MancheKid86

now that the engine runs, cam broken in. it is time to finish the wiring sorry for some photos that are not landscape my phone was on something. I know potrait photos are terrible Brake light switch I have purchased the dual diaphram booster, which to my surprise or lack there of. Does not work with the renix pedal set. now, a sane person, would have probably just bolted in the HO pedal set with the revised switch location. it would happen I even have one but did I use it? no way! I used a unibit and stepped the center bore two steps larger. not sure what the diamenter ended up being. but it was just enough the bushing snugly went into place with a bit of a squeeze from some knipex. bolted that all in place, no dice, the switch was just flopping around, out the booster came again. it needed the old blob and grind to allow the switch rest in posistion and have a slight preload on it. and this is what I came up with. ugly, yes. but effective? very legit just eyeballed it and thought this should be good enough... and much to my surprise it was! first try. switch works perfect. Throttle Posistion Sensor During cam breakin, My headder may have been A little warm. so much so the TPS connector (which I had mindlessly tucked through A nook in the intake manifold and dangling right about said headder) had melted. Which I could smell burning during the run, the friend I had watching the engine bay didnt catch it, which is no big deal. digging into one of my harness boxes I depinned a new 3 pin connector and re pinned the harness into it. Reverse/4wd the harness was from an auto XJ oringinally, so I had to thin it out a bit. at somepoint I depinned the AW4 specific wiring right out of the harness. and was left with a bunch of wires stuffed into this connector. which to my surprise I at onepoint knew about the starter signal wire and had even labeled it I ended up pinning the part time 4wd and fulltime lighting together so both of them come on at the same time since I'm not running a 242 (which I have one! have been toying the idea of putting it in the black mj for like 7 years lmao, maybe oneday) Ignore the extra grommets under the connector. they were too small and I had to run the proper size one over the pins. they will be removed when I wrap the harness. Stealing 2 pin connector for the reverse switch I was going with oem color scheme for wires. but the wires I had were a smaller gauge and I said F it, no one is ever going to see it. and used the wires out from abs circuit becuase that junk aint ever goin in. trans harness is almost done, just need to wire in the 4wd switch once I have the doubler and tcase back on the bench. I will not be using chunks of loom as pictured. it will be replaced with a new single piece. just for laughts, I put a tcase on the back. oh I wish it was that easy. but noooo. because doubler. AUX RELAYS there is so much free power and unused relays in this country edition wiring harness I am going to pin it all into my aux relays the red wires are fusible links direct from the solenoid. and theres alot of them in the engine bay unused. H4 upgrade linelock foglights fan onboard air amazon had a good deal on a 100 pack of terminals. they are slighly different. I will have to grind a little bit off of either side of the top nub and they should work perfect. more on that later Door jam Switch/Interior lighting over the years I have heard the XJ door switches do not work. did not think much of it, until now. straight up thought it was just due to the wiring/connector design and that I would be in the clear since I rewired everything. That is not the case!! they are physically TOO LARGE to fit out came the dash harness to replace the circuit (I hate cutting wires if you can just depin the entire thing, I know soldering is acceptable. but I think it is lazy and hoaky to deilberately cut your wires to do a splice repair when it takes a few more seconds to run an untainted wire.) removed the correct harness from another dash and installed it and xj lighting now on the ground (speaking of the 242, its right there! above the bucket) Start of Dash Repairs I decided to change the interior to navy blue! the only thing I am missing is the back pannel under the rear window, which I will SEM the correct color. The dash I have, is in rough condition internally, mounting tabs are gone and the headlight switch mount is broken. but it is navy blue, do you know how hard it is to find that color where I live? I have 5 grey dashes and only one blue. started the repairs, need to grab some of the correct - of rivet for the brackets. headlight switch on removal destroyed the piece it mounted too. so I took a roloc and buzzed the remaining off until flush with the rest of the pannel. from a donor dash, I removed the new part cleaned it up so all it had left was the extrusion you see from the front. taking some 240 grit sand paper and sanded it flat until it was close but still had some shoulder for it to bond too a red cap from a new battery terminal fit perfectly in the hole to line up the new part. I did mess up on the clocking angle and it is a little offcentered. I have gotten lucky any more and it would interfere with the dash vent. but it works! I did plastic weld some spots of the shoulder aswell for added measure. and here is the overall alignment in the front! turned out not half bad. you can see the scratch from who ever removed the retaining nut before more than you can see where it has been bonded. happy with the result, here dead on you can see my keyway clocking is off. the fix would be to put a notch further over for location, or just don't mess up in the firstplace lmao.

