gogmorgo

Where remarks of truth are appreciated? I would hope that’s all of them...

The transmission is also a pretty big heat source, probably bigger even than the exhaust. When I drove my parts xj out here with next to no heat at -45, the trans tunnel was definitely the warmest part of the interior, and that was with a smooth-shifting ax15, not an aw4 heat pump.

Depends on the bend, but if it pinches the rods enough to stop the latches from kicking in, I imagine it would also catch enough to stop them from retracting. I usually lift my handles to close tailgates, but that’s mostly because I don’t like slamming them.

I got into the field a little bit later in life. I was working an unrelated summer job for a couple years for an outfit with a fleet shop, and one day during an unrelated conversation with management I offhandedly mentionned it might be cool to work in the shop to learn more to support my hobby. Turned out they’d already been tossing around the idea of hiring on some temporary labour as a basic lube tech because they were short a mechanic, and two weeks later I was working in the shop. It really doesn’t hurt to ask, and all I did was show interest. Part way through the summer they hired another real mechanic and by September they didn’t have the budget to keep me on, but that experience and a good reference from my boss there got me into an apprenticeship with the same outfit at a different location a couple years down the road. Still not sure I want to do this for the rest of my life, but all I did was express interest and I pretty well managed to turn a summer job into a career. Doesn’t hurt to ask, even if you just end up sweeping floors on your way home from school.

I ocaisionally get distracted and leave my keys in the unlocked Jeep. ADHD living right there. I live on one of the main (but not very busy) routes through town, and I haven’t even had tools or change taken out of an unlocked vehicle. It’s almost like strong community spirit, single-payer health care, and good social programs that will always help you out no matter who you are actually work or something...

$508 for the set is a hefty savings, but, how far is that $508 savings going to go if the “lesser” tire doesn’t perform when needed? I’m in a similar boat. I’ve got the Grabber AT/X on my ZJ, because it’s a tire I can run year-round. But recently after driving it back to back with my MJ I’ve noticed that the cheap winter tires with unknown mileage that I’m only running because I had them have much better traction on the 2wd open-diff MJ than the much heavier ZJ does in 2wd with the truetrac. So now knowing this, and that those four tiny patches of rubber are the only things keeping me on the road, do I go get actual winter tires for the ZJ? I’m a competent driver with lots of experience in winter conditions, so it’s not a big deal, but consequences to going off the road are severe here in the Rockies and I’ll be driving it up to the ski hill on average once a week for the next six months... so is the risk worth shelling out $1000 for new winters? What effect will it have on piece of mind and stress levels while driving? On the safety of myself, my passengers... other road users? I definitely don’t want to spend the $1000 and can likely get away with the ATs, but I also know that if something bad were to happen that I could have prevented, I’ll be beating the $#!& out of myself for not doing it. Yeah, it’s a dilemma. Walmart’s business is selling cheap things at low prices. Cooper’s is selling tires. Cooper discontinues products that aren’t competitive because they’re harder to sell. In the case of Walmart, they buy lots of tires and selling them becomes their own problem. Walmart sells their products because they’re cheap, not because they want to give you the best value. Sometimes you win, sometimes you don’t. The other point of contention, a tire shop often offers free or heavily discounted installation when you buy a set of tires from them. Is that enough incentive to make you trust your ride in the hands of a Walmart employee, or will it cut into your savings to get them installed elsewhere? I don’t to seem like I’m telling you to spend more money on tires. I doubt you’ll have a catastrophic issue with the “lesser” rubber, and it’s rare to need every little bit of tire performance in regular driving. But I also don’t think you’d regret spending the extra to get extra performance. It really sucks playing the “what if” game. Also I think I talked myself into buying new winters while typing this up...

Gas smell in the oil definitely isn’t good. Best case scenario it’s a recent condition, and mostly brought on from only ne run enough to move it around the lot. Running excessively rich leads to gas condensing on cylinder walls, washing the oil off. This causes lubrication problems that lead to ring sealing issues, eventually cylinder wall and piston damage if left long enough. An engine only ever run cold will do this, but once it’s been run up to termperature it should burn/boil off the gas in the oil. I suspect #4 is another symptom of what’s causing #2. #1 could easily be a result of prolonged #2. Without much to go off, I have no insight to guess down #3, but it may also be a result of some other issues, or simply cooling system neglect... it could also just be the result of an improperly bled cooling system. With this info it’s easy enough to make a case that it needs far more than “just a tune up”. For less than $50 in parts and a 1/2 hour labour for their “tune up” (only consumables in the engine are ignition parts) the dealer’s foolish not to have already done it. No one’s going to spend that coin on a truck that barely drives. I’d say it needs the time spent to run through the tips at cruiser54.com before we can go much further with diagnostics, but for the time being I’d say your best bet to get a better deal on the truck is to make an offer you think is consistent with the truck having a blown motor, then leave your phone number and walk away, as was already suggested. I really doubt anyone is going to pay the asking price for a truck that barely runs, unless they manage to find someone with deep pockets planning an LS swap or something of that nature, which doesn’t sound like their typical sort of customer.

I like a lot of pictures for a lot of reasons... and I’m no good at picking favourites.

The CCV “valves” are really just open hose barbs. There’s two ports on the valve cover. One should be a relatively small diameter line that goes to a port on the intake manifold. The other is larger diameter and goes to the filter box. Higher vacuum in the manifold (downstream of the throttle plate) pulls the clean air through the system. The system should be free-flowing, but is susceptible to leaks. If it’s all intact, a new filter is cheap and would tell you pretty quick if it’s still spitting oil. I wouldn’t necessarily correct it for the salesman, but if there’s obvious problems it may be a simple fix, and you might still get good life out of the engine. If there is excess combustion gas bypassing the rings, the oil will turn dark pretty quickly. It’ll also likely take on a gassy or burnt smell. Most used car dealers would change the oil after taking in the vehicle, so this could be a tell. Frankly though I’m surprised they let you poke around that much at all. But it does make it look to them like you want the vehicle as opposed to being on the fence about it and you’re just trying to find something to talk the price down which may weaken your bargaining position. Especially since it seems to me like that’s the case. Also, the floor pans rust out from the top. If there’s rust below there’s rust above. The rockers and cab corners won’t be far behind.

Crankcase vent system sucks air from the filter box to through the crankcase to the intake manifold. A disconnected line between the vent and crankcase is a vacuum leak, so hooking it back up can correct that. The disconnected (or blocked) line can also push crankcase gasses to the filter, which will soak down the filter with oil. How soaked the filter is will depend on how bad the blowby is and the age of the filter. ”Too much” blowby is subjective. All engines will have some, even new. Some will say so long as it’s not using “too much” oil (again subjective) it’s fine. In my mind it’s excessive if the CCV is in working condition but it’s still pushing combustion gasses to the filter, i.e. the system is operating beyond capacity. Others will tell you to pull it off and run a catch can or just a drip tube for the excessive gasses. As a point of reference, my 2.5 has enough air moving out of the fill cap I can’t add oil with the engine running, but it doesn’t oil down it’s filter. Compression isn’t ideal at 110-130psi across all cylinders IIRC, and it does use some oil, about a quart and a half between ~3000mile changes. Yet it still makes enough power for climbing hills in the Rockies so I’m not concerned about it. I’d expect you’d only be able to knock off at what it would cost a shop to R&R the engine with one from a junkyard. Call it $1500 at the most. Be careful picking up a second MJ. Either the first will get jealous and start throwing fits for attention, or else the damn things will start breeding.

Not really. If you’re going to die when you get caught anyhow, once you’ve already done it once there’s no more incentive to stop. A far better way to reduce theft is to stop incentivizing it. If people aren’t desperate – they can afford to live, put food on their plates, have access to the healthcare and education they need, and don’t need to seek an “out” from their existence through drugs, etc. – theft won’t be worth the hassle or whatever risk is associated with it.

I’m just saying that for liability reasons if it’s not actually a rollover protection structure, you probably shouldn’t be calling it a rollbar. But like, your call I guess.

Before you get too far into this, I’m going to point out that Jeep called them Sportbars for a reason. They won’t do anything for you in the event of a rollover, unless you’re planning on making them out of much thicker tube than the factory used, and even then it’s pretty questionable. Most of us know this, but still. CYOA.

Heat and noise come through the factory carpet too... guess it just comes down to how much is tolerable.

I’d say headlight switch is the most likely culprit. When I was junkyard shopping for a new connector after mine caught fire, every single one I could find was melted. But the lighting in the cluster could also be an issue.

I’ve got a Niva and a Samara. Both were sold new in Canada, where I live. Definitely unusual to see them anymore though.

Yeah..?

Yeah, with a used axle realistically you might be able to reuse the shafts and knuckles, beyond what you have here, but you’re probably going to want to go through and put in all new bearings and seals anyhow. New gears and a pro install are more than his asking price... doesn’t seem like a bad deal to me at all, especially if you can talk him down. Might even be something fancy in the middle of it if he paid to have it built for a project.

Note to self, incorporate scatter sheild into my plans when I finally get around to building my MJ...

https://lizardskin.com This is just one product as an example, I’m sure there’s others out there. I’ve never used any so I can’t make recommendations as to what might be better, I just know they exist. Here’s a clickbait advertisement that has others listed that I found through a google search for “spray on sound deadener”... I haven’t actually read it so again I can’t comment on what it says. https://bettersoundproofing.com/best-sound-deadening-spray/

Car-part.com may be helpful in finding another axle. $250 seems pretty steep for an xj d30, although I guess I’m not familiar with the local market and if you need 4.10 gears that narrows the selection a lot. You can also still buy the later style knuckles new (~$70CAD each +shipping on rockauto), of course you’ll also then need the later hubs and brakes (callipers, discs, pads) to go with, which are usually much easier to find replacements for when it comes time, although that’s really the only advantage to the newer setup so far as I can tell.

Are the seats mounted with Hilti bolts?

I don’t mind it either. Definitely prefer it in the work trucks, carpet cakes full of dirt pretty quick. There’s also no reason you can’t put it down over something more durable than paint, and it’s also possible to use something other than the jute that isn’t as bad a sponge if you still want the sound deadening.

Might be some Cherokee vs Grand Cherokee confusion going on? Since it’s got 4.10 gears there’s a good chance it didn’t start out in the vehicle it was last under. But either way, the xj and zj axle will interchange, at least as an assembly. Your knuckles etc will swap over to it if it doesn’t come with, although you’ll need to source the one-piece passenger side shaft. If it’s a good price it’s probably a good deal, factoring in missing components. If it’s a backyard rebuild with new gears you’ll want to double check the contact pattern before running it.

All the suspension is the same so it’ll bolt in, but it’s low pinion. Just remember where it came from when ordering parts. Brakes, hubs, knuckles and suspension will be the same as a ‘91+ XJ. If it’s out of a 5.2 ZJ, it’ll most likely have 3.73 gears, 4.0’s generally came with 3.55.