neville_newman

Hello everyone, This is Josiah, using my Dad's account (with his permission, of course!). I'm just getting in to doing some needed repairs on my '88 MJ - hopefully I'll have it ready when I'm old enough to drive :-) Does anybody have a link for a site or a pdf file with good instructions on how to replace the slave cylinder on a Peugot 5 speed transmission? Mine is very leaky... Josiah

I've read about several engine swap projects, but I am particularly interested in diesel swaps. We still have one MJ and one of my younger sons would like to get it running again. I think it would be a great truck with a decent diesel conversion. I've seen a couple of reasonably-priced VW TDIs come across Craigslist here and recently saw a full engine/drivetrain 3.1 turbodiesel setup from an Isuzu Trooper. Has anyone ever heard of an Isuzu diesel going into an MJ?

I'm a rank newbie here, and I see that this thread has been dormant for a while, but I thought I'd toss in a few ideas. FWIW, I have a 2-door XJ, and 2 LWB MJs, and have had 4 Suburbans ('87-91), 3 of them with diesels. So, my own experiences are based on driving those. I have never done any kind of fab work this huge - all my fab has been on little Fiats (X1/9's) and that was a blast. But it's a far cry from your project! Re. the diesel options, the 6.2 IP on the 6.5 is no problem. I spun a 6.2 in my '87 Suburban and replaced it with a 6.5 long block from GM (at that time, they weren't producing any 6.2 LBs). They had a kit for the injector lines, but the IP and everything else just bolted on. So, use the 6.5. And since I think your G-van has no turbo, just leave it as is for the time being and save yourself the effort and $$. Re. the cab choices, I like your idea of using the 2-door XJ as a base. If you end up with only 2 doors, then be sure to grab the flip seats out of it, too. I really like having lots of space, and lots of access, and since it's your time and money that I'm spending here :-) , I say you ALSO need a 4-door XJ to cut up. I like the basic idea you had with this pic: ... except that I would use the XJ long door section up front, the B-pillar setup from the 4-door, section the rear doors to get rid of the fixed glass section, and replace the striker section of those rear doors with the tail of the MJ doors, then finish it off with the back of the MJ cab. You could get rid of the back door handles and bury an electric door release button on the backside of the cab hidden by the bed. From a distance, that would look more like fixed doors, but in reality you'd have more access, windows that open, etc. It will be tight for adults in the back seat, but your other pics show an Xtra-cab concept that would be even tighter, so that's probably not your main concern. Use a fold-down wide jump seat, or use quick-release seat mounts from a van or maybe a Suburban 3rd seat frame bottom, and you can get the maximum closed secure space in there. Another idea. I don't think I'd like it personally because it reminds me of the beer-belly rear windows from F150's of just a few years back, but... as long as you're cutting up XJs, you could try to adapt the top half of the hatch and use it to replace the back MJ window. This would buy you a lot more access and a whole lot of ugly (IMHO), but thought I'd throw it out there. I'm going to follow this thread, because this is really interesting to me. I really want a 4-6 seat truck with an 8-foot bed and a diesel engine (and want to brew my own veggie fuel for it) for my business. That is all easy enough to find on every other street corner here in Texas. But I REALLY like the MJ trucks, and so I'd like to have it all wrapped up in a Jeep package. It's going to take an inheritance from a rich relative, or a sudden infusion of fab skills, before I could ever hope to have such a rig, but in the meantime I can do it vicariously through you :-) [/img]