Christmas at home alone doing whatever I feel like = the best Christmas.

But we will have our gathering this coming weekend, when my daughter comes up from Grand Rapids to visit.

 

Spent Christmas day cleaning the IAC and throttle body.. Then ran a can of Seafoam upper cleaner. Runs smooth again.

 

Like I said, each to their own. Indeed, my Christmas Day wouldn't suit others &, in truth, the only reason it doesn't include tinkering with my Jeeps is it's too dark when I get back.

 

Picked up a new muffler and tailpipe.

 

what muffler did ya get? link to tailpipe?

 

Finally received my 0630 Cylinder Head from the UPS man today. He kept showing up at my building after the office closed for the last few days and finally arrived at around noon. I feel sorry that he had to schelp the 75lb box to my room door (my apartment building is setup like a modern hotel...). I tried to have it delivered to the UPS Store nearby but apparently RockAuto won't allow it. The ENGINETECH CH1082R "0630" head was $561 delivered to my door including the insane 8.x% Denver sales tax but also includes the perpetual 5% off RockAuto discount code.NO CORE return! RockAuto shipped it to a UPS distribution center within TWO HOURS. I ended up cancelling my Clearwater Cylinder Head order due to them being backed up at least six weeks. I must have been at the right place at the right time as RockAuto had one in stock at the moment I learned of Clearwater's backlog. RockAuto never seems to have these in stock but you can quickly setup an In-Stock Alert. It arrived double-packed in an abused box. The actual Enginetech box was intact and not damage and also well packed. Installation was SO EASY now that this was my second 4.0 project. After cleaning the surfaces of both the engine block and new head with brake cleaner and clean rags to wipe off any oil, I installed the new Fel-Pro head gasket. I placed the head onto a piece of clean cardboard and set it on top of the front of the facia. Then I sat the head on top of the exhaust manifold. Then I used my hands to lift up the had, at the center, and then set it in place. This was SO easy. Not sure why it was so complicated the last time (I made my own short alignment pins from old head bolts) and I almost lost my thumb. This time I did not make custom alignment pins and with with the tiny dowel pins already in the block. It seriously took like 30 seconds to walk the head over to the Jeep and set it in place. Zero back pain. I used a new set of Fel Pro head bolts and yes I did apply Permatex high-temp sealant on Bolt #11. Tightened all, in stages, to 110ft/lbs with Bolt #11 at 100ft/lbs. I do not have a 3/8 torque wrench (I'm living 1000 miles away from my workshop due to my job assignment) so looks like I'll be making a trip to Hobo Fright to get a $20 special in order to tighten down the rocker arms and valve cover bolts properly but before the valve cover goes on I'll turn the motor over to verify oil flow. Oh, the stripped-out Bolt #11 that I removed was apparently just a crappy bolt? Maybe they used Loctite Red on it? Anyways, I ran a 1/2-13 tap in it and its fine. Bizarre how that bolt was stripped like it was.

 

Glad it's all coming together - you got lucky with that bolt, or rather the thread in the block.

 

Spent money

 

This shallow T60 socket is so worth the price. Note that the Amazon photo is not accurate. $15 right now and that's a steal. It is a must-have to remove the oil filter adapter. I pulled it off today to install new seals.

VIM Tools T60 shallow socket

Hopefully tomorrow I'll be able to prime the engine up with some fresh oil.

 

I just bought a 1990 XJ with over 300,000 miles, that has been sitting in non-operational status for the last 5 years. The old tires were very cracked, especially the two on the "southern exposure." The small local tire shop didn't have the stock 205/75r15 so I got 215/70r15 which are slightly shorter and wider.
Today I discovered that the odometer and speedometer don't work.

 

Despite the weather, made a bit more progress with repairing the left rear corner of the floor: made up a card template for the repair panel. For such a square boxy vehicle it is surprisingly complex, even the cover for the fuel filler's not a constant radius.. Then all I have to do is cut remains of the rivet for the nearest tie-down eye flush with the floor so I can drill it out &transfer the holes in the shacklebox flange (where I'd drilled out the spot welds) to the template.

Happy New Year!

 

Replaced the o rings in the oil filter adapter. They were very rock solid like plastic. Surprised whoever rebuilt this motor and bored it 0.30 over didn't spend the five bucks to replace them. The Fel Pro o ring kit I had was apparently for the Renix as the small o ring wasn't small enough so a trip to Ace hardware made it work. I then installed a new oil filter and added 6 quarts of Rotella T5 10W-30 (AutoZone was out if stock of $18/gal T4). I pulled the Fuel Pump Relay and cranked the motor for 30 seconds. No pil oozed out of the rocker holes. Waited a few minutes for the starter to cool down. Cranked it again for 30 seconds and you can that about 17 seconds it it starts to ooze out of all rockers. The old oil was quite dark so it was easy to positively identify flow out of each rocker hole.

 

I bought a custom tool for the OFA from a guy on NAXJA a long time ago. Its basically a t60 bit welded to a piece of flat stock. Works perfectly and is super low profile.

 

Finally buttoned it all up today. Crank, not start.... I read several threads here on CC regarding the similar condition. The coil tests at 2.9 ohms over the Primary and 11,000 ohms for the secondary (normal range for Primary is 0.80 to 1.5 ohms). I suppose I'll install a fresh coil tomorrow and re-evaluate. The spark plug tester I have does confirm spark but I'm not sure how strong it is. I do have fuel and I'll "rent" a noid light kit at Autozone tomorrow when I buy the $37 coil. I did ohm-test the injectors and they are all within the acceptable ohm range. Fuel pressure was checked before my project and was within range (new fuel pump per the PO). I did purge the air from the fuel rail too. I can smell fuel out of the tail pipe after cranking this thing. I think its just weak spark. Coincidentally, RockAuto is delivering a new "tune-up kit" that consists of "Delcore (Permashield) wire set, OEM cap, rotor and dielectric grease." I suppose I'll throw the parts grenade at this and I do have a new CPS on-hand but considering that I have spark and fuel, its probably not the CPS.

 

Oh I forgot to mention how I backflushed the heater core and got a gallon of nasty liquid. Since I'm working out of a storage unit that has no electricity, I used this little rechargeable air blower to force out the fresh water I flushed each way through the heater core hoses.