Turned it on been a few years since i could do this 20250511_154653.mp4

put the pan back on and fixed the starter solenoid ground jeep is learning the cam a bit more here is a quick video of it at idle (second start) 20250511_154653.mp4

yeah I am pretty stoked! figured out the no start simply overlooked the fact that the harness came from an auto XJ it is currently looking for Park

all my oil showed up! here's a before and after of the ol' engine bay. fuel tank hooked up, lines primed. no leaks rockers/pushrods removed and everything liberally coated with driven assembly grease. oil pan removed and cam/distrubitor gear re lubed as well added some good ol' soap to the water to modify the surface tension then added my cheapo burp-o-matic to the system. Aux fan jumpered to Ignition it was go time! starter did not work. tried three different ignition switches an no luck hit er with a screwdriver and it afterfired. FIRST SOUND OF LIFE!!!! checked TDC #1 and was 180 out. restabbed the dizzy and it fired right up 30 mins of cam breakin done. don't mind the powersteering pump groaning. my helper forgot to monitor the levels while i was varying rpm VID_20250509_2040558462.mp4 BUT ITS ALIVE!!!!! pulled the oil pan and cut the filter, everything looks okay. currently diagnosing no crank from ignition. traced continuity to solenoid from switch and from starter to solenoid. either a ground issue or +12v supplied. shouldnt take too long to fix. running a little lean as you can see in the headder. have a friend who went to 80 lb injectors on his mustang, so he has a mint pair of 40lbs up for grabs. will toss those in and see if it helps. need to get a wideband o2 sensor and inculded accessories in the long run

yep glazed right over that part. Edits have you checked your compression? could straight up be your compression rings are shot. also generally when you change oil to combat blowby you go to a higher viscosity to help try to reduce it. lighter you may see a inverse effect.

cruisers valve cover mod, an old jeep/chrysler service tech I know claims he found this fix back in the day https://cruiser54.com/?p=131

new gas tank showed up! the weight difference between the two tanks is impressive, the one pictured on the right may have a slightly higher concentration of rust scale and sediment. currently using that tanks sending unit for harness testing picked up my other tanks from storage and started hunting for my good pump/sending unit first one open didnt look too promising, I was legit thinking I ruined all my sending units by leaving them in the tanks after seeing the condition of this pump. much to my relief the next one I popped open was pristine and also the one I was looking for. I am not sure where I pulled that first tank from, but it sure has seen better days out of all of the pump assemblys pulled, they were all slightly different, some close but not identical. As to why I pulled all of them from the tanks? I would like to downsize a bit, four out of five spare tanks are 100% junk and take up more room than they serve purpose, they will be part of the over due scrap run

testing the electrical was a success, added some leads to the block and some jumpers for the rest and It had power. everything works! power mirrors windows locks, dash gauges dimmer dome lights hazards sending unit blower ect. I do have to modify my brakebooster a bit more to get the brakelight switch to work properly. initially the door locks were non functional, after a bit of diagnosis there was no 12V power. with it pinned in the fuse box they worked like a charm. after a bit of digging I found the rest of the harness (it was originally from a 4 door, so it was tied in with the rear drivers door/power seat harness) with that plugged in to the correct spot in the fusebox it worked as it should

after some messing around I have managed to get the HD mount that was supplied to work ended up torching out the OEM bracket to clearance the adjustable mount and afterwards it bolted right into place. gave me a bit of relief knowing everything is starting to line up. the plate coming off the doubler I cut and had rewelded back in 2015 ( decided to change the clock angle of the tcase, but changed it back the next day, so I cut it and jammed a log under it lmao) it will be remade and will tie in to the OEM trans mount. still have to remove all of this and install the real thing.

have we ruled out if the previous owner has bobed the frame to fit a swb box on a lwb platform? not sure if that would work can't actually tell what the front mounts look like with the pic resolution

