Minuit

You must live fairly close to me, huh? Nasty weather here in Columbia.

I cheated and bought a pre-pulled one for $85, unfortunately with the ZJ pitman arm still attached. Putting it in my truck sucked enough that I feel justified in paying someone else to pull the ZJ unit. I'd hate to do it in the muddy nastiness that junkyards in TN are this time of year. Pull the drag link first. On my MJ, I used an OTC tie rod remover to non-destructively remove the TRE from the MJ pitman arm. In the junkyard I'd go ahead and pop the ZJ pitman arm off while the box is attached to the ZJ - you won't be needing it and my junkyards charge extra for a box with the pitman arm. I don't remember what size the pitman arm nut was, but think axle nut socket. On both the MJ and ZJ boxes, the nut spun right off with no trouble. Next up, pitman arm puller time. You'll want the biggest pitman arm puller you can find. I removed the MJ pitman arm with the box still installed in the truck. My 450 ft-lb Milwaukee impact on the forcing screw wouldn't even budge it. I ended up needing to bust out the 3 foot cheater pipe on a breaker bar and a 4lb sledgehammer to get the ZJ pitman arm off. I got the pitman arm puller REALLY tight and then smacked the pitman arm as hard as I could with the hammer. A few repetitions of that got the pitman arm off. The steering shaft attachment at the steering box is just a pinch bolt. I think you have to take it out all the way. You might want to spread the attachment knuckle. I didn't need to on my MJ. Remove all the $#!& that'll be in the way of getting the power steering hose fittings off. In my MJ, I went ahead and pulled off the top radiator support and aux fan. Access still won't be good, but it was workable. Crowsfoot wrenches might be a help here. I didn't have any in the right size, so I had to fight with it 1/16 of a turn at a time. The return line on my MJ got seized to the fitting. The fitting came loose just fine, just with the line stuck to it. An Autozone nearby had a new return line assembly in stock - you may want to have new pressure and return lines ready just in case. Good time to replace them anyway. Oh, yeah - O-RINGS! I used various sizes of HNBR o-rings meant for A/C service. They're oil resistant and I have tons of them thanks to working on HVAC systems. Have a large assortment of o-rings ready. Harbor freight sells a couple of good assortments that are handy. My rule of thumb is that o-rings on A/C, hydraulic, and other types of fittings are single use, and I always replace them when disconnecting them. Once the drag link, hose fittings, and intermediate shaft are loose, the 3 bolts in the driver side wheelwell can come out and the steering box will be free. The MJ steering shaft does not collapse easily, so you'll have to worm it off with the steering box loose, or at least I did. I don't know if the ZJ steering shaft collapses easily. If it does, that'll make removal a little easier. There is not a better time to replace the intermediate shaft than now. They're available new for about 100 bucks. Mine had a very small amount of play in it, so I replaced it. Now is the time to adjust the box. I followed the '93 FSM's procedure for adjusting. I ended up with about 10 in-lb of drag over-center. The FSM specifies 18 in-lb as the maximum. I suspect the ZJ box would've been loose had I just put it in without adjusting it, as it had absolutely no drag over-center before the adjustment. Installation is the reverse of removal. The steering box weighs 30 pounds without the pitman arm. It is not fun to hoist above your head with one hand while lining up the intermediate shaft, the steering box spacer, and the first of the three bolts with the other hand. This was the most unfunnest part. If you have any way to rig the steering box so you don't have to hold it up, do it. A transmission jack might even do it. I was working alone and had no way of holding the box up, so brute force and ignorance it was. The intermediate shaft is indexed to both the column and gearbox, and they all must be lined up correctly for it to fit. Once the box is securely mounted (make sure to hook up the intermediate shaft BEFORE putting a bolt in), hook the pressure and return lines back up, install the MJ pitman arm, and reconnect the drag link. Next up is to bleed the system. This took me two days of on-and-off work before I had no cavitation or foaming of the fluid. Bleeding the power steering system was for me the second most unfunnest part. The factory procedure is to jack the truck up and turn the wheel back and forth WITHOUT touching the stops dozens of times without starting the engine. I eventually got it to bleed by loosening the return hose on the back of the P/S reservoir and draining a little bit of fluid out. Don't ask me how that helped, but it did. I had some power steering pump noise before the steering box swap, and after flushing it with new fluid, it seems a little quieter. Knock on wood. Fun job. I'll be doing it again to my 89 pretty soon.

