to the inside and some foam insulation. Like many other things in my house, I still need to paint it.



It was unseasonably warm here this weekend, close to 60. Took the 2 door out a bit. Still plenty of snow piles hanging on.



Spent some time at the park with my older daughter.... who will somehow be SEVEN next month.



And the 4 door made it as far as my driveway, but it was good for it to see the light of day and run it a bit.




Had it out while I was doing an oil change on the Tundra.




If you familiar with the cartridge style housings Toyota uses, they can be annoying. The center drain plug would not come out easily without spinning the whole housing, but it made a bit of a mess coming out. Once off, I finally found an excuse to use the massive adjustable wrench I bought haha.



I've also been adding to my home gym, and trying to make it a bit more pleasant of a space to workout in the process. The wife wants to start using it a bit too, so it was a good excuse. Slippery slope for me, trying to reel in the desire to completely finish my basement haha.

First up, I bought a functional trainer:



This really kicked off a large basement re-org for me that I am still in the process of. While (mostly) organized, these shelves were getting to me. My kitchen is small and we have no pantry so we use this area for overflow.... and sadly some junk collecting.



I picked up a curtain track kit, and some cheap extra tall shower curtains, and here was the outcome. Much better.



As a hiker, I also love the Stairmaster. The problem is the home grade ones are usually junk compared to the commercial ones found in the gyms, and they are also really tall. Stairmaster themselves make ONE commercial (ish) quality machine that is scaled down for home use/lower ceiling applications, and I just happened to find a good deal on one used on marketplace. It needed some adjustment/maintenance so I completely disassembled it, lubed it up, and cleaned it thoroughly. Just need to find some help getting it downstairs.

I'll post up the other half of my gym when it's in place and organized.



And that's it for now!

 

[zmotorsports]

The XJ's are looking great outside in the sun. Enjoy the kids, they grow up too fast and this time doesn't' come round again.

Looks like several of us garagejournal members were doing routine maintenance this past weekend. I also noticed that your snowblower is resting on a rubber mat. To be honest, I really hadn't given these mats much thought until finishing off the attached garage and not wanting to get rust stains or scratches on my nice epoxy floor once completed, so I ended up purchasing one for the garage.

 

[Mr. Roboto]

The XJ's are looking great outside in the sun. Enjoy the kids, they grow up too fast and this time doesn't' come round again.

Looks like several of us garagejournal members were doing routine maintenance this past weekend. I also noticed that your snowblower is resting on a rubber mat. To be honest, I really hadn't given these mats much thought until finishing off the attached garage and not wanting to get rust stains or scratches on my nice epoxy floor once completed, so I ended up purchasing one for the garage.

Yeah, I have mine on a mat for the same reason, to keep the rust marks from building up on my floor, even though my floor is not very fancy hahaha.

The maintenance comes in waves here, and it all seems to all be due at once. Last weekend I also did an oil change and tire rotation on my wife's Subaru. When I rotated the tires, I noticed that the inside of the front tires was beginning to wear unevenly. Kind of hard to see in the photo, but it's there.



Here was the culprit (I think/hope). At only 75K miles, the lower control arm bushings are beginning to fail. They are dry-rotted and starting to separate from the sleeve when viewed from the underside.



Up she goes, drivers side arm is out.



I decided to just replace both entire control arm assemblies with a pair of Moogs that were pre-loaded with new bushings and new ball joints.



In with the new



They have an odd ball joint setup.



One of the inner bushings needs to be torqued with the weight of the vehicle on it. I'm used to Jeeps/trucks where this can easily be done with the vehicle on the ground but there is zero room to crawl under this thing when it's on the ground, so here is what I came up with. I dropped it down on to some wooden blocks to fully compress the front suspension and crawled under. How do you guys normally do this step?



Thankfully with the way this suspension geometry is set up, R/R the lower control arms does not impact alignment at all.

Also, bagged out of work one day last week to hit the slopes for some snowboarding. First time I've made it out this season.

 

[nicholam77]

Nice job on the control arms, and what a view snowboarding!

One of the inner bushings needs to be torqued with the weight of the vehicle on it. I'm used to Jeeps/trucks where this can easily be done with the vehicle on the ground but there is zero room to crawl under this thing when it's on the ground, so here is what I came up with. I dropped it down on to some wooden blocks to fully compress the front suspension and crawled under. How do you guys normally do this step?

