Grand Cherokee Part 3

It's time to go put this stuff to the test today. Project Five Grand Cherokee is good to go and we're out to prove this one. Soccer Mom Mobile is now a true dual purpose trail rig. Then we're off to one of the best upholstery shops around to make sure. Project H RT S interior is as unique as the outside of our hot rod truck. It's all today here on trucks.

Hey, welcome to trucks. We're back here at one of our favorite places to test out our four wheel drive project vehicles. Woolies off road park. Woolies has a wide variety of trails and the natural terrain. It's tough to beat. So it should be a great place to put our five Grand Cherokee to a little real world road test

that we've been calling it our

five Grand Cherokee for a couple of reasons. First off, you can pick up a nice VA Grand Cherokee like this one for about 5000 bucks. We also had about five grand to spend on our upgrades. And although that sounds like a lot of money, it goes fast when you start spending it. We also had the challenge of retaining a nice clean appearance and making this thing keep its road manners.

The first thing we wanted to change was the suspension.

So we called up Rusty's off road and had them send us a 5.5 inch long arm kit that's very reasonably priced

and features among other things, strong dom tubing,

adjustable spherical joints,

new coil springs and Billstein remote reservoir shocks on all four corners.

We also opted for Rusty's universal axle kit to mount our Dana 60 rear and the radio style arms just bolted up to the Dana 60 up front.

Now, the reason we lifted this Jeep in the first place was to make room for these 35 inch kmts on the allied steel wheels. Who knows, we may even get to test out this ceramic paint, see how tough it is now to make these big wheels stop when we want to. Well, here's what we did. This is a used parts upgrade mostly for the WJ

knuckles with the high steer arms.

We connected that to the ZJ unit bearing using a weld on spacer that allows us to retain the stock stub shacks. We red drilled the WJ rotors to match the bolt pattern and threw on new pads using the stock two piston calipers instead of expensive aftermarket units

to finish up the chassis and keep our on road handling optimized while we finally found some room for our sway bar mounts. Now, these are just the factory mounts repositioned so they don't interfere with our steering linkage and we can keep the bar and links out of the way when we disconnect it for more wheel travel

and to keep the tires and steering box from putting too much stress on the mounting point,

we installed the steering box brace that we picked up from Kevin's off road.

The rate spreads the load to the opposite frame rail, tying everything together.

We also got one of Kevin's lower radiator supports which is much stronger than the factory stamp steel support and it serves as a recovery point with these deer ring shackles and we can use front and rear the jeep only if we have to. Now to help keep these shiny body panels straight, we had to add a little bit of steel,

Tommy and Ryan recess, two by four inch steel tubing into the factory rocker panels

plated the outside base

and added tubing guards, all of which will quadruple the strength of the factory rockers and keep the trees off the paint.

Now, speaking of the T

rack, we welded on some mounts for our high lift jack and then we coated everything in a textured semi gloss black powder we got from powder X

and up front. We follow the same formula of good clearance protection

and cosmetics. Now for a little extra light when we need it, we recess these western driving lights into the bumper mounting them like this will hopefully keep us from having to replace them too often.

And since we needed a little extra tire clearance, oh, we just built the bumpers with that in mind.

Now, you can see all this behind the wheel opening looks like it came from the factory like this. But the truth is we sectioned almost two inches out of the sheet metal and this plastic body clad,

we did an experiment to see just how cheap we could get a professional looking repair.

So using some structural adhesive, a

low buck self propelled paint gun filled with PPG factory base coat color

and a revolutionary rattle can catalyze clear coat to finish it off.

So as far as looks go, I think we met our goals of a clean looking trail rig that doesn't look cut up even if it is now under the hood, we've added a few parts mostly in the name of reliability and performance.

We dropped in an optima red top starting battery to make sure we never lose power and it'll probably be the last battery we ever throw in this thing.

And we hid the compressor for the air lockers under the plastic cow screen.

Then we upgraded the spark plugs to Denzel

iridium

along with Denzel plug wires and a new cap and rotor from o'reilly auto parts.

Now to let this 59 breathe a little deeper, we plumbed a high flow catalytic converter. We got from summit racing into a flow master extreme off road muffler for a nice aggressive sound feeding that are Edelbrock ceramic coated headers and a down pipe kit utilizing stage eight locking fasteners and starting with a bolt,

you insert the locking tab

and finally the retaining clip.

