Driveway Ornament To Daily Driver: 7 Years!

[Minuit]

Now, I don't really have enough time or material to come up with a full update, which will happen later. However, I do have time to share some snippets.

 

7.033 Month A/C Update

A/C is still doing the thing. Pressures still look good and the air still feels cold. Not much else to say... yet. I'll be putting together a writeup on HVAC theory and service procedures at some point in the indeterminate future. I might have to deal with a leaky valve core in the future, because the last time I put gauges on, one of the service valves took some fiddling to seal. Perfect chance to demonstrate a tool that I think is just the coolest thing in the world.

 

Circuit Boards!

My circuit boards are finally here, and they look much better than expected. I was expecting cheap crap like you'd find inside your average knockoff eBay electronics, so when I opened the package up these absolutely blew my mind. This run was mainly to test shipping times and quality. I've since made some improvements to the circuit design and layout, so I'll need to make another run of boards. I am still learning the dark magic of printed circuit board design, after all. Remind me to pony up for real shipping next time, because these took almost a month and a half to get here. Of course, now that they're here I have no time and no parts to put them together, so maybe it's for the best...

 

 

Next time on Driveway Ornament to Daily Driver, I'll...

 

Bypass a perfectly good heater core...

 

Install some pre-owned brake parts...

 

... and take out the trash.

[Minuit]

Minuit put out a build thread update? Holy $#!&!

 

Getting Jealous: April-May 2019

 

I have long complained about the 9" drum brakes equipped to Dana 35s after 1989. I've been fighting with them since almost day one, and I've never gotten both sides to stay operational for longer than a month. The last straw was in late June, when I decided to try to get the right rear adjuster working... again. It lasted for about 3 stops, at which point the 4 year old aftermarket wheel cylinder thanked me for my dedication by filling my drum with brake fluid. I had been spending more time on the 89 recently (and it had brake problems of its own), and I think this is what payback looks like.

 

As much as the stock drum brakes suck on the c-clip D35, there is a bolt-on disc brake option available in the utterly ubiquitous ZJ. This system is virtually identical to the Ford Explorer's rear disc brakes, and some parts interchange. This swap is only "bolt-on" on c-clip Dana 35 axles!

 

The very next day, I beelined it to the junkyard at opening time, and came back with this cast of characters:

 

You're looking at the following:

- A pair of brake backing plates from a ZJ D35, with the ZJ's parking brake cables still attached. Included is some completely worn out parking brake hardware. The ZJ parking brake cables will fit an MJ, but they'll be too short to route them as factory. The ZJ parking brake cables have brackets on them that should be removed as they have no place to go on the MJ.

- A pair of brake rotors from a different ZJ. Not side specific. These appear to have been replaced shortly before the ZJ they were on was junked.

- A pair of brake calipers from two other, different ZJs. These are unrebuilt original calipers. Make sure the bleeder moves and the calipers can be retracted before buying them. Installed in the calipers are the slide pins and boots. If your calipers have torn boots, don't worry. The slide assemblies including boots can be replaced separately. As long as the caliper moves and the bleeder opens, the caliper is good.

- A full set of brake pads with about 75% of the material left. Don't worry, I won't run them for long. I just needed a full set of parts to debug with.

- Also attached to the calipers, two rear soft lines. For our purposes, these are not side-specific. They have brackets on them to attach to the ZJ's coil spring mounts, but you'll want to remove them. That bracket is the only difference between the driver and passenger side lines.

 

The next step is to remove the drum backing plates. The drum brakes can be removed complete, so I didn't waste any time taking them apart. The only "high stakes" or unusual thing that needs to be done in this build is to pull the axle shafts. To do so, the diff cover must come off and this 1/4" 12-point bolt needs to come out:

 

If you break this, I don't really know what to tell you. Mine came out easily as did the one on the junkyard ZJ I pulled the backing plates from. After the cross pin is out, just push each axle in, take the c-clips out, and pull back out.

