tugalo

I have an 88 Pioneer with about 5000 miles on a new engine, and my gas mileage is only around 15-16 mpg. Altho I do mostly short trips, I think it should be higher. I have checked all the sensors and their grounds, looked in vain for any vacuum leaks, and cleaned the throttle body. Would a set of injectors with a lower flow rate (maybe 17 lbs.) help, or should i maybe try Cruisers trick of advancing the timing by moving the CPS? Any ideas appreciated.....

I remember reading years ago about guys putting 3 cylinder Kubota tractor engines into their cars, any possibilities here?

Same thing happened to me. I took it to a local locksmith. He took off the wheel, removed the cylinder and reset the pins inside it and re-assembled the whole thing. $35 out the door........

good possiblity that ignition wiring thru the fuse block bulkhead connectors is the problem. these connectors come apart very similar to the C101 and have the black tar in them. check my write up on this problem that got me running again.

Sorry Cruiser, no pics, but once you start it is pretty straight forward, just a hell of a lot of dirty labor. Hoping it will help the "high idle" guys......

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I recently posted a request for help in removing the bulkhead connector/fuse block and was gratified by the responses, especially those from GSequoia, very helpful. Anyway, got it done today and thought I would pass on what I learned in case someone else has a similar problem. While towing a boat trailer with my 88 MJ, i smelled smoke and shut her down. Found the park/tail-light fuse melted but not blown. Previous owner had installed a 20 amp fuse in the socket and it melted the fuse and the block. Chilton's calls for a 20A, FSM calls for a 10A. Installed an inline fuse to restore the circuit, but then the parking lights stayed on. Removed the headlight switch and found two wires melted together. In the process, i wiggled the bulkhead connector and lo and behold, I then had a no start condition. Speculate that in wiggling the connector (which is very similar to the infamous C101). some of the black tar got between the contacts. Making a long story short, I removed the connector and fuse block and cleaned the contacts, works good now. Some tips to pass along...... 1. Remove the lower instrument panel faschia. Remove the washer bottle. Loosen the 6.5mm bolt between the two bulkhead connectors. It is a long captive screw. 2. Remove the dust covers on the connectors above and below the center bolt. Push in on the sides of the covers to release the locking tabs. 3. Remove the lower connector first, then the upper connector will come out, it is held captive till the lower is removed. 4. Remove the fuse block, two phillips screws 5. Remove the steering wheel braces to gain working slack on the interior harness (two 15mm bolts and one 15mm nut) 6. Use a solvent to clean out the black tar, I used Xylol and carb cleaner. Repair damaged wiring 7. Re-assemble by LOOSELY installing the fuse block. If you tighten the block at this stage, you will not have clearance to re-insert the connectors from the engine side. 8. Slide the upper connector into the retaining shell from the rear before pushing both connectors into place and tightening the center bolt. If you install the lower connector first, and then try to install the upper, it will not go...

Does anyone know how to separate the firewall connectors from the back side of the fuse block? I know that they are full of the tar that was in the C101 connector and that they have a bolt in between the two halves..... Does anyone have a pin-out of the two connectors? thanks

Might try a little peppermint oil inside the heater box, mice are allergic to it and will stay away. Smells good too.

ditto on the Intrepid bottle. I suspect that any mid-size Mopar would have a similar bottle. Love that real radiator cap

I went to the local used appliance dealer and looked at his second hand dryers and ranges till i found some vents that i liked. He sold me the entire back panel from an electric dryer for $1.00. Some careful measuring from underneath the hood to avoid the braces, some nice slow cutting with a jig saw, some thin shims to make the metal flush with the hood metal which is a bit thicker. riveted them in place and filled the seams with body putty.

I posted awhile back about my 88. 4.0L, b/a10 5 speed. It would skip,miss, and die at random. If cruising, when I pressed on the gas it would stall out momentarily and then catch and run fine. This all started when I put in a new short block. I changed out the usual culprit sensors from my stash with little improvement. Then it occurred to me that this was happening as the temperature came up into the normal range and the truck tried to transition into the closed loop mode. My gas mileage was not too great either. When the new engine went in, I had put in a later model thermostat neck so that I could move the temp sensor up to the top of the engine. While looking over this install, I noticed that the wires from the sensor were resting on the back of the alternator. My theory is that the alternator was coupling a signal into the wires and sending confusing temperature info to the computer, screwing up the fuel scheduling and keeping the truck in open loop.. Zip-tied the wires away from the alternator and cleaned the sensor connector and all is well so far. Just a heads up if you do this mod........

Gentlemen of the forum, I have a problem that has me stumped. 88 MJ, 4.0, B/A 10 tranny. The truck has a new short block installed and when it runs, it runs great. When it is in the transition from open to closed loop and I come to a stop, the idle drops sharply and the truck dies. It will not restart right away unless I am in a place where i can roll it off and pop the clutch, then it starts instantly. If I try to start it with the key, it does not want to start at all. After it sits for a few minutes, it will start and then run fine for the rest of the day. If I feather the throttle when coming to a stop, and keep the RPM's up to around 1200 or so, it doesn't die. I have swapped out the IAC and the MAP, and cleaned the throttle body. i have tried running it with the O2 sensor unplugged.......no difference. when I pop the clutch and roll start it, the idle goes to 3000 and stays there for quite a while. When it died today, I checked the spark from the coil and it was strong, so in my mind, it is a fuel issue. Any thoughts or suggestions appreciated. Pulled the plugs this afternoon and re-gapped them. They were all light gray with a little brown on the electrodes. Maybe running a bit lean. 4 hole mustang injectors.

that hose clamp trick is a NEAT idea!!!!

putting a new engine in my D/D MJ. What brand of clutch does anyone recommend? Highway use only........no off road

Good on ya for checking with the Napa guys and not just accepting what the shop told you. If everybody did that, every time, crappy businesses would be extinct.

The knock sensor has foil shielding to prevent spurious signals from reaching the computer. If your truck doesn't have a knock sensor, maybe the factory was using up supplies of prior year harnesses when it was built. If the foil does in fact go to the knock sensor, you can just ground it as a "shield drain" and not worry about it.

"Antenna trigger" is only used on vehicles with a power antenna. the trigger closes a relay which puts power to the antenna up/down drive motor.

Don, I wonder how hard it would be to cut thru the printed circuit on the back of the gauge cluster and reverse the polarity at that location with a couple of soldered wires? Just a thought

For the purists amongst us: there is another difference in the MJ and XJ clusters. The graphics on an MJ are light blue and on an XJ are red.

I made the same mistake on a 90 XJ years ago. I made a metal shim for the actuator rod and bent it at the top so that it could not fall out....been working for many years now.....

Very intersting !! Keep us posted about any problems...is your truck long bed or short? Any problems mounting the tank?

There should be a schematic pasted to the top of the original radio for th3e power and speaker wires. According to the 88 FSM wiring diagrams, the red/tan wire goes to the power antenna, and the dark blu goes to the digital clock for dimming.

Take that trade in a skinny minute, 7 days a week !!

Yes you can change the mileage on your cluster, .....do a search on this forum or over on NAXJA, I have done it on mine.

Find a renix cluster that has all the gauges. I believe that an 88 to 90 cluster is plug and play in your jeep, with the correct speedometer connection. you will have to swap out the sensors for oil pressure and temp. the new temp sensor goes into the thermostat neck.