All ZJ boxes have the 12.7:1 ratio. Not all XJ boxes have the 14:1. I think there was a slower power steering ratio offered as part of an offroad package at one point, and I want to say the manual steering boxes have an 18:1 or maybe even slower than that. The slower power steering boxes are probably quite rare at this point. You'll see remanufactured gearboxes under the same part number listed for several different Jeep models - from what I can tell, most if not all rebuilders have them lumped together. For example, O'Reilly Auto Parts lists the same part number, Masterpro 503-0122 for both a '91 MJ and a '93 ZJ. The only real difference between the MJ and ZJ boxes is the gear ratio so they are "technically correct" in giving them the same number, but if I wanted the quicker ratio and still ended up with a slow @$$ 14:1 box after asking for a ZJ box, I'd be very disappointed. So you might end up with anything if you buy a remanned box. I'm sure some lucky soul ended up with a 12.7:1 box when he paid for a 14:1 box, but you never know what you'll get. If you're set on a rebuilt box, test it on the parts counter. I believe the 12.7:1 box is about 3 turns from lock to lock outside of the vehicle. The 14:1 box is about 3.5. My memory might not be correct on those numbers, but the ZJ box is less for sure. Not only that, but the reviews I've seen on the parts store reman boxes have not exactly been positive. The ZJ box I adjusted for my '91 by the FSM procedure is as tight as you're gonna get with a recirculating ball system. According to the reviews on the reman boxes, they can be as sloppy as a high-mileage original right out of the gate. I would expect better from a dedicated steering box rebuilder, but those "boutique" rebuilt boxes are damn expensive! On my very first test drive, I noticed a major difference in quickness by the time I'd backed out of the driveway. You'll know it when you drive it. That was confirmed when I took my '89 (with original, kinda loose 14:1 box) on a dump run about a week after doing the swap and I was shocked at how slow and sloppy the steering felt compared to the '91 - before the swap, they were roughly even, with the '91 having somewhat tighter response than the '89. I'll be getting and adjusting another ZJ box for the '89 pretty soon.

I wouldn't know about the Durango box, but I just finished swapping a ZJ box into my '91 and I strongly recommend it for any street-driven application. Any ZJ (that's '93 through '98 Grand Cherokees to normal people) gearbox will fit, and for a street driven truck it gives a very noticeable improvement in steering response thanks to the faster gear ratio (12.7:1 as opposed to the MJ's 14:1). You'll need to swap your original Pitman arm onto the ZJ gearbox (this can be a job in itself), but other than that it's a direct fit. Don't buy a remanned ZJ box, as there's no guarantee that the faster gears will be in it still. You want an original un-rebuilt gearbox that came straight out of a ZJ before you got it. If you are wheeling the truck, you wouldn't want a ZJ box. Because of the faster gear ratio, steering effort will be higher and it is no stronger than the original box. If the truck is driven on the street though, I can wholeheartedly recommend it. After putting a few miles on my 91 with the ZJ box, I'll be getting one for my other truck very soon. Swapping a steering box is a crappy job to do alone, but the improvement is worth it. Replacing the intermediate shaft is easy to do at that point if yours is worn out. However - adjust the new ZJ box before you put it in! A ZJ box with some miles on it is likely to be just as loose as your original. It must be adjusted outside of the vehicle and there is a specific procedure outlined in the factory service manual that almost NOBODY follows, which is a potentially dangerous mistake and can easily result in the steering box being ruined. You'll need an inch-pound beam style torque wrench at the very least, and you may want to have a spanner wrench to loosen and re-tighten the input shaft lock nut. I just used two pin punches and a screwdriver though.

The fuel sender can be removed with everything still in place. I think the service manual wants you to remove the driveshaft, but that's not necessary. If I had all the tools I needed (which amount to a chisel and hammer to drive the lockring off the sender, a screwdriver to undo a hose clamp, and whatever size the fastener is on the pump bracket) and a replacement pump, I think I could get the job done on the side of the road in an hour. When I did it originally, I dropped the tank, but that was before I knew you could do it without dropping the tank. Even still, the last time I dropped the tank on my 91, I timed myself - from starting to having the tank on the floor, it took me 23 minutes. I started with an empty tank and knew exactly what tools I'd need and in what order, but still. The pump service on an MJ is really not that difficult. I do not see any normal use situation where the extra noise and re-engineering required for an external pump is worth it. How often is anyone really swapping a fuel pump out, anyway?

I would suggest not putting any on if you don't have a leak. You may notice that the sensor only has one wire going to it - it is a variable resistor connected on one end to the oil pressure gauge and to ground on the other end. The resistance to ground varies with oil pressure, resulting in a current through the gauge that varies with oil pressure. To work, it has to have a low resistance path to ground, which happens to be the threads where it screws into the engine. Thread tape can disrupt that connection.

