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The Little CJ that Could - ALIVE AGAIN (9/22/2012)

6K views 54 replies 21 participants last post by  joslovandikai 
#1 · (Edited)
1985 CJ-7 258ci 4.2L I6 - 5spd
Tub/Body - pretty much useless
Powertrain/Drivetrain - Close to Perfect
Frame - solid
The History: We are the second owners of this cj. Orginally came from southern california until about 10-12 yrs ago when it came to Michigan with the original owner. Sat in that guys driveway - outside for most of the those michigan yrs - pretty much unused. in '04 he wanted it out of his driveway because it wouldnt start anymore. he let us have it - just to get it out of the driveway. we brought it back to our house and spent an hour working on it and promptly had it runnning again. It spent about 2 1/2 of the last 4 yrs as a 2nd vehicle for my dads business until the seatbelts fell out the bottom of the rusted tub. At this point it entered our garage for the past 1 1/2 yrs and became a workbench/shelving unit for the rest of the family's automotive shit.

STAGE 1 : I am in need of my first dependable transportation and the best option at this time was to repair the cj until i could save more money to buy my own 4x4.
1. Resecure Seatbelts
2. Patch the worst of the body rot
3. GET MY OWN 4X4!!

STAGE 2: The above repairs are only for the next few months or year at most(hopefully) until:
1. Fiberglass Tub
2. 3in-5in suspension lift

Now for pics..i hope they work...



sorry for the bad quality..the only pics i had from before it entered the garage were from 4 yrs ago..will get up more recent and specific pics asap..

J.D.
 
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#32 ·
sorry everyone...i havent updated this in a coupel of months...not a lot has happened just a lot of bondo and sanding and more bondo and more sanding...i have pics of all this but im jsut going to skip to the exciting stuff....we set out today to get her primed and ready for paint( hopefully tommorow but not likely)...and we accomplished this so i have a couple hours on my hands before we can start sanding the primer...so heres pics of (stage 1) almost finished.

Our high tech paint booth


my dad painting the hood











J.D.
 
#37 ·
not really sure why we didnt tape off the frame..i guess we werent really that worried about it....

weather looks good tomorow so as long as it stays that way we are spraying final paint tomorow..its gonna be black even though ive been told by a million people not to use black because it shows all the imperfections


J.D.
 
#39 ·
Sorry for the long lapse since my last update...we did end up painting the next day (which just happened to be the day the big storm rolled through) lucky us we used urethane based paint and it was dry enough by the time the storm came through that the paint was not affected

Finished Product






Many problems have since come up though:
1st - Took it for a small test drive around the block and it was all over the road... A quick look turned up a broken drivers side shock mount so we got that fixed and at the same time replaced the front shock absorbers
2nd - The steering was still rediculously loose so we replaced the steering dampner but before we could get it on the road
3rd - we noticed we had no voltage and our alternator was shot - so we picked up a new alternator but they sold us the wrong one but it still fit so we could not understand what was wrong until my old man realized the alternator was functioning backwards thus not putting out voltage so we got the right alternator this time and that all works now but....
4th - the steering is still way too loose and she is at the shop right now being looked over.


J.D.
 
#43 ·
Update

Finally got her out and muddy two weekends ago...she performed well until i was going through one rather large mud puddle, we got out of it just fine then she went stalled and wouldnt start up...while waiting and contemplating what to do we had some random guy in a jeep stop and talk to us for awhile...anyway after that we tried to start her again and she started right up...has run fine for the past two weeks except when i put 87 octane in the tank. she doesnt like that much.

PICS - just fooling around on my friends front lawn






Cliffnotes
lightly wheeled her for the first time
had random jeeper stop and talk to us
stalled after a mud puddle, started back up again 15min later
realized my 258ci doesnt like 87octane gas

J.D.
 