 

We have to remove the shafts anyway, because disc brake D35s also had longer wheel studs. I can't say for sure if it's an absolute necessity to install the longer studs, but the factory did it for a reason. You'll need 10 wheel studs for a ZJ with disc brakes - make sure they don't sell you the ones for drum brakes. If you have any anger built up, now is the time.

 

Anyway, once the brake line is disconnected and the shaft is out of the way, the drum brake backing plate comes off with 4 nuts. The ZJ disc brake backing plate is a direct fit:

This would be a really good time to change out your wheel bearings or axle seals. Will I regret not changing my axle seals? We'll see. As a side note, I did not install the parking brake assembly at the time, as the truck is an auto and I did not buy the new parts. This was a one-day swap, remember.

 

With the backing plates installed, the axle shafts can be reinstalled and the brake parts can be put back together just like any other vehicle.

 

The original brake line can be reused, if you can get yours to come off. For me, one of the lines got stuck, so I ended up making new lines:

 

 

Not the prettiest, but this D35 won't be in here much longer. Didn't I say that about 5 years ago?

 

So, how do the disc brakes work? A million times better than the drums ever did, and much more consistently. I did not delete the proportioning valve or upgrade to the 95+ booster, both of which I have seen people on this forum claim are a "must" for a disc brake swap. I actually had to un-do an adjustment I made to the LSPV a year or two back to increase rear brake pressure - the adjustment immediately caused premature rear lockup with the discs. Braking immediately happens as soon as you push the pedal. All in all, it feels like it should have in the beginning.

 

Next up was a question that had bugged me for quite some time: The heater control valve - we've all cut one out and tossed it in the garbage, but did it really have a purpose? To get to the bottom of this (and before I spend $50 on a new valve), we need to realize what it is: a selectable heater core bypass.

 

So, on two consecutive days with very, very similar weather, I tested this on the drive to and from work. On the first day, I drove to work with the A/C on, with my heater control valve delete in place - full flow of coolant to the heater core at all times. On the highway, the A/C vent temperature stabilized at between 47 and 48 degrees on Normal, fan speed 2.

 

After getting home, I did this:

.. and then drove to work the next day. A/C vent temps stabilized after about 5 minutes of highway driving at just over 43 degrees! So, it would appear that for my truck with my A/C system, coolant flow through the heater core does make a measurable difference. So, it became clear that I would be putting the heater control valve back in. I'm an A/C junkie, and a 3-7 degree difference is worth fighting for in my book. So here's where I admit I did something stupid.

 

When I had the whole interior out, I tied the heater control valve vacuum line back... inside the truck. The very worst possible situation. I didn't remember exactly where I had tied it back, and I damn sure wasn't going to tear the entire heater box out to find it, so I had to go feeling for it.

 

I did eventually find it...

but getting it back through the firewall would be a job in itself.

 

Fortunately, I had some brake line left over from the disc conversion, so I used it and some 20 gauge wire to make an ad-hoc fish tape. I shoved the brake line (with the wire taped to the far end) through the on the engine bay side just above the A/C pipes...

... cut the elbow off of the line so it wouldn't rip a giant hole in my evaporator gasket, taped it to the brake line, and pulled it back through. I make this sound easy. It was not.

 

Anyway, after spending a fair chunk of change on the correct heater hoses to put the valve back in (and then having to cut them to fit, which was annoying), I was left with a rarity... someone actually putting a heater control valve back in a Jeep. Dare to be different, I guess.

 

 

All Breeds Jeep Show Preparations - June-July 2019

 

It became clear that I was going to the show in York, PA in this truck, and I had some work to do to get it fit for the 750 mile trip each way. I pride myself on having a truck that isn't a complete junk heap and is actually fit to drive, and I wasn't going to have a breakdown along the way, so I took the pre-trip preparations seriously.

 

I deleted the "extra" wiring I added to make the electric fan switchable, as I did not feel it was needed. I picked up this "fog lights only" switch bezel a while ago, so on it went:

As a side note, that chalky looking switch is no more than three or four years old. Disappointing.