In regards to the fuel gauge, if it worked before you touched it and now doesn't, that strongly implicates either the new gauge or something that you did in the process of swapping the cluster. Maybe try plugging the old cluster in again for a minute and see if the fuel gauge goes to where it should be? If so, the fuel gauge is not terribly difficult to replace. Come to think of it, I might have some spares. Check for dirty or broken connections on the back foil of the cluster. As for the oil gauge, try this: unplug the oil pressure sensor. The gauge should go way past 80. Now, ground out the wire that plugs into the sensor. The gauge should now read 0. If it does those things, chances are the gauge is good. Did you use any thread sealing tape on the sensor when you put it on?

Amplifier time!

Keeper

Those are XJ rear splash guards.

Does the oil pressure gauge go back to 0 with the engine off? If so, sounds like you got an oil pressure sensor for a light, not a gauge. The volt gauge is typical of the Renix era. Expect it to read way low due to voltage drop between the alternator and gauge. Cleaning connections will help a little, but pretty much all of them do it. Did the fuel gauge work properly before the cluster swap? An '88 cluster should work fine in your '89. I'm using an '87 cluster in mine, no problems, except that my volt gauge reads too low too.

My family doesn't really do Christmas in the traditional sense, so I didn't get anything under a tree this year! ...with that being said I decided earlier this year that I need to find ways to increase my productivity at home, so I've been steadily adding to my cordless power tool fleet. I also snagged one of those Harbor Freight tool carts on Black Friday sale and will probably be getting one of their small tool chests for work fairly soon. It's been great!

As far as I know, the only real meeting was the one in the first post of this thread. If you or anyone else wants to organize a meetup... go for it. I've got way too much stuff on my plate to organize anything, but I might be able to attend if someone else organizes one.

I have an ACC carpet in my '91. All things considered, I think it turned out really well, but don't think you're just going to lay it in like an OEM carpet. It takes some serious work to get it right. I would assume the vinyl floor is the same way. Stock up on utility knife blades before you start, and be patient with it.

Internal failure inside the radio. If shaking the radio around makes it better, more than likely bad solder joints. The AR-7752 is old enough now that that's a concern. I can see the display is bleeding around the edges as well. That will get worse. I normally see that in radios that have spent a lot of time in direct sunlight or have been dropped. That radio is nothing special. That model was used in '92 and '93, which means it isn't original to your truck anyway. All 1988 through 1996 single-DIN Jeep radios are interchangeable. To fix it would cost two or three times what it's worth.

Looking good Iwannaseetheradio

On my open system conversion in my '89, I used the Spectra radiator for the '91 and up XJ. No complaints so far - it fit well, but I don't have enough miles on it to notice any issues. It's also a manual truck with no A/C (currently) so I didn't feel like it was necessary to stuff the biggest radiator I possibly could in it. Cost was much more of a factor, and at like $60 the Spectra is really hard to beat. The temp gauge doesn't stay rock solid over the 2 on the gauge like it does in the 91, but I also didn't spend much money. I assume that the closed system version of the Spectra is exactly the same, just without a fill neck. My '91 has the CSF 2671 3-row. It's an automatic with A/C, so I considered it important to have a large radiator with a lot of capacity. The paint doesn't stick for $#!& which is very annoying, but functionally not a big deal. The only time I've ever seen the temperature gauge touch 210 since installing the CSF radiator (except when my aux fan died) was on a very hot day, climbing a very long hill at 80 MPH with the A/C on. Fun fact for us RockAuto shoppers: Check the radiator options for Cherokees as well as Comanches. They're the same radiator, but Rockauto carries a lot more options under the Cherokee listing than the Comanche ones.

I'll have you know that I once went two months without working on my truck! TWO WHOLE MONTHS!

These situations are exactly why I keep a huge stock of various size o-rings around. Never know when you might need some, or in a weird size. They're dirt cheap at all the usual suspects and you'll get plenty of use out of them. I do, anyway.

They aren't extremely common, but they are out there. That being said, if you're willing to get your hands dirty, it's not terribly complicated to modify a tach cluster to have the shift indicator. After looking through some factory brochures, I'm not sure the "3/4" cluster was even offered with a column shift automatic, at least not in '87.

Not with a tach. I believe the "3/4" cluster with oil and temp gauges was available, but not the full cluster with tachometer.

I'm starting to think someone played mix 'n' match with those springs... The truck looks approximately stock height, but that clip looks funny.

Hmm, just noticed that. Odd.

Those certainly look like MT springs to me. Here's an 89 3+1 standard pack for comparison: