NickyV

Thanks for the intel, @89 MJ. I'll try to get @boxyjeep's attention, or he can drop his recs here, if he sees this post. To answer your question, we only did the shocks. The springs are still the same ones that came from the PO. The mechanic wasn't thinking that the shocks were a big factor in the DW (if they even were), but did think they should be replaced. And thanks for the encouragement too. Confidence is definitely one reason I didn't want to try to mess with the suspension, pitman arm, etc... I do feel pretty handy, though and I bet I can do some of this stuff myself. The other rub, though, is I don't have a driveway and I live on a relatively busy street. Then there's the time factor... anyway, my confidence is growing with every project and many of the ones I have listed in my signature, I plan to tackle myself. I have a question for you related to this: I brought up caster with the mechanic, and he seemed to understand it way better than I do. I think we were both thinking that because I don't have a lift, that it probably isn't the first thing to troubleshoot. However, as much as I trust him, I trust the group wisdom of this forum more. What do you all think? If I don't have a lift, could my issue be with caster?

Hello! I am bringing this thread back! I'm also duplicating this post on r/MJComanche. Hope that's OK. I just want to make sure others who experience this can find more information if they're searching for this topic. I'd be interested in hearing back from @Knucklehead97 to hear if you ever fully vanquished your DW. So, as my signature says, I have a 1987, 2.5L, 4-speed (AX4), 2WD. It is not lifted, but it has slightly larger-than-stock tires on it (235/75R/15 as opposed to 225/75R/15). It was a base model, I'm pretty sure. Might have even been radio delete. I've done a lot of work on the cab and creature comforts (stereo, etc), but starting to get into mechanical stuff. I just spent a big chunk of change to try to address the accursed Death Wobble. It seemed to be mostly gone, although when I drove it home from the shop there was a little shimmy that the techs were attributing to tire balance or some related issue. I still need to pull the trigger on balancing the tires or just get brand new ones. I have some 235/75r/15 Goodyear Wranglers on there. They have good tread, but uneven wear and they are pretty old. According to the shop, they are probably 12+ years old. I really trust the mechanic, who I feel did a great job, despite not being a Jeep-specific shop. He runs an outfit that specializes in classic cars. MJs are classic in my book, but they aren't exactly a '56 Bel Air. He knew about Death Wobble and recommended a bunch of things to do. He replaced the pitman arm, put in new suspension which needed to happen, replaced steering damper, installed power steering (yay!) and replaced the clutch master cylinder (unrelated to Death Wobble, obviously, but also needed to happen). Since doing all these repairs, it has never gone back into full Death Wobble, but I can feel it creeping in at the edges. When I reach 55 MPH all the way to about 65 MPH, I can feel shimmy. If I hit a bump going in those speeds, I can feel the shimmy start to become more of a wobble. When I'm on freshly-paved freeway, and feeling brave, I will push it to 70-75 MPH, and it does feel like it starts to smooth out and shimmy less, which I hear may be an indicator that this is a tire balance issue. I have a few main questions: 1) I live in Oakland, Ca. The mechanic I like is in San Jose. It would be great to find a mechanic closer to home and also one who is very familiar with MJs or XJs. Does anyone have any recommendations for a mechanic or just a tire shop that is very good and thorough and would understand my issue? I see that @Eagle and @HOrnbrod swear by the Hunter Road Force tire balancer. That's good to know. 2) Has anyone ever experienced this exact issue, or close? What I mean is doing a bunch of work to fix Death Wobble and then having it start to creep back? If so, what did you do? Did you ultimately resolve it? How? Thanks so much in advance for any wisdom!

Thanks to @Spinnakerblue89! But I'm hoping that @Eagle_SX4has my answer. I was working on this in the dark last night and it did not occur to me to remove the cigarette lighter. I am thinking that this is the solution I was looking for!