 

This wiring for the ballast resistor was looking a little scabby:

 

The connectors are just single-pin 1/4" quick disconnects in plastic housings. Utterly ubiquitous - I put a couple of new ones in with my next radio parts order and put them on:

 

This $#!& was not gonna fly anymore:

I hold this build to high standards of electrical connections, and for me to have this $#!&show of a radio harness in my truck in 2019 is not acceptable. I've got more than enough wire here to do away with this mess of butt connectors entirely, so, by golly, I'm gonna do it!

 

The '88-'96 radio connector is a 13-pin AMP MIC Mark II connector. The pins are AMP part number 172773-1, and they crimp just fine with standard open-barrel crimping tools. This probably isn't very helpful to anyone else, but I use a Metripack 150 male pin to de-pin these connectors.

 

Much better.

 

I also took the opportunity to de-complicate the speaker wire situation. Previously, I used a relatively complicated jumper harness to pass the signals to the amplifier without disturbing the factory wiring, and then going back to the original connector - about a 10-foot long harness if you laid it out. A much cleaner, more elegant solution to do the same thing but with less wiring is this:

The speaker signals pass through entirely factory wiring until they reach the green 2-pin Metripack 150 connectors that connect to each door harness. That plug used to go to the speakers, but now it goes to the woofer-tweeter crossover at each side. The woofer signal plugs into the other end of the factory connector, and the tweeter signal goes to each tweeter. A much simpler solution. My only regret is that I only had blue and white 18AWG wire to build the harness with, so I have multiple circuits using the same wire. Still, I built it so that it can only be plugged in correctly - which is something that any good wiring harness design needs to adhere to.

 

My tailpipe had gotten a little too short for comfort, so enter a new one:

The tailpipe itself fit perfectly with no issues... however, this truck has had plenty of exhaust work done by people that don't have the level of pickiness that I do. Instead of getting the correct muffler for the truck, they just slapped whatever they had on it. So, when I tried to line the tailpipe up with the muffler, I got this:

The muffler they put in is a center inlet, offset outlet muffler. The muffler that should be on this truck is an offset inlet, center outlet muffler - so when you try to line up the correct parts, they aren't even close! This is somewhat of a perspective trick - the tailpipe is long enough to reach the muffler, but the muffler's outlet pipe was a solid two inches away from where it needed to be to line up with the tailpipe.

 

One VERY LOUD MY EARS ARE STILL RINGING drive to the parts store later, followed by a muffler installation in the parking lot:

Hey, that's a lot better. How does it fit in the front?

Ugh. Those "band" exhaust clamps are never a good sign. All of the exhaust pipes on this system are supposed to slip over one another. Guess I'm going to have to replace the cat too, if I want a system that clamps together like it should. Anyway, all of this made the exhaust significantly quieter. Not perfect, since that stupid band clamp doesn't seal completely, but better. This truck is due for the rest of the exhaust to be replaced soon anyway, so I'll deal with that if and when we get there.

 

It does look a hell of a lot better now, actually having a tailpipe.

 

No way in hell was I going to drive 1500 miles with no cruise control. Thankfully, I own a '91 Jeep and adding cruise control is easy! Well, sort of.

 

The cruise control actuator lives here. Its position is marked by three punched divots in the inner fender.

Drill those out to 1/8" and run self tappers in, and you're golden. Two of them are easy to get to, but the third requires removing the PDC, coolant bottle, and battery unless you own a right angle drill.

This was a good opportunity to clean this area of the engine bay, so I did. Yuck.

That's better. The connector should be poking out of the harness in approximately this area - it's one of those Chrysler proprietary connectors.

 

I decided to experiment with a base+clear paintjob on the bracket. It looks alright, but I'm not a huge fan of the rattle-can clear coat I used.

 

To separate the actuator and bracket, remove those two nuts and undo a bowtie clip. The vacuum harness should have a tee in it right where the actuator lives - pull the cap off of it, and connect the actuator where the cap was.

 

Here it is fully installed:

 

Now, the hard bit: installing the stalk. I've been putting this off, but it has to be done. This will be a lot easier if you don't have a tilt column.

