(Part 2) Best products from r/GrandCherokee

Cool! It looks great. I picked mine up last year for a little over a grand and have been working on bringing it up to mechanical speed - mostly deferred maintenance stuff - but now I kind of love it and want to start upgrading.

For the headlights, I've had great luck with the 3M kit on amazon. There are a couple variants, all the same basic thing - sand down the worn plastic, put on a protective coating, looks good as new. Don't bother with stuff like PlastX unless you feel like reapplying every few weeks.

Clean looking ZJ! Congrats!

Do you know any of the maintenance history? If not, I would suggest changing all fluids and doing a tune up before doing any upgrades/mods.


Fluids

• The 4.0 seems to love Shell Rotella 10W30 - either T (Conventional) or T6 (synthetic) its up to you and use a quality filter - Wix, NAPA Gold, Mopar, or Motorcraft FL-1A
  
• Drop transmission pan and change fluid and filter - ATF +4 only No additives or anything else. Adjust the bands and TV cable (link below for TV adj.)
  
• Drain and fill the transfer case - Selec-Trac transfer case (NP242) and Command-Trac (NP231) get ATF +4 also. Quardra-drive (NP249) gets a special Mopar fluid
  
• Drain and fill both differentials - if you tow 75W140 full synthetic in rear 75W90 in front, otherwise 75W90 in both
  
• Drain and fill coolant. Zerex-G05 is now the OEM coolant, but you'll be fine with the old school green fluid. Also a good time to look over the condition of the rest of your cooling system. If you're running below 210 you're going to want to put a 195 thermostat in - running to cold causes tons of problems
  
• Siphon out your power steering fluid - either through the high pressure hose, or with a turkey baister. Use only Chrysler approved fluid not ATF. You'll need to burp the system after by turning your wheels lock to lock several times and topping of the fluid
  
• Bleed your brakes! These brake lines are prone to rust already, and brake fluid absorbs water from the atmosphere over time and they will rust from the inside out. spray the bleeder screws with PB Blaster a couple times a day for a few days before you get started to free them up - Check your pads, shoes, drums, and rotors too!
  
  
  Tune Up - This is what I'm currently running in my 4.0
  
  
• Champion copper spark plugs
  
  
  
• Denso wires
  
  
  
• Accel distributor cap with brass contacts
  
  
  
• Accel Brass rotor
  
  
  
• Accel Ignition coil
  
  
  
• Bosch air filter any paper filter is fine though
  
  
  
• gates belt
  
  
  
• Clean the throttle body and IAC
  
  
  
• Adjust the Transmission Throttle Valve Makes a big differnce in shifting
  
  
  
• Clean the Grounds - #1 in the "Dirty Dozen" list below
  
  
  
  If you do all that, and you have any issues with stalling or hesitation from the engine, This should be your bible - The Dirt Dozen
  
  Your ZJ will be running like a top, and ready to lift, modify and most importantly be reliable when you get out there to wheel!
  

Okay, I'll try to get this done on mobile.

Headlights: heat them and pop them open. It's honestly a huge pain in the ass Lol. Mask off and paint the internal bezel to your preference, but at least leave the ribbed and textured parts silver to ensure you still get good beams out of your lights. (The corner turn lens is also in there, see below for the tinting process.) Buy some butyl rubber ribbon and use that to heat and reseal your lights. I'll post links to the process I followed if I can dig them up on my PC. it's a little labor intensive, but the unique look is worth it.

Taillights and front corner turn signals: follow the process for applying VHT Nightshade spray on tint. I think mine are 3 or 4 coats and then clear coat. The clear reverse lights were masked for the tint and unmasked for the clear. You can then sand and buff them to whatever level of gloss you want. Mine were left slightly matted.

Lift/shocks/wheels/tires: it's an RC 2" bb with load levelers I got from Kolak on Jeep forums. Wheels are Discount tire MB TKOs and tires are 265/70R17 Goodyear Duratracs.

It's got a pinchweld mod to clear the tires.

If you want deeper info say the word and I'll give you a deeper write up when I'm on a PC.

EDIT for links

Picked up a new-to-me WJ in Feb. Driver headlight assembly was frosted over to the point of being useless, and the passenger headlight assembly was fairly new.

Decided to replace both with a new set, picked up these from Amazon since the price was reasonable and reviews were (mostly) positive : DNA Motoring HL-OH-JGC99-BK-AM Headlight Assembly.

Ended up returning them after a week or so because the light pattern was horrible and the cutouts for the side marker & parking lights were terrible (sockets wouldn't stay locked in), replaced them with these instead: 1999-2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee WJ WG Black LED Halo Angel Eye Projector Headlight.

They're the exact same as these found on Amazon (Spyder Auto 5011145 LED Halo Projector Headlights) but about $37 cheaper. Overall quality is really good, bodies are well sealed and the vents on the rear of the assemblies are completely different than the little rubber tube on the DNA Motoring headlight assemblies. I don't see these getting moisture inside compared to the others.