Not sure if this is the appropriate thread to resurrect, but I have a version of the radio that the OP had. I think there are a few that look like that -- with bass and treble sliders -- based on the Minuit post. Unfortunately the sticker on mine is gone and I can't seem to find a serial number, though maybe I can find it on the circuit board? Anyway, the reason I'm here is that I'm having a hell of a time getting this radio into place. There are a couple of factors here: I didn't leave myself much room with the harness connections, which makes preparing the space difficult. However, if I add more wire length, I'll just create more material to get in the way. I am trying to fit a line converter in the radio cavity. This didn't initially seem like an issue, because It does fit nicely along the right hand side (passenger side/glove box side) of the HVAC control unit. (Note: I have all the factory speaker wire connections tucked along that side too, because I'm running RCA connections to an amp behind the seat). THE MAIN FACTOR: The two frontside wings of the bracket -- which are how you attach the bracket to the dash with screws/speed nuts -- appear to be the main thing blocking me from getting the radio into place. It appears that I'm supposed to have the bracket mounted to the top of the unit and that the tab on the top of the bracket is supposed to click into place on the underside of the dash. I feel like I'm getting the tab to hook into the receiving bracket on the underside of the dash, but then the wing on the left hand side/driver's side can't get past the trim around the clock. I'm terrified that I'm going to break my beautiful factory clock if I try to force it past. Any suggestions here? It is just dawning on me as I type this that I have an 87 MJ and the perhaps the bracket and radio are not quite right? The bracket came with this unit (which was off an XJ from the junkyard) might not be an ideal fit? By the way, I have already bench tested the unit and it works and I LOVE the green vacuum display. So cool. The radio is also way louder and I think richer sounding than the more modern Dual head unit that came with the truck when I bought it (I hated the way that looked). ONE MORE BIG QUESTION: Before I finish getting this head unit in, are there any repairs or mods recommended? I am going to go back and read the Minuit post more closely, but I don't recall that this unit was very prized, or that there was an easy way to sneak a Bluetooth module in there. I was thinking it might be possible to solder some connections that might take over the AM1 or AM2 banks. I listen mostly to FM frequencies, so I'd be fine having only one bank of AM presets. I'd also be fine if I could take over one of the FM banks. Anybody know if this is possible? If not, I already have identified a covert place to put Bluetooth receiver and a method for switching between the radio and the Bluetooth. But just wondering if this is possible. Does anyone have any suggestions or videos or anything on how I can get this into place without brute-forcing it? Maybe I need to remove the two little spacer screws on the sides of the radio? Haven't tried that yet.

OK. Good to know!

Thanks for the honest opinion, @Eagle_SX4. Do you have a recommendation for a similarly priced (or slightly more expensive) plug-and-play option? I know there are also diagrams of how to build one, which I could of course also do.

One more question for @schardein or anyone else who cares to answer. There is this note on the K Suspension website about their version of the harness upgrade (for $25 this is well worth my time saved IMO). Is this something I need to be concerned about? I do have fog lights, but I'm pretty sure they were added by a PO, since the fog lights switch that came with it at time of purchase was not a factory switch and the slots for the switch are all blank.

Thanks for explaining that. Makes a ton of sense. I should get on that ASAP.

