• NAXJA is having its 18th annual March Membership Drive!!!
    Everyone who joins or renews during March will be entered into a drawing!
    More Information - Join/Renew
  • Welcome to the new NAXJA Forum! If your password does not work, please use "Forgot your password?" link on the log-in page. Please feel free to reach out to [email protected] if we can provide any assistance.

New shocks for my XJ

jpk

NAXJA Forum User
Location
Jacksonville, FL
I just bought a set of shocks for my 96 XJ. It has been a southern vehicle all its life so there no rust just the usual coating of years of road dirt. I know I should probably get under the rear end and use some penetrating oil on the upper bar mounts before attempting to remove the bolts. Any recommendation for a good penetrating oil to saturate the connections with?
 
PBBlaster is probably the most readily available.

Might be worth trying to use the little tube attachment and spraying the stuff up into the subframe structure underneath the back where the nuts for the upper shock mount bolts live, to improve the odds of them not snapping off.

That said, if those do break, at least these days you don't have to cut into the cargo floor to replace them, you can do something like this:

https://www.quadratec.com/p/rough-c...MIgsqs8Oyp6gIVi-DICh0TwAbTEAQYASABEgLGmfD_BwE


Good luck!
 
PB Blaster. Spray them daily for a few days before you start the job. A little heat from a propane torch may help it get in there as well.
 
I just did this the past week. It was not successful though. It did get mine loose, about 1/8 turn. I thought I was getting Kroil on the threads from the side. No. You have to get from the frame pocket for a lack of a better word. I snapped one head off, then just did that for the rest. I'll try and drill them out etc. Hopefully I can find a Left Hand drill. Sometimes that works. PB Rust Blaster is good too. I am trying different stuff. Shaffer's Penetro is an option. I like it after I've shot the threads about twice with Kroil. I also think once you get threads freed about 1/8-1/4 a real lubricant helps. Heat does too. Try a propane torch on the heads.
 
I just did this, too. I tried to get PB Blaster up on the threads from the inside, which I was able to. I was gentle and careful, moved it back and forth, but to no avail, snapped off 3 of the 4 bolts. I ended up using a flag nut kit found on Ebay.

That being said, the flag nuts were stupidly easy. Just took an air hammer and busted out those capture nuts in a couple of minutes. I wouldn't waste too much time getting the stock bolts out, nor would I waste time drilling and tapping. The flag nuts are very easy.
 
PBBlaster is probably the most readily available.

Might be worth trying to use the little tube attachment and spraying the stuff up into the subframe structure underneath the back where the nuts for the upper shock mount bolts live, to improve the odds of them not snapping off.

That said, if those do break, at least these days you don't have to cut into the cargo floor to replace them, you can do something like this:

https://www.quadratec.com/p/rough-c...MIgsqs8Oyp6gIVi-DICh0TwAbTEAQYASABEgLGmfD_BwE


Good luck!

I had seen these before but had forgotten about them. I may go ahead and buy them just to have them on hand in case.
 
Not a bad idea, they're certainly inexpensive enough...
 
Here's a tip if you have the patience:
What snaps the bolts is a buildup of rust on the bolt
threads when you're turning them out. to prevent this,
once the bolt feels broken loose, retighten it and loosen
again. Go 1/16 turn at a time, slowly, while spraying
penetrant on the upper threads. Repeat back and forth,
and after 1-2 complete turns the bolt will begin to turn
easier and will come out intact. I removed all 4 of mine like this,
without damage.

Did I mention it takes patience? Yes, took about an hour in all,
but better than dealing with broken bolts. Use a padded creeper
with a good head support.
 
I read a report that acetone and tranmission fluid (50/50 mix) is the best to loosen old bolts when tested against pb blaster and other similar products. You can use google to find the study. This solution worked great when i removed stubborn leaf spring bolts after spraying them for several days.
 
Per one of the employees at the local O’Reilly’s, who is also a street rodder, the Seafoam deep creep is the best stuff on the market. He tried it after being a dedicated PB Blaster user & claims it’s better. All I know about it is that it’s expensive, like $11 a can. I guess that would be cheap if it was sure to work.....
 
I’m also waiting on new shocks, so I thought I would go ahead and take the old ones off in advance. Three of my four upper bolts came out OK. The fourth one had the threads flattened on the last 1/4” or so of the bolt. I thought I’d run a 5/16 x 18 tap in there to clean things up. It started binding up in one place on each rotation. I ran it on in, but when it came out, there was a thread chipped on the tap. I’m thinking that’s not rust. I ran a new bolt in the hole, and it came out with the last 1/4” of the treads flattened. I ran another tap in the hole and felt the same bind on each rotation. There’s something hard in that hole and it’s not rust. My guess is that when Chrysler made my Jeep in 1995, the person or machine that tack welded the nuts on the back side of the cross member splattered some of the wire / rod used in the welding process, and it’s harder than anything else involved. No way to know for sure, but I got to thinking that if that is what happened, it may be one of the problems the plagues many XJ’s, besides just rust....
 
I’m also waiting on new shocks, so I thought I would go ahead and take the old ones off in advance. Three of my four upper bolts came out OK. The fourth one had the threads flattened on the last 1/4” or so of the bolt. I thought I’d run a 5/16 x 18 tap in there to clean things up. It started binding up in one place on each rotation. I ran it on in, but when it came out, there was a thread chipped on the tap. I’m thinking that’s not rust. I ran a new bolt in the hole, and it came out with the last 1/4” of the treads flattened. I ran another tap in the hole and felt the same bind on each rotation. There’s something hard in that hole and it’s not rust. My guess is that when Chrysler made my Jeep in 1995, the person or machine that tack welded the nuts on the back side of the cross member splattered some of the wire / rod used in the welding process, and it’s harder than anything else involved. No way to know for sure, but I got to thinking that if that is what happened, it may be one of the problems the plagues many XJ’s, besides just rust....

OOPS, they are metric!
 
OOPS, they are metric!

Same thing I thought, but I checked the three good bolts at the local hardware store and O’Reilley’s. All three fit the 5/16 x 18 sizer at both locations. None of the three would even start in the 8mm x 1.0. They would fit loosely in the 8mm x 1.25 but bound up at about three threads deep.

A new 5/16 x 18 bolt finger-threads nicely into the three good holes without binding or looseness. Gotta go with what I got.
 
Back
Top