MereAnatomy

Stopped at the brother's in Waco to shower, and I was in Dallas an hour after 4WD hardware opened so I could pick up a replacement wheel, the 2nd in 2 days (one bent, one with worn lug holes). Then to tire shop to swap the tire and rim, and back on the road. Got hung up in bad traffic in Arkansas, so after waiting with everybody else for a 30 min or so, through the ditch I went in search of a backroad. As i crossed the line into Kentucky just past midnight the next day, fueled only by red bull, monster, and a Whataburger I ate back in Dallas; there was a guy hanging out of the passenger window of a lifted Chevy giving me thumbs up that kept me pushing onwards. Made it into Louisville around 3 am, had been on the move for 45 hrs straight between the build and drive. Only problem for the untested Comanche was a short in my power locks that keeps blowing a fuse. Crashed at 6 am, didn't move till 4 pm that night.

its just called "vinyl dye." Had the local auto paint shop mix it up, used a piece of the cherokee donor trim as a sample color. expensive though, $70 a quart, applied it with pre-val sprayers (like a do it yourself aerosol). Trick is put it on thin and do multiple coats otherwise it will come off all screwy. definite upgrade from the stock blue we finished it at 0320 in the AM and i was on the road by 0420 for Kentucky. sunrise over Texas just south of Waco

then on went door panels and a new and improved seat fresh Line-X fresh rear exhaust pipe, have to love San Antonio only took em 45 min

Behind you 100% on the paint scheme. I had an 88 cherokee chief for a couple years, (actually sold it twice and bought it back after wrecks) because it was too pretty to end up junked. The decals were still available as of 2 years ago. All the cherokee chief and pinstripes are not painted on, though that would be even better if you could swing it.

time for some interior work, turning cherokee trim into comanche and my Dad deserves a lot of credit for the ensuing color change we ran it assembly line style with prep, laquer thinner, and then dye knocked it out in an hour or so. He has been an ever present part of the build, mainly cursing me for dragging it to his place and leaving it taking up space when i moved to Kentucky. In between his 72 years worth of wisdom rigging stuff up has made a lot of the impossible possible.

ill let you know when I make it out there, already have another shopping list. one can never have too many rusted piles of spare parts... as to the bumper maybe these will help, the Nate's rear bumper does stick out a bit far, but the build quality is good and the bolt kit he includes is first rate, he tack welds rods onto the bolts you can't reach. He will also do custom stuff. If I were to do it again I would ask him to extend the sides a few more inches to better protect the bed corners and invert the receiver so it was flush on outside and I could mount the license plate there on a flip bracket. Things we learn, fast shipping and excellent quality for the price.

hahah right you are, that's pick n pull in San Antonio, at one time it held the record for largest in the states. any recommendations for one around Louisville?

being a poseur and back to the hunting grounds again for a few things i forgot last few pesky wiring gremlins

then she sprouted doors, a hood, and i tossed in some really cool red buckets to roll around in cleaned up after the painter some more and rattle canned my Nate's rear bumper and did some touchup work on the warn unit for the front

Thanks guys, maybe run into you sometime out around these parts then? What are you driving around in and I'll keep an eye out. Fast forward to March of this year and Kentucky Blue was still at the painter's. My father was kind enough to start harassing him about the job since I was a thousand miles away. After a lot of hassle and of course more money it finally emerged and made it back over to the house. Signs of hope with the donor XJ in the background

So, been quite some time, but resurrecting the old girl has continued. I had to relinquish the idea on having the truck ready for my move and started my job in Louisville, KY back on 7/1/2012 leaving the truck half-finished down in San Antonio. Barely had time to come up for air since. Managed to get home back in November and got the truck over to sandblaster's to clean up the surface rust issues on the underside of bed and inner fender panels. Soon as it emerged from the sandblaster I got it over to the painter (more on that later). And by the time I left for Kentucky again work seemed to be going well. Thanks Rymanrph for the link to b52nav's build (I hope he still has the truck) as that definitely sealed the deal on color choice. The camaro aqua blue metallic really looks great and it meant I could avoid the engine compartment with a believable color difference.

Looking good Got the exhaust hooked up, put in a new master cylinder and switched her over to silicone fluid, radio wired. May not have doors, a hood, or bumpers, but she's got cold A/C!

Been a while, but I now have floorpans. Fitting Not pretty but strong and sealed With the red oxide primer Painted and ready for another 25 yrs

Finally getting close to paint, just needs doors from the donor and new floor pans. Which brings me to the most important question of them all. What color blue does it get? My current ranking 1.2010 Chevrolet Camaro Aqua Blue Metallic 2.2011 Corvette Jetstream Blue Metallic 3.GM Quasar Blue Metallic 4.2009 Jeep Deep Water Blue Pearl 5.2007 BMW Montego Blue What does the rest of the tribe think?

This past weekend I managed to scheme my way into 2 days off, and got home for Easter and a little more progress. Huge thanks to mfpdm and this helpful writeup on making wiring harness pigtails for engine swaps http://www.comancheclub.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=19695 Still had issues with the differences between the 96 the earlier HO's as far as turn signal wiring, but finally figured it out around 1am Tuesday morning and went to bed with a clean conscience. Ready to plug in. With all the new wiring temporarily hooked up, and a little drink of the local ethanol blend Kentucky Blue came to life and dropped into gear!

