jeep mj Meximanche!

[Pete M]

as a general rule of thumb, I try not to reuse crusty, rusty items that are key to saving my life.   

[MiNi Beast]

Brakes are overrated, if it isnt hissing at you just avoid steep hills. 

[Skylynx]

On 12/18/2021 at 8:31 PM, Pete M said:

as a general rule of thumb, I try not to reuse crusty, rusty items that are key to saving my life.   

Ooooh yeah, i'm not in a million years Re-using this thing, i already got an alternative which i'll tell the story of in the next post ;)

[Skylynx]

On 12/18/2021 at 9:48 PM, MiNi Beast said:

Brakes are overrated, if it isnt hissing at you just avoid steep hills. 

I'll just do like the Flintstones and use the rust holes on the floor to stick my feet out and break with them against the pavement hahah

[Skylynx]

... So there i was...

 

THREE MONTHS AGO!

(you know, back when i had time to update this thing with all the shenanigans I'm doing to this poor rust bucket)
 

with a new mission and purpose in life, 25 USD in my pocket and enough gas to haul my butt off to the junkyard to search for a  new break booster for the truck, having done some small bit of research before hand i knew just replacing it with a working equal unit was enough, but that the Possibility of an upgrade for something BETTER was also there, out there, in the ether, waiting for me as it rusted out in a junkyard near me...

i woke up early a friday morning and got ready, with tacos on my belly, women on my mind and country music on my radio i drove over to "Junk Mall" as the locals call it. i'll get pictures of this some day for you guys, this place is a conglomerate of shops that pick cars apart and sell the pieces away like a Pick-a-part over there in the US, just with some help while pulling the parts out!

FOR NOW, THIS GOOGLE MAPS SCREEN CAP SHALL BE ENOUGH.

 

 

I had a list of models and years that had break boosters that would fit my humble Manche that i no longer possess and even less remember, but in it were XJ's, ZJ's, and most importantly... WJ's since even though all the boosters i could pull from these trucks in certain years would give me not only more breaking power but also more reliability, but the WJ's even more so!
I was specially looking for junked WJ's from a certain date range which as best as i could remember were 2000 to 04 models, but don't quote me on that!

I walked for HOURS but could find only jeeps without the booster, or without one i'd be able to fit in my truck, it had started to seem i was going back home empty handed, but in one of the last shops i finally found a shop with not 1, not 2!... but 3 WJ's all with the booster i needed! i was EXALTED!
Such a joyous day this was, so many options to choose from! all i had to do now was choose one of the three and strike a bargain with the shop owner!

Choosing was quick and easy, the 2000 WJ break booster was the best one out of the three since it's got the pliable and flexible break lines that would make it a whole lot easier to adapt to it's new home under my hood, it was a no brainier to pick that one over the other two with solid lines, now all i had to do was ask the good, humble man from the shop how much money he was willing to receive to part with the piece, i was expecting to nod at his response, give him a soft, warm smile and for me to pull the 25 USD from my pocket to hand the over to him for the whole thing.

Yeah, the idiot wanted 150 bucks for it. JUST FOR THE BOOSTER, MIND YOU< he wanted another extra 50 for the pump and reservoir... i didn't even ask for the break lines's price before i started walking away.

I didn't knew what to do, either to cry because my hopes of going back home with the part i needed were now slim to none, or to laugh because of the absolutely outrageous price the guy wanted for a used piece on a 21 year old junked jeep.

with just a few shops left on the junkyard that could possibly have a suitable booster for me ,y chances were not looking good at all, i looked up towards the sky, gazed upon the mighty clouds above to as god why he had forsaken me in my mission, i had wasted the whole day and half a tank of gad to come back empty handed... what could ever be worse?
i $#!&amp;e you not, dear reader... i asked the question and right then and there it started to rain.

GREAT.

Now i was about 3 miles away walking distace to my car in a place without paved roads and not even an idea of what a sidewalk means, i could have turned around right then and there, admit defeat and start heading back to the car before the storm rolled in too harsh, maybe i could make it back to the car before being entirely drenched and covered in mud from the knees down...

NO!
NNNNNNNNNONONONONONO!
NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WHO THE HECK DO YOU THINK I AM?!!?!?!??!?!?!? A PUUuuuuuu... LITTLE KITTEN? HECK NO TRUCKER MOTHER, I'M A LYNX!!!! WE GO AND KEEP GOING NO DEFEAT NEVER SURRENDER CAPITULATION IS NOT AN OPTION!!!!!!

with only 5 shops left to search i shrugged my shoulders and kept going as the droplets began raining around me and thunder began.... thundering in the distance, the first of the last 5 shops yielded no results, just as the other probably hundred shops i asked beforehand... But the second one... Oooh.. the second one~

The clerk at the front greeted me like many had done before that day as he sat on that old Carta blanca chair, asking me what i was looking for in that fateful day, my reply, again, was the same as it had been that same day, Break booster from such and such models from such and those years... i was expecting to be met with the same old wrinkle of the lip and a shake of the head as he told me that that key piece was not in his possession for me to buy, but instead a smile drew on my face as one of his eyebrows went straight up before he stood up from his chair and asked me to follow him inside.

I felt like a schoolgirl being asked to prom by the highschool quarterback, i followed burly, manly man into that dirty and musty shop carrying my hopes and dreams on my arms, hopeful and happy that i was finally about to find what i was looking for.

we doubled the corner and came to a section filled with shelves, row after row of shelves! each board carrying about 30 or 40 break boosters from all kinds of makes and models! Ford, Dodge! Bmw, Mercedes and more, the mad man even had a section for Oldsmobile!! finally though.. we came the jeep section as my heart raced and my eyes remained wide open, there were thousands of break boosters and pumps in that room, many jeep ones too! AND from the top and behind of a big pile of them i could recognize the yellow-ish reservoir of of a Jeep WJ... I WAS PRACTICALLY MELTING.

