CherokeeJon

Let me start by saying this is my 3rd jeep at the age of 17 and my first true build. I'm more excited than ever to do this and get all of this moving.

So I found a good ole Craigslist ad for a 1986 comanche and couldn't resist when I saw it. I offered up my 97 Cherokee for it and he was interested so we set up a date for me to come check it out. I went and saw it Friday and he actually delivered it to me Sunday. Awesome guy to deal with and he knows what he's doing. He works for ok4wd, so if you've seen this anywhere, he's probably been around the block out here in PA.

I'll list what it has then tease you guys with some starter pictures. So, it originally had the 2.8 but he started the 4.0 swap. It came with an uninstalled driveline consisting of a 92 4.0, aw4, and the np242 with a SYE already on it. Custom driveshaft to mate with the ford 8.8 geared at 4:10. Dana 30 front with matching gears. Aftermarket exhaust manifold. 6.5" lift with 35" tires on d windows. It has the long bed with no tailgate and a prerunner style spare tire mount.

98xjred

Sweet truck. Cant wait to see what happens!!

Moparboy01

Very cool

CherokeeJon

Day 1: Sunday the 21st

I got the jeep Sunday around 5 and was working on getting my donor jeep apart the whole day. Once we got the comanche, I emptied out the garbage and spare parts that were spread through the rig and organized them. Then we simple greened and power washed the whole cab forward. It was more of a cleaning and organizing day.

CherokeeJon

Day 2: Monday the 22nd

I had school and a track meet so I could only get so much done by a reasonable time. I got the entire dash out and consolidated the entire interior wiring to the driver side and began to decide how I want to go about the new wiring harness.

I think I'm going to run the harness through the comanche and figure out what is not use or not needed. The harness came out of a four door power option cherokee, so there's going to be a lot to go through. I'm also not going to be using the air conditioning, door pin things(that control the cab light coming on and off), and the cab light. I'll be running an led strip along the back of the headliner above the rear window with a switch on the dash.

So the project tonight is to get the wiring harness completely out, take the seats out, and begin the process of installing the engine and wiring harness into the comanche

CherokeeJon

Here's how it sat at the end of my night last night

CherokeeJon

Day 3: Tuesday the 23rd

I had an army of guys working the jeeps tonight. My brother is actually going to be becoming a member of the jeep family this weekend. He's trading his project ranger for an 85 2 door with the 2.5 and 4 speed. Pretty sweet set up actually.

Anyway, so I had one friend and my brother pulling the harness out of the old cherokee. It is completely out and set to be gone through and installed. During this, my other friend and myself got the wiring harness out of the comanche, cleaned the engine bay, took the good off, got the remaining interior pieces out, and began the floor work.

We had a lot of work to do on the floor, as you'll see below. We tried to wire brush as well as possible where my dad is going to have to finish welds or weld new pieces on. He also grinded down the thicker surface rust on the passenger side.

So, tomorrow night I plan to continue the interior work and put the engine mounting brackets on. I'll also use the rest of whatever time I have to simplify the wiring harness where it obviously won't be used, such as the wires that went to the farther back components.

So, my only question is, are comanche and Cherokees gas tanks the same? I know they're turned different directions, but since the carbed engine was the original one, there is no fuel pump, but I have the whole tank from my old jeep that needs to be dropped anyway. Do I use that one altogether?

CherokeeJon

I skipped out on a work night since I got home later from a track meet than I had expected and I'm exhausted. I may as well get good sleep since tomorrow and friday will be engine/wiring harness install days. I'm also starting to look into exhausts since this one basically only came with an exhaust manifold(which is definitely aftermarket, I believe Dorman). Any recommendations from the manifold back? I'm assuming just an OEM downpipe, high flow cat, flowmaster muffler, and cut the tailpipe short and kick it out the side?

CherokeeJon

I had my first "why in the world do I do this" moment tonight, while trying to get rid of things I know I won't need in the comanche. I couldn't find two simple diagrams to compare what is used in a 4 door power option cherokee compared to a manual lock/window comanche. That frustration was met by non identical firewalls and the bed not being fully bolted down because one bolt was snapped.

I'll be pushing through tomorrow night with more wiring work and hopefully dropping the driveline in saturday morning before I have to go record with my band.

If anybody has any advice for wiring or any things they found useful, I would greatly appreciate it.

XJwonders

Sound like fun project!

CherokeeJon

I'm pretty excited about this one. It's my first challenging project, so it's a big step in my jeep career. This wiring harness is really a war though.

I think I'm just going to go home and check what wires come out of the plug in the comanche on the drivers side and compare it with the cherokee plug and cut and splice if wires match. Taking a big risk but its just the interior and I'll double check and post up on here after I label it and get thoughts.

CherokeeJon

Over the past few days, I've taken more apart and started painting parts such as the tunnel, engine bay, and the chassis. I'm painting the engine bay, tunnel, and wheel wells with under coating and the unibody with chassis paint that my dad has.

I already cleaned and scuffed the engine bay, just have to finish painting it. I also scraped and wire wheeled the unibody up to the back of the cab and am going to be painting that this week. I have to go out to New Jersey with a friend to get him tires and wheels for his truck, so not much will get done tonight.

CherokeeJon

It has progressed fairly well in just 8 days:

XJ ONLY

Good choice on the black...now people won't be able to tell the difference between paint and that Nasty black gunk that covers all jeeps.

CherokeeJon

So the engine bay is all done in undercoating, just have to run a thin coat over some areas. Rustoleum takes HOURS to dry fully and 3M only took maybe 2 hours max, I guess tonight I'll see which one looks better and I'll let you guys know.

The front portion of the unibody is going to get painted as soon as I get home and then as soon as its dry the engine will go in. Pretty excited to say the least