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00:00Here in the shop, we're going to start with a bare frame and assemble this amazing rolling
00:10chassis that's part of our JK slash rock bouncer build. And we're going to finish it off by
00:16dropping the body back on. Today on Build for Off-Road, we're working on this. Now,
00:23it might not look like it, but this is a 2014 two-door Jeep JK that we are turning into the
00:29ultimate combination of Jeep and rock bouncer. Now, the reason it doesn't look like that is because
00:35it's just the frame. Last time we worked on this vehicle, this is exactly what we worked on. We
00:40basically got the drivetrain mocked up underneath the hood, which is a monster 6.4 Hemi. We love
00:45that. And then did all the frame modifications to basically clear that engine and all the suspension
00:50that we have planned for this. So before we put the body back on here and start chopping it up
00:55to fit a set of monster wheels and tires, we're going to basically turn this into a complete
01:01rolling chassis. That's step one. So we're not starting by cutting something up for the first
01:06time. We're actually going to put something together. That feels weird. Down, down, down.
01:11Six-four going down. Down, down, down. Six-four going down. Now I'm stuck. There we go.
01:18That's another one. Up, up, up. Six-foot going down.
01:26Bolt installed. Whenever you're moving an entire drivetrain like this around the shop,
01:33it's great to have some type of engine lifting device or leveler like we have here at the front.
01:37Makes lifting the modern engines a lot easier. But it's always a good idea just to keep a set of
01:41ratchet straps around because you can hook the back of the transmission and you actually use the
01:45ratcheting mechanism of the strap, actually raise and lower it. We recently picked up a bunch of
01:49these for the shop. These are WeatherTech ratchet straps. They have a working limit of 600 pounds.
01:56So I don't need to worry about the weight of just the back of this transmission. And they'll work
01:59great just securing cargo when we're out on the trail and stuff. They have these cool little S-hooks
02:04that have these little keepers on them. That way you make sure they don't slip off. And they come in a
02:08pack of two. So when you buy them, you're going to get two. So they're just handy to have. So if you're
02:12looking for some ratchet straps, go ahead and look up these WeatherTech straps. You'll
02:15never have too many ratchet straps. That's a promise I make to you. Now that the engine
02:19transmission is in place, as we've talked about before when we mocked it up, we've offset this
02:23entire package over to one side. And now we can start working with our transfer case. There's tons
02:28of transfer case options out there. But when you're talking about hardcore, heavy duty off-road, what you
02:34really want is a full gear case that can handle the abuse and the power that we're going to throw at it.
02:39And that's exactly what we have for this project. This is set up for 1410 CVs. So monster U-joints up
02:47here at the transfer case, which is perfect. So now the transmission's in place. I'm going to go ahead
02:51and mock up our transfer case, get it set to the correct drop, mark it for the studs. And then we
02:57can basically mock it into place because I need to build a custom transmission mount for the back of
03:01this transmission because, you know, custom. That's what we do here. There's no kits in this shot.
03:12Just like that. Boom. Mount. Next step in our rolling chassis is going to be to get the axles
03:18underneath of it. Now I said from the very beginning, the plan here is Jeep slash rock bouncer. And when
03:23we're talking about rock bouncer, obviously we're going to talk about monster big heavy axles. And that's
03:29exactly what we have here. This is a 40 spline, 14 bolt rear. And then we have a 40 spline front
03:37Dana 60. Now I'm sure you're looking at these things and you're thinking those things look massive. And
03:42they are. We're talking a four inch axle tube and a giant knuckle on the end. But the reason that we
03:50chose this particular front axle is because we plan to run a very specific axle shaft. It's over there.
03:59Now the axle that I'm referring to is this bad boy right here. Now this is what is referred to as a
04:05big bell RCV. Now we're going to get to why we're using these in a second, but we first need to talk
04:11about why are we going to put RCVs in anything? I get asked all the time by people when I'm out on the
04:16trail and they see my rigs, like, why should I swap out my U-joints for a set of RCVs? Now I looked over
04:22the entire shop to try to find a set of axles with U-joints in them. And honestly, unfortunately, I don't have
04:27any. I've kind of thrown them all away. But I do have this example right here. This is a short side
04:32of a drive shaft. And this is what you would normally see inside the knuckle of your axle
04:36shaft, a U-joint, a universal joint. The problem is that it has four points of contact between,
04:43essentially, your carrier and the tire and wheel. And when you turn this when you're off-road,
04:49it doesn't keep flowing in a constant motion because those four points of contact. If you actually saw
04:54this in high-speed camera, you'd see it actually almost work in an oblong movement. That's why
05:00when you're on the trail and your tires start to spin in the front of your vehicle, and often you'll
05:05see those vehicles, the tires will start hopping up and down like this. That's caused by the oscillation
05:10inside this U-joint. Inside an RCV is what's called a constant velocity joint. We now have six points of
05:17contact throughout that entire turning circle. And when the joint turns or the star on the inside
05:22turns, it smooths out that motion. So what happens is you have a smoother output of power down to the
05:28tire and wheel. And I'm sure you kind of figured out by now that we're talking about breaking parts.
