DrComanches Project "Frankenstein"

[thecodemonk]

Wow, those doors look amazing! Definitely inspiration as a much better look than tube doors on our rigs.

Sent from my Pixel 2 using Tapatalk

[drcomanche]

1 hour ago, thecodemonk said:

Wow, those doors look amazing! Definitely inspiration as a much better look than tube doors on our rigs.

Sent from my Pixel 2 using Tapatalk
 

Thanks, I'm working on a writeup for them. I've had more than a few requests on how they were done.

 

And now some pics of the shows from OC

And a little flex when I got back.

[drcomanche]

Been a while, as usual, since I've posted any updates for the truck, so what better time than now?(Otherwise, I'll be writing an essay by the time I finish, and nobody wants to read all that). So, as is usual fashion, I took the truck off the road this past winter to undergo some more upgrades/repairs. When I finished up last year, it felt like a good stopping point, and I was fairly satisfied, although some things were rushed for the show and go season. The real kicker was the trip to Ocean City Jeep Week. The trip there wasn't much to talk about. I noticed on the way that it did get warm, but the temp gauge never really made it beyond 220. The drive out was in nice, not too sunny, not rainy, not humid, not too hot kind of weather, which made it easier. A few issues occurred, however, that would be addressed in this garage session. For one, the engine did eventually vapor lock, which put a damper on repeat events and driving too much. Not too bad of an issue, but something to fix so it doesn't turn into a problem down the road. The more pressing issue was the transmission. Either the trans fluid or the clutch hydro fluid was on it's way out or overheated too much and I started losing gears(until, eventually, after my trip back, I lost the ability to shift at all. I was right around the corner from my house though, fortunately). In all my years having this truck, and back when it was my daily, I never had issues like this, but they became progressively worse over that Ocean City trip. This was the main reason I didn't do any offroading events with it. I was afraid, after waiting in line or in the sun for hours, that it would lose the ability to shift and I'd be stuck on the obstacles. The third problem; the engine had a steadily more pervasive miss that by the end of the trip was almost stalling it out. I was having to apply gas at stops to keep it alive, that could've been something in my plumbing for the fuel cell, since I later found my charcoal canister overflowing with gas. Maybe incorrect pressures or pull causing the vacuum to fight with the pump for fuel pressure. It's hard to say. When I got back from that trip, after letting it sit for a couple weeks, I drove it to a buddies house and we checked the compression numbers on all the cylinders. I was expecting it to be very poor and maybe some blow by, but the numbers were exactly 150 on every single cylinder, so somethings working right in there. We also tossed around the idea of some electrical issues being present since the harness was a cherokee adapted hack job. And the fourth major issue was my brakes. The truck was still very capable of stopping, but it was wavy when I had to apply at speeds. It tended to pitch back and forth and, generally, be a bit more difficult to control. The harder I applied the brakes, the more right and left motion I got, so it made me fearful of stop lights on the highway. I didn't want to blow through a just changed red light, but I also didn't want to pitch into another lane. Add to that the fact that about 5 miles from my house, one side locked down completely, giving me a burning smell and braking that pulled hard to one side. 

 

With all of these things in mind, I made some decisions as far as what was getting done this season. I wanted to address the engine components in particular, the drivetrain components, and I wanted to address the safe driveability of the truck. I don't have a tow vehicle nor a trailer, so I'd prefer to have an all arounder truck that can make the trip to trails and drive back. To these ends, my starter list was:

Replace my rotting radiator with an all aluminum 2 core and old fans with a full electric unit

Replace, if I can, my engine and cab wiring harness with one from an HO era Comanche

Upgrade my brake booster to dual diaphram

Replumb my fuel cell system and eliminate the charcoal cannister

Replace my clutch and whatever other components need it at the trans

Improve airflow and heat shield my injectors

Add an Antirock sway bar for driveability

Get proper lug pattern wheels and lose the spacers as well as tires(if I could find any that weren't insanely expensive)

Finish my front frame braces(Didn't get to them last year because of the effort involved and all the parts I needed to remove)

 

As with all upgrades and repairs, I kind of added a bunch more to this list as I broke down components and sized up what else could be done. I began by stripping out the engine harness, removing the dash and that harness, brake booster, and then, because I had access to much more, I stripped the engine down and removed the heater box. Since I had it all removed, the gears started turning on further upgrades and customization. I took the opportunity to paint my engine bay so it matched the rest of the truck. I went with a black bedliner spray that I've used before, and the results were fine. I don't need perfection since this is supposed to go out and do stuff.

