Stronger tie rod for my Jeep Cherokee

After bending the tie rod on Scuffy a second time, I decided to make it stronger. I looked at several options. First I looked at getting the V8 ZJ steering set up from Crown Automotive. Then I figured out that my older style steering knuckles will not work with the ZJ steering like the later knuckles do.

After looking at the Currie steering on Matt’s XJ, I decided to simply reinforce the stock tie rod. I will keep the stock tie rod ends.

I began with an old tie rod I had removed for one of the parts cars a while back. The tie rod ends were frozen in place so I used my torch to heat the threaded part of the tie rod and eventually freed them up. The actual ends them selves seems in good shape so I decided to reuse them with new grease seals and fresh grease.

I looked through my scrap metal pile until I found a piece of pipe that slipped over the tie rod. I think I ended up with a one inch pipe. Since this tie rod was slightly bent as well. I had to hammer the pipe over the old tie rod.

Once I had it centered on the tie rod, I drilled three holes and plug welded the pipe to the original tie rod. I then lubed up the tie rod ends and put them back in place.

I tried setting the front end alignment with the Jeep on the lift as it is much easier to access the tie rod this way. I thought it might be close enough.

However, when i put the weight back on the front end, the toe was way off. So I had to set it again. It took a few tries, but I eventually got it set back to zero toe in.

I locked down the clamps and took it for a test drive.

It looks pretty beefy and I know it will take a lot more force to bend the pipe and the tie road than just the tie rod alone. I turned the steering to the stops in both directions and I did not see any place where the thicker tie rod interfered with the steering in any way.

I look forward to seeing how my extremely low budget fix works out on the trails this summer.

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