Chico

You guys wanna talk safety. You know how all repair manuals always say "Make sure vehicle is in Park, apply the parking brake, and Chock the wheels" so there is no possible way the car can role. Guess what :brows: I forgot to put the truck in Park ,didn't apply the parking brake, and didn't block the wheels ,and when I blipped the throttle on the throttle body to show my buddy that the water pump was indeed working because fluid was squirting into the pressure bottle, low and behold the MJ decided to go through his cinder block wall. :rotfl2: I WIN THE "IDIOT OF THE MONTH AWARD"

If it was your TPS it would have an arm that rotates on the back. Take a pic of the other side for us will ya?

I don't think that's your TPS. Mine has the wires already attached to the TPS which then connect to the wiring harness. That looks like your IAC. Try switching one out from the junkyard or a friends XJ. If it fixes your problem buy a new one at your local parts store.

Oops, Rog I read your post wrong. That looks a little differnt than the one on my 88 but similar. Your TPS should be right next to it. If you have an automatic their should be two sets of wires coming out of the TPS. I think one set of wires for a manual. The IAC sits right next to my TPS on my throttle body and like I said looks similar to that.

Was it on the throttle body next to the TPS. If yes then yeah, that's probably it.

Yeah, I'm not happy with Sears/Craftsman. I've now switched to Lowes/Dewalt.

I don't why it is stalling, just found this looking for the problem. Which is new since the stalling started. Trying to narrow things down. Trying switching out IAC's

Are yo sure the XJ is stalling because of the crack in your manifold. That sounds like the IAC is either bad or not connected. I only say that because my 96 VW gti did that when the IAC went south.

I'm telling you. I bought a set of combination wrenches at the beginning of last fall. Never used it all winter. Pulled it out of the shed when the temp warmed up and they were all like that from the moisture. Walked into Sears said I wanted replacements and they changed out everyone. What's messed up is that they didn't give me a problem about the $40 tool set, but they wouldn't do a stinking thing about the weed wacker, lawn tractor or plow I had for the front of it that were crap. (All Craftsman). I also took back a circular saw, cordless drill, and work lamp (Craftsman) that were worthless too. However I don't think they gave me a problem with that because I ended up buying Dewalt stuff.

Replace the cable going from the negative terminal of the battery to the block. Clean both connections real well. Get the cable at Autozone that has a second wire that runs from the battery side and bolt it to the inner fender. Replace the ground braid from the back of the block to the firewall. This worked for my problem. If it works for yours we might as well sticky it. It seems to be happening to a couple people with XJ's in my area.

wait wait wait, forget all that work. You said Craftsman right. Take the whole set to Sears and they'll replace every piece in that set one by one. I did it. No reciept needed.

This is going to sound dumb but I had similar symptons. Couldn't figure out what it was. I changed everything you did and no differnce. Then I put a new cable from the negative terminal on the battery to the block that also had a second wire attatched that bolted on to my inner fender. I cleaned up all three connections real well and problem solved.

I put a CSF 3-core in my MJ about 2-1/2 years ago when I installed my stroker. The engine ran hot (220* - 225*) all the time w. the 195* factory stat. I called Hesco, they recommended pulling the CSF rad and putting in one of these single core aluminum rads: http://www.alumrad.com/dblpass.html The running temp immediately dropped immediately 10*-15* and stayed there. When I pulled the hoses to drain the CSF, big globs of solder came out. I shook out about a pound of solder balls out of it later. I send it back (my dime) and they refunded my $$ after I screamed, so no more CSF products for me. Maybe I just got a bad one and they've improved their QC now. I also remember a bunch of guys on NAXJA had similar problems at the time. The crowd now watches silently :popcorn: Anybody else?