 

After removing all of these components I added a few more things to my list of upgrades. I had always seen the late model intake upgrade and thought that would add some additional airflow to help the engine run more smoothly, so I bought one of those. The fit up took some custom work with grinding and tapping and I ended up welding together a bracket to go from that to the top of the power steering pump. I'm currently putting together the vacuum system, which just needed a few extra elbows and sections to work. I decided to add hydro assist in addition to a steering fluid cooler, and the grand cherokee steering pump upgrade, so I purchase the necessary components and ended up cleaning, resealing, and porting my steering box. I wanted to keep the brackets that made the power steering pump a belt tensioner, so I ended up drilling and tapping sections of the new pump to make it work. All told, after just planning it out, it wasn't too tough to come up with a plan and get it held together. The ram I bought had to have the bolt bracket on the end switch up 90 degrees so it wouldn't bind when I mounted it, and I have the other parts on standby until I finish welding the frame stiffeners. I had to build a custom bracket for it once I found a place for it to go, and I incorporated some custom sway link brackets into the design out of quarter inch. I also got the boostwerks steering box brace for added support with the large tires I run. Since I already had the heater box out and I had a bud with a scrap 96 cherokee, I got the full AC system and decided to put that in. I had to but a few new parts, but the install itself was fairly easy. The electrical was pain to deal with, and I'm only guessing that it will work now. I had to dive into the wiring guides and took apart 2 other harnesses to try and figure out the circuits. I ended up taking the entire HVAC wiring components out of the other harness, removing the pinouts from the firewall block(that only controlled the heat before) and installing the complete HVAC harness section in it's place. I purchased a THOR cowl intake and spent some time cutting and drilling to get that to fit up correctly. With a bit of trimming, I got the new radiator in with the fan shroud as well as the AC condenser but ran into a problem with the reservoir, which was covered with black mold, and, to my surprise, a couple inches of hardened mud at the bottom of it. No amount of cleaning could remove the mold, so I spent the ten or so dollars for a new one. I managed to get lucky at one point on Facebook and found a guy selling a 92 Manual engine harness and got that from him. This led to one of the more difficult portions of my endeavors since I wanted the wiring for the new fans and all that to be nice and neat. I decided to tie them into open relay and fuse segments of my PDC. I had 2 open maxi fuses and 2 open relays that I used. I ran 2 of the 3 fans to one of those relays to automatically come on when the thermostat reaches the desired temperature. This meant I had to find circuits to tie into and I had to make a jumper and new fuse section for it. I also added my offroad lights to the other open relay in the box with a wire running inside the harness into the cab. The last fan I wired into my old e fan relay, but disconnected it from the ECU and instead ran a wire to the cab, that way I can turn it on and off at will. Running these all into the harness made it look a lot more professional in the long run and gave me an extra 2 or 3 feet of harness that goes around the battery tray. I even wired in actual waterproof connectors in lieu of the worse looking butt connector or blade links. Now I won't have to cut wires to pull things out again, it all just disconnects from the main engine harness. After all that, I had to adapt a few newer style connectors for some things and then re taped the whole engine harness with new friction tape. While I was in there, I bought a battery tray from Ballistic Fab to replace the hacked up old plastic one, and to give me a proper solid battery hold down. I had weld up a custom bracket for it but I have a bunch of leftover metal for exactly this reason. I painted a bunch of the metal parts I removed(as long as they weren't in an area that got too hot for it) with the army green I use on the outside. Hopefully, the engine bay will look much more presentable now. I rebuilt the master cylinder of the brake booster since it sat for so long, and good thing I did, as there had definitely been some water that made it's way in there. It took some custom work on the pedal and the plunger to get it to fit correctly and I had to make a custom metal bushing to hold it in place. Having the pedals all out allowed me to straighten out the clutch pedal so it didn't compress at an angle(used some wrenches and a hammer after applying some heat from the torch)plus weld up a bolt sleeve to take up the slack between it and the retaining bolt. With them out, I decided to replace the pedals with some quality billet units(when my feet were wet, they would slip off the pedals, plus the gas pedal cover kept falling off while I was driving). Otherwise, with the engine and wiring harnesses apart, I cleaned up anything I could take apart or get to, including the throttle body and the intake and exhaust ports. I also replaced the broken pcv valves in the valve cover, which was a pain as they had turned to concrete over the long years spent in there.

 

The next step for me is to roll the truck back outside under the awning to do the final weld work and the transmission work. I decided, since it will already be out, to upgrade to the external slave cylinder setup, and have the parts for that waiting. While I'm under there, I'll be removing the third member from the rear axle to change the fluid and check the condition of it. The front axle will come back off so I can do the stiffeners but I figure while it's out, I'll paint it back up, too, with some other parts. I'll be finishing my exhaust while it's all out, and porting it out the side of the bed. The last portion will be to do the raptor liner on the front frame, roof, roll bar, wheel wells, tail gate, re finish the front bumper, and do a coat on a custom rear bumper someone is setting up for me(no tube bender makes that a bit too much for me). There are a few odds and ends I will get to as well later on, but for now, this is a pretty solid update.

 

On a side note, the truck ended up in JP magazine. It's only a small pic, but pretty cool nonetheless

Barely fit in the garage

Some goodies

Coming apart

Some of the custom fit up of the new intake manifold

Dirty before, painted after. It got another coat to get the extra red bits

Relatively clean

Painted up

Gave the block a good cleaning too. So much oil and dirt on there.

Why I replaced the radiator and the old engine harness

Before and after cleaning and rebuilding the brake master

Some lettering on the block. No clue what it means.

Empty cab. I added more sound/heat deadener under the firewall mat, too.

Rebuilding, ported, and painted

Power steering cooler mounting

Then plated the front

Battery box, pinion guard, and home brew bracket, all finished up.

Working on wiring

Pedals and new reservoir 

Dash back in

Harness in the making and harness all done. Getting closer, but still some way to go. I guess it's a good thing I can't go anywhere else but work right now. I have a lot more stuff to come, but I'll probably just do another big post after I get it back out and finish it up.

[drcomanche]

It's been a looonnng time since I've posted on here. I'll come back and give some more details on it when I get more time, but for now, here is a brief overview of what's happened. 

 

All electric fan setup and custom wiring into the harness

fully plated frame

Hydro assist steering with a custom setup

Steering box brace

New tires and custom made beadlocks

New seats with custom brackets

Custom late model intake

Custom bed exit exhaust

Completely new braking all around

New clutch hydraulics all around

New 2 row radiator

custom AC install

Custom under dash speakers

Complete bedlining of the underside

New Spare tire mount

New intake

New clutch and added external slave cylinder

Repainted almost everything underneath

 

 

 

 

 

I have about 200 more photos of progress and work, but I'll have to space them out a bit.

[neohic]

So great to see an update!

[Pete M]

 

how loud are the tires?

[drcomanche]

On 9/20/2021 at 9:57 AM, Pete M said:

 

how loud are the tires?

Still very loud with the trail doors. But the stereo can outmatch it, so it's not really an annoyance to me.That was the case with the old Bias iroks as well.

[drcomanche]

Back again with another way too long since update. To be honest, I'm not quite sure where I left off with explaining the mods I've been performing, so I'll be rehashing a bit of some I may have already said while adding more info around their installation. 

 

For starters, I'll elaborate on some of the current upgrades. I basically replaced or rebuilt every system in the truck. 

 

For the cooling system, I changed the thermostat to a lower temp one to cycle coolant sooner. I replaced it with a 2 core radiator from champion, and went full electric for the fan system. Two of the fans are run by a temp sensor that I had to install mid tube from the top of the radiator. I couldn't replace the existing one since it communicates with the ECU. The last fan is run by a switch on the dash. I cleaned the whole system out, especially since I replaced the heater core when I had the dash apart.

 

For steering, I went with the power assisted steering I wanted from the beginning. I had read all kinds of topics in the past about steering pumps that could work and I found the one for the 5.2(I think?) that was said to fit but the input nozzle needed boring to not cavitate. I basically played it by ear and settled with a size in the middle. I ported the steering box myself and replaced the seals while I was there. After purchasing some extra parts(ram, mount, hoses, fittings, etc.)I put it together. It took a lot of trial and error to get the placement right where it wouldn't hit the tie rod or steering linkage. I also added a cooler for the lines in case it got too hot moving the big tires. I ended on a psc ram rather than retrofitting a hydraulic one as it was just easier. I wanted to keep the old belt tensioning system, so I customized the bracket a bit to fit this pump. Since I also installed the late model intake manifold, I had to cut it up to fit and made a custom bracket from it to the tensioner bracket. The size and fact that it had to be fabricated meant it didn't fit quite right and would eventually start causing belt squeal due to misalignment. After doing some measurements(and after a lot of belts) I propped it out about a quarter of an inch and now, no more belt squeal. I also added a steering box brace 

 

As I said before, I installed a late model intake and customized it, and with that, I added a THOR cowl intake. I repainted the manifold in ceramic coat high temp when I did the head work.

 

For exhaust, I went all new. New manifold and new downpipe. Since I wanted a bed exit exhaust, I had to cut the new pipe partway, and then installed a flowmaster super 44 on the end. To keep it removeable, I did a v band after it and then welded up a pipe to go over the rail and out the bedside. I increased the size to 3 inch at the exit and cut a piece of aluminum to help spread the heat. 

 

I did a ton of custom wiring and incorporated the lights, AC, and fans into the pcm in the engine bay. I had purchased a complete harness from someone and before installing it, I redid all the taped joints to freshen them up. 

 

For the body and frame, the entirety of it is now plated and bedlined after doing a ton of prep and paint work. The entire trans tunnel is insulated with aluminum sheet and fiberglass backing to keep some of the heat off the floor. 

 

Inside the truck, I custom made some brackets for under dash speakers and courtesy lights. I also made dash switch bezels out of aluminum and got everything working. I purchased some generic bucket seats from jegs to install and had to basically make a bracket from scratch for them. I also added a fire extinguisher, just in case, and replaced some of the insulation and gaskets.

 

I finally switched to the bigger brake booster and remade my brake lines all the way around the truck. I also snagged a zj brake prop valve for the rear discs, but I may change it out with an adjustable rear one, since I'm not getting very good rear brake actuation. 

 

The engine itself has one of the more recent issues. It had been giving me a ton of warm start issues and poor performance. I went to town on sensors but eventually just settled on pulling the head and looking at it. Turns out the head was warped by about a quarter of an inch and the head gasket was starting to fail and let blow by happen. I replaced it with a rebuilt unit from Clearwater, which was good for me, because the valves were pretty bad as well. Took a lot of effort and strain(and next time I'll probably take the whole hood off) but I managed. 

 

I made some beadlocks with the Total metal innovations kit and slapped some pitbull rocker radial 37s on it. I may try to switch the wheels out for some aluminum ones(if I can find them in 15) to lose some of the rotating mass I have. Also put together and installed a rough country spare tire mount that I customized to fit my 5x5.5 pattern.

 

The most recent repair/upgrade I've had was when, a month ago, my rear end blew out. I pulled it out and found that the mini spool and carrier pin had split in half. I think the carrier pin had already been broken and that caused the excess stress on the spool. So while I was in it, I decided to do the whole axle. The prior work that someone had done to it resulted in some questionable damage to the axle including low cut, bad welds, and preexisting damage. The old spring perches had one welded in about a quarter inch too far, which caused by leaf spring to pull out of the busing in the bracket. I cut them off and replaced them with a set of motobuilt u bolt eliminator ones, as I'll also be adding a truss to it. I got the truss from ruff stuff specialties and it took a lot of adjustment to get it working. I also had to cut it in around the new perches. I added some brake line brackets too. I had to do some touch up inside the case since some prior damage had left some sizeable dents in the rear of the case. I custom made a skid plate for the bottom as well as some shock mounts. Then, I repainted it all. I'm currently in the process of adding coats to it. For the carrier, I'm replacing all the bearing and refitting everything. I thought about it for a while, and decided I would not be putting in a spool again to give it better road manners and went with a grizzly locker. Fortunately, the gears were fine, but the axle shaft splines were pretty damaged, so I'll be replacing them too.

 

 

[drcomanche]

[drcomanche]

[Pete M]

looks like you got a good amount of progress done.   

 

the thermostat's job is to warm everything up.  it doesn't help cooling at all.  cycling the coolant sooner just keeps it in warm-up mode longer and burn more fuel as it tries desperately to get up to operating temperature.   

[drcomanche]

On 9/9/2022 at 3:06 PM, Pete M said:

looks like you got a good amount of progress done.   

 

the thermostat's job is to warm everything up.  it doesn't help cooling at all.  cycling the coolant sooner just keeps it in warm-up mode longer and burn more fuel as it tries desperately to get up to operating temperature.   

 

I'll probably go back to the 195 later. I'm at 180 now, but it does get VERY hot and humid here, so by the time I go to drive it, it's already over the 195. But in general, not much use for it as is.