The projector headlight assemblies are waaaaayyy better as far as quality of manufacture (all the bulb sockets stay locked in and don't pop loose) and the beam pattern has a visible cut-off to it (unlike the DNA Motoring reflector housings I tried previously).

The one drawback to the Spyder Auto projector housings is that you can't do a full 9011/9012 bulb conversion. The 9012 bulb (low beam) will fit, but the 90° base puts the connector snug up against the inside of the housing to the point that it barely fits. The 9011 bulb (high beam) is flat out a no-go, the 90° base will barely fit without the connector attached, so unless you're okay with carving out a section of the housing the 9011 bulb isn't going to connect and lock into place at all. I ended up leaving the original 9005XS bulb in there for now, and I'm looking at swapping to LED bulbs instead.

Sorry it took me 2 days to see this post- Bad Mod.. bad!

One of my personal favorite can-do-in-stock-form-and-still-challenge-yourself trails (also a bit of proving grounds for any new mods I do as it is so close to Denver- Yankee Hill Road

I would also pick up a copy of this book for future reference.. This one has a lot to do with trails in Southern/ Central CO- but there is a version 2 of it that has trails that are a bit more northern.
I have used these books religiously since highschool for leading trails around CO, and even Moab. It is a great resource. For everything else- there is Traildamage.com- You can use the map to drill into trails closest to you or where you are looking to go out and the descriptions are pretty good most of the time (i.e. written by users... so think of Yelp reviews.)

Finally, It is a bit late for me this weekend, and I am travelling next weekend, but if I remember I will hit you up next time I am headed out/ up- would be happy to show you around.

Replace the tie rod ends. You need penetrating oil, a pair of big pipe wrenches, and some strength to get the ends off.

The steering stabilizer looks like it's shot. It's 2 bolts to remove; super easy. With that leak I'll bet you can easily compress it by hand. A new steering stabilizer is cheap and worth the money[1].

If you plan on lifting the Jeep in the future, get an adjustable track bar[2]. Also super easy to replace

Go for an alignment after you do this, particularly if you don't tape the threads on the old tie rod ends to act as a guide for how far to thread the new ones in.

I have no idea how many miles you have on your jeep, but I'll just give some perspective:

• at 65k I had to replace all my shocks. Had to. They were all shot.
  
• at 90k I put a 3" lift on. Steering stabilizer, track bar, shocks, front end links, and OME springs went in the front. This made my suspension and steering amazingly tight.
  
• at 120k I replaced tie rod ends. Had to.
  
  If you're over 100k and everything looks stock, I highly recommend throwing $1k at the suspension. Even if your'e not going to lift it, replacing everything will make a HUGE difference.
  
  Oh, and sign up for a couple forums. This sub is nice, but forums are much better wealths of knowledge.
  
  [1] http://www.amazon.com/Rancho-RS5409-RS5000-Steering-Stabilizer/dp/B000CB42EM
  
  [2] http://jksmfg.com/i-8952506-grand-cherokee-wj-1999-2004-adjustable-front-trackbar.html
  
  

Yah fawkes will be awesome, I'm waiting on some stand alone shackle mounts from them but they are pretty much made to order on a lot of parts it looks (8 week wait time for the shackle tabs) When you said underneath I figured you meant like this....
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004MDBF6Y/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_cZ-4xbB9KHWXS

I used the ones linked below. I think they are ok not great. No canceller or resisters needed. They display a proper beam pattern (if properly installed) and won't dazzle drivers in other cars. I love the whiteness and clarity of LED, but honestly these aren't much brighter than stock halogens. What I'm saying is you can do better but these are pretty cheap.

Cougar Motor H11 Led headlight bulb, 9600Lm 6500K (H8 H9) Fanless All-in-One Conversion Kit - 3D Bionic Technology https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07HNKRM56

EDIT: I have 3 pairs of these in mine, low beam high beam and fog.

Thanks! Last question for now....what are your thoughts on these? Seems pretty straightforward and risk free to me:

1. https://afepower.com/afe-power-77-16204-sprint-booster-power-converter
   
   
2. Fits Jeep Grand Cherokee - High-Performance Tuner Chip and Power Tuning Programmer - Boost Horsepower and Torque https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07SFXLWKB/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_vfT2DbS1FDCD0

Can't offer any help on what you bought, but can recommend the approach I took to this....

FM Modulator

Pair that with a Bluetooth receiver and you can even have Bluetooth music at the flip of a switch. Have been using it for years, works excellent

Edit:

You'll probably also need this too... look into it... relatively easy install

I highly recommend this 3m headlight restoration kit.

It worked great on the one WJ headlight I did. It did all I could ask for, but the pitting in places was too deep. I bought a set of new ones on ebay for $80.

The quality is not OEM, but for the money they're spectacular and you would think they're OEM looking at the face.

The only issue is regular 9006 headlights won't go into the low beam housing. You need to use 9006xs bulbs which are a straight piece instead of having the 90 degree bend for the plug.

For Grand Cherokee WK2 SUV Front... https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06ZYHF425?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share