Looks more like 80s toyota graphics to me

Parts showed back up from powdercoat missed a few but those will go with the next batch welded the clutch pedal up, modified the vaccum booster to work with the renix brake light switch and installed the pedal assembly. after messing around with empty transmission/tcase casings i have learnt a few things 1. the ironman 4x4fab 4link is for jeeps with no tcase doubler. the "it shoudlnt make a difference" i have recieved when I asked is 100% makes a difference. If I had known that it was going to interfere so much I probably would have went with a different kit. granted every thing built is beefy not dissing the quality. 2. the ironman 4x4fab xmember is so wide regardless of the doubler it makes it extremely difficult to install tcase/trans at the same time. to the point I am cutting the floor out I have made and turning it to an access panel that I can unbolt and remove to install the complete assembly/ work on down the road. 3. undercoat has to wait until I complete the tunnel mods I was having issues with transmission aligment and HD mount that was provided with the kit so the only way I knew to be sure was to drop in the motor. I took all my Hvac boxes and stripped down the modules to give them a good clean. picked all the best parts and reassembled it, replacing the foam tape on all mating surfaces. put a new blower motor balast resistor and heater core in it while it was apart. Pictures are MIA. wired the truck up, put A dash in, not the one I'm using just for mock up. once all systems are confirmed working I will pull the dash again and bundle all wires. so excuse the mess under the colum. just waiting on the correct radiator and a new gas tank to show up on thurday before I prep the truck for cam break-in. most important mock up complete, the doggo fits. will have the passenger seat removed for when he comes with me, not the smallest of doggos.

Well in its current state it is just as useful. spring is here, and back at it. put some tires back on because they took up alot of room blew it off and thats about it, going to get majority of it together before I proceed with more blocking of primer so when its in sealer/paint it can rest and I won't be banging it all up until I hit the trails. plans are to tie some things in on the "frame" then undercoat. once undercoated I will plumb the fuel, brake and airlines. then work on wiring the beast up here is some quick photos, clearly can see there is some more blocking to be had on the box. but all things considered very minimal from what I started with. have an idea for mounting some fenderfares for road use without drilling a single hole.

Let me tell you, is it hard to find a half decent priced paintbooth for "rent" around these parts. eventually found one but it took a few weeks to line up a time I could get in I was just going to prime it outside if the weather allowed me too but it ended up getting too cold sooner than I had hoped I spent three and a half days tediously razorblading all the paint off of the wiper cowl. this was a very miserable process. if your thinking doing all the paint prep yourself and if there is reman of these I would 100% buy the raw unpainted version of this cowl. the hood, drivers fender and front clip I spent my time prepping were NFG. so I went and sourced some new to me pannels and stripped them down new to me front clip had the classic rotten fasteners so I drilled them all out and refibreglassed them test fit of the new chrome and lenses. I think they are going to look great tow truck blew me off last week (I wish I had my own trailer lmao) so I had to rebook booth time and finally got in today! all epoxied and between coats of hibuild primer! you can't even tell that the box has been bobbed! there are a few small dents I missed when doing the bodywork so I will have to address them when I block the primer. but finally some real progress.

still working away paint has arrived realized I didn't have a tailgate for the truck the rest of my collection just had too much rust and other defects to deal with time wise, so I picked the best one and stripped it down. currently adding the bondo back into the truck. then it will be epoxied and hibuilt and then comes the lipstick lmao

I am using a methylene chloride base paint stripping gel. brush it on and let it do the work, scrape it off and re apply. once the gel flashes off from the chips I just swept it up off the plywood into a dust pan and in the bucket. its nasty stuff but if you don't get any on you its not so bad The panels have now been chemically etched and have a zinc phosphate coating, this includes the cab applying the metal prep and the end results I submit my paint order tomorrow it will be epoxied, body filler then hi build final color will be metallic cyber grey

100% not going into this much detail again. I have a tracker that is built on tons and a smallblock in it. when it gets the 46's put on and the new links made its not going to be pretty, just functional. I feel like this truck deserves this much of a restoration though, regardless on how its going to look after a few night wheels. since afterall it is a piece of 4wd history. another day of stripping yeilded good results. after I finish the driver side of the box I just need to tackle the intake plenum, A pillars and then decide if I am stripping the two surfaces between the cab and box, since not much can ever access them. and here Is my paint collection. about 95% of the old paint made it in the bucket.