 

Booster Messiah, as i like to call him now, climbed the shelf up to it and grabbed the reservoir to pull the whole booster out from behind the pile of jeep liberty and commander boosters it was hiding behind for me to take back home, victorious and happy!

it all shattered in an instant when instead of the whole thing coming up from behind the other boosters, the only part on Booster Messiah's hands was the reservoir... life was teasing me beyond measure, he had apparently sold the rest of it about a month ago, and only the perfect, yellow-ish reservoir of break fluid remained from the unit, which he offered to me for about five USD, i told Booster Messiah that i'd keep his offer in mind, but that i had no use for just a reservoir, i said good bye to him with a smile, but in the inside... i felt like

 

 

Three more shops to go was all i could think of as i stepped outside and was reminded about the incoming rain by the drops of condensation landing around me, so with a crushed soul i continued my hunt for a booster for my poor Comanche, the next clerk on the shop right next door asked me the same things, and i replied again, with the same i nodded once i was met with the classic shake of the head move, and began to turn around defeated once more before he spoke again...

"But Jacinto next door here took a WJ apart a month ago, though.. i think they're coming to pick what's left of it for recycling tomorrow though.. go ask him, you never know."

I sprinted over to the next gate where Jacinto was, shaken and short of breath and hopeful. i can't recall how the exact conversation, but it went something like this: (... in spanish, of course, this is translated to english. <3)

 

Me: "JACINTO!"
Jacinto: "Hey, what's up Vato, what do you need?"
Me: "Guy next door told me you took apart a WJ, you still got it?"
Jacinto: "yeah, it's all stripped though, nothing left, they're coming for the carcass tomorrow."
Me: "UUugh.. really?.. everything gone?."
Jacinto: "Si vato, doors, hood, the whole engine, seats and trim... even the roof, i sold the roof too."
Me: "dammit.. just my luck, i just needed the break booster.... Ooh well, good luck man, have a good o-"
Jacinto: "Hold on man, you said you need the booster?... come with me."

Dearest reader, again, i $#!&amp;e you not and i have photographic evidence to prove it. i followed Jacinto through his shop all the way to the back with my heart beating as fast as fast can be, coming out to a small yard through a piece of old sheet metal that was being used as a makeshift gate, there, alone and under a small tree was the remains of what was once a WJ, that was just as jacinto had said, lacking everything from the axles to the roof, the engine was gone, the whole bay was barren and empty as the promises of a politician, this thing had been picked apart thoroughly and left to rust and rot...

but there... in the upper left corner of the engine bay, partly covered in fallen leaves... there is where i found it, under the sprinkling rain, under the incoming thunder... alone and cold and ready to be trashed the next day, melted for it's value in weight of steel along with the rest of the WJ.

you can even see the drops of rain on the black trim just above it as it started to come down a bit quicker as i mused over it!
Jacinto asked me for 20 bucks, i said 15, and he said deal.

 

 

Booster, pump, lines, sensor and reservoir from a 2000 WJ, EXACTLY what i needed! he was even kind enough to pull it off the truck for me for me to take home!... there was just one issue.. the plastic reservoir had been burnt by the Sun's UV rays for a month, and was badly crackling.. and the yellow cap was bent and wouldn't seal right...

BUT WAIT!!!!!!!!

 

BOOSTER MESSIAH HAD THAT EXACT PART!

I RAN BACK OVER TO HIM, I RAN BACK TO MY MAN, MY MANLY MAN WITH GREASY HANDS AND A BEER BELLY, I CAME RUNNING BACK TO HIM WITH MY NEW BOOSTER AND A SMILE ON MY FACE!

 

he received me with a smile and clapping hands as he saw what i carried in my arms, cradling it like a child as it leaked break fluid all over me, he went to the back and got the exact reservoir i needed to complete my set, he even gifted me a cardboard box to darry my prize easier! i paid him, and bid him good bye, walking about 3 miles back to my car under light rain, getting into it just as it started to really pour, lucky me... getting exactly what i needed, with two shops to spare!

 

THE BOOSTER WAS IN WORKING ORDER AND COMPLETE!

But it wold still need maintenance and modifications before i can fit it into the Comanche, that and more coming tomorrow in the second part of the Booster saga!

[watchamakalit]

Great story telling. Glad yo hear you found a booster.

[89 MJ]

Very entertaining read

[Jesse J]

very nice! loved reading it especially!

[Skylynx]

Early the next morning i got to work on restoring the new booster i had found at the Junkyard, it was in great condition for it's age, but the one month it spent under the sun and rain when the hood of the truck was gone had started to take a toll on it, the crimps that held the booster together were starting to rust, and the reservoir was rotten and cracked, unusable really, Thankfully i Met Booster Messiah in my travels and he was kind enough to sell me the exact part i needed to fix this issue, which is the first thing i did to start the restoration of this thing.

Actually, that's a lie, first thing i did was clean the thing, it was covered in dirt and dust that i didn't want anywhere near the internal parts of it, or along my hands and clothes, so with a damp rag on hand i got to task of getting the damn thing un-dusty

 

It cleaned up quite nicely after a few passes of that wet rag, though the paint was very faded, and the rust on the crimps was even more evident like this, after doing this i held off on removing the old reservoir still, and instead grabbed the wirewheel and a cordless drill to remove as much rust from it as i possibly could, being very careful not to hit the break lines nor to wire it down too much, just enough until i stopped seeing red on it, the cleaned it up again and dozed it with a spraycan of rustoleoum, and you know what?.. it turned out amazing!

NOW i switched up those damn reservoirs! a pair of small flathead screwdrivers pushing the two plastic flaps inwards was the trick it needed to come straight up, the O-rings seemed to be still in great condition, and even though i'd rather replace them, i just threw those back on since i am absolutely not bothering with finding that part number and praying to booster messiah to find it.

Clicking the new reservoir in it's place was easy as cake, just coming up from on top, being very careful not to pinch the O-rings and being slow until it clicks in place, just like that i was left with a perfectly (almost) brand new booster and pump set for my poor rust pile!

 

Next order of business is to adapt the break taillight switch to the hole in the new booster, the old booster had a different... rod? spoke? spire... shaft?.. okay this is getting weird, the thingy that comes through the fire wall and grabs the break pedal, that thingy
The original had a 5/8th's sized hole through which the pedal pivots and pushes onto it to make the booster do it's thing, what does it do exactly? don't know. don't ask i don't know, boosts the breaks i guess.
It also has a flat spot in the front where the switch is meant to rest on, being activated and pressed every time you touch the pedal from the change of the angle it sits because of that flat spot and... holy moly this is a very complicated way of making your taillights shine or not, wow...

Thankfully the hole from the new WJ booster was smaller than the comanche one, since it's a whole lot easier to remove stuff than to add it correctly, this means we can very easily modify it and make it work! what i should have done (and you should too is you're about to embark on this task as well) is find a friend who can lend you his bench drill, grab a steel cutting 5/8 bit and drill that hole bigger to it's exact needed diameter, being careful of being straight and level when  doing it, and then just flatten the tip of it down at a 90 degree angle to the shaft with a belt sander, literally a job that will take you 5 minutes, tops.

the smartypants amongst you may have noticed i said SHOULD HAVE DONE and not DID

you see, Dearest of readers, i am what is known and most commonly refereed as an idiot, also known as an imbecile, a dolt, morron, and the such, i didn't choose to be this way, i just am!
it's not the best of things but i make do, mostly...-ish.. I don't even know why but i suspect it's either a glitch in the simulation or just faulty software, we've tried a lot of things to remedy but the factory apparently won't apply warranty for that on my model ( Dropdead handsome sigma male model), not much else i can do but leave them a one star review on yelp and see where this crossed cables on my brain take me

 

i am also poor (absolutely cause of this jeep)

I dremeled the heck out of this thing, yes i did and here's WHY.

all my friends are pansies and none had a bench drill,something that i don't have either automatically making me a pansy as well... yeah.. but like...
ANYWAY
Paying someone to do it was going to cost me as much of not double of what the booster originally costed me, me, wanting to save money knew that was just not going to be a thing, i tried looking for a 5/8 drill bit for steel so i can do it through my drill just by pulse, but the only one i could find locally was again, twice the price of the booster, and my idiot brain just couldn't compute that, and decided to take the dremel route.

AFTER ALL i already owned it and the bits needed to do this, all i had to invest in it was the time and care to bore the hole larger to it's needed diameter, making a hole larger is one of my specialties! in fact, the first thing i did when i was born was make a hole a lot larger than what it was, the people around were quite shocked!

This comes with it's downsides though, no matter how much of a hole stretching professional i am, i could never match the precision and accuracy that a machine has, and thins being a very delicate process from a very delicate part meant that i'd have to be extra careful when doing this... first thing first, get the dang thing secured and tied down so that the only thing moving is me and the dremel, a vice grip, a cardboard box and a bench vice holding the vice grip that held the shaft of the booster tight while i did the hole stretching.

 

I used a level to make sure the rod was straight and flat towards me, and then kept using it on the dremel to make sure i kept it as straight downwards as possible, light passes with the dremel all around, not adding pressure at all to it, letting the took do the entirety of the work, slowly grinding away at it and testing it often with that little plastic thingy you see on the bench vice, that thing needs to fit in there.... like this!

 

 this small plastic thingy is part of the switch you'll be putting in here, it's got the biggest dimension that you need, 5/8.

having this fit inside snugly and without wobbling means you did a good job! it took me about 3 hours to grind the whole thing open to the point i could put this thing in, i know cause when i started i also started a joe rogan episode, and once it clicked in place they were saying good bye.

BUT WAIT WE ARE STILL NOT DONE!

 

Next step is getting a micrometer and getting the measurement from your old booster's rod distance from the outside of the hole to the flat surface to the front, on mine it was something like 2.9 mm, but yours may be different so make sure, for this step i ditched the dremel entirely and used hand files, it took me about an extra hour or so to do this until my new booster had the flat spot i needed at the exact distance it needed to be, i took a deep breath as i assembled the switch in it's new home, thinking i was going to need adjustments for sure, but to my surprise...

 

It fit just right, the first time too! hah!

This post is getting long, and it's getting late! i'll continue the booster saga tomorrow with the installation, or at least part of it!
 

[Far McKon]

How is this not a Netflix series yet?

[Skylynx]

On 3/21/2022 at 7:09 PM, Far McKon said:

How is this not a Netflix series yet?

Gosh, i need to start posting here again soon! been so tied up with life that it's just giving me no time to do so!
I'll have a few posts done tomorrow though, i promise! glad you're liking it so far! <3

 

[Skylynx]

Yup.
YUP.

I done did it again boys.
I disappeared for a whole three months this time just about, that outght-a be a new record for me! don't worry (too much) the comanche project is still going strong, and i'm making at least some slow progress on it every day! it's just taking way more time (AND MONEY) than what i thought it would! that's fine though, i knew from the start of it that she'd be a massive money pit, and i'm very happy with the progress if it!

Last time i pestered you all with my presence we were talking about the absolute blessing of me finding the Break booster i needed for my poor old jeep out from a WJ from the year 2000, boy was i lucky to get that thing in a decent condition, and even though it's not as plug an play as i'd like it to be i'm happy i finally made it an addition to my rust bucket!

some modifications to both the truck and the booster are needed for this thing to actually be of any use, thankfully the holes for the bolts on it are the exact same as the ones already on your comanche, so there's no drilling the firewall needed for this mod, no... YOU JUST NEED TO BEND THE CRAP OUT OF IT.

Okay okay..

maybe not ALL the crap out of it, perhaps like, two tenths of the crap, 2.2 tops. but you know what i mean, you'll need to pull out the vice grips for this one, and maybe a rubber mallet.
See, the firewall gets welded to the top of the... cowling? i don't know the exact name of that part of the truck, but it's the front wall of the ~CREVASSE~ that the wiper motor hides behind... problem with that and your shiny new 22 year old and used and a little bit dirty WJ break booster is that the booster is a little THICCER than the one your MJ previously had, and you need to bend the firewall away for it to fit properly in the truck, kinda like this!

 

Pretty, Ain't it? i mean the booster, not my 3 brain cell ape job quality bending the firewall away, either works, i got out of it what i needed, make sure to paint over your bends or cuts if you decide to go that way, all that shifting and bending with tools are bound to Unfix the factory paint in those spots and it could very easily start making rust a problem in that area!

The job's way easier to do if you get a Buddy (or your mom) to hold the booster in place while you torque it down from the inside of the cab, just make sure to get the right nuts for it! they're not the same nuts that came off the other booster that was originally in your truck, Mine happened to be m 8.25 for the WJ booster.
make sure to thank your mom after her assistance is no longer required, and notify that she can go back to watching Netflix FOR NOW...
 

 

That's the view from the inside of the cab and under the dash, (OR IT WOULD BE IF THERE WERE ANY DASH THERE FOR IT TO BE UNDER.) This whole job is way easier with it not being in the way, so if you're already taking it off and have the chance to go for the upgrade to, I'd highly recommend it and save you the hassle of doing it later while you wish you'd get a few yoga classes in first to fit better under that spot.

Ooh, and yes, by the way, I sound deadened the whole firewall! haha! It looks so good like this! and just booping on the covered metal with a finger before and after applying this thing makes it obvious how much of a difference this is, this jeep is going to be quiet enough for long road trips for sure!

 

I'm skipping the floorboards for now since i want to see how they behave for a year or two, if the rust returns i'll be seeking other measures of sound deadner, but if it remains good, i'll absolutely cover that too!

ANYWAY, BOOSTER!

Yes, you're not done doing modifications to it if you have an AW4 automatic transmission with the column shifter like i do, Thing is... not only are the WJ booster's studs thinner than the other booster studs, they're also way longer, like twice longer, and normally that wouldn't really be a problem, but only by happy chance i noticed that the shift lever for my column shifter was leaning EVER SO SLIGHTLY lower, i barely even noticed it and when i checked, surely enough, the peg at the bottom of the steering column that pulls and pushes on the Tranny's shifter cable was only barely hitting the longer bolt from the booster...

It was probably okay though, i'm sure it wouldn't really be an issue, right? no need to take it all apart again and cal your mom again to hold the booster... nah...
That's what the dremel is for.
This job's way easier to do when the booster's out of the truck than when it's inside, but i managed to pull it off while it was installed anyway, so you should be able to do so too with the right tools, still, do it outside if you can, and save yourself a headache.

 

As you can see, with the bolt cut down to a more suitable length, the peg can move to the left enough to sit perfectly fine on the parking position.

I had to cut that bolt down enough for the Shifting peg could clear it, and for that fact, that's not the only clearance issues those bolts are causing now for you shifters cable, the other lower bolt is also in the way of the cable's path, since it needs to go over it and into the cable holder where my finger is in this next picture, so you'll need to cut down to length both lower bolts in order to get this thing in right if you have the same automatic setup as me.



After doing all this you can go ahead and re-install the break pedal and heel happy about yourself and the work you've done, Atta boy! help yourself to a beer or two and smile! you're in good track to get this thing back together, it's super simple too! just put the piece back where it came from, like that accelerator pedal you took out to pain the other night, Just line it up with it's bolts on the firewall and put the nuts onto them, super easy!... even a baby ape could manage that..



I WISH TO SCREAM

i ABSOLUTELY over-torqued the ACC pedal's bottom nut, it snapped right off like it was nothing, my excessively strong, well toned, fine tuned, well worked, exemplary and remarkable muscles that make all the women around me need a change of underwear have come back to bite me in the rear..... GREAT..... more work that i didn't need to do, now i needed to welt this stud back in it's place and so i did as a temporary fix before i can find a better solution to this.

I put a few beads of Flux core onto it and call it good for now, a few washers to skip the ruined threads make it so that the nut can still be torqued down with the threads further up, it works, i tugged on it pretty good and it's solid in there, and not moving at all, so i'll have to come up with a better plan for the future, but this'll do for now.

With that done and set, we're done with the pedal stuffs for now... we still need to re-fit the booster's break lines to the prop valve and bleed the whole system after we check for leaks and what not, but that's for another post, if not for another person (an expert) to do, i want my breaks to be done by someone with half of an idea of what they're doing.

But we're not done with this Area of the truck! tomorrow's post will be about the blinker switch and how to replace it!

I'll try my best to post more than one post tomorrow, but it's all depending on luck, honestly... gosh can't wait to catch up this page with all that's already been done, this is all old news by now! haha! soon though, for sure! i want to get this thing up to date by sunday, it would help if each of my posts weren't long enough to put the bible to shame, but hey, that's the fun of it!

ANYWAY GOOD NIGHT!

[Pete M]

big hammers can fix a lot of things.   welders can fix the rest.   good job all around!  

[Skylynx]

Okay, this one will be a quick one since i don't have that many pictures because i either lost them or i just flat out forgot to take them even though i DISTINCTLY REMEMBER taking them... i think my FBI agent is playing tricks on me, deleting the things i need to make my Comanche journal the way i want it only because i forgot his birthday... ANY WAY YEAH.

 

Blinker switch! Yes! i got it a few months back on amazon and it got to me a few days later, The brand's standard motors i think, but i'm not sure since the box it came in is already in a landfill somewhere, but it's identical to the OEM one aside from the color and the connector's end which has a few more unused slots than the original on my truck

 

 

I'm not doing this just because i'm bored though, The one already inside the steering wheel is locked up entirely and the connector on the bottom is snapped in two, and since i got this thing for cheap i'd rather just replace it rather than trying to fix it.. that's also easier said than done, if you know anything about these steering columns you'll know how absurdly complicated they are, you need two special tools just to get the steering wheel out of the way and start poking at the first layer of STUFF that's in it.



The connector was snapped in half from the past troglodyte that owned this truck probably trying to open a beer bottle with it, at this point i wouldn't be surprised if I'm accurate on that.



And once the steering wheel and lock plate's removed, this is what the OEM connector looked like, dry grease and dust covered the entirety of the old plastic switch, this thing has seen better days for sure... it's easy enough to remove since it's just a bunch of Philips screws holding it in place, make sure not to loose the black steel tab up there being held by that one screw, that's important and you won't be replacing that unless yours is broken too, the new switch doesn't come with it, so you'll have to scavenge junkyards if you manage to doink it.

From here you have two options... either go the thorough and responsible route like any sane person would, and keep dismantling the whole steering wheel to clear up room for you to pass the connector and cables through the small nooks that the cables need to go through to poke below the dash before carefully re-assembling the whole thing again around it... or just cut the damn thing and shoe the cables through just to solder them back up under the dash like i did.

Gotta say, the fact that this saved me hours of work was almost worth it smelling the fumes from the soldering, haha!
The connector folds down once the screws are removed, only held in by the cables that run through the steering wheel body.

I just cut those at the old switch to remove it, being careful not to push the cables in and out from the underside just yet, instead i cut the cables of the new switch at the connector instead, taped them to the old ones and pulled the new ones through with the old ones from below



Ye Old cables



and the new one's being taped to the old! ready to be guided through...
Once i got them on the other side i got set up with my cheap soldering kit and began re-joining the cables back up with their respective colors on the connector side, it gets cramped in there for sure, i found it more comfortable to kneel besides the door than to be inside the truck for this.



And this is where the Photos dry up, damn you, FBI.
But once you're done re-soldering your connector you can set it back in it's new home, screw it down the way you undid the last one, and enjoy your new working turn signals! mine instantly got better, and by better i mean they actually work now, at least the selector lever, that is, now the high beams and the turn signal problem is fixed from this end at least, the steering wheel goes in after you re-assemble the locking plate, torque everything down, and go reward yourself with MORE BEER because unlike what mom says you don't actually have a drinking problem, you swear.
 

[Pete M]

are you using a phone?  I had a phone a couple years ago that simply refused to save all my pics.   

[Skylynx]

Yup, and then i immediately upload them to the cloud after taking them, so it's weird that neither the phone or the cloud has those photos..

[Skylynx]

 SO.... Next post is either going to me Stupid long or there's gonna be about 3 or more of them, they'll all be about the one project i incurred into that i'm so far most proud of yet, it was a chore to do, it got me pulling my hair out trying to think of solutions and ways to get it done how i wanted as i found many unexpected problems in the way, thankfully i got through them all.. and in the end... well, you'll see!~

It's been quite a few posts now that i've mentioned working under the dash, mentioning a few things and little jobs that i partook in while the dash was out of the truck and not in the way of my Sasquatch sized hands trying to get things done under there, but i've not really mentioned the DASH itself much... it's for a very good reason too, for you see the dash of this truck was, Much alike the truck itself.. entirely FUuuu.... uuh.. HECKED.

 

 

That's a picture of it the day i bought the truck and trust me the picture doesn't do justice to the state of disrepair and negligence it was in, The radio along with all the connector were gone leaving the wires bare and peeled behind it, the glovebox's latch was AWOL, the color of the top part of the vynil was different than the rest of it, at least where it wasn't cracked, every single little nook that could harbor dust was hosting a whole desert, and it had the Idiot lights cluster that nobody likes..

After 34 Years of Abuse, one can't really expect much else, after all this was a working man's truck, parked outside in the sun for it's whole life, more of a tool than a toy.

 

I had a little bit of an idea of the state this thing was as i was giving the previous owner the money he wanted to depart with this Manche, but i didn't know the full extent of the damage all those 34 years of existence had imparted on it, it took me about 2 hours to finally take the thing apart from the truck, it fought me well, maybe thinking i was about to replace it with a better looking one, refusing to be thrown away into a landfill, after all it had seen so many things alongside this truck, heard so many conversations, traveled so many miles.. if only it knew it's true destiny!

The first thing i did was grab a wet wipe and start cleaning it thoroughly, a job gets way, waaaaaaaay easier when dust isn't part of the equation, getting in your eyes, obscuring key deets and making your nose runny, as i defused the absolute smoke bomb that this dash was with the wet rag on my hand i also inspected it well, cursing every time i found something else that i'd need to fix eventually, the list got LOOOOOONG......



I dislike Rust, there... i said it. and i'll also say i'm not the only one, Okay? all you rust lovers can die mad! i'll be happy with my non rusty... things.. okay this bit wasn't gonna work ever, enjoy the extra toes in the picture, I'll be generous and not charge you for those (this time..)

First thing i did with this thing was to remove the Steel bracket from the underside of the dash to grind the rust away with a wire wheel and then pain it, a steel bit and a drill made quick work of the rivets holding it to the plastic below it, juts be slow and steady with it, you only want to drill the rivet, not the actual bracket! Just enough for it to come loose with a small pry is enough.

I'm a lair, actually, that wasn't the first thing i did with this dash, but that's beyond the point, it's just the thing i want to get out of the way first, since it was the most easy and boring part of this restoration, and i'm sure i don't really need much more explanation than what i already gave to really tell you guys what i did with it.

Here's a picture of it finished, painted and placed back in it's home with new rivets!

 

The ACTUAL first thing i did was shake my head at the state of the vynil cover on the top of the dash, it was in a very sorry state to say the least, just using a screwdriver to pull out the screws that hold it to the firewall was enough to crackle it as i removed it, pressing onto it with a finger in different spots caused the same... the de colored and burnt plastic was done, it had served it's purpose for longer than what i'm sure it was intended to survive.

