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Street Look for my Jeep

TriZZle904

NAXJA Forum User
Location
Jacksonvile
Not sure just what you have in mind -- you are aware that the Cherokee is a unibody, right? There's no frame, and except for the front fenders the entire body and frame is a single, welded assembly.

Check out the thread "Chopping the XJ" on this same forum. If you want a customized body, you'll have to break out the sawzall. XJguy is one of our early members and you'll find him on our forums -- but that was no "kit" -- he did that all with the sweat of his brow, and it has taken him years to accomplish. (Actually, it's a closely held secret that there is no Warrior, and XJguy is just a whiz with PhotoShop :D )
 
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yeah i knew it was a picture, i saw the "Stages" of his jeep lol... but thanx il look at that thread... i dont know anything at all about installing stuff myself but maybe a local custom car place will do it ... for a pretty penny
 
Several of our members have "bobbed" their XJs, and I'm sure with a bit of searching you can find pictures and writeups. Stryker, Beezil, Borton are names that come immediately to mind, but I'm sure I'm missing at least one more.

You can customize -- but you have to do it, because with a unibody you can't just lift the old "body" off the "frame" and bolt on a kit. Since it is a unibody, before embarking on any major surgery it's a good idea to review the plans with someone who can advise you on how to reinforce what's left to make up for the strength lost due to removals of structural or semi-structural panels.

Forget custom shops. Aside from the fact that they are obscenely expensive, there's no fun in having someone else do it.
 
so once i rip it apart what kindof stuff ami looking for to use to create my "body kit" or my new body... am i looking for metals or pieces of other cars? this is probably not going to work but i thought i could maybe get an oversized "body kit" and cut it to fit that way id have the design on the fender i wanted and just make it fit th jeep... ?
 
I'm still not clear on what kind of a look you hope to achieve. Are you clear on what a unibody is? Except for the doors and front fenders (which are bolt-ons), most of the body panels, including the roof, are stressed skin members that are part of the structure of the XJ. It's not like a Blazer or a Broco or an Explorer that has a body bolted to a separate frame. Therefore, there are no kits, because there's really nothing to mount a body kit to.

Sean (OneTonXJ) has chopped his XJ down to little more than a rolling floor pan -- but he restored (actually increased) the structural strength with a multi-point roll cage. Beezil's customized XJ also has a cage tied into the chassis for stiffness. I don't remember if Borton's uses a cage or not, but I'd guess it probably does.

All those guys wanted a cage for stiffness and for roll-over protection. If you're after a street look, you may not be as concerned with the protection a cage provides. It certainly interferes with interior access. I just don't see any easy way to take panels from some other vehicle and attach them to an XJ unibody, but as I said I really don't have a sense of what you want to create. To be honest, it sounds to me like an XJ (or any unibody vehicle) is not what you should be starting with. You should probably be starting with a vehicle that has a real frame, and then you can bolt on any body kit you want. A Jeep CJ or Wrangler has a separate frame, so you could take one of those to get a 4WD platform, and replace or customize the body to your heart's content.
 
The aero kit on the Warrior is highly modified version of one I sell.
(yes the finished photo of the Warrior is a photo-slop picture)

The red Grand Cherokee in the link is actually currently for sale on ebay!

By the way NAXJA is for all XJs not just the lifted. There are a few fellas that visit here that have street minded XJs. We welcome you!

XJguy
 
XJguy said:
By the way NAXJA is for all XJs not just the lifted. There are a few fellas that visit here that have street minded XJs. We welcome you!

XJguy

Oh, yeah! Absolutely. I wasn't trying to put the guy down, just having a hard time figuring out how to accomplish what he wants to do on a unibody.

Maybe semantics is the culprit again. When he asked about a "body kit," I have a friend whose two nephews are in the middle of building a reproduction street rod using a complete Model A coupe fiberglass body that came in a crate as a kit. When I was more into sports cars, the Fiberfab "Avenger GT" fiberglass body for VW chassis was the hot setup, so when someone says "body kit" I assume he means "body kit." Ground effects skirts and spoilers and such are not a "body kit" in my mind -- they're just accessories.

If I'm on the wrong page, just tell me. I'll shoot myself with a small caliber handgun so you won't even hear the report.
 
yeah i guess im just used to saying body kit because my friends have imports and so thatz just what came to mind when i saw the future look of the warrior... i think ted z pretty much summed up what im looking for...
 
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