I had a few pinholes I needed to address prior to paint then afterwards I started paint stripping. all exterior paint/bodyfiller is being removed for a fresh start so far I have done both doors and fenders, half the roof, hood and box B pillars have alot of filler I need to remove tomorrow but its coming along nicely everything will be neutralized with more chemicals afterwards, gunwash then metal prep and then wax and grease remover. getting closer to having it ready for paint/filler

There is a bit of a valley in the middle of the panels I need to address, nothing a bit of stud gun action won't fix. its getting body filler regardless, as you can see the passenger side is textured like a golfball, so it's okay. I am happy with the end results, the arches turned out fairly decent. just waiting on a few simple things to be machined, but now moving onto prepping for the paint booth at the end of the month.

thanks! years ago, my favourite build to follow "mfpdm's wrenches gone wild" just stopped posting... weeks went to months, months went to years.(OG build, pre H3RESQ) I just couldnt understand why, I thought to myself, could never be me I won't stop for anything. but... here I am seeing myself now in somewhat of the same circumstance, it has been almost if not 5 years since I blew the famous "4.5L Poor Mans Stroker" and the truck is still sitting there, waiting.... to be finished. well.. anyways while working on the truck box I noticed the front passenger corner was buckled, from seeing how much bondo was in the side of it I can understand why. I clamped a 2x8 to the box and jused an assortment of hammers and c clamps to straighten it back out as you can see I was using more of the cherokee fender to patch a little rotten bit on the box just like that no more crease added some extra metal inside the wheel well, here you can see I have trimmed the inner seam, it has been fully welded to the outer skin and then slowly tacked it in place and fit the inside of the wheel well. the seams are now fully welded, just need to weld the pie cuts where I needed to stretch the metal into the arch, since the front fender arch is about 1" higher than what was there previously afterwards trim the remaning lip to match the rest of the wheel well Cut and fold would have been alot simpler, but the upper arch was just not there and this should hold up a bit longer .

well after trimming the front fenders an idea popped into my head why not just use front fenders for the rear arches? over the years on CC I have read they are slightly different. So... I cut up some perfecly good fenders and seen how off they were they are indeed different, the arches are in different spots. but for me, that doesnt matter. The wheel well is rotten anyways so I can just remake the inners to be bit higher so I can weld the seams together.

both sides removed, reveals the rot inside the well itself I will be welding the two seams together, instead of the cut and fold. this is why I cut it the way I did afterwards I spent the time to strip all the bondo out of the truck box and weld the piecuts where I cut/folded the taillight corners. I wish I knew how to read brail because this boxside would tell a story. who ever did the body work just beat all the high spots down with a hammer and bondo'd over top. My old fenders went under the knife, removed the frames from them and used them as templates for the new fenders this is why I was not concerned about the rust on the flares I need to make some sort of tab on the rock sliders for the bottom of the fender to mount

And then.... I started cuttin. after what seemed like eternity I had all the debris removed from the unibody Let me tell you... I have over 30 hours of grinding in the control arm areas. the upper control arm mounts have been torn out and off of the unibody so many times there was an obscene amount of weld. it was like going through the layers of time in your grandparents deep freeze. after all of it was removed and cleaned up, the new suspension went in! yes, there is droop! tires back on, checking clearances. will have to put in steering stops so the lugs don't contact the control arms. (took them out so long ago, I'm sure they are labeled in a bag haha) suspension will be dialed in last, just need it in to have it rolling for the paintbooth at the end of the month onto the last of the rust repair! I have seperated the skin from the wheel wells, today I will cut the affected areas off the box and beadroll some new

Now I think we are caught up to the final photo on page 4 The truck bed fits and time to finish fitting the sliders Time to line up where needs to be trimmed after a cut and fold and removing a pile of bondo on the lower quarter they fit not bad back to where I picked up the steel to have them trimmed and ends cut at a 45 and capped final test fit prior to some rattle can and being welded in the rockers were siginificantly thinner than the slider material so I wasnt doing any stringers I mean I could have on the new material, but my bend tests prior to welding them to the truck proved this was adequate penetration. once fully welded they became my lifting points for my jacks.... for the next project!