I slept on it for a night or two, thinking on a way to solve this issue, i ALMOST actually decided to try my luck and hunt for a slightly less HECKED dash on a junkyard.. but as i laid there in bed along my 16 smoking hot girlfriends and looked blankly at the wall, drifting in my thoughts i saw the small but fun little Morale patch collection that i had hanging from my wall on a big square of Velcro that i got for cheap on amazon like a year ago, and then it clicked.

The next morning i started working on getting the thing ready for it's TRANSFORMATION.
It was surprisingly easy to peel off the burnt Vynil from the foam below it, i was very careful to do it slowly anyway to avoid pulling the foam up with the Vynil, it came up in Cookie sized chunks that crumbled like one with the slightest bit of pressure, i had to be extra careful where the vents were, since there it was still a little bit more flexible, and the Foam under it wasn't as tough and thick as the rest of the dash

 

I of course had to remove the vents from this, since they'd be getting in the way if i did not, it was slow and boring work, nerve wrecking too, but quite rewarding in an odd way, kind of like trimming your fingernails, or pressure washing a dirty driveway.
Soon i was lest with this, The naked dash with none of the Vynil that covered it for 34 years.

 

Under it were two big imperfections in the foam, one looked like a cigarette burn and knew was there even from before i started this since it was visible from over the plastic cover, but the other just under it was more like a factory defect that had hid under it for all this time, only to be discovered 34 years later... Jeep i want a refund!

I had a little bit of Foam from other projects laying around, that and a bit of glue along with an exacto blade was enough to remedy these imperfections and bring them level with the rest of it, almost like adding bondo but to your dash!

 

 

You can see the new pieces of foam sticking to the dash now, helping it recover the from it once had!

Continued in the next post!..

[Skylynx]

SADLY i apparently don't have pictures of this next step on the process, but it's a very simple one that's easy to understand with just a quick explanation, i needed a negative from the Dash's foam surface area to copy that and trace it onto the back of the Velcro so i can cut the pieces to match it, this is simply done by basically enveloping the whole Foam covered area with masking tape and then cutting off the individual pieces of it, laying it down onto the Velcro and then tracing onto it the shape of the tape.

 

Here you can see the main dash's Tape negative i made from masking tape and cardboard paper, i also made markings onto it where folds or important parts that held special detail were, these helped a lot to guide me, i also gave the tape negative an extra Centimeter all around the actual shape of the dash, this helped with the stitching and fitting, remember that's way easier to remove what's already there and is not needed than to add what's not there seamlessly.

Don't make my same mistake if you try this too, and make sure you trace and cut the side of the tape that will accurately mirror the piece on the dash, or else you'll end up with useless straps of Velcro that will serve you no purpose like i did, thankfully i realized my mistake before i made the big cut for the dash so i was able to save this project before i accidentally killed it. (at least until i got a replacement Velcro sheet)

Here's the pieces traced to the sheet the wrong way, i should have flipped them over for them to match the dash correctly.
 

Aaaand here's them laid out the right way, i barely managed to squeeze them all in what little i was left of the Velcro sheet after my mistake, i may be dumb but i AM lucky!~

At this point i kept thinking that the hardest part of the project was surely behind me already, that there couldn't be any more surprises left for me to stumble upon, and that this thing would be a breeze from here on out, Boy how wrong was i lemme tell you...

I knew this velcro was some tough fabric to work with but i never imagined it would be this much of a pain, i thought once i had cut it into smaller more malleable pieces that i would be able to stretch it and compress it to more easily fit the contours and curves of the dash i wanted to put it on, but this thing refuses to budge even a little bit, instead of bending to the form it kinks and warps, leaving ugly peaks and seams all over it, i thought it would be tough but flexible-ish like denim, but i was clearly wrong..

It quickly downed on me that working with this thing was like trying to make a one piece swimming-suit for a curvy super model (like all my multiple girlfriends are) out of used car seat belts...

I still needed a way to adhere this velcro sheet to the foam of the dash anyway, so i began testing a few ways to do it while i thought on a solution for the NON bending problems of the material, i took a few small strips of it and began doing tests with different adhesives and them over the foam of a part of the dash that it wouldn't be visible anyway in case the tests caused any bit of damage, i was looking for the best adhesive power along with knowing that the glue wouldn't dissolve the foam, i tested four types which i can't remember the brand of anymore

One effectively dissolved the foam, so was ruled out, the other two were quick drying, but a small bit of prying was enough to peel the Velcro back from the foam, and the last one was VERY slow drying, but it held down to the foam better than what the foam holds down to the plastic below it, and it was 5000's contact cement.

Having selected the glue i was gonna use, i began attempting to paste it to the dash and began from the nook where the radio and climate controls are, i applied a good coating of it both to the Velcro sheet and the foam on the dash before i pressed them together, the fact that this is very slow drying gives you ample time to line everything up and make sure things are being pasted where they need to be.

There's a very, very big problem with the slow drying glue though, and that's the fact that... well... it dries super slowly and the progress with it was going to extend for days...
I used my fingers to hold the velcro in place as i pasted sector by sector, i was forced to hold it down for about 30 minutes every couple of inches until the glue got tacky enough for it to hold itself in place, by the time i got to the area just above the gauge cluster i gave up on that frankly torturous strategy and began using my brain a little.

 

 

i recruited a vice grip and a few pieces of wood and cardboard to hold the velcro down to the glued foam, and it worked somewhat aside from the fact that since the wood now was blocking the pass of Oxygen to the velcro below it the getting tacky enough to hold itself process now took all day instead of a few minutes..

 

 

I was using very slight pressure, juuuuuust enough for the pieces to hold themselves together in order for me not to deform the foam below the velcro as the glue dried, or else i'd permanently alter it's form!