Thanks to all who responded. @eaglescout526 Thanks! I guess I gotta get in there. Dang! I just finally put the floor kick plates back in after them being out for like three years. Oh well. --- --- --- --- --- --- --- @Eagle_SX4 Good call. After replacing the switch, the dash is dimming as it should, but I'll keep that in mind in the future. Taking the instrument panel out is a pain and I really don't want to break my speedometer cable like I did last time! But also good to note for others thinking about doing this swap. You might not want to do it if you have LEDs behind the dash? --- --- --- --- --- --- --- @schardein Good tip. I need to do that, and I will! And thanks for the intel on the extra prong on the headlight switch. Good to know. Shoot. I did not. It was dark and I didn't get a good look at it. But I did read up on this a bunch before I made the swap and I think I understand what people are saying. My question is this: Think I can extend the life of the headlight switch by not dimming the dash lights? The way they are in my MJ, they aren't too bright. I don't mind having them at full brightness. I just wanted to have the feature because it was bugging me that it didn't work. And... as it turns out, I'm glad I did. Because if I hadn't then the footwell courtesy lights would be staying on 24/7, which I do not want, obviously! Anyway, going forward, I am planning to keep the dimmer just to the right of the click. --- --- --- --- --- --- --- I definitely plan on getting one of those after market headlight harnesses as @eaglescout526 recommended. Seems like the move. I'm also excited by the prospect of not having to put LEDs in the headlights if I don't have to. I want my headlights to be a bit brighter. I don't live in an area with snow, but I prefer the look of the incandescents in the headlights. But I may want to go LED in the turn signals and brakes for safety purposes. What do you all think? --- --- --- --- --- --- --- I see... But that won't impact my MJ? I have an 87 Base model, by the way. It sounds like what you are saying is that this will not impact my vehicle. I'll try to remember to look this evening. BIG THANKS AGAIN TO ALL WHO ANSWERED + ANYONE WHO ANSWERS GOING FORWARD!

Hey everybody! Just wanted to report that I was experiencing a problem that I know others have had. The issue was my dashboard/instrument cluster lights were working, but I wasn't able to dim them. As others have noted, this can be related to a malfunctioning headlight switch. I fixed it by replacing the headlight switch. Here are the symptoms I was experiencing: - Dash/instrument lights would illuminate, but only when my headlight switch was rotated all the way to the left (counter clockwise). You know you've gone as far as you can go to the left when you hear/feel a click. - When I rotated the headlight pull knob to the right (clockwise), I would lose all dash/instrument illumination as soon as the switch clicked going in the clockwise direction. The clock would also go out. I went to the junkyard and grabbed a bunch of things, including two headlight switches. One was from a 1991 Cherokee (pictured top) and the other was from a 1988 Cherokee Laredo (pictured bottom). (I hope I'm remembering that correctly...) The switch that I ended up trying first was the bottom switch (the one that I believe came from the '88 Cherokee Laredo). I mention the one I chose for a two reasons. First, it just looked like it was in better condition, as you can see from the pictures. The ceramic wheel was not yellowing as much as the other one, and the terminals were a lot cleaner. If you have multiple switches to choose from, and don't have the know how or equipment to test them out, go with the equipment that looks better (at least that's what I say). Second, after I pulled my busted switch out, I noticed that it looked a lot closer to the top switch in the picture I have attached. Specifically, it did not have the terminal prong that I have circled in the attached picture. I took a gamble and went with the switch that had an extra prong. I figured that it probably wouldn't hurt anything, and it might give me additional functionality in the long run. If anyone knows what the extra prong is for, I'd appreciate your answer in the comments section. It's a bit of a pain to swap these out. I highly recommend removing the kickplate/lower dash. I think it would be possible to do without removing the lower dash, but you'd be working almost entirely blind. It's a whole lot easier to get out if you remove the instrument cluster as well, but I don't recommend doing that if you don't have to (especially if you've never removed the instrument cluster before). When removing the instrument cluster you have to be really careful, and it's very easy to accidentally mess up your speedometer cable. Anyway, while I was at the junkyard, I also picked up some courtesy lights for the footwells. I am so happy I have these now! They illuminate when I open the driver's side door (but not the passenger door... perhaps that's by design, but I'm thinking that I need to do some more tinkering). They also light up when I turn the headlight knob all the way to the left (counter clockwise). And I'm hoping that when I get the time to tinker with the wiring in the pillar lights, that I'll be able to get those to light up when I open the door, but that's a project for another weekend. If anyone knows why my courtesy lights might not be lighting up when I open the passenger door, I'm all ears! I'm including a video of a guy explaining how to remove it:

@Silverhawk1991 Sorry it took me so long to reply to this. I did make a video! Hope this helps some people!