On my Golf when I hacked my way through the suspension, there were a few bolts to torque under weight. Being on jack stands, I just jacked the hub up with a floor jack until it was about to lift off the stand in that corner (without the wheel on of course). I have no idea if that is suitable, but that's how I handled it with a lowered car and no lift. Your solution seems good to me!

 

[Mr. Roboto]

Nice job on the control arms, and what a view snowboarding!



On my Golf when I hacked my way through the suspension, there were a few bolts to torque under weight. Being on jack stands, I just jacked the hub up with a floor jack until it was about to lift off the stand in that corner (without the wheel on of course). I have no idea if that is suitable, but that's how I handled it with a lowered car and no lift. Your solution seems good to me!

So I have some very tall adjustable tripod jack stands and I started to do just that with the car up on the lift, but it made one slight funny sound in the process and that was enough for me to lower it down on the blocks hahaha. They did the trick at least!

Few cars through the shop this weekend. I did not take a ton of pics of the first one, but the guy bought this 2010 Chrysler 300 3.5 AWD for $500.



Not a bad deal. In has had pretty much no maintenance done, so he asked me to do transmission fluid, front and rear diff fluid, transfer case fluid, oil chance, replace the dipstick tube, rear passenger wheel speed sensor, and an air filter. Also to give it a once over. A dangerous proposition on a $500 car haha.

It wasn't too bad, but the brakes are completely rusted over and all need to be replaced, and both CV axles have failed:



And the front sway bar bushing mount has somehow snapped off the frame



He ordered all of those parts and asked me to do all of that work as well.

Next up was the white XJ I've posted about in the past from time to time that I've worked on. This time it needed a heater core flush, new radiator, and he bought a flowmaster exhaust kit.

XJ x 2



New exhaust kit on. I'm not really a fan of these bolt on kits that just use muffler clamps. I'm always overthinking the orientation of the clamps to balance what looks good and maintains the most clearance to surrounding components. And this kit came with some particularly poor quality clamps.




Next up was the heater core flush. I bought the Lisle flush tool, that uses compressed air and water together. it worked great i was very impressed. Took several passes until it finally started coming out clear.



Heat was very cold before, now it is hot! He dodged a bullet, the heater core replacements on these ****.




My next job coming up is a dreaded 5.7 exhaust manifold replacement. The manifold warps and the head bolts snap. Ordered this kit to hopefully help with the whole process. Anyone ever done that job before?

 

[zmotorsports]

You are turning into the resident XJ specialist.

Very nice work. I have the OTC version of the water/compressed air flushing system and found it works well in many situations, and I agree, the heater core ***** on these, on many Jeep models for that matter.

 

[racer-john]

So I have some very tall adjustable tripod jack stands and I started to do just that with the car up on the lift, but it made one slight funny sound in the process and that was enough for me to lower it down on the blocks hahaha. They did the trick at least!

Few cars through the shop this weekend. I did not take a ton of pics of the first one, but the guy bought this 2010 Chrysler 300 3.5 AWD for $500.



I'd give my eye teeth for a deal like that!

 

[Mr. Roboto]

You are turning into the resident XJ specialist.

Very nice work. I have the OTC version of the water/compressed air flushing system and found it works well in many situations, and I agree, the heater core ***** on these, on many Jeep models for that matter.

Appreciate it! You could say I have a type haha.

Back to work on that Chrysler 300 yesterday afternoon. It was beautiful out here, temps in the low 60s. Got to work with the garage doors open, the music on, kids were playing in the yard/driveway. Nice little taste of spring in the air.




Got the front brakes and CV shaft replacements done yesterday.






Car is a bit crusty. Fought me a bit, but I was able to get it all done. The circlip CV axles are always a toss up on how easy they will come out and how much access you have to pry on them to get them to pop free. Drivers side was much easier than the passenger side.


I also made the decision to try and sell my trusty table saw. I have a big cast iron full size saw which is really nice, but because of this, it is not mobile at all. So it's pretty much stuck in my garage. It's too much saw for what I need currently, as I really don't woodwork as much as I used to. I've had it for 9 years now (sheesh time flies). I paid $502 on sale for it, posted it up for $550 (saw prices have come up quite a bit, as have most things) and it sold a few days later for $500. Safe to say I got my money's worth out of it (all $2 worth!). It took up a lot of space in my garage too, which was a big contributing factor in moving to something smaller.



After a bunch of research, I decided to replace it with this model from Dewalt.



Hopefully I don't regret the decision, but I think it will be OK for my needs.

Last but not least, I bought another Guitar. I know, I know, I have issues. But this time I sold one to keep the number of guitars owned the same. I've still been longing for a Gibson Les Paul, and the new 2024 Modern Studio series finally got me to pull the trigger.

I am a little torn, it looks beautiful up close with some nice lighting



But when you see it from afar, it really looks kind of dull.



It plays and sounds beautiful, though, and I guess that's really all that matters. Also not pictured here is my acoustic, which I've moved into it's hardshell case with dehumidifier to keep it stored safely.

 

[nicholam77]

Nice!

I think that might be the same DeWalt saw I have? It has a few shortcomings but I think you'll like it. It has one of the better fence systems on job site saws, that was the selling point for me at the time. I'm sure you've probably seen in my thread, but bolting on a longer aluminum extrusion to the fence really helps get some of that stability of a full sized saw back.

Guitar collection is looking great!

 

[Mr. Roboto]

Nice!

I think that might be the same DeWalt saw I have? It has a few shortcomings but I think you'll like it. It has one of the better fence systems on job site saws, that was the selling point for me at the time. I'm sure you've probably seen in my thread, but bolting on a longer aluminum extrusion to the fence really helps get some of that stability of a full sized saw back.

Guitar collection is looking great!

I think it is! I was really torn between the Dewalt and the Skilsaw worm drive table saw. I loved everything about the Skil better: the power, the appearance, the functionality of the cart, however there were 2 main drawbacks. 1) The fence, while also a rack & pinion setup, was a bit notchy to operate from what I have read. A smooth fence is one of my biggest criteria. And 2) the work stand is SUCH a better design in terms of mobility and setup, but it really is massive, and I was looking to save space.

The saw did arrive last week, and I got it assembled this weekend. So far, so good! I need to order the dado throat plate for it next, and get a better push stick. The one it comes with is not great compared to the very solid one my old saw had. Any recommendations?



I haven't really posed about it much since I hate it, but this little bench/shelf has gone through many different transformations over the years. It's really a temporary thing that has stuck around for far too long, but I modified it one more time. I had to raise it 7" so that the new saw would fit underneath, and now that I don't need the full front opening width exposed to slide my old saw under it, I was able to kick it all the way to the left. I also added a shelf above my generator to store my winch on, which has just been sitting on my workbench taking up space ever since I got it.



Again, I really don't like this setup, but I need to re-think the entire right wall of my garage and how it's organized.

I also decided to upgrade my miter saw. I bought this Ryobi sliding 10" compound miter saw 10+ years ago and it has served me well though MANY projects. But I decided to upgrade to the Dewalt 12" sliding compound saw. So, up on marketplace this old trusty guy goes, and I ordered the new setup.



Finished up the 300 this weekend too. Rear brakes replaced, front sway bar mount repaired, transfer case fluid swapped, and the steering angle sensor has been replaced. The car had a traction control, ESP and transfer case light on. Best I could tell, it was the steering angle sensor causing all of this, as it has several stored faults, and I could not re-calibrate it's position.

Steering wheel and electronics removed.



Disassembled to access the SAS. it's the sensor that spans the 3:00 to 6:00 position.



All back together, calibrated the position, and success! Steering angle is now visible in live data.



He's picking the car back up Wednesday. Good thing, I need the space. I may be buying this.... more to come haha.

 

[rharman]

For the push stick, take a look at the GRR-Ripper. They're great. Get the gravity heel kit too. A necessary addition.

I bought a pair of them many, many years ago at a woodworkers show. Never regretted it.

https://www.amazon.com/Microjig-Grr-Ripper-GR-100-Pushblock-Yellow/dp/B001I9UNWC/?tag=atomicindus08-20

 

[nicholam77]

The GRR-RIPPER is good, and I do have one, but personally I don’t use it that often because I don’t like constantly adjusting it. It’s also quite expensive. Nice to have, though.

I do tend to use it when I need to apply pressure to the cut, like a slightly warped piece of plywood or something.

Tbh I grab the plastic DeWalt stick for most things, and just use my hand on larger plywood sheets.

For thin rips I like to use a John Heisz style plywood push stick. It’s sacrificial and gives you great control for really narrow rips like 1/8” or less.

 

[Mr. Roboto]

For the push stick, take a look at the GRR-Ripper. They're great. Get the gravity heel kit too. A necessary addition.

I bought a pair of them many, many years ago at a woodworkers show. Never regretted it.

https://www.amazon.com/Microjig-Grr-Ripper-GR-100-Pushblock-Yellow/dp/B001I9UNWC/?tag=atomicindus08-20

The GRR-RIPPER is good, and I do have one, but personally I don’t use it that often because I don’t like constantly adjusting it. It’s also quite expensive. Nice to have, though.

I do tend to use it when I need to apply pressure to the cut, like a slightly warped piece of plywood or something.

Tbh I grab the plastic DeWalt stick for most things, and just use my hand on larger plywood sheets.

For thin rips I like to use a John Heisz style plywood push stick. It’s sacrificial and gives you great control for really narrow rips like 1/8” or less.

Thank you both for the recommendations. I've seen the GRR-Ripper advertised quite a lot. I do think for certain scenarios, it's probably the only tool for the job, however I've always thought it does look like it would take a while to adjust for each different cut like Nick mentioned. Regardless, maybe I'll add one to my fleet, and save some money and build my own also, like the style Nick linked to.

So that Camaro I teased in my last post... I think I am going to pick it up next weekend. It's a co-workers car. It started having the infamous T56 2nd gear synchro issue, which you can work around, but it also blew a clutch line. Once that happened, it's been sitting ever since and he lost the motivation to work on it. It's a ~1995 Z28, so an original LT1 car, but it's had a LS1 swapped into it from a newer SS camaro. I've really had the itch for a V8 RWD manual sports car so this may be a cheap way to scratch that. I also really would like to learn more about the LS platform. Someday I hope to have a C5 or C6 corvette.

Anyway, since it cannot move under its own power, I needed to finally get the winch mounted on my trailer. My winch is on a 2" hitch mount plate, so I added a receiver to the front of the deck to accomodate this. It's bolted down with (4) 5/8" grade 8 bolts, and I added a thick metal backing plate on the underside to help disperse the load as well. Should hopefully do the job. No power solution yet, but for now I'll just run jumper cables to a 2nd vehicle.





This kind of lit a fire in me to finish up and sell the 2 door XJ. I've been too busy working on other people's cars to do anything on it. And the only reason I've been hesitant to sell it is that I've enjoyed driving the manual. But with the Camaro potentially coming, I'll have that. So it's time.

Finally applied the seam sealer to the replacement panels I did on the floor. My first time going this. It's probably a bit messy, but I plan to spray them all over with undercoating, so it should all blend in nicely.






I need to go back and add some to a few spots, but overall it's not bad for my first time I think.

This XJ came with a aftermarket ratcheting style lunchbox locker in the rear end. They're OK if you're primarily off roading but it was a nuisance in here. Especially with the manual. Thankfully the previous owner gave me the spider gears and the rest of the guts to return it back to an open diff, so I popped the diff cover and started removing it.

Forgot to take a before pic, but here it is partially disassembled.





All out:



I've got this Friday off, so it will stay on the lift until then when i can jump back on it. I've always wondered if I can sneak my XJ back in front of the lift with a car up on it. Tried it out, and I can!

 

[Mr. Roboto]

Well, being greeted by this view for 2 days in a row as I returned home from work was enough. Had to sneak out last night and do some work.



First up, I finished reassembling the rear end. The original spiders/idlers went back in. Cleaned up the diff cover surface, and RTVd that back in place.