Been busy with the truck and school, but I cleaned up my junkyard aw4 and np242. Got them bolted up to the HO motor and stabbed them into the body the day after the fuel pump. Then I got the joy of discovering that the knockdown cable for the transmission was much shorter on the Renix era AW4 than the HO. Off came the pan to swap them and do a fluid change. Pleasant surprise of clean fluid and an absence of metal... In with the transfer case linkage and shifters. Almost passing for a 4x4!

Thanks manchekid, you were smart to leave it at the 4wd swap. Hopefully it all pays off. As far as Kentucky Blue goes I got the engine and dash wiring harnesses from the Cherokee swapped in. When it came to the fuel pump issue I explored the threads on how to get make the renix fuel pump work for the HO motor. My 96 donor also had the returnless fuel rail, so after pulling both pumps and taking a look inside the Comanche's tank I decided I would come up with my own solution. Hope some of this info helps. The Comanche's tank is significantly deeper and narrower than the Cherokee since it has to clear the Comanche's driveshaft. The Cherokee and Comanche pumps are also mounted in opposited directions from their insertion points at the tank. The Comanche's pump is on the left so it can drop inside a rectangularly shaped fuel baffle. It has a munch longer mounting structure to hit the appropriate depth to sit on a bumper mounted within the baffle. After a quick comparison of the two pumps, I reasoned that I could cut up the cherokee pump's mounting tube, reverse the pump and separate it from the mounting plate on the outside of the tank and fabricate a new mounting bar to locate it within the Comanche's fuel tank. This gave me the new style fuel pump, a functional gas gauge that reads in the correct direction (though it will read full till you burn about 1/3 of the fuel tank due to the depth difference). I figured it was more important to be accurate around empty than full. Long story short I made the first attempt and snapped the metal fuel line i was bending for the mounting rod. I then defered to the wisdom of an elder who used a strange device called a pipe bender (versus the vice and my arm that I had been using). The second attempt also broke the mounting pole. Third time was the charm though and here is the finished project. Original Comanche pump on top, frankensteined Cherokee pump replacement on the bottom The added twist does require you to lengthen two of the fuel gauge's wires, which were soldered and isolated from eachother in a piece of spare rubber fuel line. Went in fine after that, here's hoping she fires when the time comes.

On Monday I managed to score the missing transfer case linkage, a front driveshaft, a replacement air bag, and a tan mini console (had 3 to choose from) at a couple of local junkyards. I also tore into the interior and wiring on the donor Cherokee. If the rust in the Comanche wasnt a problem, the Cherokee was on its way out. Lake Cherokee consisted of standing water in both floorboards in the front, and the passenger rear was swamped.

Next up was stripping the Comanche bare, all factory equipment and wiring forward of the rear cab had to go. Did I mention I had a rust problem? Doing my best Fred Flintstone.

The project is on the move. Motor and transmission are out of the Comanche and separated for storage/sale/etc as of yesterday morning. I tore into the Cherokee donor car as well. The motor and transmission are now on the floor, but will have to wait till I can con someone into helping me pull them apart. The Cherokee had two female torx bolts on the top of the bellhousing that were standard bolts on the Comanche. After stripping one out, and having to grind the head off I bought the right tool at Harbor Freight for the other bolt. Don't try to be cheap, definitely more hassle... Will try to get the Comanche back in the garage tomorrow so I can stat stripping the interior and wiring harness.

zj grille it is, at some point someone must have thought it looked better. I did appreciate the fact that it was zip tied in though when it came time to get rid of it. free grille if anyone needs one

So to start it all off, I bought an 87 4.0L AW4 2wd truck back in December. Found out last week that I will be headed to Kentucky for the next 5 yrs, and I've decided its gotta be 4wd, reliable, and nice enough to be a dd by the end of May. Current plan is to drop in an HO motor out of 96 cherokee, an 87 4wd AW4, an NP242, and do an interior swap. Got her into my Father's shop this afternoon to start the madness. Her last drive as American Motors made her... minus the 6" Rocky Road lift and the D30 that's been bolted up Noon sitting next to the Cherokee donor truck Engine and transmisison on the hoist, waiting for an extra set of hands in the AM So far I've only lost a little blood, and broken 2 bolts and a Torx driver. The rusted hardware is nothing compared to the floorpan rot I discovered...

I second the fuel tank cleaning before any more tries. At a minimum drain the old gas and put a secondary inline fuel filter to catch the crap that will surely be headed to the motor from the tank. We had a couple cars in long term storage that ended up with bent pushrods (one with only 2100 miles on a new motor) from bad gas...

Pulling a dying Renix 4.0 and plan to swap in a 1996 4.0 (along with entire vehicle wiring harness forward of tailights from a wrecked 1996 Cherokee 2wd). My 87 Comanche is currently 2wd with a Renix 4.0 and an AW4 column shift. I have already picked up a junkyard 87 AW4 with a NP242 hooked up to it. Will my 96 4.0 (2wd motor) bolt up to the 87 4x4 AW4 transmission and work with the 96 Cherokee harness? Any other problems I should expect to encounter? Had my Comanche a couple months and have already been seduced by the upgrading bug...