I fixed the problem of the glue taking longer to dry with the wood on it somewhat by drilling holes in it, allowing air to pass through to the velcro below, this made it so that within an hour the glue would be solid enough to continue with the next few inches i needed to paste, and then a small USB powered fan helped reduce that time to about 15 minutes between sectors!

 

 

Once i had done the whole bottom part of the dash things sped up a little more since i didn't have to be as precise as before now that things were set, keep in mind that all the while i was doing this area i measured and double checked the fitting of the Velcro over the foam, in the end, i easily checked the fitting and position over 200 times easily, and because of that by the time i was working with pasting the top part of the dash down it all fell and fit in the exact place it needed to be in!

By this time i was sure on the way i needed to go to make the curves and bends on the dash translate well to the velcro covering i was applying over it, there wasn't any way around it, i would have to cut the bends and kinks and then sew them back together from below it and force it to my will, this greeted another problem of itself, and that was the seem it would forcefully create bot on the surface and below it

the one on the surface i could live with, since it looked like any other seem ever from any seat ever on any car, but the bulge it would create from below from the two parts of the velcro being joined was going to bother me to no end... thankfully the answer was clear from the get-go, cutting a small slot on the foam below to shove the joint in as i glued it down made that seam disappear, i used a permanent marker to delineate where it would lay, cut that off, and then shoved the joint into it along with glue to make it seem as seamless as possible, i did this exact thing wherever i would have to sew two pieces of velcro together.

 

The mark, and...



The cut-out slot, you can see the sewed joint right next to the slot i intended to shove it in!

I had to reduce the shape of some of the pieces by making smaller pieces out of them because of this kinks and bends, like the ones you can see in this picture where the dash starts to come down next to the glove box, which i intended to be a single seamless piece at the start, but was forced to form them with the needle and thread, i did the same slot there to shove the seam into, as well as the AC vents next to that.

 

 

Continued in the next post!....

[Skylynx]

At this point things started to move a little quicker, once enough of the Velcro was glued down to the foam below it prevented itself from shifting and moving itself out of it's proper alignment, that's when the rigid nature of that fabric started to play to my favor! i could basically flick it over the dash and it would wall in the exact place it needed to be glued in, so instead of doing a few inches of it at a time through hours on end now i could start doing whole sections of it in a single go!

I started stitching every single piece down the way it needed to be before i did that though, since it needed to be stitched before the glue could hold it down to the foam, making the velcro hold onto itself and helping it keep it's shape around the dash, this was tedious and boring work but a few JRE episodes on the background made it more bearable, plus i recruited a friend of mine who's a lot more skilled with stitching since she owns a tailoring business, which made the work a little bit easier and better, crazy how just a little bit of experience can make a job way better!

One the stitching was done, i took the dash out to the yard to start pasting it down with the glue, the fumes the glue was giving out were bad enough when i was doing merely inches, they would have been unbearable if i tried to do the whole sections inside as well, i was so happy to be done with the stitching, specially around the vents areas which have the most bends and little details that are so hard to get right with such an inflexible material.

 

On the far side you can see the passenger's vent already stitched up and ready to be glued down, while the closer pilot side one still needed work to be done, the fact that the whole underside front of the dash was glued down already made things easier, keeping everything in place for the needle to do it's work.


A few more hours of grinding through this boring work paid off with progress, the sun went down and the dash's new cover was taking shape, my supply of beer started to run low, and my nose hurt from those fumes rising up to it even outside, so i took a break now and again to resupply my alcohol hoard and my willingness to  actually get this thing done!

A few more adjustments were needed to get things set down in the correct place, and even though it wasn't the most perfect thing ever, they were quite good for the absurdly hard material to work with in the end, specially since i basically only had to buy the glue for this to happen, and not have to pay someone else to do it!

 

 

I decided to leave the sides and vents for last, and did the whole top side of the dash in a single go, from the start it held itself in place where it needed to be since now gravity was helping with that, plus me having being careful and taking so many measurements and test fittings before helped with that. this job involved a lot of idling about, waiting for the glue to dry out, so good entertainment on the side is a must!



There you can see some excess velcro on the top back of the dash which i more than expected to be there in the end since i gave the whole cutout an extra CM all around, this was no issue though, as soon as the glue hardened enough i was able to cut the excess off, trimming it to the actual shape it needed to be in.



I followed this by adding glue to the vents and pressing both sides down with a clamp so that the Velcro would stay where it needed to be, using those pieces of wood i had made before to hold things down where they needed to be, progress on this part of the project seemed to slow down once more, since now we were working with details again, and those take a lot longer than the big, broad strokes of the larger parts.

I left things dry out overnight since it was getting pretty late, and early in the morning the next day i continued doing the last few parts of the dash that still needed glue on them, by the end of it my smile was as wide as wide can be, i fitted the dash with it's front cover just to see it better, and added a few morale patches to it just to decorate it and see it in it's new form better!

 

 

 

 

It's not perfect by any means, but i'm so incredibly happy with it! the fact that i could save the original dash from becoming trash and instead made it to be something that i can't buy anywhere...man, that just makes this whole experience worth it!

Now... now i just need to fill that dash with something!... and i may have juuuust the thing for it.~

[Skylynx]

THIS

THIS UGLY THING IS THE WORST THING TO EVER SKIMP OUT WHEN BUYING A BRAND NEW 1988 JEEP COMANCHE.
I have no idea how much money it was to jump from this (idiot light) Gauge cluster to the more advanced, cool looking fully optioned one with the tachometer, But what i do know is that i would have never chosen to skip it if i were me, still, the first proud owner of this truck did for whatever reason, yet another example for all of us to see that nobody can be perfect.

 

The other Gauge cluster gives you so much more information about everything, and more precisely too! it's actually comprised of actual gauges rather than just ugly warning lights...
Okay.. they're not that ugly, but they're not very functional at all, specially if there;s a way better option offered, if it were me getting this jeep out from a dealership i would have absolutely paid the extra to get THIS instead.



