Just a quick q for you mechanics out there. I am thinking my 4.0 is beginning to poop out from the neglect of the PO, and I am already looking for another 4.0 to slap in there.

Heres the thing. I am (at best) medium with my mechanical ability; meaning I understand Hayne's fairly well and know some tricks of the trade. I plan on doing this swap in the presence of my ASE Certified Mechanic uncle, but he cant manually help due to his back. With my uncle there to guide me, me and a cousing should be able to do this shouldnt we?

 

Its not hard at all. Just take ziplock sandwich bag and lable all bolts with location. You can also lable with good tape electrical plugs. Just take your time. You can also take pics with a digital camera.

 

Piece of cake. It's just grunt work and label, label, label. Take pictures, too. They really help on the reassembly.

 

If you do it right, there are only a handful of plugs and you can't put any where they don't belong (size, shape, etc). It's not hard, I've done it a few times and can pull off a swap from one to another and have it running in about 2 hours by myself. That's not meant to be bragging, it's just that easy if you have average mechanical abilities. Nice thing Jeep did for us was not put anything in a place where it's hard to get ahold of due to space (with the exception of the tranny bolts).

 

The biggest hassle is getting the engine lined up on the tranny and set down on the motor mounts at the same time. You will more than likely need an extra pair of hands at that point.
Then the rest is purely hooking everything back up.