Installing the Engine
This weekend’s task was installing the engine. Here is the progress:
Red more below.Nancy and I got the engine hoisted up, pushed it into the Jeep, and mated it to the transmission. As usual I do things differentely, instead of taking the engine top bolts (those stupid Torx E-12s) out from the bottom by dropping the transmission I remove the engine front mounts and ears and drop the engine down as far as it will go. This allows me to remove those bolts from the top side which makes things a lot easier. Here is the engine sitting low:
I ultimately got the engine about 99% installed this weekend. It is currently in tight with most everything hooked up. I only have to install the radiator, fill it with oil, install the airbox, and connect the battery and it will be ready to run. I would have gotten it done today but I had to make an unplanned bone yard run to get some bolts the previous owner lost.
While I was working on the crossmember I noticed more previous owner screwups. It seems that they stripped out the drivers side nutzerts for the crossmember, this was probably related to the ghetto transfer case drop (twenty washers) failing at some point. Here was my fix for this.
I simply tack welded a nut to a bit of 1″ bar stock. Please excuse the shoddy welding, this was done by a novice welder with a Mobi-Arc so it looks like crap. I don’t care though as long as it works. For those fellow XJ and TJ folks out there yes, I got the idea from the trackbar nut on a Jeep Dana 30. Here they are in action, they worked perfectly, I’d imagine this method was a lot easier than the previous owner’s method of split lock washers and fishing nuts in place with duct tape (there were about four or five nuts in the frame rails).
You may also notice the decidingly less ghetto transfer case drop. I’ve had this sitting in the garage for the past four or five years, about time I put it to some use (I always meant to put it into a raffle but never remembered to grab it). Now I just have to try to remember to call Rubicon Express to get one more spacer puck for the transfer case skid, since this has an NP242 I need to space the skid as well. I actually don’t much care for transfer case drops but with the 2″ lift on this Jeep it is necessary.
That’s it for today. Hopefully I’ll be able to get it running this week.
Sequoia
