1994 Hunter Green SE “Back to Stock” Thread

DOWNS said:

I've gotten "new" remanned units that squeaked straight out of the box. They probably didn't bother to put new bearings in during the overhaul. I've had good luck with the new build ACDELCO units. They run right around 100 dollars and are 90 amp units.

AC DELCO 90 AMP ALT 335-1181

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That was going to be the one that I go with had I needed an alternator and/or not found the one I did. For a while I thought maybe I’d try Bosch or Denso but Denso disappeared one day and Bosch really didn’t have great reviews. $100 for ACDelco isn’t bad at all if it works.

Interesting/disappointing update. It has been raining here like crazy so I haven’t made much progress. No real motivation to get out there and work if I know it’s going to storm all week.

My YJ has always idled strangely, pretty low (600ish rpm) and sometimes inconsistent, dropping lower than that and shaking the jeep pretty badly. I’ve been doing some comparisons with some connections I’ve made, one being @Plastic Fury and another my buddy from Facebook who has a 94. Both of theirs idled how I would say is normal, mine is lower. Long story short on that, I think it’s my Jasper engine being “harder” to turn with larger 0.030” pistons upping the compression. No confirmation but it isn’t the engine management that is the problem. But anyways, that isn’t the point of all this.

In doing testing for the idle, I removed my IAC to make sure it actually functions. With it removed and the key turned on, it shot the pintle out. Oops. That one seemed to be ruined, so I ordered another IAC. Finally got that this week and it’s installed. Went to start the Jeep up today, and it ran okay but a bit weird. Instead of doing what it did before, it now took a long time to drop down in revs after revving up. For example, it would idle normal, 700 or so, then if I rev it up to say 2500, the revs would fall quickly to 1500, then very slowly fall from there back to idle.

After a few different startups and idling and revving this morning, the Jeep just shut off. Started it back up, ran for 2 seconds, shut off again. Tried to start again, just cranked and cranked but nothing happened, didn’t start. Swapped the cam sensor, since I’ve been doing a lot of distributor tinkering lately. Cam sensor didn’t change anything, however it started up again for 2 seconds, and then back off again and no more starts after that.

For the heck of it I decided to install my old PCM. The one that was installed at the time of all this is a “reman” from Cardone that I bought in 2016. We’ll call it “the bad PCM”. The original is the one from 94 and still works. We’ll call it the good one. I bought the bad one because of troubleshooting idling problems back then. It ultimately made no difference in how it ran, but it ran fine so I kept it and decided to use it and put the original on the shelf.

Well, I swapped the good/original one in, and it started right up. Ran great, idled, revved, etc. Moved the connector back over to the bad one again and same thing as before, it was dead. No start, just cranked forever.

I don’t really know where I’m going with all this at this point. I don’t know why the bad PCM randomly went bad. It isn’t the capacitors, it isn’t the voltage regulator, it’s just a random problem where it won’t run. Never heard of that with a YJ SBEC PCM. It always ran fine, never had any problems. It is a “reman” but it looks untouched. The part number traces back to a 1995 4.0L manual PCM. It looks much different inside than my 1994 PCM, but they both ran exactly the same as far as the engine goes. It was in there for 8 years and was a good reliable spare…until today. Just disappointing because I don’t like knowing I’m relying on a 31 year old computer with no backup. I’ll want to get another one, but everybody charges $500 for them these days, which is ridiculous for a used PCM that is as old or older than my good one.

Anyways, that’s my update. Jeep runs good on the original PCM still, so I am not hosed, but I am disappointed that I can’t rely on a spare until I either get another one or have an expert fix this one.




Other than all of that, I still need to get out there and clean the garage, finish up the dash and hit the road. I’ve just been lazy and the weather isn’t helping. Even when it’s nice out, it’s still 95-100°. Really I don’t have hardly anything left before I can drive it though. I will definitely either need another master cylinder or more diligent bleeding with mine because the brakes are way too soft based on feel.

dieselearl said:

you have certainly done alot of good work and i have learned a lot from all the posts you have made, keep up the good work. at least you have something that you can work on , not like the ones that are build today. i am at a age that i still buy tools, but some times not able to work with them like i want to. i am of the "Old School" still like the same, thanks, good luck and safe driving.

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Thanks for the kind words. It has been my hobby for 11 years, naturally it becomes pretty easy to work on after that long and tinkering with it for no other reason than to tinker. These days I just really want to be done working and just enjoy it though. I do like how it is old school. Although my truck is a 2021 and I still find my way around it with a wrench, but it needs some electronic tools to diagnose things, like computer programs to control the ABS and whatever else. Not a fan of that type of stuff.

Well, I cleaned up everything from around the Jeep in the garage, buttoned up the windshield and fastened the hardtop, and took it for a very brief ride. It isn’t street legal so I can’t do much.

Very strange to be behind the wheel of this thing again. It definitely still has some quirks despite being stock again. The steering doesn’t return to center very well, and it’s a bit squirrelly feeling, but I need to give it more time to see what I really think. I’m so used to driving a nice Tacoma that I’ve kinda forgotten how YJs are. It is better than the last time I drove it, after all this work, that’s for sure.

The gearing is freakin amazing. 4.56 and 30’s is aggressive and just really wants to go. 1st and R will creep with barely any gas. Just awesome. Didn’t hear any weird axle noises but I also only went like 25 mph max and only for about 5 seconds. I heard some weird clanks and stuff but the jeep is filled with crap. I didn’t clean it out for the drive, since I wanted to go. So probably some stuff in the backseat moving around.

The brakes are awful. They either have a bad MC or lots of air in the system. The MC is new but old from the shelf so maybe something to look into there. I’ll get it fixed up eventually.

The new exhaust parts are smoky so have to ignore that as well. It adds to the experience of feeling like something is wrong.

Next steps are to clean out the interior and finally button the dash up so that I can minimize noise of things flying around and focus on the actual issues that remain.

It didn’t overheat at all, and I got it up to 210. It barely starts to creep past 210 and then the fan brings it back down. I need to do lots of cooling system flushing, another item on the list.

I just remembered my steering shaft bearing is a bit loose and taken apart currently so that probably added to the wonky feel. Need to address that.

Getting there!

It will look so much better dusted off and with the hardtop removed. And man, I need a set of half doors badly.

Yeah, so I’m working on a bit of a laundry list of things to tend to before going to get it inspected, registered, and reinsuring it. That way it’s more road friendly than it is currently. Here’s what I’ve come up with so far:

Steering gear​

The steering gear seems to be in bad shape. I think that is where all of my handling oddness is coming from at this point. I plan on getting a Lares 11353. This is a new, not reman option that came about a few years ago. They seem to be making their own castings so that you don’t end up with somebody else’s old junk. Used gears that are worn aren’t really conducive to being rebuilt which is why “remans” are so hit or miss. So new seems the way to go. This is also why in 2016 PSC started making their own brand new gears as well, because they couldn’t make do with the used core options. I’d love to get a PSC, but it’s not budget friendly and is overkill, so I’m going to try Lares. A buddy of mine has used them like 5 times with great results.

Exhaust​

Sadly I knew this one would be a problem. The new tail pipe is rattling against the tub. Not really sure what to do about that. The aftermarket pipes are pretty “tall” where they go over the axle and I tried every which way with pretty much no way to get it oriented to where it won’t hit the tub. I verified I did have a very small amount of clearance. That didn’t work, now I’m rattling. I might reinstate the Magnaflow, it had a much better tail pipe design. I honestly don’t even think the Walker is that much quieter, they both are pretty noisy seeming.

Brakes​

Brakes, as stated earlier, are awful. The stopping I was able to do was so minor that it didn’t even rub the coating off the rotors. I either have lots of air in the system still (not really sure how) or I’ve got a bad master. Not sure which, I’m going to investigate.

Misc​

At this point, like I said, I need to clean all the crap out of it and reassemble the stuff that belongs in there. Get rid of all the random bolts, screws, old steering wheel, wheel pullers, etc. make it to where stuff can’t tumble around and make a bunch of racket. Reassemble the dash of course, though that not being put together isn’t adding any noise.


Between those 4 main items I think I’ll be in a whole lot better shape. The steering gear and cleaning up are probably first on the list. There is some “knocking” in the steering, pretty sure I’m feeling feedback from inside the steering gear as well as the vagueness being caused by the gear being loose from age and use.

Steering gear is ordered. I went with a Lares 11353 stock style from Summit Racing. It is backordered everywhere, and Summit said it will be a direct order to the manufacturer. Guess we’ll see how it goes. Lares gets a lot of praise on the TJ forum, and from my friend who has installed BBB and Lares on a number of Jeeps with good results. He prefers Lares but said both are great. If it falls through then I will place an order for BBB from RockAuto. I’m really excited at the prospect of it handling nicely again. It needs it.


The cleaning part is pretty much done. I emptied out almost everything, especially
the back seat area. Im hopeful evenings after work this week I can maybe get the glove box and rest of the dash put together. The glove box is a kicker because it has those screws in the back that are a pain.

I will probably take an evening this week to mess around with the exhaust and see if I can swap the magnaflow back in without much fuss. That would at least solve the exhaust rattling against the tub problem.

I’m not going to deal with brakes quite yet. It’s drivable (barely) without dealing with brakes so that will be last, when I can simply focus on that one issue.

Plastic Fury said:

That is interesting. I am running a walker tail pipe and the same Walker muffler you have and I have no issue at all with clearance or vibration. It doesn't touch anywhere. I have a Banks header/JBA mid pipe/Walker straight section (where the cat would be)/Walker SS muffler/Walker tail pipe. I just used some Amazon exhaust band clamps and so far, it's done pretty well. I did buy new hangers but my OEM hangers were probably just fine and looked to be in decent shape. Without a cat and that Walker "quiet flow" stainless steel muffler (and of course the Banks and JBA have some effect), my 4.0 has a pretty solid rumble to it.

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I’ll snap some photos when I get a chance. Your body lift may be helping. I am using a stock style Dorman exhaust manifold, and stock transmission hanger. Stock length cat and then the same Walker muffler. Everything bolts up but the tail pipe at its peak is extremely close to the tub and while it had maybe 1/8” of clearance, it doesn’t now and is rattling.

I had this problem with the Dynomax catback kit years ago too, and I had the stock (cracked) manifold at that time.

If I had a body lift I think it would clear fine, but would stretch the hangers at the muffler since that mount is on the body and would move up accordingly.

The magnaflow catback fit fine, the peak was much lower and nowhere close to the tub. I tried a Borla kit briefly and that one didn’t hit the tub, but it hit the gas tank crossmember…still not sure how or why. I returned that one.

Plastic Fury said:

Ahh yeah, good point. Could be that 1" difference for clearance. The hangers for the muffler were very easy to get on and don't seem stretched or anything. It all went together very well, just had to clearance the JBA with a hammer so it wouldn't touch where the bellhousing meets the engine lol.

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I grabbed a photo of mine tonight before I started taking it all apart. My hangers are honestly pretty smushed. Not sure why, but regardless there is no good way to get that muffler and pipe in there without touching the tub on mine.



And now of course I’m having a hell of a time getting it apart because the clamps for the Walker stuff are the type that crimp the pipe. I was trying to get it apart and still be salvageable, but I really can’t. I think I’m going to cut it out with a sawzall and install the magnaflow. So much for a $400 experiment…..

The walker tail pipe was pretty awful looking anyways. It hung really low and looked really cheap. It honestly wasn’t that much quieter than the magnaflow either so the MF is probably best. The only truly “quiet” exhaust I have had was stock. Too bad you can’t get those anymore, and too bad my original started rattling internally. That was the only reason I ever replaced it to begin with, otherwise I would have stayed stock there.

Plastic Fury said:

Wow, those hangers really are smushed. The Walker tail pipe end is certainly nothing fancy, I have considered cutting a more angled tip to it. With no cat and this Walker muffler, my Jeep definitely has a rumble, more than I had expected but not enough to bother me. I'd be curious how the Magnaflow sounds with no cat. I have liked them on previous cars I have owned.

I like the band clamps so far, they don't distort the pipe so it can be taken apart rather easily but they hold tight. The one in this pic is very short due to the short area available to clamp. The other two are better being longer. Overall I am happy with them and have been a inexpensive solution as I didn't want to weld anything that I might want to take apart at a later time.


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I can definitely see how my 1" body lift makes a difference but it's still odd how your hangers are smushed as if the exhaust is being pushed upward toward the body.

