Onboard Air, on the TJ

Okay, new rig new upgrades. You’ve got to add and change a few things when you buy a rig to make it your own. Yeah, I’m hearing the ‘build it don’t buy it’ but it was a deal I couldn’t pass up.

Having taken the rig out a few times, it got old “borrowing” air to fill up my tires. So, I ordered up a few parts (thanks Amazon) and headed out to the garage.

The first issue was finding a place to mount the pump. There’s not a lot of free room in a TJ like I’m used to in a CJ. But, I found room behind the windshield fluid container. After a few cardboard cutouts, I built and painted the steel mounting plate. It mounted without drilling any holes.

The blue hose on the right is for the filter on the intake. It’s so close to the fender, the filter wouldn’t fit on the pump, so I went remote. Even the 90 elbow had to be cut down in order to screw it in to the pump. Yes, I should have screwed it in before mounting the pump. The second blue hose runs down to the bumper.

This winter, when I remove the bumper for more upgrades, I’ll build a bracket to hold the hose better. I’ve run an switch to the dash so I don’t have to pop the hood in order to fill the tire.

One of my pet peeves was having to continuously check the tire pressure when filling tires. So, I installed a regulator on the discharge side of the pump. Now, the most pressure I’ll ever get out is 28 pounds (it actually adjusts from 0-60). No more tire gauges!

Okay, this time I’m just lazy. I built a filler hose to fill all four tires at once. With this and the regulator, I hook up the hoses, flip the switch and wait. Once the tires get to pressure, the regulator no longer draws and the pressure switch shuts off the pump, once the pressure gets to 115 before the regulator.

It’s a small diameter hose, and I need to shorten them both for quicker fills and easier storage. And when filling all four tires at once, it seems to take forever. But you hook it up and walk away. Fourteen minutes later, all the tires are full an all to the exact same pressure.

Feel free to use this idea as imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

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Rubicon Ronin