howeitsdone

I would post in this section as this is just for VIN registry https://comancheclub.com/forum/3-mj-tech-modification-and-repairs/

The best advise given so far Even beyond the bolts. This view is a feeding trough of oil and gasket.

Out with the old, in with the new. Not sure what to do with the old one. Thinking of just saving the cover & innards. Probably the right shaft as a backup since its bearing was good. If anyone needs the brakes with the plates let me know. They have little wear on them, just a bit of weathered rust. Otherwise just going to scrap the whole housing. Pretty straightforward. Decided to roll it left-to-right instead of removing the rear leaf bolts.

The Dana 44 drums are 10" x 2.5" - not Comanche specific. Almost any part store/retailer should have parts. One of the most desired axles to put under a Jeep.

Looking good so far! I like that bench seat. Maybe someone put the ring carrier bolts there as a courtesy instead of leaving them on their bench I gotta ask though... what is going on here??

Don't remind me how much I have into this thing. Could've just about paid my car off by now I've put about 100mi on it so far and I've had an ear to ear grin every single one of them. Almost 20% of my expenses has been tools, but I'm okay with that because I never have to worry if I have the right stuff to fix something at this point. Comanche or otherwise.

Exactly what they said. All of those items splice together. Make sure to check your chime module on the left of fuse panel and fuse pins for corrosion. Fuses may be fine, but you may need to remove corrosion from the pins on the box itself. The wiper circuit breaker is on the bottom and also can be effected by brake fluid and water over time. Disconnect battery when doing so to be safe. Otherwise, it may be a ground issue. You'll want to check the C102 connector behind the front left headlight. Unplug it, not the easiest thing to do. To help, you can remove the parking lamp and pull the connector through. You'll need to clean it and that will give you the most room to work with. If you have a multimeter it really helps to narrow down paths to the issue. The parking lamp socket grounds go bad. Cruiser54's tip #3 shows this plug. The ground is located in front of the washer reservoir on the side of the fender.

I agree with eagle, vacuum leak for sure, plus IAC. Possibly sounds like an exhaust leak, hard to tell from a video if it's down-pipe. But the vacuum (or lack of) would cause your engine to try and keep up like it is. If you've got it, and are comfortable, using a propane torch is a great way to see where the leak is coming from (NOT lit) with the torch set on low.

Long Post Unfortunately a noise began as I was driving Saturday night. It was like a ticking/knock, but only happened every one or two seconds. Not like an engine knock. I had no idea where it was coming from, so I took the wheels off and checked torque on everything. No play anywhere. Had my brother come over and take a listen as I drove in front of the driveway. It did a really nice high pitched squeal that sounded like something was caught up. He isolated it to the rear left wheel. That's the one with that bad bearing. We had the hardest time getting the rotor off. Took nearly 10 minutes. So I'm thinking "The brakes did something funky and something got loose to cause this". When we got the rotor off, the brakes were just fine. Here's where it get's interesting. One of the bearing pins got loose in there causing the noise. Upon further inspection, the bearing had been replaced at some point and the job was done so $h!tty. When I had the shaft out the other day I hadn't even bothered to look closely as I was focused on the one seal. Well, that's because there is only ONE seal. They didn't even install the inner seal. Hell, the bearing retainer wasn't even pressed on all the way. So all that oil just washed the grease away and caused bearing failure. Fortunately, there is a guy 20min north of me who is restoring an 88 and had a D35 with almost half the miles mine does. So I went up and got that yesterday for $50. Less expensive than new bearing pressed on the shaft. Inspected the shaft and bearings and seals are in great condition. Wanted the 8.25 he had, but since I already have new brakes and can just swap in the plates it's much easier (and I don't have a welder). Plus it's got 3.55s with will be a nice (slight) upgrade from the 3.07s. Just won't have 4x4 for now, but he does have a D30 out of a later XJ for sale with 3.55s... Decisions... That tube sure is marred up pretty good. You can even see the tool marks on the outside of the tube they left.

I just had a similar issue. Blower and Turn fuse are linked together. Make sure to check for corrosion on the blower fuse. Have you cleaned the C102 connector behind the L Headlight & the turn signal socket itself?

Where are the finished photos??

Well, the steering wheel sure was an interesting one. I found out I'm missing some sort of bearing sleeve, which means someone was in there before me. You can see in the photo that the little ring was my issue. It wasn't seated under the bearing at all. So after I finally got to that point in the assembly, I just took a dowel and hammered it in (silver one around the steering shaft in photo). Steering wheel has almost no play in it anymore. I'm sure the sleeve is supposed to keep that ring secured, but honestly I've taken the steering column apart 4 or 5 time now and it's kind if a breeze to get to that point if this happens again. I also took the time to clean parts and re-grease them. I finally also have reverse lights. Turns out that when I put it in gear that the switch doesn't activate unless I pull the shifter as far as it'll go. Wonder if that's just the clutch. I know I certainly need a new clutch kit since I can smell it every time I'm in 1st or 2nd. It also got funky after doing a fluid change. Plus the stuttering. Not exactly looking forward to that either. And now for the "crap" part. I removed the left rear axle shaft today to change the seal. 1st, didn't know that I would need a press to do so. That was a bummer already. Oh well, I can still get that done. And then I noticed something very odd about the bearing itself... It is somehow split. Great, now I have ANOTHER part to replace. At least it's not the end of the world. The bearing has to come off anyway to replace the seal. Just sucks to have to fork out the dough. To end on a positive note. I'm now at 85mi driven and am not so scared to take it on the road anymore. Got up to ~55 and no DW, so that's a plus! I wonder what 5th gear is like...