This connector is what you're aiming at, down at the base of the column. Unfortunately, you have to thread that wire through the steering column to get to it.

 

Oh boy, here we go again:

I decided to pull the steering wheel and lock plate off to make it easier to route the oversized connector on my stalk through the column. I tear into these GM steering columns regularly and have all the tools needed to service them, so your mileage may vary.

 

It still wasn't much fun, but I eventually did get it.

Installing the actuator and the stalk is all you have to do on a '91. Sure enough, it works perfectly right away. Controls are identical to the GM system of the era.

 

At some point, the fuel pump wires came out of their loom and scraped on the driveshaft. I cut out all of the chafed wires, soldered them back together, and loomed the harness up:

I need to find out what is supposed to retain all of this stuff. What I think are the clips for the fuel lines and wire harness have long since broken off. Zipties are a little bit unprofessional.

 

That scabby looking original coolant bottle was practically opaque, so I went to the Bay of E and came back with this new one:

Nice. I'll let you know how long it takes for it to look ugly again.

 

And then, the day before I was supposed to leave arrived. I spent the afternoon doing a complete check on every system of the truck, changed the oil, and looked everything over. I had the truck idling with the A/C on, and then I heard it...

 

taktaktakatakatakataka

 

A very faint tapping noise, and only with the A/C on. That unsettled me just enough to investigate further - sure enough, it was coming from the NOS A/C compressor I put on just a few short months before. I do not take risks with A/C, especially right before a 1500 mile trip, and I was NOT going to miss this trip. So - the obvious solution: I call every parts store within an hour's drive asking for an A/C compressor. And, as it turns out, a parts store in Franklin could get one by 4 PM! (this is about 1:30)

 

I use the time in between to recover the refrigerant and drain the oil out of the compressor looking for metal - fortunately, I found none - so a compressor hotswap was possible.

 

Fast forward some fairly boring A/C work (I was not taking pics, as I was trying to get done as quickly as possible. At about 8 PM, I had this:

So then I went to bed, and slept terribly... because I never sleep well the night before Jeep-related events.

 

Anyway, 5 AM the next day came, and I was off!

The truck was an absolute pleasure to drive the entire way. No mechanical failures of any kind happened, and the truck was as smooth as a cloud and as quiet as your granddad's Buick. The only interesting thing that happened on the entire drive was that a trucker tried to merge into me once. In most old vehicles, extended highway driving involves suffering. In this truck, it just isn't. All of the sound deadening, stereo amplification, and attention to detail ensures that.

 

At the 450 mile mark, I stopped and checked all of the fluids. No issues!

 

Right before getting into Pennsylvania, I stopped for gas and to look at some scenery:

	...and after 12 hours of driving, I made it and entered my truck in the 2019 All Breeds Jeep Show: \

 

We won the club participation award:

(I'm third from left in the maroon shirt)

Someone drove their Jeep further than me! I hear that it was a much newer model, so we all know who the real winner is.

 

Going to the show was easily in the top 3 things I've done with this truck, and everything involved in getting there was absolutely worth it. I'd REALLY love to make this a recurring thing. Can't forget the D44 I brought home with me, either. And maybe someday @Pete M will come get his sweet Comanche marked bedliner. I really do love it in the mean time, though.

 

Daily Driver, for real: August 2019 - Present

 

After the show, not much exciting happened. I went back to work in Nashville from August to December, and drove the truck for the majority of that as long as the roads weren't salted.

 

I did decide to install the original valve cover again, now painted in a nice shade of silver:

I never was 100% happy with the 97+ valve cover. Its gasket relies on pins built into the head bolts for alignment, which my older engine just doesn't have. As a result, I never could get it to stop leaking, and after a while I decided I liked the classic cast aluminum look better anyway.

 

In October, the auxiliary fan died on me, resulting in the temperature gauge moving off of its normal spot when sitting in traffic with the A/C on. My junkyard spare failed me, so I bought a new one:

Yes, I peeled that cheap looking sticker off right away.

 

I also started wondering if I'd like a leather wrapped steering wheel (spoiler alert: yes) - a search for a good OEM one in black predictably resulted in nothing, so I tried out one that had been reupholstered:

I'm pretty happy with it. It's not perfect, and it's not an exact match for the OE pattern, but looks nice and is very comfortable in the hand.

 

Next up: time for me to break stuff! I've had a ZJ steering box sitting around for a while. I swapped it in. I may be producing a full writeup on this later, but the important points are these:

- This job sucks alone. It really sucks alone.

- The gearbox must be adjusted according to the FSM procedure, which is NOT what you see on Jeep forums. There is more to it than what you see online.

- The quicker ratio, combined with proper adjustment, GREATLY improves steering responsiveness and tightness. It steers almost like a real car now, not some junky old farm truck.

 

I did not take pictures, because it was a dirty job, and hoisting a 40 pound box above your head without help isn't exactly conducive to picture taking. I also took the opportunity to replace the intermediate shaft.

 

In the process of this, I broke the fuel line. Fortunately, an upgrade exists, in the form of the fuel line from a '95 ZJ:

This is a steel braided line, and of a much more durable construction than factory. It fits right up, and there aren't even any o-rings to replace. Looks sporty too.

 

I then drove to Missouri and back to meet @jeepdude89 and return with a care package for this truck's older, sometimes forgotten, brother:

 

Next, I set out to do something I laid the foundation for literally years ago: add power mirrors. I've even had the switch in my truck and plugged in for the last few months or so.

 

Here We Go Again!

 

I decided to take a chance and buy some cheap mirrors from Amazon. Unfortunately for me, this truck can smell when an aftermarket part is near. It immediately rejected the Chinese junk with extreme prejudice - the passenger mirror (the only one I had installed at that point) stopped adjusting vertically pretty much right away. Fine, truck, you win. I'll regroup and come back with more expensive parts.

 

I at least took the opportunity to improve the passenger side power window's dreadful performance. In almost all cases of "my window rolls up slow" or "my window is very hard to crank up", the problem is easily fixed. These window regulators almost never fail in the traditional sense. The window mechanism in our trucks is a worm drive "snake" looking thing. The only real failure point is this snake or the gear that drives it (connected either to the motor or to the crank handle) stripping out, so if your window will roll up and down completely without any skipping or grinding, you do not have to replace the regulator!

 

Sometimes, rust and dried grease accumulates in the channel of the "snake" and binds it up. Sometimes, it just needs some lubrication. That would seem to be the case with my passenger side power regulator, as the snake on this 26 year old used regulator looks almost as good as it does on my NOS one:

Shooting some white lithium grease along the full length of this snake, as well as into the hose it retracts into, more than doubled the speed of the window. If the regulator is dirty or corroded, it would be good to remove the hose and clean the snake more thoroughly, but this one didn't need that. I'll go into more detail on a worse-condition regulator in the build for my '89 pretty soon.

 

One potential source of door rattles is the window motor and regulator assembly touching the door. From the factory, there is a block of foam on each side of the motor and some jute padding along the top. Both were gone on mine, so I used some closed cell weatherstripping foam to replicate it:

 

I robbed the steering stabilizer off of this truck to replace the completely dead one in the '89, so naturally I had to get this truck a better one:

I've always wanted to try out Old Man Emu shocks on this truck. This isn't really what I meant, but hey. This truck has never gotten death wobble, but I do tend to go with the "Jeep put the steering stabilizer in for a reason" side of that particular argument, and it honestly seems to make the steering feel a little tighter too.

 

Another silly, meaningless claim to fame: I own the very last MeanLemons 62mm HO throttle body.

 

Initial impressions: throttle response to "tip-in" is greatly increased. It feels much punchier at low throttle. I can't say if it's making the engine more powerful, but it definitely feels like it. The unit is nicely put together and the butterfly was adjusted perfectly. I would recommend Neal's products, but you can't buy this anymore. Sucks to be you!

 

Stay tuned for next time! I have some pretty exciting stuff in the works, including some truly custom work. Here's a couple of hints:

 

[89 MJ]

I have a set of chrome power mirrors for sale if you need them. I want them gone, so I’ll sell them cheap. 

[Minuit]

8 hours ago, 89 MJ said:

I have a set of chrome power mirrors for sale if you need them. I want them gone, so I’ll sell them cheap. 

PM sent.

[89 MJ]

13 minutes ago, Minuit said:

PM sent.

PM replied to. 

[Minuit]

It is becoming apparent to me that I might have a chance at actually being able to drive a vehicle on public roads at some point in the future. That means it's time to address my modes of transportation. There are three doors I can go down, but only two realistic choices. I chose the door that led to this truck.

 

I won't pollute this build thread with the backstory, but if you really want to know, here you go:

 

I haven't been completely idle since April, but my "talents" have been redirected to something other than working on cars since then:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today, I did something other than tightening power steering lines and checking fluids to the truck for the first time since April. It hasn't been driven in about two months. It started right up (although the battery was a little low), and the AC which I suspect has a slow leak is semi-cold. Not bad.

 

It's got a thick coating of tree sap, and this is the part of the year in TN where it's either raining or so hot and humid that I'd rather just sit inside, so that's just great.

 

I finally did get around to installing @fiatslug87's new 3D printed tailgate bumpers. They're great and you should buy them. They aren't a perfectly exact match for my originals (which were distorted and warped, so they might be correct after all), but the differences won't matter for their intended purpose.

 

 

 

Installation is somewhat of a pain in the @$$ because Jeep chose to be cheap when putting these things on. They're held on by rivets, which of course will have to be dealt with. This is an area that'll be visible, so not damaging anything is especially important. For the ones that attach to the bed, you can get to the back of them by removing the tail light. I have had pretty good luck drilling this style of rivet out through the back, and there's a lot less risk of scraping the paint on the bed that way. If appearance didn't matter, drilling through the front or grinding the heads off works just fine too.

 

I want these to be removable, so the obvious solution of "just rivet the new ones in" is off the table. I also don't want to use a nut on the other side. The next most obvious solution is riv-nuts, and that's what I decided to go with. Believe it or not, I've never owned or used a riv-nut gun before, but hey, this $20 Harbor Freight special works pretty well for this small stuff:

 

The ones on the tailgate go on the same way. On one of them, the rivet had gotten so loose that I could push the center of the rivet out with a center punch, which made things easier.

 

The #6 riv-nuts that come in the HF kit are perfect for the holes that were already there. Couple that with a machine screw and the largest washer you can fit, and they work great. Don't forget to clean your tail light sockets, lube the tailgate pivot points, and make sure the tailgate straps aren't bent while you're in there.

 

 

[89 MJ]

Any more updates on this Minuit? I really love these HO era Sportruck stripes, almost as much as my Renix Sportruck stripes.

[Minuit]

On 12/21/2020 at 11:15 AM, 89 MJ said:

Any more updates on this Minuit? I really love these HO era Sportruck stripes, almost as much as my Renix Sportruck stripes.

Sadly not, but not to worry - it's fine. I start it up every now and then and make sure everything works.

 

The next few things that are liable to happen:

 

- I have the D44, a trac-lok carrier for said D44, and 3.55 gears. Might play around with that.

 

- I have everything I need except headliner fabric to install the overhead console with new, more user friendly keyless entry.

 

- Misc. audio system shenanigans?

[Minuit]

So, here's where we stand right now.

Actually, not quite. There's about 3 inches more snow on it now, but I busted my @$$ on icy stairs the last time I went out to get pictures, so that'll have to do.

 

As to what I've actually done to the truck in the past... like, year. Here goes:

 

I replaced the cab vent flap things with new ones printed by @Dzimm - I found the quality of the print to be good, and the fit in the truck to be approximately equal to the OEM part:

I can't say if they'll reduce wind noise or the annoying flap-flap noise of the old rubber flaps at speed, as I haven't actually ridden in the truck since putting these in. I'll update once I do.

 

Somehow, I misplaced one of the chrome armrest trims for my Limited door panels at some point. @schardein kindly sent a replacement down, and my chrome armrest bits are whole again:

 

Finally, I installed a set of chrome power mirrors. The wiring "exists from the factory" in a sense, because it was part of the independent power accessory wiring used by '91 and '92 cross-body harnesses, so I laid it in as part of that when I did the power windows and locks. All I had to do was plug in the switch, the mirrors, and the single power lead it uses into the fuse box. The ground is shared with the ground point I made. A very simple and elegant install. Going from black to chrome is kind of a big stylistic change for the very conservative nature of this build, but it's growing on me. I kind of like the idea of "chrome above the body line, black below it" that the chrome windshield and drip rail trim creates. I'll take some pictures once the truck isn't frozen under a car cover and several inches of ice.

 

I'm closing in on a vision of what I want to see done by my next big milestone, which I'm officially setting as July 24, 2021 - the first day of this year's All Breeds Jeep Show. I'm not gonna lie - motivation to work on cars is hard to come by in Minuit-land these days, but I'll get over it. As I said above, I'm sitting on a pile of parts related to several different projects, although to be perfectly honest I'm not totally sure if I have enough parts on hand to complete any of them.

 

Some highlights:

 

- I have literally everything I need on hand to make the overhead console functional except the connector for the ambient air temperature sensor. And yes, it is going to be fully functional. Very annoyingly, the connector I need for the sensor is one of those stupid Chrysler connectors, not anything I can buy new. I lucked out a while ago and scored a NOS overhead console computer (the most common failure of these is due to cumulative heat - the voltage regulator puts out a huge amount of heat. Combined with being right up on the roof, eventually the capacitors dry out and the circuit board basically melts), but I'm pretty sure there's a more reliable replacement available - the part number maps to 94-98 Dodge Ram trucks. The connector looks the same, but I don't have one to try.

 

- I tracked down a roughly 1 volt drop across the ignition switch - that's on the short list of things that can burn an MJ down, and neatly explains why my amplifier stopped turning on without the truck running (it won't turn on on anything less than 12V). A new (Mopar) replacement switch is in transit. That's gotten me going down the line of doing a general electrical tune-up. Mainly, this is going to mean new battery cables which I'll be making myself, but also the usual connector cleaning and whatnot. I considered buying a pre-made set of cables from one of the many makers on the internet, but decided to do it myself so I get exactly what I want. Currently, once you consider tooling costs, it looks like I'll be saving a cool negative 100 dollars!

 

- I've noticed a steadily growing dribble of coolant from the front of the engine, and I know for a fact that the weep hole in the (aftermarket) water pump has dribbled a little bit from almost day one. Pretty sure the thermostat housing gasket is leaking a little too. Since I'm a little tired of dealing with that, I've loaded up the parts cannon: The thermostat, housing, water pump, and all related hose clamps are being replaced with new (Mopar) parts. I'll be painting and clearing the parts so they should stay pretty and new-looking. A clean engine bay is important to me.

 

- I'm probably going to be redoing the exhaust - the parts I haven't already redone already. There's a noticeable exhaust leak where I clamped the muffler to the cat even though they didn't want to line up, the factory manifold is cracked (duh), and there are a number of previous hackjobs in the system that don't make me happy. That'll give me an opportunity to take everything back apart and paint it, hopefully increasing its lifespan a little.

 

- I bought a set of new motor mounts as well as a new transmission mount a long time ago, and I'm pretty sure they're in the attic. That doesn't narrow it down nearly as much as you think.

 

- I'd like to do some beautification, especially to the front end. The bumper and all of the trim is starting to get a little dingy looking again. I've got some front tow hooks that need to go on too.

 

 

[89 MJ]

Were those the chrome power mirrors you got from me? You’ve had those ones for a while, glad to see they are getting installed!

[Minuit]

13 hours ago, 89 MJ said:

Were those the chrome power mirrors you got from me? You’ve had those ones for a while, glad to see they are getting installed!

Yep.

[89 MJ]