Now, the reason that we chose stage eight locking fasteners is because the header flange and where it meets the head, well, that area will go through thousands of heat cycles over the life of the engine. And that is what literally forces some header bolts out of the threads with stage eight locking fasters. We're never going to have to think about that annoying header tick again. Now,

here we find a great place for a charcoal canister. This way, we're not going to throw any codes or throw any lights on in the dash.

And right here we wanted to use an air raid filter to keep the dirt and stuff out of the five nines intake and to keep the big clots from plugging the filter up, we use one of their pre filters, but right now it's time to go put this stuff to the test

up next. It's put up or shut up

and later making an interior that will fit the style of project H RT. Stick around.

Hey, welcome back to trucks. We're down here at Woolies off Road Park, putting our five Grand Cherokee to the test and

so far so good. But uh see what kind of trouble. We can get into.

One of the main goals we had was to keep this thing easy to drive everywhere and with 5.5 inches of lift on 35. Well, that's pretty ambitious, but the results are outstanding. The ride quality is great. Thanks to Bill Stein's shocks, but it's also stable with very little body roll. Great acceleration was built in with a 59 but Edelbrock headers and a flow master muffler make this CJ sound downright mean

panic stopping. A lifted truck can get squirrely fast,

but we had no trouble staying in a straight line and in control,

an important part of a successful project like this one is choosing the right vehicle in the first place.

Now, even if you're not a die hard Jeep guy, you got to admit this Grand Cherokee looks tough.

It's got the built in pedigree of a dual purpose vehicle. And while it's right at home in the highway off road, it's no poser either.

Our payoff day at Woolies was after a week of rain.

Now, four wheeling. Well, it's all about trashing and there's not a better test of traction off road than mud covered rocks.

Woolies has some pretty challenging trails and right away he found a sloppy deep gully with some serious shelves and boulders to climb.

That was close. That's the good thing about mud, you know, it breaks up but you can't get any traction.

That was,

that was awesome.

The engineering behind Rusty's Long arm kid really shines here getting the power to the ground where it counts.

And here here the air lockers don't hurt either.

That's one way to do it.

I love that V8.

You guys should consider yourselves lucky. The cost of replacing expensive cameras puts a whole new category into our build budget.

I don't know

that took care of her POV camera, whatever that's racing.

There's a couple of clubs that we pay attention to

tread lightly and the Blue Ribbon Coalition. But there's another club that this Jeep used to belong to that. We wanna pay a little bit of respect to

in memory.

This Grand Cherokee is definitely no featherweight but off road it's nimble and powerful.

And if you've ever had to talk the family into a day's worth of playing around in the woods. Think about this.

It has power, leather seats, power windows, air conditioning, a great sound system, sunroof and excellent manners.

Seats five, best of all, you can drive it home after you're done. Wheeling.

Well, so far this EJ is walking up everything we can throw at it and then some in the slick mud

and the tires are doing their job. The lockers are doing their job. The Rockers kids are doing their job, man. This thing is kicking butt.

I get a little seat time to see if I can bend this thing.

You guys that have been up these trails know how steep they are, but it's difficult to show on TV. So you're gonna have to trust us. We say Woolies has some tough trails

and we're just on our way to the ballpark. No big deal.

Now, we're calling this our five Grand Cherokees,

but the truth is we stole the axles out of our YJ project from last season

and didn't add that cost in since we technically didn't have to buy them twice,

no vibrations on the highway,

excellent road manners and handling combined with great off road performance all wrapped up in an affordable, solid and comfortable platform.

This is without a doubt the best dual purpose rig we've ever built

after the break. It's how leather suede and chrome come together to round out project H RT. Stay tuned.

Hey, welcome back to trucks now, unless you've been under a rock for about the last year, you know that we're giving away project H RT. This 37 Ford pickup is all Street Rod with the best of the best in the aftermarket right down to the cool flame paint job and it's not quite finished yet, but it's closer every day.

So that brings us here to a quiet unassuming corner in Shelbyville, Tennessee. To what very well may be one of Tennessee's best kept secrets. B and B auto trim. So come with us when me and Tommy, check out what's inside

Michael Young of Street Rods by Michael introduced us to these guys,

B and B auto trim has been doing quality custom interiors since the 19 fifties.

Over the years. They've been building a very impressive resume of completed vehicles.

