Dimmwatt’s ‘57-2006 Rubicon Wagon

Second try at glove box was a success. For the first one, the flange was too big to shrink in a wood hammer form and practically destroyed the form. I made the blank much smaller for the second one.



 
I made a quick phone holder for our upcoming road trip. I only need it to last a week. Its made of a maglight clip, sheet metal and an old phone case that fits my phone




Finished and installed the glove box. Top right is the stock TJ glovebox light.



My son has been telling me he wants to learn to fabricate. I thought of a small project that I have been avoiding. This is the mount for the clutch master. With it, the pedel bottoms out before fully disengaging. You can still hear the slightest of clutch drag. A little more pedal throw is in order (or I need to modify my floors like I have been wanting to do... This may or may not be a temporary fix. I think he did a good job.




While I'm on the LED kick, I thought I'd swap out my inadequate, yet cool under hood lighting. First pic is the old one. Its all controlled by a gravity switch that flips on when the hood opens. Its similar to a mercury switch without the harmful metals. It uses a ball in a cylinder.



 
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Night shot of the new light. It works way better. More of a flood light effect and less shadows


Unfortunately the part my son made pushed the clutch pedal way too far out. I went back to the stock part and decided to modify the master so that its adjustable. I forgot to get pics before I installed it... It consists of cutting and welding a threaded end on the masters shaft, then making a rod end out of some steel. You can just see the end of it in this photo. Seems to work good. The pedal is now pushed out a smaller more acceptable amount.



 
My son's stock JK 6 speed has the clutch riding even a tad higher than yours is. It bothered me looking at it but I don't even notice it when driving. Once you adjust mentally, you wont even notice. BTW love the stock looking round pedal pads.

So you are proving that the car built by a builder, is never really DONE!!! Cool lights. Actually looks like you could repair something under the hood at night.

Duane

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Hung out with some friends today at Toms Farms





When I got home I started work on a new glove box for the driver side





I also installed a new steering box armor plate
 
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finished and installed the glove boxes. The backs are hammer tone paint, the remainder is 1/16 thick foam sheeting glued in place.


 
I only want to do this twice, once! I find myself saying that a lot lately.

I didnt like my buttons for the cruise control because they offered no feedback. I never knew if I had actually pressed the button. I replaced them yesterday with these tactile (clicky) buttons.



I had been running my amplifier off of a 12 foot long 3.5mm to rca extension. It had poor sound quality, was a pain to hook up and it would often cut out due to poor connections. The temporary fix was to wiggle the 3.5mm jack around. First pic is of my 5 channel amp installed in the panel behind the passenger. I also found the ground connection was loose when I opened it up. Its held in by that bar you see protruding from the side of the amp. Its spring loaded and pushes the amp into the body panel. It works good. Nice and firm, no rattles. The top of the bar protrudes through a hole in the lateral support bar on the body. The bar has an L bend at the top to stop it from working its way down.



I decided to order this JL audio bluetooth adapter. Its output is a full 2 volts which means higher volume than my phone could put out through the headphone jack.


Sorry for this blurry pic. Its of the panel reinstalled and shows the location of my high lift jack. Its not mounted, but wedged in, held by the tire and rear seat. the spare needs to be removed to access it.



I may have missed some small details in the build log... Like this combination seat hold down (when the other half of the seat is installed)/ dog tie down. When i'm traveling with 250 lbs of dog, I want to make sure that if I were in an accident I don't get killed by their weight.


My 10" sub woofer location. Tidy and out of the way. Again, not mounted down, but wedged in. I seem to have a theme going dont I???
 
It's all in the details. I really like the amp hidden behind the interior panel and the drivers side glove box.
 
This may apply to everyone here so I will likely cross post it in the general thread.

Yesterday I figured out how to restore those pesky frozen push buttons that are on your glove box and under seat doors.

Start by removing this clip with a very pointy object. I used an awl.

Its small! Note its direction of install.


This will allow the button to come out the front. If its frozen, add some oil, pry the latching finger up and gently coax the button out. This one was damaged heavily on the side and had the common dented in face. I wasn't able to remove the side dent completely on this one, but it was an extra, so I used it as my tester.


First gently bend this tab out


Make a dolly. I used a bolt. It required a bit of sanding to reduce its diameter, and I also put a crown in it.


Insert and gently tap with a flat face hammer in a swiping motion as you spin the piece




Next clean, grease and put it all back together

I did 3 yesterday. The far left is before, middle in process, right is completed

 
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I decided I wasn't going to have time to finish the glovebox door before I leave for moab. I need to find or fabricate the catchm and paint the door. The driver side wont work as stock so modification of the hinge and door is needed....just no more time, we leave tonight!

I did find time for a few small projects. I used a knob I found on mcmaster-carr for the shifter. It never fully seated and shows threads below it, so instead of cutting the shifter, I made a spacer. its round, tapers from 3/4 down to 1/2 and has a 3/8 hole. Perfect to be made on the lathe I dont have...so I chucked it up on a bolt, put it in the drill and ground it down on the belt grinder. EVERYONE NEEDS ONE OF THESE belt grinders!



This is what happens when you apply too much pressure and resulting heat on a cheap belt. It made one hell of a noise when it broke.The narrow belt that resulted is still useful.



finished and installed


I had a cast aluminum oil breather laying around. It had this lid...Its a close fit but required ovaled holes. I cut down some stainless fender washers to cover the holes.


 
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