The Grey

[BlueGerbil]

The Grey (was: BlueGerbil 2.0)

Some of you may or may not remember my former rig, a blue XJ from Germany, quite built, not too extreme, for travelling in Europe. It has been totalled on my way to the largest offroad expo in Europe where it should has been displayed in the booth of Global Offroad, a reseller of LED lighting systems I´m working with.

Last saturday I bought a "new" XJ and this should be the build-up thread for it. It´s stock as stock could be (minus the tinted windows), blue again, has the I6 4.0 HO in it, about 100k miles on it and is a ´99 Limited.

Plans include, but are not limited to:
6" lift, 285/70R17 MT tires, built Dana30/Ford8.8, huge amount of LED lights, winch, fridge, two seater, roof rack, bumpers, two GPS systems, nice stereo, yada yada...

 

[mike94yj]

Off subject, but do you know if the rear headrests were standard for the limited trim pack or is it a euro requirement?

 

[BlueGerbil]

Off subject, but do you know if the rear headrests were standard for the limited trim pack or is it a euro requirement?

They were quite rear on the Pre-Facelift modells (84-96) and even rarer with three headrests (like I´ve got in my daily driven black XJ from 94), but I´ve got no clue, if all Limited after the facelift (97-01) came with them.

 

[Root Moose]

Whoa, Jan, totaled the Gerbil? Backstory?

What's the weird box on top of the throttle body? Resonance chamber?

Rear headrests are Eurospec only.

 

[BlueGerbil]

No story, no pics, sorry! Just too sad.

Don´t know what that flat black thing is, yet. But it should be gone when we´re done with the intake...

 

[ExpoMike]

Rear head rests were never available in the US. Interesting that Euro spec ones got them but they also got other optional things like hood vents that never came on US spec ones.

Nice XJ BTW.

 

[alexfm]

Very nice. Im interested to see how this build goes.

 

[BlueGerbil]

Some small upgrades... first, the above mentioned Jeep now belongs to my wife. I got myself a silver 2000 XJ.

Beside that, my ´94 black daily driven XJ had close to 200000 miles on the clock and then there came another pristine ´99 blue XJ with only 35000 miles on the clock - so we bought a 3rd XJ. Now I am as broke as one could be, but what the...

That´s my new daily driver, it´ll get converted to LPG again to cut the costs of driving into half. Got a 1.5" budget boost and some 265/70R16 tires on moab wheels (taken over from my black one).

But now back to my trail rig...

Two mounts from Brodit and DashMount found their way into the cockpit - for GPS, phone, stuff...:

Clear cornerlights and sidemarkers with Sylvania bulbs (chrome-coloured) bring the bling...

Tires and wheels are bought and are waiting to be mounted. The Currie parts and the Reflexxion hood are on their way from the US and I hope we can start installing these things ASAP.

A new 260W LED lamp bar and some smaller LED lamps are ordered as well, the new rig will be used as a promotion vehicle for a friends company who is selling the fancy LED stuff.

 

[BlueGerbil]

The daily driver got a chrome fascia from a ´00-´01 XJ Limited, some maintenance and a LPG conversion with a 160l tank in the trunk. No pics of the LPG yet, but buying fuel for half the price is cool!

 

[BlueGerbil]

The trail rig sits on it´s "new" axles (D30 HP and Ford 8.8), has been lifted, yadda yadda, no pics yet, because the shop did it while I was away. Hope to have it ready for the "Abenteuer Allrad" fair by end of July.

The new LED bar has been mounted under the Hannibal roof rack where it´s better protected from shady people...

 

[bldeagle10]

man, looks like i'm going to have to do some research on the Euro model's and see what cool little non US stuff i can have shipped over i.e. rear headrests and other little stuff shown... looks like a pretty sweet build!

 

[BlueGerbil]

4 Switch console instead of three switch console in the US modells
Rear spoiler from the UK Orvis modells
5.9 ZJ hood vents from the UK Orvis XJ modells
Rear headrests

 

[BlueGerbil]

Some progress... the front coils are too large, shocks and currie antirock is missing, front bumper is missing, emergency brake cables are missing...

 

[alexfm]

What LED Lightbar is that? I've been looking at getting one for my XJ, although not as big as that one. Your rig is looking great! Im diggin those new wheels!

 

[BlueGerbil]

That´s a 42" LED bar from Vision-X. It´s similar to
http://www.visionxusa.com/LED-Evo_P...VO_PRIME_|_20_DEGREE_NARROW/product_info.html
but it´s custom built, so the outer 4 LEDs on every side have a "flood" type beam pattern whereas the inner 18 LEDs have a "spot" type beam pattern.

Yeah, I like the wheels to, found them very cheap in a german online shop. I´ve thougt about the 17x8" Rubicon knockoffs from Mamba but shipping would from the US would have been expensive.