05:33Anytime you are jarring a suspension component or a driveline component, that's when it breaks. So if
05:38we can smooth out that action, there's less chance that it's going to break. The good news is,
05:43is that if it breaks, if you have an RCV, you've got a lifetime warranty for your application. So
05:49this is a Jeep JL set of RCVs. Very popular application. You can see a big giant CV joint at the end.
05:56This is going to be warrantied for up to a 43-inch tall tire in your vehicle. Another option would be to
06:02step up to a set of one tons. This is for an 05 and up Dana 60 Super Duty. Very popular upgrade. This is
06:08warrantied up to a set of 47s. What we're running, as I said before, is this 40 spline big bell. This is the
06:16back daddy of them all. The biggest one they make. There is no limit on tire size or horsepower for this bad
06:22boy right here. So like I said from the very beginning, we're building that Jeep slash rock bouncer. This is it.
06:28But the best news is, is no matter which set of RCVs you choose for your project, it truly is a buy once,
06:35cry once scenario. Because not only are they warrantied for life and built in the USA, they are the strongest
06:42axles on the planet. Oh, that's heavy. Okay, so that cleared. Now we've got to come off this.
06:55Look at that. Great. There.
07:01There we go. That's its home. This shaft combination is all 43-40, but if you're looking for the ultimate
07:09upgrade, RCV offers all of their shaft combinations available in 300M material, making them incredibly
07:17strong. Boom. Installated.
07:34Today in the shop, we're working on our ultimate two-door JK,
07:37and we're building a pretty serious throwdown suspension to go with these monster axles. But
07:43this is a perfect time to talk about probably one of the most asked questions I get when it comes to
07:48any type of off-road fabrication, and that is, when should I MIG weld something versus TIG weld something?
07:57There are some very specific times when we would TIG weld versus MIG weld, but a lot of the times,
08:03at least in the world of off-road fabrication, it comes down to personal preference. But I thought I'd
08:09go over a couple of reasons why you would switch between the two forms of welding in your shop. So
08:14first, we'll talk about MIG welding. MIG welding is officially known as gas metal arc welding.
08:19Obviously, we've covered this a lot. You push that trigger. The wire then comes out. Electricity is
08:24transferred from the contact tip to the wire. When the wire meets the workpiece, a short arc is created,
08:31and that creates an arc which then creates the molten puddle, and then the wire is fed from the
08:35machine down into the molten puddle. That's your filler material. Now, in most fab shops like I have
08:41here, you're going to have a machine that has a set wire feed speed. You set up the machine,
08:45and the wire comes out. If we were operating in a heavy fabrication environment like shipbuilding or
08:51ironworking, you can step up to a more professional machine like an ESAB Warrior. Now, when it comes to
08:57TIG welding or gas tungsten arc welding, it's a little bit different because now what we're doing
09:04is the arc is being created, being jumped between the tungsten and the workpiece, and I'm going to be
09:09feeding the filler wire or filler material with my spare hand. The difference between the two is that
09:15I now have full control over how much filler, how fast the filler is fed into the joint, and also the
09:22amperage of the machine because I actually control the amperage output at the end of the piece of
09:27tungsten by a foot pedal on the floor. So when would you choose them, and why would you jump back and
09:33forth? Well, this is a perfect example right here. This is a bracket right here. It has a whole bunch of
09:38MIG welding on it. This is for the suspension on this Jeep JK, and this is a perfect example of when
09:44MIG welding works great. It's fast, it's quick, it's strong, it's fine. But this little captured nut plate that
09:50we're going to add to hold the bolt to keep it from turning. If we come in here and MIG weld it,
09:55we could do that, but it's so small it is better for us to TIG weld it, and I'll show you why.
10:04You can see on a joint like this where we just want to basically lock this washer into place,
10:09using the TIG welder ends up with a much cleaner and much more low profile weld than if we went in
10:15and MIG welded it. If we MIG welded this edge material onto this base material, considering how thick this base
10:20material is, we'd end up with a really fat weld that might cause undercut on the top of this washer
10:25and also wouldn't look very good. Another time where you see a lot of people switch from MIG welding
10:31to TIG welding, believe it or not, is on sheet metal.
