CrustyBoy

The other weekend I went through the valve cover mod process, here's some pics. Before: This is the inside of the vacuum fitting that goes in the rear-most hole of the valve cover. Super clogged wow.. While I had the cover off I did run the engine for a few seconds to confirm all the rockers are flowing oil good. Seemed fine. Cleaned up: This is as far as I cared to go with cleaning the inside. Took a good bit of wire brushing to get it this far. Flutes chopped and drilled: Crappy crinkle paint job I did

Hello Everyone, I bought this 88 Comanche Eliminator a couple months ago and have been tinkering with it a lot. For now I just want to get it stabilized to a point where I can drive it daily. Eventually I'd like to challenge myself with some rust repair and body work but I have no experience in that realm. I would also like to do some swapping, like an 8.8" rear end and AX15. The good - It starts and runs every time. Seems to hold its fluids reasonably well. The cooling system has already been converted from closed to open. Transmission shifts smooth and clutch feels okay. The floor pans from underneath look pretty good. Haven't felt a death wobble yet. Tail gate is decent, and it came with some other desirable parts (good tail light lenses). The bad - The body is obviously rough. Windshield is cracked. It's 2WD. The engine is tired and making a few concerning noises. It has a surging idle while cold, and then idles around 1000RPM when hot. A lot of shoddy wiring work has already been done under the hood that will need corrected. The steering is very vague and there is a fair amount of play in the linkage. No A/C. Here it is the day I drove it home: Removed spark plugs immediately: This picture isn't great but the bottom plug (Cyl 1) looks a little rich, the rest look a little lean? Looks like I'm missing the front-most exhaust stud: Not sure if it is broken off in there or just gone.. Anyway, I have already done a bunch of steps from Cruiser's list. I'll be documenting those in the near future here. Planning on doing all of those that I possibly can, and making sensible upgrades along the way. Appreciate everyone's insight in my repair threads so far. There will be many more I'm sure. - CrustyBoy

Appreciate you confirming. I will leave it disabled then. I suspect I have some bad leaks around the intake/exhaust manifold. Partly because I'm missing the front-most nut, and that stud appears to be broken off too. So I'm going to take that all off when I have some time and address those issues, I'll freshen up whatever is blocking off the EGR when I do that too.

Anybody know, is there a replacement part for the EGR solenoid that mounts over by the fuel pump ballast resistor? I went to hook up all the hoses on my new vacuum harneses and discovered mine's gone missing! Tried a quick search on RockAuto and nothing came up for a replacement. Edit: or should I just leave it bypassed/deleted?

I don't know the measurements but I saw this pic the other day. Looks like the XJ bracket is a longer with a different shape. Picture is from Cruiser's Technical Photos

Couple updates: I changed my harmonic balancer because the accessory belt started rubbing against the timing cover. That was pretty easy to do thanks to the rental tools from AutoZone (OEMTools harmonic balancer puller & install kits). Also started to feel a slip in first and second gear, so I changed the trans fluid for the first time since buying the truck. I see a lot of people asking online about the square bit needed to remove the drain and fill holes on a BA 10/5. For reference, this socket (CIA Tools 2036) works great and it arrived at my door in one day. It seems like the correct volume drained out of the trans so I don't think it's leaking too bad. However, there was a good mount of metal in the fluid and on the plug magnet unfortunately. I replaced the fluid with Red Line 75w90 NS, and drove it around a bit. Haven't felt a slip again yet so I think that's fixed at least for now. Question - If I was going to swap out for an AX15 down the road. Is it possible to set it up with a transfer case for 4WD, but run it in 2WD? Would that damage the transfer case or anything? I would spend the money on a nice reman AX15 kit, but want to hold off on figuring out the front axle for a while. I'd rather focus on upgrading the rear end first.

I could be wrong but usually a consistent start followed by a stop is caused by a bad fuel pump ballast resistor. There's a part in this video where he starts the engine prior to fixing the problem to show you the symptoms. Watch and see if yours is behaving the same way. Edit: Sorry I missed the part where you said it's running after the O2 sensor was fixed. Still probably worth it to confirm that resistor is good but maybe it isn't your problem.

Damn that looks awesome if I ever get the chance to buy one of those I'm gonna do it for sure.

Is there a preferred oil additive for these engines? I am going to change from 10w30 to 15w40 and was thinking about adding something like this to try to quiet that down.

Put in rebuilt Bosch 4-port injectors from Trevor.skankfootracing@gmail.com. Good buying experience. Probably didn't need to do that though, it already ran fine. Still runs fine. Couple questions: 1. Do I need to unhook the battery and reset the ECU after I did the fuel injectors? It didn't really seem to change much at all. 2. I'm going to be taking off the valve cover to do the mod from Cruiser's page soon. Going to clean up and paint the cover. Is there anything I should be doing with the valve train while I have it open? I've noticed it starts to tap intermittently once the engine is fully hot. Takes about 30-40 minutes to get that hot and it's not real loud.