I like to think of myself as an audiophile, although I'm by no means an expert. Also, I'm not made out of money. Over the years, I have inherited a lot of car audio components, including an two-channel Alpine amp and some 3 (or maybe 4)-inch midrange speakers. Over the past month, I surfed FB Marketplace, picked up a small sub and bought some better 6x9s (the ones that came from the PO were POS's). Because the Alpine was only two channel and I installed speakers in the doors a few years ago, I had to do some math-ing. I used Chat-GPT and figured out how to wire it all up using a combination of series and parallel. It sounded pretty good. But it was bugging me that the dash speakers were not the intended size. And because they weren't the intended size I wasn't able to mount them the way tweeters were intended to be mounted in the truck. Just today I went to the junk yard and found some Jensen tweeters in an 88 XJ. I took of that damn kick-plate AGAIN. (Man... I hate taking that thing off). I took the 3" full-range speakers out and put the tweeters in. I think it sounds pretty good! I did not use a crossover, but because I had done the series/parallel wiring, maybe I ended up wiring the system close to the way they did it in the factory? The tweeters are not overwhelmingly loud or tinny and overall, I think there's a bit more balance to the system. TL;DR — Tweeters under the dash with the factory brackets, 5" full-range speakers in the doors, full-range 6"9"s in behind the seats in the pillars, and a single 12" sub. I'll never be able to make the cab as quiet as a modern car, but now it doesn't really matter. Sound system sounds great! Ed Note: I am running a little bit of a crossover on the amp that is driving the tweeters and the full-range speakers. I am cutting the sub at about 80hz on the low end and the mids/highs at 100hz. I think that's right... I'm tired right now. But jazzed about my system. I think it's complete!

What the heck is this thing? I took it out while doing some work, and I do plan to put it back in, but from what I can tell the only thing it does is direct air flow from a vent flap... and I'm hyperfixated on it because it's a weird design. Maybe it is intended to catch debris coming in from the outside? Also, if something like a hose is supposed to be hooked up to this, I don't think it has been for a long time.

I'm looking for some advice. And this is something of a two-part question. I am planning to finally get the center brake light on my camper shell trailer working like it should. But I'd really like it to function as both a running light and a brake light — but avoid the issue of flashing. I understand from other posts that there are two methods to do this: Getting a logic module or bypassing the multifunction switch. But what I have been having trouble figuring out is if there is a best way to do this while also ensuring that the truck cap light functions like a running light and a brake light. When I search the web for logic modules, I'm not finding anything that clearly states they will provide this functionality. And come to think of it, I'm thinking I may have to do some additional cab-to-cap wiring if I want to go the bypass route: Running one wire for the running light circuit and another directly from the brake. Has anyone out there set up their third brake light so it works as a running light and a brake light? If so, how would you recommend I do mine?

Thanks @pizzaman09! I'm so happy I did this. It's like... Night and day. Ha! But for real, I also replaced the halogen festoon bulbs with LED bulbs while I was doing all this. I gotta say... they are clearly brighter, but they didn't really make much of a difference in lighting up the cab. But with the dome light, I the whole cab is illuminated. I am trying to be as much of an OEM purist as I can be, but this dome light doesn't really look out of place to me.

Thanks! That's what I was figuring. I got the headboard back in yesterday and hooked up my new dome light to the drivers side courtesy light. I also did a little work on my courtesy lights. I have the aftermarket Euramtec lights, which I purchased about 5 years ago. I put some LED bulbs in, but they are still not working perfectly. I don't know how I could possibly sand the interior parts and I didn't have the patience to go at them with a paper clip or dental pick. So I tried to bend the little prongs inward just a little bit and used a queue tip to brush a little dialectic grease on all the metal parts. Now one of them is working a bit better, but they are still kinda finicky. Next time I'm in there, I'll either just replace them with some brand new ones or I don't know what. Here are some pictures of my refurbished headliner. I'm pretty happy with it. I couldn't track down 3M-77 (big box store was out), so I bought what seemed to be the Gorilla Glue equivalent. Time will tell if I did a good job. But it looks good right now! I used an old blanket I had lying around.

