TJ half doors on CJ7
AussieCJ7
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- Australia
- Vehicle(s)
- 1983 CJ7 Australian delivered RHD wide track, orginally GM iron duke 4cyl, T5, Dana 300. For now see mods :)
After a few google searches have read many people saying it cannot be done. Well I scored a set of TJ half doors cheap and thought would figure it out
Well after a good few hours of shed therapy today got it sorted out.
The shape of the doors are a perfect fit and after a bit of hinge alignment they sit perfect
The big issue is the catch type and height. CJ hard doors use a pin style striker and TJ use loop. I went to a wreckers yard and walked around discovered that the vast majority of loop strikers are the same size and bolt spacing. Found a ZJ that had loop strikers and grabbed 2 of them. Note XJ uses a pin with keeper loop so stayed away from them and the yard had only 2 jeeps so slim choices for jeep parts but lots of Fords Nissan and Mitsubishi had the same style strikers that seemed to be the same size. Got to love OEM parts
Height. After removing the pin from the CJ striker bracket found the center hole is too big but is the right spot for the top hole of striker drilled new hole in bottom of CJ striker bracket and made a backing plate tapped with M8 1.25 thread to match the bolts that came with ZJ striker next issue is that the striker fouls with CJ body so needed to enlarge the cut out for striker by about an inch and presto it all lines up and TJ doors close and latch.
So my next challenge is upper doors the best top CJ uppers do not line up with holes in TJ doors and looking at them don't think I can cut off pins and weld to line up with TJ bottoms due to shape so now I will borrow a friends TJ uppers and test them to see how different the shape is and work out best option. If not will make a steel frame and will get a sail maker to sow me windows and cover frame
Any way hope this helps those who want hard half doors the other options
BTW YJ's were not sold here and the going rate for YJ doors was about $1000 and freight kills the idea of importing them. So when I got TJ doors for $75 off flea bay it was incentive to give it a go even with lots of reports saying it doesn't work
Well after a good few hours of shed therapy today got it sorted out.
The shape of the doors are a perfect fit and after a bit of hinge alignment they sit perfect
The big issue is the catch type and height. CJ hard doors use a pin style striker and TJ use loop. I went to a wreckers yard and walked around discovered that the vast majority of loop strikers are the same size and bolt spacing. Found a ZJ that had loop strikers and grabbed 2 of them. Note XJ uses a pin with keeper loop so stayed away from them and the yard had only 2 jeeps so slim choices for jeep parts but lots of Fords Nissan and Mitsubishi had the same style strikers that seemed to be the same size. Got to love OEM parts
Height. After removing the pin from the CJ striker bracket found the center hole is too big but is the right spot for the top hole of striker drilled new hole in bottom of CJ striker bracket and made a backing plate tapped with M8 1.25 thread to match the bolts that came with ZJ striker next issue is that the striker fouls with CJ body so needed to enlarge the cut out for striker by about an inch and presto it all lines up and TJ doors close and latch.
So my next challenge is upper doors the best top CJ uppers do not line up with holes in TJ doors and looking at them don't think I can cut off pins and weld to line up with TJ bottoms due to shape so now I will borrow a friends TJ uppers and test them to see how different the shape is and work out best option. If not will make a steel frame and will get a sail maker to sow me windows and cover frame
Any way hope this helps those who want hard half doors the other options
BTW YJ's were not sold here and the going rate for YJ doors was about $1000 and freight kills the idea of importing them. So when I got TJ doors for $75 off flea bay it was incentive to give it a go even with lots of reports saying it doesn't work
