I recently got my 1997 Jeep Cherokee Country w/200k miles back from my little sister who has been driving it the last four years while I have been serving in the the AF. It has a loud buzzing noise around 2k rpm's that I have been trying to discover the cause of the past couple of weeks. Finally, I decided to check out the manifold because of the pinging that happens for a while after I turn the engine off. Surprise, surprise, I can see a huge crack on the manifold where the tube converges.

Today, I went ahead and ordered the APN Jeep Exhaust Manifold and hardware kit and Brown Dog motor mounts to replace my stock one's w/ 200k miles on them to hopefully keep this from happening again. I've read through a few walkthroughs around the internet, but are there any other hardware, bolts or anything I will need before attempting this? Thanks in advance.

 

You won't need any extra hardware. I did this swap about a month ago. Use your same bolts. The header should be a direct fit. You will also need to remove the oil filter stand to get to the passenger side motor mount. You will need new rings/seals for it when putting it back together. Also, use the proper pattern to tighten the intake/exhaust manifolds down and correct torque specs. Good luck! Cheers!

 

How was the fit on your APN? I'm reading more reviews and getting a little scared about having fitment issues.

 

If you have access to an impact wrench then I would recommend it. The bolts that hold the exhaust to the headers will usually be extremely rusted and possibly seized, even if you can unseize them it will still be a very grunty job of completely loosening them.

 

Just got done replacing mine and i have the brown dog mounts.

Are you lifted?

1. I did not have to remove the oil filter adapter to install the motor mounts.

2. For the exhaust manifold the bolts should come out just fine even if they are all rusted. Factory was 23- 24 lbs of torque. Should not be an issue.

also you want to have several extensions along with swivel or universal bits.

and for sure buy yourself at a 14mm ratcheting wrench it will make the process much easier.

 

Further to the rust comments and siezed downpipe bolts, I hacked up my orginal manifold with a sawzall to remove. It's busted anyway. Also just used some penetrating oil an 14mm ratchetif wrench on the manifold bolts. A few needed the "double wrench" trick to get enough leverage.

If your exhaust needs any work at all, strongly consider adding a short section of flex pipe. The reason the manifold cracked in the first place is that the entire exhaust is a rigid unit. Adding a bit where it crosses over under the transmission will fix this.

 

I had no problems installing my APN. It was a direct fit. I hear some guys need to grind down some of their headers to fit a lil easier. But I believe that was for models with the horse shoe intake manifold (yrs 99-01).

 

I'm at factory height. Thanks for the tips.

 

In case u needed something to reference against regarding the torque pattern for the manifold, here it is

 

Thank you sir. I believe that was in one of the walkthroughs. I'm definitely going to use it when I do the swap.