Scrapping the ZJ
There has been a burned out ZJ sitting in front of my barn for over a year now. I finally decided it was time to let it go.
The rear disk brakes are on my off road XJ. The engine (what we bought it for) is in Jenny XJ. The rear axle was sold to go in another ZJ. The transmission was sold for yet another.
It seems a shame to trash so many good parts, but there has been little interest in the body parts I have offered for sale. I have stripped off as much as I thought I might be able to sell and yesterday I loaded the rest on the trailer.
It is fun trying to load a Jeep with no rear axle on the trailer. I began by jacking up the rear and running my steel ramps as far as I could under the body. I then lowered the body on the ramps. I left the front axle in place with tires so that at least that end can roll.
I then set up my XJ at a right angle to the trailer and fastened my snatch block to the front of the trailer. I threaded the cable through the block and attached it top the rear of the ZJ. There are several holes in the rear bumper so it makes a nice place to adjust the angle of the pull by selecting different holes.
I used my battery charger to keep the battery up on my Jeep during the winching process. I then pulled the ZJ up the ramps.
Once on the wooden trailer floor, I put a floor jack under the bumper. This made the back roll as well as helped keep parts that were hanging down from dragging.
I slowly pulled the ZJ up onto the trailer. I often had to wait for the battery to recover before making another pull. Since the steering box has been removed, I used a long steel bar to turn the front wheels to line them up with the ramp.
Occasionally the whole trailer would slide toward the winch dragging the rear of the XJ it was attached to along with it. As more weight came on to the trailer, this became less of a problem.
It took an hour or so of maneuvering to finally get it in position on the trailer. Now I can strip the front axle and steering. Then it will be off to the scrap yard unless someone lets me know really quickly that they need a door fender or hood.
Update: pulled the front axle on the trailer. After the control arms and shocks were unbolted, the only thing holding it was the swap bar end links. I cut those with the torch and the axle rolled right out.
Update 2: I was waiting at the gate at Buff Salvage this morning when they opened at 8am. I was greeted by the friendly scale operator who helped fill out the form for a car with no title and sent me on my way to the track hoe. The excavator operator used hid giant thumb ot easily lift the ZJ off the trailer and drop it on a pile of other cars including what looked like a pretty nice Nissan ZX. The then used the bucket to squish the ZJ flat. He then noticed the axle that was left on the trailer and after a couple of missed grabs was able to pluck it off the trailer as well.
The return trip across the scales gave me a weight ticket which I took to the pretty girl at the cashiers window. She traded me a check for my paperwork. It was a quick and easy process.