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Alexia's 1987 To 1997 Comanche


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6 months later, What is the latest on this build?

Lots of things getting in the way. One of those things is coming to terms that our bodies will not always work perfectly. Dealing with a repetitive stress injury(RSI) in my left wrist and hand from being a software engineer. Basically have gotten nothing done on the MJ this entire weekend, but I did prepare the roll bar for paint last weekend. I am going to drop the MJ off at the dealership tomorrow and just have them get some things done for me. Better for them to handle lifting a heavy steering box and get the air conditioning working again.

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  • 4 weeks later...

I had a friend assist me with installing the new PSC 12:1 steering gear I bought. In exchange I was helping him remove a bunch of toad/tow wiring and fixing electrical connectors.

 

The stock steering pump can barely keep up with this gear. My current plan is to get the upgraded PSC pump kit. There is the option of a smaller 4.5" pulley, but I rather keep this stock pump around as a spare for the LJ.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Part of the power steering installation was a full PSC pump, PSC reservoir, and a passive cooler installation. However, I learned the hard way that PSC sells a kit for XJ models, but never actually did any fitment testing on the reservoir. It is up to the end user to make it fit whether that be cutting a hole in the hood or modifying the wheel weel.

 

So I cut 1.5" out of the reservoir to make it fit next to the brake booster with the included bracket. Just waiting to hear back from a local welder who can do aluminum. I do not want to spend the money to get my old welder setup for aluminum. I have also found a shorter version of this filter in case for whatever reason the tall one causes issues in the smaller container.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

This is BY FAR the worst designed kit. After shortening the reservoir then cutting and modifying the mounting bracket I find out that the kit should have included two 45º*fittings instead of a 90º and 45º. Fine, whatever, so I look up the specifications on the reservoir since there are no instructions including detailing these things and order the -10AN 45º fittings listed.

 

They actually use -12AN fittings and now I am having to pay for overnight shipping on the other fittings to get this MJ out of the garage.

 

*Flips a desk.* In absolutely no way did PSC actually test this kit on a XJ like they claim. If they had spent even five minutes actually test fitting this they would have realized all the issues.

 

The included -12AN and -6AN fittings hit the air box.

 

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Sliced, bent, and welded the mounting bracket to correct the angle. Added some spacers to move the clamp to the correct position.

 

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Built a bus bar from a door shim since the only post was crowded.(Cover not shown.)

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Thanks for that one - I'm over crowded too. :thumbsup:

Never seen one of those before. I'll have to make one, I'm way overcrowded. Also, what kind of sound damping material did you use in your cab? I saw it in one of your videos and was wondering. Thanks

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Thanks for that one - I'm over crowded too. :thumbsup:

Never seen one of those before. I'll have to make one, I'm way overcrowded. Also, what kind of sound damping material did you use in your cab? I saw it in one of your videos and was wondering. Thanks

 

Dynamat - I found a good deal on one of their kits that ended up being cheaper than the competition.

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Thanks for that one - I'm over crowded too. :thumbsup:

Never seen one of those before. I'll have to make one, I'm way overcrowded. Also, what kind of sound damping material did you use in your cab? I saw it in one of your videos and was wondering. Thanks

 

Dynamat - I found a good deal on one of their kits that ended up being cheaper than the competition.

 

Thanks!

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  • 2 months later...

I started working on a CAN bus conversion for stock 1997+ gauge clusters. I plan to switch from the stock PCM to a Haltech which communicates over CAN bus. Since the stock gauge clusters use Chrysler's proprietary bus they are obviously incompatible. The gauge clusters are just six bipolar stepper motors and a bunch of light bulbs. All I have to do is piggy back on the stock circuit board and cut the traces in a few places. I also plan to add PWM to the illumination circuit so that LEDs can be put in place of the bulbs and be fully dimmable.

 

So far I have test code abusing one of the stepper motors to see what voltage they run out. Looks like 5V is the sweet spot so running these off the PCB's power supply will be easy.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Just got done watching some of your videos on youtube. The MJ LOOKS GREAT! I didn't put 2 and 2 together that it was you from the forum until I caught a glimpse of my old drive shaft under your mj! haha. So what numbers did you end up getting on the dyno before the transmission problems. 

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  • 3 months later...

Just got done watching some of your videos on youtube. The MJ LOOKS GREAT! I didn't put 2 and 2 together that it was you from the forum until I caught a glimpse of my old drive shaft under your mj! haha. So what numbers did you end up getting on the dyno before the transmission problems.

"Terrible." Maybe 190 at the wheels. That supercharger was dragging it down too much.

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My friend with a Subaru is telling me there should be a turbocharger with this assortment. I do believe he is correct.(Eventually.)

 

The stock PCM can no longer cope with the modified engine. SCT X3 tuners are hard to get, SCT X4 tuners do not work, and once the tuning cost is added in it is much cheaper to go with an aftermarket ECU for the huge increase in flexibility. The Haltech Elite range of ECUs previously were not suited for these engines or had way too many features necessary; 1500 and 2500 respectively. The new 750 just released this past month is perfect for six cylinders and drive by throttle cable applications.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Sweet!  Wish they made that for the Renix system.  It would be nice to see what's going on under that hood of mine.  Good luck!

Oh, it is not made for any system. It replaces the entire system.

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Yeah I was aware of that, just wish I could just get real time data and adjust things inside my ecu.  That is awesome you are taking this step, a costly one for sure!  Good luck and I will be watching this to see how it turns out for you. 

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  • 1 month later...
  • 2 weeks later...

One the goals to installing the aftermarket ECU is that I want to keep the stock 1997+ gauges. However, all new vehicles and aftermarket ECUs use CAN bus for communications. Old Chrysler gauge clusters use either CCD bus or SCI bus.

 

So I started working on a CAN bus to CCD bus hardware and protocol adapter. CAN bus is easy and there are drop in libraries for it. However, CCD bus is very strange and uses a 7812.5 baud rate. After a bunch of research and fiddling I just got the CCD bus communication to the gauge cluster working.

 

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Simulating voltage, oil pressure, and coolant temperature by swapping the values between 0x00 and 0xFF every 500ms. The bipolar stepper motors are not fast so they can not keep up.

 

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  • 3 months later...

The Haltech installation is now in progress. Unfortunately the Elite 750 ended up not having enough inputs and outputs so I switched to an Elite 2500. However, I decided I wanted to switch to drive by wire functionality that the Elite 2500 provides.

 

Take one GM DBW throttle body from some V6 piece of junk.

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Model an adapter plate.

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Then... do some air CNC'ing because I am waiting for the correct collets to come in the mail. Direct video link: https://vid.me/je3i

https://vid.me/je3i

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I'm curious why you didn't want to pull the intake manifold off, mill the inlet bigger, and stick the new throttle body directly to it. 'Sup wit' dat? Awesome and interesting work as usual there, Alex!  :popcorn:

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