Did floor shifters ever come stock?

[grinch]

New MJ owner and site member here, caught the Jeep bug after my wife got an XJ and I couldn't keep my hands off it. So after searching for awhile I found a Comanche Chief with the configuration I wanted: 4.0 / 4wd / Automatic / Short bed.

 

Needless to say I'm excited to start tinkering around with it. 

 

On to my first (newbie) question: my truck has an auto trans with a floor shifter. I was under the assumption that these trucks had column shifters for the auto trans. Is this a modification or is it stock?

 

I apologize if this is answered elsewhere, I tried searching but couldn't find it. Thanks!

 

Photos for reference:

 

 

 

 

[Strokermjcomanche]

They came with both floor and column shifters from the factory .

[grinch]

They came with both floor and column shifters from the factory .

Thanks for the quick answer!

 

Do you know if the floor vs. column shifter placement have anything to do with the trim (ie Chief vs Pioneer)? Or was it random?

[Minuit]

A Comanche could be ordered with pretty much any combination of options, but certain packages came with certain options - e.g. you'll never see a bench seat column shift Eliminator since the Eliminator package came with bucket seats. If your truck was special ordered you could get some seriously wacky combinations. One I've seen is a fully decked out '87 (so the 4.0 was available) with an automatic transmission and I think even the heavy duty rear end, but a 4 cylinder engine. So it's entirely possible that that is how your truck came from the factory, but it's also possible that it could've been swapped in. The Chief was one of the higher trim levels, so chances are an automatic Chief would come with a floor shift.

 

I swapped in a floor shifter and tilt column into my '91 this week with absolutely no modifications whatsoever to the truck itself. As a general rule, even the most basic Comanche is set up for pretty much every option, it's just missing the parts.

[Eagle]

My '88 MJ Chief has a bench seat and mini console. (It's a 5-speed, so no question there about the floor shift.)  Maybe bucket seats and a floor shift could be ordered in a Chief with automatic, but I'm more inclined to think that a previous owner made some upgrades.

[grinch]

My '88 MJ Chief has a bench seat and mini console. (It's a 5-speed, so no question there about the floor shift.)  Maybe bucket seats and a floor shift could be ordered in a Chief with automatic, but I'm more inclined to think that a previous owner made some upgrades.

The previous owner did say that the bucket seats and center console were pulled from a Cherokee, so that is definitely true. I just wasn't sure if they switched the column shifter to a floor shift or if that was probably stock. Sounds like it was probably stock.

[Eagle]

 

Sounds like it was probably stock.

 

 

My guess is that it was NOT stock, but it doesn't matter. I prefer the floor shifter, especially with bucket seats.

[grinch]

I ran the VIN decoder on Jeepz.com and it says:

 

Powertrain: 4-speed automatic, floor gear shift, part time 4 W/D

 

So it DID come stock :) Nice to know.