sweet jiminy jeepers batman, that is starting to look like an engine bay again! looks good Buck, now since you dont have the tranny lines in yet, are you going to go with an aftermarket cooler in conjunction with the stock one? for whellin it would be a good idea, but you would still have to run the stock one out of the radiator as well cause we live in a cold state, and auto trans dont work so well when cold.

 

One of the many options the new white Jeep had was the factory towing package. So along with my three core radiator's internal, larger than stock cooler, the Jeep already had the factory external cooler. I had cquired an external cooler from an 89 Laredo XJ with a towing package, that I had in my 91 Jeep. That one will now be my ready up spare if anything goes wrong with the external cooler already in Great White. Thanks for looking out, David.

 

Just made a run to my friendly local Wally World to pick up needed fluids for Great White. As long as I can get Valvoline oil and tranny fluid, Prestone coolant and a Purolator filter at a Wally's price, there is no sense in paying the auto parts store price. I might just be ready for a test fire tonight. I just need to get the passenger side wiring straightened out, hooked up and the good old Duralast Gold battery out of my old Jeep put in. I also need to get the oil filter adaptor put back on and my new oil filter while working on that side. I need to go underneath one last time and hook up all of the tranny cooler line clamps and get the lines connected to the radiator and external cooler. Then, I think it will time to pour in some oil, antifreeze and ATF and give her a crank. It could happen tonight if I don't have ant after work "Honey-Dos".

 

Oh, almost forgot I did pick up the 2 heater hose clamps for the new lower short piece of heater hose I had to replace. I still need to put the heater hoses and heater control switch back on before the test fire, also.

 

No new pics today as it really doesn't look different visually. I got a little bit later start than I had planned on last night. I did get all of the wiring straightened out and hooked up to everything over on the passenger side of the motor...alternator, coil, ac clutch, coil, distributor, oil press sender, starter and grounds. I hit another snag when I attempted to put the oil filter adaptor back on. The 91 motor had the adaptor that mopunts the filter upside down. The 96 motor had the adaptor that mounts the smaller oil filter toward the rear. I decided to stick with the original adaptor for the 91 motor as it uses a larger diameter filter. Bigger means better filtration in my mind. Anyhoo, the AC hoses were routed for the smaller filter mounted to the rear that was originally in this Jeep so I had to get a little crafty while making everything fit. I switched the oil pressure sender from the 96 motor to the 91 motor so it would be a plug and play deal with the original harness plug and new motor. I'm pretty sure the sender from my 91 motor was bad or going bad, anyway. Periodically when wheeling my oil pressure would just drop to 0 and stay there. Then, it would just magically pop back up to normal. I don't like playing like that with oil pressure. Next, order of business was heater hoses. All of the heater hoses from the 96 Jeep were trash. However, the heater control valve was good. That was perfect as the heater control valve in the 91 Jeep had started leaking, AGAIN. That was like the 4th one I'd put in that Jeep. So, I went with hoses from the 91 and heater control valve from the 96 and a new lower short hose as that one was trashed on both Jeeps. I had the little valve cover clamps, for the heater hoses, from both Jeeps so doubling those up really holds the hoses much better than just the one the OEM gives you. So, wiring, oil filter adaptor, oil filter and heater hose plumbing was all done. next I put the hood back on and then routed the serpantine belt through all of the pullys. I need to adjust the hood a little bit forward. I also found out there is a little round tab thing molded into the edge of the timing mark on the 91 motor that the serpantine belt rubs on with the new 96 belt routing. One of the changes they made between 91 and 96 was solid mounting the PS pump and moving the idler pully from next to the AC pump to just below the PS pump and the idler is adjustable to tighten and loosen the belt. I will need to take my grinder to that little tab and all will be well for the serpantine belt. that is where I stopped for the night. Getting closer and closer to a test start. just not ready yet. I need to get a piece of hose to complete the tranny cooler line plumbing tonight. I will have to give everything a once over after that but, I'm pretty sure I will be ready to pour in fluids and crank it up! Woo Hoo!!

 

Dang, I keep forgetting things. Along with getting the tranny cooler line plumbing straight tonight, I will aslo have to install the fans. Then she should be ready for fluids and a test start.

 

I've finally given in to the fact that I am only going to get a couple of hours each week night to work on Great White. What I thought I could get done in one night is going to take all or most of the week. The good news, as you can see by the new pics, is that I finished putting the engine together last night. Tonight I am literally ready to pour in fluids and crank it up. Last night I started out by getting underneath, again, and putting the tranny cooler lines together and installing all of the clamps that keep them out of harms way. I thought I was going to have to get a new piece of hose but, after after raiding the pile of spare parts that is my old Jeep out in the driveway, I found a piece that was just the perfect fit. Anyway, a couple of cuts, a couple of hose clamps, a few zipties and a couple of line clamps along the oil pan and it was good. Next order of business was grinding off that little nub by the timing marks on the dampener pully. All I had to do was pull the bottom radiator hose. My grinder fit in there perfect and I zipped it off. With that out of the way it was time to put the serpantine belt on. I did find out that my 91 Goodyear Gatorback serpantine belt was too long with the 96 accessory drive pulleys. Sad, because it is obviously a better belt than the cheesey one that was on the blown motor. No big deal though. It was a cheapy but it also looked like it was farely new. It will do for now. Next time I go to the parts store I will pick up a Goodyear Gatorback belt for a 96 4.0 and I will be good to go. Then the cheapy will go in the trail spare box. I found out last night that you will not find the proper serpantine belt routing for a 96 Jeep Cherokee 4.0 in a Chilton's, Hayne's or the 96 Cherokee Owner's Manual. I did figure it out after a couple different routings but the routing for the 91-95 4.0 is in all the books. Next order of business was installing the fans. This went smooth and without incident. It seems like my CFS 3 core radiator is a little bit tighter fit in this Jeep but it's probably just my old eyes playing tricks on me. I did one last thing before calling it a night. I went ahead and cut the nasty old battery clamps off and installed the new ones I bought. Tonight I just have to install the cold air intake from my old Jeep and pour in the fluids and she should be ready to crank up. Then I'm sure there will a hose clamp here and there to tighten up. I will probably pick up a new Spectre cone filter at Autozone on my way home from work. The one that was in the old Jeep is pretty nasty and beat up. I'm having a buddy of mine weld up the crack in my 2.5" Flowmaster exhaust from the old Jeep. Then that will be put on the new Jeep. I just gotta have that Flowmaster sound....LOL. I will do that after I get the Jeep running and driveable. Man, I am getting pretty excited about seeing and hearing this thing run after all of this work.

 

I was just looking the last pics over. I'm going to go ahead and put both of the larger valve cover breather hoses on the new Jeep. It's still the same old motor I've dealt with for 8 years. This thing likes to spew oil out the breather hose into the intake when I'm really getting on 4wheeling. I don't know why. It's got good compression in all cylinders. I just figured it was another of the quirks of this motor, along with running hot and having that crappy plastic heater control valve. It has always ran great. It just gets a lot of oil blown out the breathers.

 

Buck, the next time you have issues with your heater valve, just delete it. The 97+ doesnt even have one, its unneeded.

Also, im wondering about your belt issues, since i am doing the same swao but form a 97 in a week or so. Why was it to long? Did you use the ps pump from the 96 with the tensioner or did you put in your old ps pump from the gray jeep?

My engine came with everything on it, but im taking it down to a short block and using all accessories from the 91, im thinking my belts should still fit the same? The nub may have to come off also, not sure about that.

 

I used all of the accessories....ps pump, ac pump, water pump, etc. from the 96 Jeep. I would have to look again but, I think the PS Pump pulley on the 96 is a little bit smaller. Also because of how the idler pulley is adjustable mounted below the PS Pump on the 96 vs. hard mounted by the AC Pump on the 91. I think those two things effect the difference in required length of the belt. It's a very small difference but, it's enough to where the adjustable idler pulley can't take up the slack and the belt won't tighten up correctly with the belt from the 91 Jeep. Basically, just go with the belt for the year of Jeep that you use the accessories for and you will be good to go.