BEHOLD

THE GOD TIER LEVEL OF GAUGE CLUSTERS

This thing looks straight out from an 80's movie, just looking at it for a while lets me hear the Danger zone song playing in the back of my mind, Back when i found this thing in a junkyard and got it off the old and dead carcass of a 1990's Cherokee i was feeling like a firefighter pulling a puppy from a housefire, rescuing something special from it's certain doom otherwise.

That being said, nothing's ever perfect.. and this cluster isn't the exception.

See, one big difference about this fully optioned cluster and the gross, nearly useless one i pulled from the Manche is what the old one the Automatic gear selector indicator feature displayed under the gas tank gauge, since my comanche along with many others like it has the selector lever on the steering column instead of the transmission tunnel's floor where most other indicators for the automatics were.

Some don't consider this a problem at all, choosing to just FEEL in which gear they're in when doing this swap, others do a workaround by installing an external indicator to tell them what gear they're into at the time..
Me? well i wanted the best of both worlds, of course!
It took me a while to think of the best way to do this conversion, and it took some taking apart to actually get it planned out and under way, but as you'll see in the end, it was WELL worth it!

First thing's first, you'll need a few things from your old cluster to make this work, the Gear indicator and the fuel gauge plate it's hiding behind to use as a template to make the cut on your tachometer one, just try not to be an idiot like i was and rip out the gauge's needle out to get it, and instead just unscrew the gauge from behind the cluster like a normal person would.

 

There's your indicator, sitting under the gauge and held down by two screws, be careful not to rip out the cord attached to it or the tab on the end of said cord when taking it out carefully, you'll need those for your indicator to work too!

once you fish that out from the hole on the underside of the cluster you should have something that looks like this!





Put this aside for now, since this is the easy part of this whole ordeal, just make sure not to loose it!

instead take out the tachometer from your new gauge cluster by unscrewing it from the back of the body, be very careful with it because the needle is beyond fragile, any bump to it with a tiny bit of force can make this whole project a pile of trash, since the tachometer s likely the most important thing of this whole cluster and you really don't want it to be faulty.

One you have the whole unit out, grab the Fuel gauge plate from your old cluster and place a piece of paper over it, though masking tape or other methods can work as well, so long as it's removable, carefully place it over it and cut it to size as perfectly as you can for it to fit inside the plate, be specially careful while cutting the hole for the indicator, that's the part you really want to be straight and to size... i used an exato blade for this!

 

 

Breaking off the needle from the old gauge does make it easier to do this part, but it makes it so that you can't go back to your old cluster if the new one doesn't work, risk/reward type of stuff... up to you, cowboy.

I found it easier using the edge of the sheet on the bottom flat part to line things up perfectly and hold it there while i used the blade to cut around the circle

 

By the end you should be left with something like this, making the holes for the needle and the screws up top helps lining things up further specially if you accidentally move the paper out of alignment, they help center things back up if you do so, keep in mind the holes in this are not the same as the ones in the Tachometer plate, so you'll have to be more careful with that when we jump to the next step.

Next, make the center hole on the paper a little bigger and VERY CAREFULLY fish it into the tachometer's plate through the needle, again, you don't want to bend that, heck. try your best to not even touch it at all.



Do your best to line things as best you can and use a bit of tape to set the paper in it's place so it won't move, and then very, very carefully use your exacto blade to scratch and mark the very edge of the Indicator's cutout on the paper down onto the plate below it, be very slow and careful, the steel of your blade can cut the aluminum of the plate with ease, but it also binds into it and forces the blade to jump and skip of you're not careful, possibly scratching your tachometer plate, or breaking your RPM needle if you're very unlucky.



A few passes is all you'll need to leave a mark and that's enough for you to remove the paper as it has done it's job by now, i considered hitting this with the dremel and getting it done quick and easy, but that wouldn't let me be as precise as i would have wanted, and would have created many small aluminum and steel dust that could get into the tach's internal circuit just behind the plate, making it malfunction, so i instead kept scratching at the aluminum plate with my blade through the same lines i already created, digging them just a little bit deeper each time i did so.

You'll have to replace the edge on the blade or the blade itself a few times, since the grind of metal against metal will wear it down to the point of no progress despite your efforts, that and a dull blade is more prone to skip and jump, making you more prone to errors with a hard to replace part that's beyond delicate.



Took me about 30 minutes of slow scratching through the marks i made before to get to this point, but with each pass the groves i was making were getting deeper and deeper, and soon you could feel bumps from the backside of it starting to form where the blade passed and was getting close to cut straight through the aluminum.



DON'T loose your cool, keep your patience and go slow and steady, any mistake could be fatal to this project and could set you back hours of work, if not days... but soon you'll feel that exacto blade starting to pop out from the back side of the plate, just be careful not to cut yourself! and also brace the plate down to a hard surface when doing the cuts, don't do it while holding it on your hand!

Soon you'll get this!...



I could have made a better, more careful job at it, but a bit of black sharpie masked the scratches on the paint quite well, and in the end i was left with a tachometer with a shifter indicator window on it!~

Next is making a hole on the underside of the new gauge cluster body to pass the string of the indicator through, take the old cluster's hole as a template and trace the place you need to dig into the plastic in the new cluster from it, then just go to town with it with your preferred method, (i used a pocket knife) make sure not to leave any sharp edges on it and to make it the same shape and size along with it being in the same location as the one on the other cluster.

 

Thankfully Daddy jeep placed mounts for the indicator in the fully optioned tachometer cluster too, so all you need to mount it is to screw the indicator into place before putting your modified tachometer plate over it, fish the string and the tab through the hole you just made in the bottom, seal everything up and...

 

 

Boom, there you go! A brand new, automatic tranny indicator for a column shifter Comanche!



Doesn't look too bad now, does it? i'm very happy with how this turned out, and i may post this in the write up section too for it to be easier to find for folks, hope it helps you too!