jeepcomj, do you really live to storm into threads and angrily say people are wrong about tech?
See, some of us don't do this for monetary reasons... if we did we'd be driving Hondas. We do it for FUN, so it's not an "investment", it's a hobby. I'd drop 2 grand on fixing my floors in my rustbucket XJ no question, though I'd be unhappy about the price, I'd learn to do a hell of a lot of sheetmetal work and repair that way. I'll probably end up spending around 300 (or more if I plate the frame at the same time) on materials when I finally decide to redo the floors in my XJ. Economically speaking that's a bad decision, I can pick up a rust free XJ around here with a blown engine/tranny for 300 and swap everything over. But then I wouldn't have as much fun (debatable) and I wouldn't learn to weld new floor panels.
Actually, all of that sounds fun now. Wish I had the space for a second XJ...
no but people should think about what they *should* be capable of, and stop taking their xj's in for ridiculously expensive repair jobs on things that either aren't worth fixing, or are ONLY worth fixing if you
do it yourself.
If I had an xj with junk rear frame rails...it would either be scrapped, or truggy'd.
I'm a comanche guy...so I'd be more inclined to go the extra mile for an MJ than an XJ. that said, if I had bad frame rust on a comanche, I would also scrap it. just scrapped an '88 chief for that exact reason...only had 120k on it, 4x4, d44, roll bar, etc... and I got it from the original owner. Actually, I've scrapped no less than 12 comanches for that reason...the investment is not met evenly by the gains of the investment, therefore it's not worth it.
From what the OP is saying, he has the skills (though he didn't exactly point that out until I questioned him) but not all of the proper tools. he also made the whole thread sound like he would actually pay for the frame rail sections, and pay the labor to install them...then changed his story to being able to make the parts and just have the shop weld them in for him.
I guess I was pointing out that even that is a smarter decision...it would run him less than a grand, and then he can drop a few hundred on sheet metal to repair the floors.
floor replacement on an xj/mj is easy. an investment of less than $500 resulting in more than that in gains through fun using the vehicle (be it just d/d, or wheeling).
Just sounds to me that he bought a $5000 vehicle a couple years ago and wants to turn that investment into $7000...I don't know if he already has mods on the xj, but if he does, let's say upwards of $7000 invested.
$7000 in a handful of years is a poor investment, especially if more investments are planned in the future. with the rust being that bad already, who can tell how long the xj will actually last?...may be a year, may be 10. That's not enough assurance to justify actually going through with the repairs unless you can keep the cost MUCH lower than the shop can do it for.