Now, don't let the name fool you because these guys will upholster just about anything that will stand still long enough like this Jabiru aircraft that's manufactured in Australia but assembled here in the United States B and B throws an interior in about one of these a week.

Steve Gifford B and B's head designer is a hands on leader working right alongside his guys overseeing every project that comes out of the shop. Steve uses his years of skill as well as a keen sense of styling to anticipate new trends in the market, giving B and B's customers every possible option.

It used to be Tweeds, everyone with the hot rods. Now suedes leathers and the exotic materials now are just really hot

B and B takes their design cues from a mix of what the vehicle demands and what the customer wants

with project H RT. We wanted it to be elegant and classic. At the same time,

the chrome and the black, you know, the leather and the suede just gives you a luxury feel on the inside that you have something that's high dollar on the inside as well as

it's definitely sporty

man. Would you take a look at this? This interior is outstanding. There's three different types of fabric carpet, a custom overhead console with dome lights, hidden speakers in the corners, completely reupholstered seats, a center console and everything is wrapped around the custom chrome plated fiberglass dash from advanced plating. We got to get this thing back to the shop show you guys a closer look.

So we loaded up H RT and thanked B and B for their incredible workmanship and headed back to the shop. Oh, and by the way, you can find B and B auto trim by going to the truck's website. You won't be disappointed,

man. That thing looks killer, man. Those guys at B and B really hit one out of the park. Check out the details,

the leather accents on the chrome dash

rewrapped steering wheel,

custom made center console

and the six way power seats borrowed from a late model Pontiac. It all looks like it was made for this truck and that's the result of experience and a sense of style and design,

custom speaker grills,

an overhead console with chrome accents, a plush padded insert that houses our auto meter gauges, even the storage compartments behind the seats show B and B's incredible attention to detail and function.

Of course, the chromed wrap around dash from advanced plating and Watson Street works billet flame door latches just add to the whole appeal of this interior.

The combination of all these components is exactly what we had hoped for.

Now, the reason we're over here at power block is because this is the place that we're gonna turn the keys over to one of you. Lucky viewers. Yeah. And we still got a few loose ends to tie up the next time you see this thing, we're gonna take it for a little test drive. I don't know about you. I can't wait,

can't wait to see if we can spin these big tires

when we come back. We'll update you on our attempt to better Tommy's fuel mileage. Don't go away.

Hey, welcome back to trucks. Well, a while ago, we set out to do a long term fuel economy test using a Fitch fuel catalyst strapped to Tommy's 06 mega cab truck. And if you remember Tommy's Cummins powered 5.9 turbo diesel is basically

do.

It's got cold air and 35

and even at 7500 pounds, it's still got a surprising 20.1

MPG.

So we threw on the fish catalyst and ran about a dozen tanks of fuel through this truck. And here's what we found.

According to the truck's computer, we're now seeing 20.8

MPG, which is about a 3.5% increase. Now, this is obviously not a scientific test, but the vehicle's computer is how most people measure their fuel economy anyway. Now, 3.5% does

sound like a whole lot. But considering most diesels run well past 250,000 miles and with fuel costs hovering around five bucks a gallon. Well, that's a savings of about $2000

and the way diesel prices have been lately, but the more they go up

more you're going to save.

Now, if you've got any questions about the Fitch catalyst or anything that you've seen here on trucks, go to the truck's website on power block tv.com.

Now, if you like the looks of Tommy's big old truck, then Daystar has got the kind of leveling kits you need to give your truck the right attitude.

A little bit more altitude.

This is their two inch leveling kit for 94 through 08 Dodge Ram 2500 and 3500 pickups.

It comes with the spacers and all the hardware needed. So you can add a bigger wheel and entire combo to your ride while keeping the right look. Day Star makes over 300 lift and leveling kits. So no matter which one fits your truck, the price is only 100 and 30 bucks. So I'm sure that fits your budget too.

Now, if you're looking for a little extra engine protection, this is PX three's extreme oil booster. This additive is a patented synthetic formula. It works on both gas and diesel engines and PX three claims that will increase horsepower and torque but to 5% or more. Now, it also protects against heat while reducing friction and wear and won't cause corrosion of your internal components. Now, it's recommended for any street or high performance vehicle. And one bottle will treat 5 to 7 quarts of either conventional or synthetic oil. You can pick up PX three's extreme oil booster for just under 19 bucks. Thanks for watching trucks. See you guys next week.