10:38You can see down here where I TIG welded the exact same butt joint on this 18 gauge,
10:43I was able to essentially melt this MIG welding tack that I had started with and basically draw it across
10:49the entire joint all the way down, only having to add a very small amount of filler and I have
10:54a good fusion weld. This right here, honestly, is ready for a little bit of metal finishing
10:58and you are ready to go from there. So it removes a step in the process, which is why you see a lot
11:04of high-end sheet metal fabricators will prep their joints and TIG weld them instead of MIG welding.
11:10But you can see the benefits of having both machines at your fingertips in the shop at any given
11:16time, which is why it's great to have a multi-process machine like the ESAB Rebel. Now this is actually
11:23the Rebel AC-DC, so not only can it MIG weld, it can stick weld, it can TIG weld, it can also AC TIG,
11:30so I can do things like aluminum, and most importantly, it's equipped with the Cool Mini 2, so I have a
11:36water-cooled torch, so I have an incredibly small torch to fit into tight places. One machine to tackle
11:42any job in the shop. Before we sling the front axle underneath the frame, I went ahead and tacked on
11:50these shock towers. Now when I'm building custom suspension like this on an off-road vehicle, I like
11:55to build it at full compression, so that means the suspension is fully compressed and the axle is
11:59basically at full bump. That's where you're going to have any interference issues when it comes to
12:04vehicles like this. Now that these are tacked in place, we'll get the front axle underneath there,
12:08and then we'll start figuring out some suspension links.
12:31When you're choosing shocks for a project like this rock bouncer slash JK, there's lots of different
12:38options. Now I always have thought that when we're dealing with rock bouncers, you can get
12:43incredibly complicated when it comes to the shocks. You can have coilovers and bypasses and three tube
12:50bypasses, five tube bypasses, but I don't really think you need that because rock bouncing is kind of
12:56like a drag race versus desert racing is kind of like a marathon. So for this vehicle, what we decided
13:02to choose is a set of internal bypass shocks. What that means is that we have full adjustment of
13:07compression and rebound right on the reservoir. And what that allows us to do is fine tune how the
13:13shock reacts, whether we're on or off-road. When you're mounting your shocks, you really should
13:18plan to upgrade the fasteners as well. Now, ARP makes fasteners any size, any length that you can
13:26imagine, and they are perfect for an application like this. These shocks are going to see a lot of
13:31abuse off-road and all that abuse transitions through the upper and lower shock bolt. ARP
13:37bolts are 20% stronger than grade eight. They're 100% made in the USA, and they're available in either
13:45a black oxide or a stainless finish. The threads are rolled after heat treat, which helps the strength
13:52stay in that fastener after it's been made. It's a perfect upgrade for your project when you have a
13:58critical fastener like these shock bolts. While we're back here at the corner, I think I'll go
14:02ahead and start mounting up the brake lines. Now, the JK is a little bit different than, let's say,
14:07a buggy. A buggy, we'd think about running the brake line off the caliper, down the axle tube,
14:12and maybe up one of the links. But because we're going to keep this vehicle just as much JK as is
14:18hardcore off-roader, we're going to have hard lines going to all four corners because we're leaving the ABS
14:23intact. So we're going to need good long flex lines for every single corner because we've got so much
14:29wheel travel. And whenever I'm looking for custom flex lines, I only go to one place. I call Crown
14:34Performance. Crown Performance can make you a flex line any length you want. I've ordered 10-foot long
14:41flex lines for projects. They are 100% made in the USA. They are a multi-layer design. They come in many
14:48different colors. They are incredibly strong. I always tell the story about how I had a flex line on a
14:53project like this, and it was attached to the caliper, and I was racing in an Ultra 4 race,
14:58and a tree root came up and caught the flex line on the axle. And when it ripped it off,
15:04the flex line didn't fail. It actually pulled the banjo bolt right out of the caliper, and the flex
15:09line was still good. All we had to do was put a new banjo bolt back in, and we were back on the trail.
15:13So that's how strong these things are. Now, when you're ordering your Crown lines,
15:18make sure to get a hold of Crown Performance in California. You can talk to all their experts
15:23on the phone. They'll spec out the perfect line for you. They have multiple end options.
15:28If you talk to them, you'll get exactly what you want every single time.
15:32It's a big tire, but I'm strong.
15:45With the rolling chassis all mocked up, before we start building suspension, we want to test fit
15:49the body to make sure everything clears. So I'm going to have Ricky go get a Jeep body from the shop
15:54next door, and I'm going to go grab some lunch in one of my pickups. Of course, before I hit the road,
15:59I want to upgrade my truck with some parts from WeatherTech. Whether it's protecting the outside
16:04or the inside, there are no-drill mud flaps bolt right on. WeatherTech has you covered.
