Project: "GoodTimes"
Project "Goodtimes" was never expected to take the form of such a rigorous build-up when first purchased in the summer of 2000. "Goodtimes" was the third Jeep in my garage, but the first CJ project I have owned. Initially it was purchased on a whim, simply for cool factor. My good friend Blake bought a CJ7 to replace his Nissan truck, and when he caught the CJ bug so did I. I bought "Goodtimes" with a 3-inch Procomp lift and a rotting top with a gun rack...that was about it. As the project grew, I realized that if I was going to build a big Jeep I would do it right, surpassing the money grubbing habit of going from a 3- to 4-inch lift to an SOA setup...soon after, the "fun" began. My vision was to: Fit 38's on a CJ5 - that is all I knew and all I cared to do.

Initially when doing a build-up you have to make one of the toughest decisions in your Jeeps' life: What to do about that 4.2 inline 6. With the popularity of crate 350 swaps growing, I decided to go against the grain and build up my inline engine with a twist. The fist major step was contacting Clifford Performance out of Corona, California. Originally I just called them for some stud alignment washers...and in the end, I came out with a built 4.0 head swap under my belt and a 4.2 with 2 times the HP of a stock CJ.

With the newly added horsepower, I now decided I could justify turning the meats that I had envisioned before. Again on an impulse, I enlisted a friend with a big truck to take me out to find some axles...3 hours later I was sitting in my garage with a D44 14-bolt combo from a 3/4 ton Chevy Suburban. Little did I know that this swap would take me upwards of a year to complete; partially because my 14 bolt fell on my hand one night while doing some work, and when one of those lands on your hand there isn't much you can do but wait for someone else to get home. Needless to say that put me out of commission for a while.

However, the end result was awesome. I decided to keep the axles full width and used 3-inch CJ lift springs that I had to top off the SOA. Everything was either built or made by me with the exception of the shackle-reversal system from Matkins. And with a little (and later a lot) of fender trimming, I now proudly run 38's with ease.

Immediately I ran into a big, unexpected problem...no not the fact that I can now only drive 45 MPH safely on the street, but that the San Diego police like to follow me around and give me a ticket every time I roll into town. So I decided that this would be a perfect justification to go and purchase a tow vehicle. I ended up getting a Chevy dually with a Big Block that serves my needs just fine and get better gas mileage than the CJ gets.

With a new tow vehicle in the driveway, I now had the opportunity to turn "Goodtimes" into a Rock buggy. Right off the bat I broke out the angle grinder, cut off my windshield, removed my front fenders and did some "custom body work". To top off the function orientation, I pulled out my seats and installed one Pro Stock racing seat from Summit and bought some tank gunnery goggles to make driving livable.

So is the build-up done? Not in the slightest...heck I'm only 2 years into this Jeep! So what's next? A new 290 Clifford cam I just received in the mail should go in sometime soon. A full cage and new frame from Matkins is coming in December, and the guys at Clifford and I are trying to decided between going for an MPI swap or doing an LPG conversion (one of the guys up there has an LPG Viper of all things). And then maybe a coil-over... I have my eyes set on getting this Jeep into ARCA next season, there is still a lot to be done.

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