WesD

Great work.

Pete, Hard to believe that's the same bed you and I pulled that summer day. Shop gave me hell about finding a better one, then made it look new again. Grill is fixed! Gotta find some black headlamp buckets now.

And it's finally back. Have to finish putting on the body trim and putting in the interior trim. Dad and mom got to see their Comanche looking better than new. I paid more for the body work than it cost new in 88.

Temporarily gone. Gone to the body shop that is. Time for a transformation. I was hoping to learn to do body work and paint it myself but that's just not going to happen right now.

Long time since update. Traced the wiring issue down to a pin inside the bulkhead connector. I documented the fix for this inside another thread. Ford parts worked correctly to get the bulkhead connector all going again. Truck has been sitting outside for the past year due to lack of interest. In meantime got a full bench seat with headrests. She's gone today....hopefully when I get it back it will look as it did in 1988.

Most impressive build I've seen on any website yet. Excellent work. Safe flying.

My next post will contain the pictures. I ordered Packard 56 terminals from ebay, I got 6 for $5. They don't work exactly because they're too wide. I had to do a little mod to the power wire (12V from battery), as there is corrosion on the end and I'm going to end up splicing a little extra wire in there to get some slack. Tomorrow I'll get my dremel tool and try to shave a little off the sides, and then they should fit OK. I wouldn't be surprised if this is a Ford-sourced fusebox, as the connectors look nothing like the GM trucks I've worked with. Even a male spade quick disconnect connector should work fine, assuming it was long enough. The blue grid is the wire lock, it holds the pins in place. I'll do a full write-up once I get this done.

in the connector, look where the hole is (top center, second pin down). That's where the red wire in the background connects to. I was trying to fit in a male spade connector (see bottom of connector), it's almost the same size but it's not long enough to fit through. I think it needs to be at least 1". I doubt it's a Delphi because those have a hole, and this one is solid. I'm going to try to make a delphi one work.

87 2.5, the pin for the power wire corroded enough that it broke off the pin for the C100 bulkhead connector. I can't find any pins that fit it, which one works? I have an old connector from a GM truck but the pins are a little different in size.

It's not fixed correctly, but it's fixed for "right now". The spade connector coming from the engine side has a bad connection at the bulkhead harness.

Got a Q for the hive; My 2.5 renix had no power when key on. I checked the voltage at red wire @ ignition switch. 0 volts. Checked the voltage at the solenoid where the positive battery cable goes, and had 12.5. HMMM Checked all the wires with the fusible links and had 12.5. Checked the red wire entering C100 (fusebox), and had 12.5. Checked ignition switch again, had 0. Stepped away for a second, and it read 12.5. What the hell.... Anyways I've determined the red wire into H2(?) on the bulkhead connector is loose immediately after the spade terminal (inside the connector). Any ideas on how to remove this spade pin and fix?

I'm impressed by your work and perseverance.

Why bother? If the 2.8 sucks, just drop a 4.0 in there, or search for a TBI setup from the S10/Blazers of that day, grab the engine wire harness, ECM, throttle body, fuel pump, and associated sensors and it should all fit up no problem. Gives another few HP and a much better driving experience. Plenty of write ups of GM TBI all over the net, I've done one conversion and it's simple. One might have to do some wiring mods to make it work with the bulkhead connector. There used to be aftermarket kits available just for the 2.8s, might even be able to do a Holley sniper kit or similar. The 2.8 V6 was just fine for the period it was made in. The oil leaks Cruzer mentioned I had to address on mine. My rear main didn't start leaking until the quick lube place overfilled the oil. The intake seal let go some time later, again it wasn't difficult to change just a little messy. I worked with a guy who owned an 86 Comanche with the 2.8. He was happy with it, bought it new. Heck, the later 2.8 engines with the MPFI were downright peppy (in the Beretta, 6000, Grand Am, Cavalier, Camaro, Corsica, etc). The 2.8 then became the 3.1 which lived on til the mid 00s in the Impala/Malibu cars.

I went with my dad to buy his Comanche (now mine) on 5/12/1988. Does that count? He was driving by the Jeep/Eagle dealer, on the way to the Dodge dealer as he wanted a Dakota and had just driven one the previous day. He spied this Comanche on the side of the lot, and stopped in to check it out. It was the last 1987 they had. They weren't able to work out a deal, but by the time we got home the phone was ringing and he and mom drove back into town and brought it home. I still have the main copy of the original keys. We had a summer party in 1990 and a couple school friends came over. We were shooting guns off the tailgate and one kid looked at the Jeep and said "That's an awesome truck". Just a couple weeks ago my 5 year old nephew came over and looked at the Jeep and said "Wow, awesome". I'm going through old pictures trying to find a few, here's a couple from November 1996.