I'll just use a zip tie then. Thanks guys.

Is there a part number for the clip that holds those two harnesses together on the intake? I ordered all that stuff from your links + a valve cover gasket so I can do that mod as well.

I got the bearing in (Timken 203FF) had to buy a new spacer/bushing for it (NAPA P/N TEM 409157) so everything is quiet now on the serpentine belt. I suppose it's kind of cool to keep the original pulley for what that's worth. You can see all that mounted up in the video below. I took off the breather tube that should run from the valve cover to the air filter box and wanted some opinions on it. Is this too much smoke? I know blow by is common on these things but it's looking like a lot to me. This is after about 20 minutes of idling in the garage. If you wait for the end you can see the what the temp/odometer reads. I am not sure if this video will work, sorry if the quality is bad. Pxl 20220606 225752870.Ts.m4v

Appreciate you guys taking a look. I ran it hot last night and unscrewed the cap, no burns. Sorry for the dumb question. Next dumb question - How bad is it that I don't have the electric radiator fan? You can obviously see the belt driven one in the picture, there's no electric fan next to it. The coolant temp gauge never goes past 210, but I've heard those can't be trusted.

So on a closed system, if I get the engine hot and take that surge tank cap off I'll get blasted with scalding hot water right? Maybe I'll just try that and see how it goes haha. Edit: I've never actually tried that, I just saw the coolant level go up and assumed it was building pressure. There could be none.

Yeah think I'm going to just switch directions and replace the bearing. Reading around other Renix forums it sounds like these pulleys are very hard to find. Maybe impossible to buy new. Stupid question (sorry) - How do I know with 100% certainty whether I have an open or closed cooling system? My surge bottle does pressurize as the car gets hotter. The level on it goes up, it has a "cold" and "hot" fill level line etc. But it seems like my radiator is not supposed to have a cap? Is that right? If there's a radiator cap does that mean it's been changed to an open system?

Idler pulley came in but was the wrong part. I'm actually pretty sure the seller sent me the wrong part in the correct box (box said PN 53002903).. All of the pictures of the part online look like this (the original pulley looks like this too): The actual pulley I got looks like this and does not fit: Those fins that run from the inner bearing area to the outer edge rub against the metal mounting point for the AC. So buyers beware I guess? Just posting this for anyone who needs the same pulley. If anyone knows of a reputable source for parts like these I'd really appreciate it.

Went ahead and ordered the Crown Automotive unit that pops up in your search there. Thanks for that! We'll see how it works. If it's a dud I'll go the bearing replacement route instead.

Yep here's what I got. That top-left pulley is what I'm looking for. Going to go through your list as much as I can. Let me know if anything bad jumps out at you in the picture. The hose that runs from the radiator cap to the surge tank is pretty close to the fan. I think I can change that just by rerouting it.

Gonna give these a try thanks for the tip. Definitely a few I'm going to have to cut/drill off.

Well, I installed the new Mopar water pump and replaced the hoses. Seems to be working well. Now I'm chasing down a noise from another pulley. Does anyone know the correct part number for this pulley?? The smooth one to the right of it was real easy to find at a parts store, but this one is a pain in the @$$. The one I got from Oreillys is plastic and did not have the correct depth/shape to clear the bracket it mounts to. The original one is metal/grooved and has a deep side to help it clear that metal. Anyone familiar?

Hey All, I'm trying to get my driver door off so I can put on a better shell that was given to me when I bought my truck. I'm having a real hard time getting these torx bolts to break free. Several are stripped pretty bad and I can't get a good bite on the heads with a vice grip. Anyone have any wisdom on how to extract these stupid things? Also, can anyone recommend a good hex-head replacement bolt? I'd like to make this process much easier going forward if possible. Thanks!

I would also buy 5.

Thank you! Wish it still had those bucket seats instead of this stupid blue bench. Based on the color code, maybe it is less of a franken-truck than I thought. I'll have to confirm the rear-end/diff. Excited to hear it might have an LSD.

1JTMW6458JT041466 / 1988 Jeep Comanche Eliminator 2WD Short Bed 4.0L / Peugot 5-speed Build date: Unsure. I don't think the doors are original. Current Location: Central Ohio Status: Drives pretty well. Idles lumpy at first but once it's warm it's a steady 700RPM very smooth. Planning to run through all the common maintenance items and get it as mechanically sound as possible. Maybe swap an LS/T56 later on down the road? Not sure. Notes: I think this is somewhat of a franken-truck. Seems like a lot of parts aren't original to the car. Interior is all mis-matched, brown steering wheel, grey dash, blue bench seat etc. First glance at the floor pans from underneath is actually pretty good! I haven't removed the carpet to get a real look yet but plan to do that very soon. Current owner: Me!