Well the level of coolant in the bottle is not going down. However water does come out of the tailpipe at start up with a little bit of smoke. It goes away after warm up. I'm reasoning it's because the engine has 220,000 miles on it and I don't believe the PO's treated it well. "unexplained missing" maybe, truck never idles over 500 rpm but I figured it was because the inside of the valve cover is nasty with build-up and won't let the engine breath properly. When I unplug the vac line from the VC to the intake mani it idles great. (getting around to cleaning it :oops: ) What did you mean by"water don't burn"? I'm gonna borrow the pressure tester from autozone for the coolant sometime this week. The rad is getting changed anyway to the three row one. As soon as I send the money Taz is sending me a new shroud. (sorry TAZ, forgot to go to the bank today) Bought a "block test kit" at NAPA today. Looks like a big glass crayon. I skimmed the directions quickly it said to place over coolant bottle, pour some blue fluid in, turn on the engine, and start sucking air out of the bottle. If the fluid turns yellow or green then there are combustion gasses in the coolant and I guess that means the head gasket is crap. We'll see tomorrow when I do it. Back to the original "getting hot". I said the gauge was showing the engine getting real hot. Not in the red but close. Hit it with a laser thermometer from harbor freight and at it's hottest would read 230-245. Well today after chasing down a couple friends w/laser thermometers and rechecking with theirs I found out that not only is the truck gauge reading incorrectly (which we knew) but now my laser thermometer is off by about 20-25 degrees, which means my engine is really running at 210-225 Which means after all this crap it's actually pretty normal :wall: I'd still like to bring the temp down a bit. Hopefully the full shroud and new rad will help. Thanks for all the help guys. I'll update with the tests when I get em done :cheers:

Yeah I'm buying that one next week. Story in a couple posts.

There's no redness to the dipstick. Compression test was done with engine cold from overnight wait. Cylinders 2-6 were all 150-160. Cylinder #1 was 135. The oil on the dipstick does smell like gasoline a little :dunno:

You're going to have to splice I think 5 or 6 wires

So, called NAPA today. 1988 radiator=$145 1992 radiator=$158 These are both aluminum with plastic ends. He then told me the 1992 also had a copper one w/brass ends for $210. He can't get it though. I take it the copper one is better? Anybody have any opinions? Later on, I called a friend who's a VW mech. He said don't spend the money on the radiator because he thinks the head gasket is blown. Told me to get a kit that hooks up to the coolont bottle and somehow changes color if there's a loss of compresion due to a head gasket leak. Anybody have any experience with this?

So Pete, what should I ask for at NAPA tommorow? A 91 or newer radiator for a 4.0 automatic.

If I get one with a radiator cap don't I have to change evrything else over to the newer style though? At the begining of the week the gauge would read a bit over the 210 mark I used a laser thermometer to point at the sensor on the head. It said anywhere from 215 to 225. Tonight the gauge is almost in the red and the same spot/laser thermometer is reading 230 to 245. :eek: However nothing is leaking/system is under pressure and the big reason I think it's blocked is because the fan isn't turning on until it gets really really hot (wasn't like that before). The temp at the fan switch is perfectly normal (160-180).

The days here have been getting warmer. So has the MJ. My truck's getting really hot now but not overheating yet. Here's my first question. With the temperature hot, the top of the radiator fins are warm , but the bottom is cool. Is this normal or does it mean my radiator is blocked? The truck has new: thermostat, fan switch (electric fan does work but does not bring the temp down) fluid, pressure bottle and cap. I guess the water pump works because fluid shoots into the bottle and I just replaced the fan clutch and bled the closed system by removing the sensor on the back of the head (which blew all over the place when I took it off) Question number two: If it's normal for the radiator fins to be cool at the bottom what should I check next?

Don't listen to T. The rest of us want to see em. :D

Thanks hornbrod :cheers: TAZ, PM on the way :D

K, thanks guys. Would not having that bottom part have a negative effect on the cooling system? What I'm really asking is getting a new one going to actually help keep the engine temp cooler?

Anybody have one? I changed out my fan clutch today and noticed there's no bottom part to it. Is that normal? Sorry I don't have anything else to reference to. :cheers: