Joop Posted January 20, 2007 Share Posted January 20, 2007 Just picked up a XJ 4.0 and I'm going to put the engine and tranny in my MJ. But the XJ is auto and my MJ is manuall... And I'm no big fan of autos! I'm going to use the auto anyway, but what do you guys think? Whats best when it comes to offroad performance? My opinion is that autos steal power, accelerate slower, they may start to work poorly (manuals neither work or they don't work) and they shift when they want not when I want. On the other side its relaxing to worry about only 2 pedals and i must confess i have never driven an jeep with auto before. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eagle Posted January 20, 2007 Share Posted January 20, 2007 I'm a manual tranny guy for longer than most of you have been alive, and I wheel both the MJ and the XJ with 5-speeds. With that as background, if I were building a dedicated off-road XJ or MJ, especially if the wheeling might involve any amount of rock crawling, I would definitely go with the automatic. Rock crawling with a 5-speed is VERY hard on everything in the drive train. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DirtyComanche Posted January 20, 2007 Share Posted January 20, 2007 People do both for everything. I just figure it's a wth either way. If you're talking avaliable stock trannies the AW4 is a better choice than the AX-15/NV3550; and if you don't like the way it behaves PM brettM and buy one of his shift controllers. For heavily modified (ie. all that's stock is an emblem or a couple peices of sheetmetal) then it is far more of a tossup. SM420/465s and NP435s both have a great first gear (all around 7:1) which really helps if you plan to rockcrawl. Throw in a doubler and a 4:1 tcase and some low gears in the diffs and the next thing you know you can dump the clutch from idle with the brakes on HARD and not stall. But there's a lot of bulletproof autos out there and then you don't have to think about things as much and you don't need an absurd crawl ratio - just a really good tranny cooler. With an auto more wheelspeed is just a matter of hammering the throttle - it'll shift up if you have no traction. One thing that is nice about a standard is being able to get into neutral easy. A friend of mine missed neutral - went all the way to park - and went over backwards because of it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oizarod115 Posted January 21, 2007 Share Posted January 21, 2007 only bad thing i can think of when rockcrawlin/wheelin an auto was how hard it is to stop, my brother has a 4.0 AW4 with 4.88s and it is hard to stop in low range. whereas in a manual you can hit the clutch without shifting it to nuetral like dirty said. other than that i like wheelin auto. haven't tried manual though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
feerocknok Posted January 21, 2007 Share Posted January 21, 2007 I always fry my tires in truck #2's stick in the rocks, whereas I feel I have more control with truck #1's auto. I'm also heavy on the gas in rocks, so I think it would depend on your driving style and abilty/lack-of-ability with a stick. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jared Posted January 22, 2007 Share Posted January 22, 2007 my cars i prefer in a manual trans, but trucks and jeeps i like an auto, off road thats just another thing to worry about doing, and imo it makes having fun turn into work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rejeep Posted January 22, 2007 Share Posted January 22, 2007 if your battery dies you can always pop the clutch and get home...... another vote for the 5spd! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Twisty Posted January 22, 2007 Share Posted January 22, 2007 you gotta be on a hill, or have a push for that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DirtyComanche Posted January 22, 2007 Share Posted January 22, 2007 you gotta be on a hill, or have a push for that. Which still beats towing it around all day because your starter fried with an auto. We had that problem with a GW. The starter smoked pretty good and refused to turn over, and it was an auto. I wound up having to play bumper cars with him to get him back to the road. His whole back end was smashed in by the time we had it loaded on the trailor. (It was a free beater - so it didn't matter) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pingpong Posted January 22, 2007 Share Posted January 22, 2007 There is much debate about this. I personally prefer auto's. especially with the kind of wheeling I do. just wheeling in rocks, the auto makes it nice to 2 foot drive, where as ppl with sticks have to slip the clutch and hope they don't stall. Also auto's make up for the crawl ratio, by mutiplying torque. You can get away with less crawl ratio for this matter. Also there are less wear items in an auto, I mean no clutch , slave cylinder or other things to fail. My current build up is going to be using a T350, buit my 85 XJ with the 4.3 has a 700r4, and that means overdrive :D which means better gas mileage. It all comes down to preference. I thought about building a YJ with a np435, and np203/205 doubler, with a 108 wheelbase, just to have something different :hmm: I just havent found that almost free YJ to do it with yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete M Posted January 22, 2007 Share Posted January 22, 2007 But the debate never really goes anywhere. Both transmissions have plusses and minuses and the debate runs around in circles. This ones stronger, that ones easier, blah, blah, blah. The bottom line is that it ALL comes down to personal preference. Unless you're in some sort of competition where you need to analyze every little detail to eek out a few extra points or shave a few more seconds, then this decision boils down to which one you think is more fun or the least work or whatever the heck you think is more important. You are the one that will be driving it. But as i said just the other day: "if you have to ask, get an auto" (and install a big transmission cooler). Unless you're a die-hard clutch fan, the auto will likely make off-roading more fun for you. For those of us who are die-hard clutch fans, we wouldn't have it any other way. :D The manual transmission is simply more fun for us. But if you're riding the clutch all the time (or if you're riding the brakes all the time), then the terrain you're tackling requires more gearing. Get yourself a 4:1 gear set in the t-case. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joop Posted January 22, 2007 Author Share Posted January 22, 2007 Hehe seems like theres alot of opinions out there. I'm gonna use the auto simply because thats what i have, even if I'm a clutch/stick person. Just wantet to know if it sucked and it seems like it doesnt. Hope nones watching the first time i drive it because up to this date i have never driven an auto without trying to clutch... ramming the brake pedal at high speed thinking thats the clutch can be quite scary :eek: takes a few secounds before i understand what the h**l is going on!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
feerocknok Posted January 22, 2007 Share Posted January 22, 2007 Hehe seems like theres alot of opinions out there. I'm gonna use the auto simply because thats what i have, even if I'm a clutch/stick person. Just wantet to know if it sucked and it seems like it doesnt. Hope nones watching the first time i drive it because up to this date i have never driven an auto without trying to clutch... ramming the brake pedal at high speed thinking thats the clutch can be quite scary :eek: takes a few secounds before i understand what the h**l is going on!!! If it's the AW4, you won't be let down. Shifted the mom's Tacoma into reverse at 35. Turns out that R doesn't mean 3rd and the empty spot on the floorboard doesn't have a pedal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oizarod115 Posted January 23, 2007 Share Posted January 23, 2007 Hehe seems like theres alot of opinions out there. I'm gonna use the auto simply because thats what i have, even if I'm a clutch/stick person. Just wantet to know if it sucked and it seems like it doesnt. Hope nones watching the first time i drive it because up to this date i have never driven an auto without trying to clutch... ramming the brake pedal at high speed thinking thats the clutch can be quite scary :eek: takes a few secounds before i understand what the h**l is going on!!! never done that, but i did ram the brake and the gas once while wearing my boots... luckily the clutch was on the floor so i didn't ram the car infront of me.. .i just made a whole lot of noise :popcorn: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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