Got all of the locker components cleaned up and took a pic to list it up for sale. It's an Aussier locker for a 29 spline 8.25 rear end, so hopefully someone will grab it. It originally cost $320




Also unrelated, I had to do some diagnosis on the new guitar. Got some ground buzz going on. Pulled the rear cover off and did some checking with the multimeter and determined that the bridge/strings are not grounded. Buzzes out fine from the input jack to all the pots, pickups, switch, and the wire TO the bridge, but it must not be connected at the bridge end. The bridge has to come off for this and I don't want to mess with it so the company I bought it from said they will pay for me to have this repair done at a local shop.

Kind of wild now, that guitars now have circuit cards inside of them vs the traditional soldered wires running to/from everything. This is mostly due to the new generation of guitars all having push/pull pots for coil tapping/splitting/phase change etc.

 

[Mr. Roboto]

Hit the underside of the Jeep with undercoating in all of the areas where I replaced the floors. It all blended in really well, I'm quite happy with the outcome considering it's my first time doing this type of work:




Also reinstalled the front driveshaft. It was out of the Jeep when I bought it. The front straps/hardware was in poor shape, so I grabbed some new stuff:



Painted the front bumper as well, and also removed all the fender flares/rear bumper caps to be painted, but didn't get to it yet.



And then Sunday, I spent the day picking up the Camaro. It was 200 miles round trip, so my longest adventure with the trailer so far, but it all went fine.


All loaded up. I didn't grab any photos but I used the winch to pull it onto the trailer - worked out very well.



And back home!



I'm just going to leave it sitting here on the trailer for the time being. 1) because I'm not ready to work on it yet. And 2) it doesn't drive, so I'll probably need some help anyways getting it off and into the garage.



Sun setting on a long day

 

[zmotorsports]

Nice job on the XJ gearset as well as floorpans. They look good.

Congrats on the new to you Camaro. Looks like a fun project. Looking forward to watching it unfold.

 

[Mark_17]

Do you know how they went about converting the camaro to an LS?

I have worked on far more of those LT1 cars than I'd like to admit. They all have gone through multiple iterations.

 

[Bob Heine]

Looks like the Camaro has a 3" exhaust!

 

[Mr. Roboto]

Nice job on the XJ gearset as well as floorpans. They look good.

Congrats on the new to you Camaro. Looks like a fun project. Looking forward to watching it unfold.

Thank you! It’s not really something I’d normally buy, seeing as it’s someone else’s project and I couldn’t even drive it. But for the price I paid, risk was fairly low. We’ll see where it takes me!

Do you know how they went about converting the camaro to an LS?

I have worked on far more of those LT1 cars than I'd like to admit. They all have gone through multiple iterations.

Not sure. This car is a mutt and will take some time to figure out the puzzle. If I had to guess it’s likely been swapped over from a later model SS but as of now, your guess is as good as mine.

Looks like the Camaro has a 3" exhaust!

Yes! It has a 3” magnaflow exhaust system and a hurst shifter. 2 mods I would have likely done at some point myself!

 

[zmotorsports]

Thank you! It’s not really something I’d normally buy, seeing as it’s someone else’s project and I couldn’t even drive it. But for the price I paid, risk was fairly low. We’ll see where it takes me!

In all honesty, some of the better priced projects I've done have been ones where someone started, lost interest or got in too deep for their skillset and I was able to pick up the project mid-construction for pennies on the dollar.

 

[Mr. Roboto]

In all honesty, some of the better priced projects I've done have been ones where someone started, lost interest or got in too deep for their skillset and I was able to pick up the project mid-construction for pennies on the dollar.

Fair point - I hope that is the case here!

Had this newer ram rebel in for an exhaust manifold replacement this weekend. These 5.7s have a common problem where the manifold warps, and snaps the mounting bolts in doing so. The problem is so common that Lisle even makes a tool for drilling the bolt locations for this job, as they often snap off flush with the block.



Nice looking truck otherwise though.



Thankfully it was the passenger side - access is much better than on the drivers side. Got the old manifold out. There were 3 broken bolts to start.


You can see in the left most port where the gasket is very black from the exhaust leak.



I was able to extract 2 of the broken bolts, but this location needed to be completely drilled out and re-tapped. The M8x1.25 tap I had was a standard tapered tap, so I could not get the threads deep enough into the blind hole. Thankfully amazon was able to overnight a bottoming tap.



