fivendime

I'm new here on the forum but I thought I would share a bit of info on the motor swap I just did. What I have is a 96 HO motor that blew a head gasket and then took out the head and 2 pistons. So I checked craigslist and found a 98 Wrangler motor. It was a factory manual motor and mine is an auto. For the first thing I swapped out all the brackets for the alternator and AC as well as the motor mount brackets and rubber mounts for the simplicity of using the same stuff. The second thing I ran into was the sending unit for the temp gauge "the one on the back of the head", easy fix, I just drilled and tapped to fit sender on my old motor. Third thing I ran into was to deal with swapping out the flywheel for the flex plate. Simple, yeah but theres a hitch. Use only the bolts that came off the original part to swap it to the other motor because the bolts are shorter for an auto and longer for the manual for the thicker flywheel. On the 98 manual motor I had there is needle bearings pressed into the end of the crankshaft. I just broke the flange and pulled the bearings out. It worked great since the torque converter has a nipple that slips into the end of the crank. I also used my original intake off the 96 as well as the header/manifold. The distributor is different as well so I swapped them out. The oil pressure switch is different so same with that, switched it out. Used my old coil as well. And one of the most important things overlooked is the water pump, which is longer then a cherokee one. I learned this after trying to put the fan on.

I know I'm long winded but this may help if your swapping a wrangler motor in at least from this year. By the way never trust someone who says it will just bolt in. hahaha Hope this helps! Whew.