16:09Let's hit the dirt and put these parts to the test.
16:15Let's go off-roading. Brought to you by WeatherTech.
16:20Driving up the hill, but sunny up here.
16:24I think the best vehicle for overlanding or, you know, car camping, as we used to call it,
16:32is full-size truck. I mean, the reality is you're not going to hit any super hardcore trails,
16:37but you got so much room for your stuff in a full-size truck. You got a bed in the back,
16:43you can put a rack on the back, you can add a rooftop tent to it. You still have room for all of your
16:48friends, and you can get to some of the mild trails or, like, just mild off-road sections like we are
16:54here, and get to some pretty remote campsites with just a well-built mid-size or full-size pickup truck.
17:02This is 2010 Silverado. It's not a huge investment. They're not very expensive. V8 power. You know,
17:09it's IFS, so it rides comfortable on the highway. A little bit of lift, and you can fit larger wheels and
17:13tires. This one's got a locker in the back, and it's open up front, so you can do some mild off-roading.
17:19You're not going to throw it up any hardcore trails, but when you're looking to get into,
17:22like, remote campsites, it's got everything that you need. This is why overlanding has become so
17:29popular. You can get out in nature, still have all the creature comforts of home on your rig, and when
17:34you need to get back to civilization, you just jump in your truck and head out. Myself, I've got to get back
17:39to the shop, because I've got a Jeep to cut up. Jeeps, choppy, choppy, grinding wheels, lots of welding.
17:49Whenever I go out on the trail, I always like to carry some type of coolant stop leak, and for over
17:5550 years, Iron Tight all-weather seal has been the choice of professionals for coolant stop leaks, and
18:02that is because it chemically bonds with the cooling in the system, so it stops the current leak, as well as
18:08stays in place to stop leaks in the future. You don't have to flush the coolant system at all, so
18:14you simply pour it in, and it works fast. The perfect place to use Iron Tight all-weather seal would be
18:20if you had a leak at this junction, right here. This is a crossover through the intake where the
18:26coolant flows. Sometimes you end up with a small seep or small leak right here, or possibly a pinhole
18:32in your radiator. You simply pour it in, it acts quickly, and you are back on the trail.
18:50Okay, let's get the plumb bobs. Today in the Build for Off Road Shop, we're working on our two-door JK,
18:56that's a combination between a Jeep JK and a rock bouncer, and the body is finally going back onto
19:03our rolling chassis. But because of our rear shock towers, we need to clearance the body, because
19:09we've essentially done what's often referred to as frenching in these coilovers. On any Jeep,
19:15the best thing you can do is move the shock into the frame, and that's exactly what our suspension
19:20kit did. But because of that, we need to cut out this wheel well so this shock tower can fit.
19:26Since we're trying to keep a lot of the creature comforts of this JK, even though we've slid a
19:47hardcore off-road chassis underneath it, in the old days we'd just cut these holes in the tub and leave
19:53it. We don't want to do that. I'm basically going to build some type of interior panel structure to
19:57cover it up. We'll seam seal it with some seam sealer just like the rest of the body, and then
20:01we will coat it using this Duplicolor truck bed coating. Now, you've seen me use this in the past
20:07when I've been lining truck beds, but the nice thing about the Duplicolor truck bed coating is that
20:12it's universal. You can use it anywhere you want. This is a perfect application for this. It's a durable,
20:19impact-resistant black vinyl textured polymer, so it gives me a really nice textured finish when I'm
20:25done. It's dry to the touch in about an hour, and then you can actually start moving or using around
20:31it in two hours. So it's perfect for an application like this.
20:35I like it because it's quick, easy to apply, and made for the DIY crowd. Whether you're applying it
20:43with a roller, spray gun, or just grabbing an aerosol can, it's a great all-around protective
20:48coating that you can use on truck beds, inner fenders, tailgates, bed rails, step areas, and even
20:55running boards. That's a wrap for today on our two-door JK build. We got a pile done. We now have a full
21:02rolling chassis with the drivetrain in place. All of our axles are mocked up, as well as our shocks
21:08are locked into position. The next thing we're going to do is start working on of all the suspension
21:12links. We'll cycle the suspension, make sure everything looks good, and then we'll weld that
21:16in for good. Next time you see this truck back here in the shop, we're going to be dealing with all the
21:20things that are obviously not done. We have to do something with these front fenders. That new rear
21:25opening for the rear tire is not going to cut it, so you got to deal with that. And it's going to need
21:29something better than a factory cage for the throw-down four-wheel on this truck it's going
21:33to see in its life. But that is next time. Right now, that is a cool-looking Jeep.
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