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Just an update on the Jeep.
LOVE IT!
On the highway its turning about 2200RPM at 100km/hr in 4th which it holds nicely.
Shifting to 5th and it drops too far and cant pull. Its fine over 120km/hr but not many roads are 120 around here.
With the current tune it has very little torque below 2000 rpm.
We are going to change that though and hopefully it will pull better below 2K.
Maybe a gear change is in my future.
You have to be careful on wet roads if you have your foot in it. The boost comes up real quick over 2000 RPM and it will break the tires loose in second.
It's turned out to be a great little rig and we should have it in the family for many years.
Awesome! Ive read through this build like 5 times! I am starting to aquire the knowledge and parts to do this swap myself! I'm currently dd'ing an alh jetta from langley to Chilliwack. I'm sure I'll have lots of questions!
Awesome! Ive read through this build like 5 times! I am starting to aquire the knowledge and parts to do this swap myself! I'm currently dd'ing an alh jetta from langley to Chilliwack. I'm sure I'll have lots of questions!
My wife was just on the mainland with the Jeep for 3 days.
Maybe next trip although she only does that trip once a years for Christmas shopping. ;>)
Just an update on the Jeep.
LOVE IT!
On the highway its turning about 2200RPM at 100km/hr in 4th which it holds nicely.
Shifting to 5th and it drops too far and cant pull. Its fine over 120km/hr but not many roads are 120 around here.
With the current tune it has very little torque below 2000 rpm.
We are going to change that though and hopefully it will pull better below 2K.
Maybe a gear change is in my future.
You have to be careful on wet roads if you have your foot in it. The boost comes up real quick over 2000 RPM and it will break the tires loose in second.
It's turned out to be a great little rig and we should have it in the family for many years.
great to hear! a swap like this may be in my future some day, i want to build a more "road friendly" xj/mj with a tdi motor in it
very impressive build!
i'm planing to build a pd tdi cherokee ('99) myself, the 1.9 pd tdi is like, the most common engine you could get here in romania... and with a proper tune you can get great performance and efficiency from it. in europe you can get the cherokee with a 2.5 vm td engine but thy're low on power and torque and even in stock form the cylinder heads (yes it has a head/cylinder) are prone to cracking. the only thing i'm not quite sure is the gauge setup. i plan on keeping the xj instrument cluster but i don't know if they communicate through can bus or not. if you could shed some light on this, i would be very grateful!
I left the Jeep ECU in place and it runs the dash, just kept the original senders for water, oil and crank so the ECU runs just as it did before the swap.
I stripped out all the ignition stuff and just kept what was needed.
From what I understand the Jeeps used their own language for communication and was not standardized CAN.
The brakes have been pulling to the left so I did some investigating today.
All the brakes, ball joints, tie rods and pretty much everything else is new so not an obvious place to start but pulling left points to right front brake.
After checking slides and pins I pulled the pads.
They were glazed a bit so I gave them a bit of a sand to clean off the top surface.
Did a few hard stops and no more pulling. I sprayed a lot of wax based rust proofing as we reassembled the body and suspension so some over spray must have landed on that rotor.
A simple fix once I found it.
The TDI is an awesome little engine and really hard to not drive like a kid....again.
Jeep has been great through the winter so far. The one thing that's a pain is the poor back up lights. I replaced the stock bulbs with LED's but still not enough light for my old eyes.
I don't want big 5" landing lights for this DD and happen to find these cool little LED lights at one of my suppliers for $18 each.
There sealed and very well built.
Sorry about the blatant advertising. ;>)
Here is a shot of the stock lights with LED bulbs.
And here are the original LED's along with the new ones.
They give a lot more light off to the sides, it will be interesting to see how they work outside in the real world.
Jeep has been great through the winter so far. The one thing that's a pain is the poor back up lights. I replaced the stock bulbs with LED's but still not enough light for my old eyes. I don't want big 5" landing lights for this DD and happen to find these cool little LED lights at one of my suppliers for $18 each. There sealed and very well built. Sorry about the blatant advertising. ;>) Here is a shot of the stock lights with LED bulbs. And here are the original LED's along with the new ones. They give a lot more light off to the sides, it will be interesting to see how they work outside in the real world.
I want those lights. I've been looking for some small ones for the rest of my jeep since I got rid of my rear light bar.
I wish I could point you in the right direction.
They were in a white box with no markings other then "15W 90 degree".
My supplier is a company who builds work truck bodies and uses these for compartment lighting.
I did a test in my driveway last night and was VERY happy with the results.
Hey, now that you've been driving it for a while, I've got a few questions, if you'd be so kind:
Did you ever tune it down like you mentioned before, with it taking off too easily above 2K RPM?
How has your driving style changed since it had a 4.0L? Similar? I'd have to resist the urge to shift low for that deep tone at 1500 RPM lol
Does the TDI still have a ton of pull at speed? IE in my 2003 ALH I can accelerate just fine from idle in 3rd gear.
How are the vibes? Good?
How is cold starting with all the mods? (I can't remember if you did a FrostHeater)
Any chance of a driving video? I can't imagine I'm the only one who'd like to hear this thing from the inside!
So many questions. ;>)
Have not done anything about drivability, just too busy with other projects and work. Besides, my wife has figured it out and doesn't stall it anymore so the pressure is off.
Cold?? We live in BC, Have not noticed any problems in the "cold", I would like to add a glow plug light to know if/when they are on.
Once spring arrives I will pull it back off the road and do the gear change, cam and then look at a possible tune change if needed.
Vibration is much better then my ZJ with the Isuzu diesel which rattles coins in the ashtray.
Once that's all done then a driving video would be in order.
12-22-2015, 09:47 AM
and with a proper tune you can get great performance and efficiency from it. in europe you can get the cherokee with a 2.5 vm td engine but thy're low on power and torque and even in stock form the cylinder heads (yes it has a head/cylinder) are prone to cracking. the only thing i'm not quite sure is the gauge setup. i plan on keeping the xj instrument cluster but i don't know if they communicate through can bus or not. if you could shed some light on this, i would be very grateful!