#45 ·
The Little CJ That Could Update 3/9/09

The little CJ that could As dubbed by f l e x i n

A. I finally got to actually go wheeling!! Chili Day at the Mounds, thanks to all who i was with.

B. The Random Stuff:
-all the bondo my dad just had to use in the beginning is giving me hell now(its all cracking and falling off now)

-got rid of the tube side steps after the my first mounds experience, new sliders are in the works(design/dream stage right now)



C. And after the mounds a started having a power steering whine, but nothing felt wrong and it went away. Came back yesterday so i filled the resevoir last night and a lot was goen this afternoon when i checked again. Found the problem was a small leak but while under there foudn another much larger problem...


not sure if you can see in the pic but the steering bracket broke, and one of the bolts farther back sheared off the head...everything has to get taken apart, so i won't have a car next weekend. Yay.

Also i understand this is a fairly common problem on the CJ's. What are some ways for preventing breakage again??
 
#48 ·
Update / 2nd Beginning

The CJ got in an accident a few weeks ago:(
Money is scarce as we all know, so progress will be slow. Hopefully the repairs we do now will be more permanent and less hurried.



Originally looked to be just sheetmetal and a new radiator but...



You can see here that the whole axle shifted toward the drivers side, torqueing the shackle hangers and...



...bent the leaf spring.


Already picked up new 7 leaf leaf packs w/ the double wrapped ends??(i know i'm missing the correct term here) to replace the 4 leaf ones that are currently on it. Thanks to Jeeper48.
 
#49 ·
Finally got her out and muddy two weekends ago...she performed well until i was going through one rather large mud puddle, we got out of it just fine then she went stalled and wouldnt start up...while waiting and contemplating what to do we had some random guy in a jeep stop and talk to us for awhile...anyway after that we tried to start her again and she started right up.
Probably the least of your worries since the accident, but sounds like a cracked distributor cap. Once moisture gets in there, it won't start for a while. If it happens again, hit it with some WD-40.
 
#52 ·
yeah its a shame. it was a 50 yd beauty though. What you can't really see is the splotches of different black spray paints used to cover up the bondo that was falling off in large chunks and the tub that falling off in even bigger chunks. Hopefully this time when we fix stuff it will look good permanently. Its my dads now and he isn't into wheeling so it probably won't get beat on much. thats the real shame:(
 
#53 ·
Alive again!

After surviving a few years as a shelving unit and almost getting sold, the cj is back again. We almost sold it this summer but after lack of interest decided to do something ourselves.("we" being my father and I. He beat his 4-year fight with cancer this june, and now I'm helping him re-build this jeep)

Body coming off the CJ:


Then this decided to follow us home:



The YJ has a solid frame:beerbang: and a fairly clean body (we did find that it has been in an accident and repaired at some point, but its still straight and clean!)

CJ headed to scrap:


A couple weeks later I got the motor installed:



Immediate things to do
-flip the Dana 300 or find alternative transfer case to use YJ axles
-make it run again

Future things to do
-build efi 4.2 using parts from the 4.0 in the corner of the garage


Problems/Questions I'm currently having: Advice Appreciated!
-Flipping the Dana 300 is giving me grief
-Getting it to start - I have it turning over and pumping fuel no problem. Having trouble with spark, I'm not getting any. brand new coil. I am starting from scratch for wiring right now, so I have my battery and starter/solenoid hooked to an ignition switch, a hot wire going to the (+) coil and the (-) at the coil grounded. It turns over all day long but will not spark. Any suggestions??
 
#54 ·
a 231 out of any jeep will bolt right up to your t5 it is the combo i have in my jeep
and the hardest part of the 4.0 fi will be welding in the crank position sensor in the bell housing, which i have also dont for my jeep
 
#55 ·
np231 bolts on with no adapter? well that would be a helluva lot easier....

On another note, got it running today. Just had to sort out the wiring for the ignition control module. There was a fire in the engine bay of the original jeep prior to our possession, and whoever he had rewire it did an awful job. I'm slowly weeding out all the spliced wires and junk but keep coming up on wires that go nowhere, but came from somewhere.
 
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