 

Gotcha, well i will be using the brand new water pump that i put on the bad motor, and all the accessories from the 91, so im thinking i can use the belt still. Its a brand new gatorback and i dont wanna waste it =D intake and all is being used from the 91.

 

Love this. Subbed!

 

Okay guys, so last night was the big night for my engine swap project. Great White does run and the motor appears to run very smooth. I had the typical few leaking hoses to tighten up here and there.

Now, for my problem. The motor has an excessive idle speed and after a few mintues of running around 1800-2200rpm the exhaust manifold glows red hot!! I'm figuring this to be one of the typical causes of this. Either an issue with the throttle body being cruddy and AIC or TPS cruddy or bad....or a vacuum leak somewhere with a slim possibility of a third being a timing issue. First, thing I did was give all of the vacuum lines and connection a once over. Everything appears to be fine. I even looked at the plastic sections extra carefully looking for tiny cracks. The next thing I did was pull off the throttle body. I verified that the gasket under the TB was there and in good shape. I removed the AIC and thoroughly cleaned it and it's bore in the TB with choke and carbuerator cleaner. No joy. Next I thoroughly cleaned the TB with choke and carbuerator cleaner. Tried it, no joy. Next I swapped the AIC out with the one from the 91 throttle body, no joy, next tried the TPS from the 91 TB, no joy. Each time I tried a new sensor I removed the negative battery cable for 10 minutes. This suppoedly "flashes" the computer. So, next I re-installed the original AIC and TPS. They appeared to be identical with the ones from the 91 TB. I just wasn't sure if there were internal differences between the OBD I and OBD II sensors and I want to keep all the original pieces as I'm troubleshooting. I did some reading online last night about the causes of my high idle issue. Most guys said to clean and/or replace the AIC or find the vacuum leak. There was one story by a guy on this forum who found that he needed to pull the distributor and advance or retard it one tooth as the computer could not adjust enough for the excessive wear of the timing pieces on his high mileage engine. That sounded kind of sketchy so I'm not ready to go there. However, the timing being too advanced would be a logical cause of high idle and the red hot glowing exhaust manifold. Oh, and before anybody says plugged CAT, JUST the exhaust manifold glows hot. nothing past the manifold collector glows. I read a couple other storys where guys said to remove both battery cables from the battery and touch them together. This supposedly "Resets" the computer. That one sounded a little sletchy to me, too. If any of you guys can verify this touching together of the battery cables please Roger up. I will try it... I really still think I have a vacuum leak somewhere. It's just a matter of figuring out where. One other guy said he had the high idle and glowing exhaust manifold issue. it was even on a 96 Cherokee Country. He replaced his computer at $335 and that fixed his. I really don't want to go there. The more money I have to throw at this jeep the less and less my good deal on buying it gets to be. I think tonight after work I'm going to startn plugging off vacuum ports one at a time on the intake manifold to see if the idle goes down to it's normal speed. If any of you guys out there have some advice or had this issue and fixed it PLEASE PLEASE feel free to give me some things to try to fix this problem!! Thanks ahead of time....

 

I forgot to mention one other thing that happened last night. The last time I ran the engine. (This was with the TPS from the 91 TB). It started off idling around 1800rpm. I blipped the throttle and it went up to 3000rpm and then came down only to around 2500rpm and stayed there. The "Check Engine Light" then came on. I have a code reader for my 2004 Dmax but I don't know if that would read the codes for my 96 XJ. I also read that removing the negative battery cable for different lengths of time...5 min., 10 min., 30 min., would reset the CEL. I let it sit overnight with the negative battery cable removed so I will see tonight if the CEL went away. If not I will try to read the codes with my scanner. I believe my Dmax is OBD II. I just don't know if all are the same. I used my scanner to read codes on my buddy's 2003 Trailblazer so I know my scanner reads both gas and diesel computers. I just don't know if the Chrysler computer in the 96 Jeep would make a difference. So, my battle plan is start it and see if the CEL went away, if not, try to scan it and see what code I get. If the CEL is gone I will continue with the vacuum leak troubleshooting. Throw me some ideas guys!!!!

 

It must be a bad intake/manifold leak. considering it didnt do this on either jeep before the install, thats the only thing i can think of. Its running way to lean. Let me know what u find!