The Free MJ

[WranglerMangler]

I drove past this Comanche in a neighbors yard for a year or so before stopping in and asking what was going on with it. Turns out it was a drug addicted Uncle’s truck who had not been heard from in a couple of years and used to live out of the truck. I told the guy I was interested in the truck and left it at that. Another 6-8 months went by and one day, driving by, he flagged me down, says to “come get the truck, I have the title”. I was kinda taken by surprise and asked him how much? He said he was tired of looking at it and just getting rid of it would be payment enough. He wanted to use the space it was taking up. 
I ran home real quick, grabbed some tools, a decent battery, and a fresh 5 gallons of gas. The truck actually started right up and ran good enough to drive it the 1/2mi home down a country back road. Despite it having absolutely no brakes. Assuming that’s why it was parked. This all happened in 2016-2017-2018ish. Can’t remember exactly. 

I got the truck home and basically have done nothing with it since. Except borrow parts from it. Lol.
 My best friend fell on some hard times and has always wanted an MJ. I told him he can have this truck. He is completely capable mechanically and will hopefully take over this thread one day. 
My plan for now is to get the truck running reliably. It would be nice to have it sitting here ready to drive. Unfortunately I really don’t have any extra money to put into the truck at the moment but I got a pretty good parts stash that we’re going to get into and I’ve been acquiring some parts in the bed. 
Here’s how the truck sits now. I found the canopy here on Comanche Club from my now good buddy NorthwestMJ  
 

 

1988, 4.0, Column shift AW4, 2WD, D35, LWB. 186,2xx miles 

In the bed is a 4wd AW4 with an NP242 bolted to it and a non vacuum D30 for a 4WD swap.  I totally intend to let my buddy do the swap. I also have close to the same color front clip and power doors with wing windows off an XJ that I recently parted out for the truck as well. 
 

I had some time tonight, went out and really got a good look at her, changed the oil and installed a new serpentine belt that she has needed badly for a long time. 
 

Noticed the water pump definitely needs to be replaced. Lol. Has a screw plugging the weep hole. 

Plus I really don’t like the Blue goo all around it either. I will be converting to an open loop cooling set up anyway. 
 

Will post more updates as they slowly happen. Plan on doing all Cruiser54 updates as well. 

[Pete M]

price is sure right.    score!

[WranglerMangler]

On 9/2/2023 at 8:04 PM, Pete M said:

price is sure right.    score!

I agree with that! The truck definitely has potential. She’s a little rough around the edges but does clean up pretty good.