I'm getting ready to put my revamped headliner back in my '87 4-cl / 4-speed (base), and I am going to install an overhead dome light. I was just going to do my own wiring job and then I encountered a mystery wire. I'm wondering if anyone knows it's purpose. It is coming off of (or at least it is sprouting from) the wiring harness for the driver's side courtesy lights (are they called "courtesy lights" or do they have a different name?). I'm colorblind, so I'm not always great with colors. The wire is striped. I'm thinking it is black and white, based on the Haynes manual I have. The manual indicates this is for the cargo lamp. Do you all know if this is indeed for the cargo lamp? If it is, I won't touch it, as that seems like something I might want to add one day. Or is it possible that this is for an optional overhead dome light? I probably should have looked at my wiring diagram before starting this post, as I'm starting to think I just answered my own question. Then again, I've been wrong plenty in my life. Heh. So what do you all think? Including pics for reference. If it is for the cargo light, I'm glad to know it. I didn't even realize that was a thing and I can see how useful it would be. I have a camper shell and a dog. It would be great to be able to run something to the camper and be able to check on Lima when it's dark out (among many other applications).

Definitely worth replacing the sockets/harnesses on each of the front turn signals. This resolved my always-on headlight indicators (always on when the headlights are on).

Dropping in 13 years later to say that after having the always-on turn-signal indicators in my 1987 MJ for many years, I finally got around to swapping out the two front turn signal sockets/harnesses and that fixed the problem. The ground on one of the old ones was very clearly rusted all the way through (the rust had eaten all the way through and the prong was loose/broken). I checked the indicators after changing each harness and I could see that it resolved the always-on issue one at a time. I used these ones by Doorman. The Autozone computer system said it wouldn't fit my vehicle, but they did. However, on the driver's side, it did require a little bit of force to get the headlamp housing to fit back into place and lineup with the screw fastener holes. I'm going to make a TikTok about it.

Just dropping by to say that I had the same issue recently, and it was the "trans" fuse. Now... as to why that fuse keeps blowing? Only the fickle Jeep gods and their gremlin minions know why.

Final question. Are you happy you took the time to put AC in your 2.5L? I see a lot of folks saying I might as well just upgrade to the 4.0, but I'm a bit invested in my 2.5 at this point — and it only has 115,000 miles on it.

Thanks a bunch. I think I'm beginning to wrap my head around this. One more clarification question: Are you saying that if I find a 4.2L AMC I6 I might also find a compatible AC bracket? I'm scanning the Wikipedia entry for the 4.2L right now. Looks like it was used in a variety of cars for many decades. I'm assuming that if the bracket from a 4.2L is compatible that it wouldn't be compatible in every single vehicle that the 4.2L ever appeared in — that there are variations.

Thanks @eaglescout526. Forgive my ignorance here, but I have some followup questions: 1) Is this bracket a two-part thing? If I find one, will all the pieces most likely be together, or might I have to piece it together from two separate vehicles? 2) I saw on a different thread that @Jeep Driver had a photo of a super clean and polished 2.5 L with the AC bracket (see Jeep Driver's photo below for reference). Again, I'm new to this world, but all the parts on that engine look ridiculously clean. Did you somehow get that bracket fabricated, Jeep Driver? Is that something that is possible? We live in a world of 3D printing, after all... Please, explain this to me as if I were a child, because in this instance I basically am.

Hello Everyone. Can someone post a picture of what an AC/Alternator bracket for a 1987 2.5L looks like? Alternatively, can someone let me know if I'm on the right track in my search (photos below). I understand they are hard to come by, but they are REALLY hard to source when I can't even figure out what one is supposed to look like. I've found many brackets in junk yards all over the Western U.S., but the mechanic who is helping me with this project keeps saying they aren't quite right (because they either came off of an XJ or they came off of a 4.0 MJ or some other complication). I am going to attach images of some of the brackets that I've found in my search. Perhaps one of these is actually the right one and my mechanic is mistaken? Help!