And maybe a bit of coin, cursing, and patience

This is not fun at all... Steering wheel is loose, but got to this point and the e-torx are tight as can be. Thinking it might be the bearings. Got too dark to look. Will have to check in the AM.

Are you getting 12v to the red wire going into the switch?

So as it turns out, the blower motor and turn signal fuses are hardwired together. Slightly confusing as the FSM does not label as so. Because of this, I ended up cleaning up the blower fuse pins (blower was already working just fine) and now I have turn signals. I didn't have a good view of what was going on until I removed the C100 female side from the fuse panel. After working through that nightmare, I still don't have reverse lights unfortunately. Getting about 9v at the fuse and then drops to almost nothing at the switch connector. So I need to begin tracing that into the engine bay to see what's going on with it. Went ahead and changed the tranny fluid. It certainly did make a world of a difference! The fluid didn't look terrible when draining, but I did have a lot of metal shavings which is a little bit of a bummer. Front axle seals came in today so now I need to start on that. Losing a lot of fluid in the rear but not a heavy amount in the front. Will try and get the passenger one done tonight though. Rear ones come in tomorrow.

Highly Recommend downloading or buying a factory electrical manual. Best decision I’ve made so far. It has plenty of troubleshooting guides that truly help. Makes tracing issues and wires super easy.

Another update: I am missing the Brown/Yellow wire to the TURN/BU terminal. You can see in the photo how one goes to the radio (like in the above diagram). So I jumped those to test and then somehow I lost continuity to the relay. So I said f-it let's jump those too and, well, turn signals work! I can't for the life of me figure out why the brown/yellow wire would be missing. I couldn't find it anywhere in there. I also don't know why I lost continuity to the relay from the TURN/BU fuse. I'm going to have to diagnose further and see about installing some new wires. I'll continue this in my build thread and if anything else comes up I'll post it here. I DO NOT recommend anyone running with the wires jumped on the outside like I have here for testing. Just to let it be said...

Small update: Moving to just the interior side of the C100 as I've done more testing and it appears to be an issue where I'm no longer getting voltage to the TURN/BU Fuse. I do have continuity between the fuse and the turn signal relay, and then from the relay to C100-A1. This is going to be a mini nightmare working on the back of the fuse block there is no good position to be in physically lol Here's to hoping it's just the connector at the fuse itself!

Thanks. C102 has been completely refreshed

Still no blinkers or reverse lights. So the C100 has been fun... Going to brainstorm a waterproofing method from the brake fluid. Tired of the electrical issues. May get some gasket material and use that on the opening at least. Had a weird grind shifting today. I do have the thumping when getting into gear, so before buying parts, I grabbed some VR1 20W-50 and Lucas Oil Stabilizer to try out. Yeah, yeah, 10w-30... Already praying I'm "forced" to throw in an AX15, but I'm going to let the little guy run it's course and experiment while it's still going.

FWIW, you can get some Fel-Pro gasket material and cut out the shape you need to make it simpler. I don't have a factory light to verify it'll work though. Just a thought.

As mentioned, Spicer is a great option. Opinions are all over the place on brands, but OE is a great choice in this case if unsure. Hub and Driveshaft U-Joints are different - Been there, tried that. Spicer is great here again. Greaseable or Non depending if you don't feel like doing that maintenance. My general rule on Bearings & hubs are that if they're not making noise or acting weird, save your money. Again, like mentioned the axle seals are good to replace...if leaking. Just ordered some for myself today. Front passenger is notorious for leaking with CAD. If you're looking to do preventative maintenance, then replace whatever you feel & have the budget for. If you're looking to replace the worn parts, then look for wet spots & listen for noises that shouldn't be there. FWIW the axle seals are only a couple dollars per on RockAuto

Figured out the above. Had the wrong manual. Got the factory electrical manual and has the paged I needed. After reading the brake fluid tears up the fuse panel, I decided to tackle the C100 connector. Like the C101, disgusting but there are more contacts so it just takes forever. Anyway, for some reason, there is continuity between the connector behind the left headlamp and quite a few different points on the C100. I'm scouring the manual, but don't see how any of them even connect. I'm taking an ohm reading from any pin on the connector behind the headlamp and just probing the C100 at different points and I get a reading which I find extremely strange. For example, #3 (GY) should connect directly to A1 on the C100, but it actually gets a reading on multiple pins as do others. I've refreshed the ground on the LH fender. No clue what's going on.

I actually did call a place right by the house and they said “We don’t work on cars that old” “Do you work on 2001 Cherokees, any Wranglers…?” Needless to say they referred me to somewhere else. That’s fine because I still need to tighten the steering column first since it’s all over the place.