New manifold in. All bolts torqued to spec without any issues - phew! You can see Dodge added a tie bar to the upper and lower row of bolts. I suspect that this is to increase clamping force and better distribute the preload from the bolts to assist in the issue not happening again. More of a band-aid than anything else if you ask me.



Heat shield on and exhaust flange torqued back up to the down pipe.



Took the XJ out of hibernation a bit too. Maybe a bit too early, we're being threatened with another Noreaster this week, but it was good to stretch its legs.

 

[zmotorsports]

Nice job on the manifold replacement and the XJ is looking great out in her element.

 

[Trapps]

What Mike said!

 

[nicholam77]

Sweet pick up with the Camaro!!!

 

[Mr. Roboto]

Nice job on the manifold replacement and the XJ is looking great out in her element.

Thank you! It was kind of a pain. If his drivers side lets go, I will politely decline the job, as that side is even worse haha.

Sweet pick up with the Camaro!!!

Thanks! I am excited for where this one could go.

We had a freak snowstorm in the Northeast with heavy wet snow and wind. Knocked out our power for 2 days straight. Generator kept us going.



Kind of threw off my plans a bit, but once it came back, I did some stuff on the 2 door.

Got the new carpet installed and most of the interior back together.







Seats back in for the final time



I did not replace the trunk carpet. The new one isn't a perfect match to it, but I have a rubber trunk matt that will cover it up and make it barely noticeable.

I removed this hideous headliner also. I need to recover it next. I've always done the actual foam backed headliner material, but that stuff is getting expensive. I'll probably just grab some generic dark gray material for much less this time around.



Installed a new Flowmaster super 44 cat back exhaust too. It still had the original exhaust system, which was in dire need of replacement. Forgot to take any pics.

Lastly, I need to decide how much paint work I want to have Done on this jeep. If I were keeping it, I would do it all, but since I am flipping this one, I need to balance out cost/return. The hood and roof absolutely need to be painted, but the whole drivers side is dull due to the clear coat failing. And the passenger 1/4 panel could use some additional rust repair. I could set the bar high - a cosmetically good 2 door 5 speed XJ would really sell for a lot, but the higher the listing price, the more I limit the group of buyers, and therefore likely increase the time it would take to sell. But selling it with some faded paint at a more affordable price may net similar profit given the fact I would spend as much on paint/body work..... need to get some quotes!

 

[Mr. Roboto]

One update to share…. I spent last weekend traveling to PA and back with my dad to look at his dream car: a 1969 Camaro SS 350 in hugger orange with a 4 speed manual transmission. He just retired at the beginning of April and has been planning to do this for YEARS. The car was beautiful, and he did decide to purchase it. We decided against towing it back that distance with my open trailer. He’s having it transported via enclosed car hauler and it should be in NH in about 2 weeks. He is beyond excited, as am I!

I only gabbed a few pics in all the excitement but will get some more when it’s here.

 

[zmotorsports]

BEAUTIFUL car. Congratulations to your dad on the purchase of his dream car AND his retirement. May he be able to enjoy both for many, many years to come.

 

[zanyad]

Second Mike's comment above. Gorgeous car, congrats to dad x2.

 

[Finallygotit]

Very envious! Congrats to your dad on his retirement and the '69 Camaro.

 

[nicholam77]

Wow, your dad's new ride is

It looks brand new!

Funny you both have 'new' Camaros now

 

[Mr. Roboto]

Thanks everyone for the kind comments on his Camaro! The shipping company got it to him super quick, and without any issues. He’s so happy to have it home.



I was away on a work trip in MD when it arrived in NH. I squeezed in a visit to Camden Yards for an Orioles game one night I was there. I have always wanted to visit this park, and it didn’t disappoint.




Getting close to being done with the 2 door also. Recovered the headliner and got that reinstalled. I used some cheap material this time (vs the actual headliner stuff) to save some $. Still much better than what it was.



Had to make some adjustments to the exhaust as well. It was hitting in a few places. Remembered
To snap some pics this time. These bolt on kits can be ugly, but oh well.





I also painted the rear bumper, and got the chrome tip installed/adjusted.


Replaced the rear bump stops also. 2 of the 4 bolts snapped coming out (as they always seem to do).



It’s going to the painter in 2 weeks. I’m having him repaint the hood, roof, and the entire drivers side. I decided to really make the exterior nice to try and get all the money out of this flip. Plus it’s a new guy I met, so I really want to feel out his abilities. I need to find a painter to work with for future projects.

 

[Mr. Roboto]

Been keeping busy the last few weeks. Had a 2013 ram in weekend before last for a spark plug change (all 16 of them!) oil change and rear brakes. Only pic I took of this job haha:


And another ram this weekend for a steering rack R/R



Then my dad swung by with his car to get it up on the lift for the first time. The reverse lights were not wired up, so it would technically fail inspection for this. Hurst makes a kit that adds a microswitch to the reverse linkage that just completes a circuit when engaged that sends power to them. Install was pretty straightforward. Dropped the ball on pics here as well. Just grabbed this one of it up on the lift.



Also dropped the 2 door off to the guy doing the paint/body work. He sent me a few updates. Things are underway!

 

[st4ngster]

congratulations to you guys, that Camaro really is a beauty, I love the color

btw: I have a JKU myself and always loved the XJs
you are the reason I am looking for a 2 door XJ around my area now

 

[Mr. Roboto]

congratulations to you guys, that Camaro really is a beauty, I love the color

btw: I have a JKU myself and always loved the XJs
you are the reason I am looking for a 2 door XJ around my area now

Good luck! I hope you're able to find one. They're hard enough to locate in the US, I can only imagine how much more difficult it is in your area.

Been a minute for me since I posted much. Got a few more updates from the painter. After some discussion, I had him expand his scope a bit to include a few more areas that weren't going to be addressed originally. I think it was the right call. Hopefully it's done in another couple weeks. This jeep should look fantastic when it's all done.







Got the irrigation fired up, and the lawn is coming in nicely. Had another bad zone valve that needed to be replaced. I've replaced 4 out of 5 now. When I replaced a valve last year, I bought 2X of everything needed, so I had everything at the house already, ready to go.



Been trying to make the most out of spring when time allows. Finally got to test out the new bike rack, and did some mountain biking. The rack is super solid, and it holds the bike nice and high to still maintain some ground clearance.





This got me thinking about my road/hybrid bike... it's the first "real" bike I bought when I got into cycling, which was 17 years ago...... man does the time fly. Trek released a "sport" series of their popular FX hybrid (which is the bike I presently have) which is kind of a do-it-all setup. Flat bars, full carbon fiber frame, disc brakes, and it comes setup with a more robust gravel rated component set and tires. Makes it very capable and comfortable, and I'm not really looking to set any speed records in a full road bike with narrow tires, drop bars etc so I decided it was the bike for me.



Previously, I've hung my bikes up from the ceiling in my basement. I've come to find out through the years, that this really isn't good for them, for various reasons. Most notably, it's not the best for the hydraulic brakes. So I needed to move them to the floor. My wife told me to just get some kickstands, to which I replied "real bikes don't have kickstands" so I build this bike rack instead. It won't win any awards, but it gets the job done. The wife's bike is very basic with cable actuated brakes.... so that one can stay up!

 

[Mr. Roboto]

Not to much to report here. Body guy is still making slow and steady progress on the XJ. It's mostly done, just needs paint at this point. It's grown to almost an entire respray at this point haha.




Had a random house repair creep up too. The trim kit in my shower has been looking pretty crappy. The chrome plating started to flake off and I didn't want my kids to cut their hands on it. Also, the valve itself started to develop a slow leak so it was time to replace it.

The handle was so corroded on I needed to get this tool to pull it off



Once the handle/trim was off, this is what greeted me.



It was so stuck in there, I had to go back to Home Depot to get this puller tool to remove it.



Old and new valve.



All buttoned up, with a new trim kit/handle installed as well. I hate plumbing, but when there is no soldering involved, I can usually handle the repair.



In other news, made it out for a few hikes recently





And been getting some miles in on the new bike as well

 

[Bessy]

Man, plumbing is one area that I really don't like messing around. Too easy for it to get expensive and quickly. I think the only job I dislike more than plumbing is finishing drywall, but that's for entirely different reasons. That Trek is one sweet looking bike!

Cheers!

 

[isonic]

Lawn is looking great. Do you know what type of grass you have there? Looking for something good for my lawn here in MN.