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Yeah, it’s very bizarre….at one point I wondered if my Crown skid plate was a bit flatter than stock, holding the drivetrain higher…but it’s not. The shifter, and engine are at the same angle as stock. Back when I had the stock skid still, I still had this trouble with the dynomax catback.

My pipe is actually dunomax, not walker, so it’s a bit differently shaped. I thought the dynomax looked better so I went with it. Axtuallt, dynomax is the only one I’ve ever had problems with. Stock rattled inside itself, not against the tub. The flow master and walker pipe that replaced stock rattled together, not against the tub. And that was only because the clamp wasn’t strong enough to crimp the flowmaster muffler to the pipe. Dynomax came next until it fell apart. Then magnaflow replaced that. It fit fine at the pipe to tub, but the hanger at the end is a bit fat and placed a bit too far back so it wants to hit the hanger bracket. But I got it to work when I had it installed. Borla like I said hit the gas tank crossmember.


I think the dynomax problem might actually be the hangers on the dynomax pipe being too long maybe. If you think about it, the height is pretty much already set by where the muffler is. If the tail pipe hangers are too long, they’re going to push the hangers up. That is probably what my problem is. Even though walker and dynomax are the same brand, they might not be perfectly the same dimensions.

Waiting on the new steering gear to arrive. I wanted a Lares, but they’re backordered indefinitely and so I cancelled and ordered a BBB. In addition to that, I added all 3 new hoses. I don’t like the crimp clamps that the stock hoses and the aftermarket hoses I ordered come with, so I ordered up a bunch of different size constant tension hose clamps from Bel-Metric, making educated guesses as to what I need and ordering a few extra of other sizes just in case.

I don’t need it but I threw in a new power steering pump from Lares since I figured it made sense to make the system all new. I’ll throw the stocker in a bag and then in the box of the new one.

Lastly I’m adding a cheap power steering filter on the return line just because it hurts nothing to do so. It’s a simple metal strainer with a magnet to catch any metal that may be flowing around.


In the meantime, I changed out the lower steering column bearing. 5 years ago I used the “upgrade” bearing from Wolff engineering, which seemed nice but it didn’t fit my column without some slack. Maybe I installed the outer collar wrong, but it was plastic and so I don’t think so. Anywho, don’t want to speak too negatively, but I found a place that sells GM genuine replacement bearings (the column is a GM Saginaw column after all), so I ordered up a kit from Steering Column Services. It said 1969-1991 but it fit just fine on the 94 column.


That is now installed and looks good. Went on pretty easily, took me a few minutes to get the outer collar lined up - the brake booster makes it hard to see what you’re doing. Anywho, it’s in and done.

It’s been a short, long, weird, and busy summer. Not going to go into all the details, but the day I drove my YJ around a few months ago, there was an incessant tapping noise that sounded worse than the typical 4.0L noise. I was a bit concerned, especially when it was worse when the engine was warm.

Like I’ve said before, I have this Jasper engine that I’m not exactly thrilled with, however it has run decently for the years it’s been in place. After the noise, I couldn’t get it to go away and so I bought a used engine that I intended to swap in. The seller seemed very honest, straightforward, etc. I hate to say he wasn’t honest, he truly maybe didn’t know, but the used engine that was supposed to have no surprises, was quite nasty down behind all the accessories, the block was pretty gross, and you could tell there had been some engine mount troubles because one of the bolts was broken in the block and others had grinding marks in the bolt bosses showing someone had worked in there before. Thankfully, with the beefy SFR engine brackets I have, there is no reason to be concerned there regardless.

After finding out the valves leaked and that this engine overall was pretty gross, I decided to not use it. The Jasper was already pulled at this point, and I got to see what is probably the cause for the noise: coolant sludge.



Not sure why this happened. The only coolant I’ve ever put in there was conventional green, or Zerex G05 HOAT. Both are compatible, just the green doesn’t last as long. My guess is the years of sitting and about a year of the cooling system being open allowed things to dry up and create a nasty goo. I think this was the cause of the noise: poor cooling due to the sludge and probably some lifters getting hotter than the should.

I ended up taking the engine to the driveway and just blasting the crap out of it with a hose for about an hour. I got it clean enough for my satisfaction. Engine went back in, but first, new water pump and thermostat housing. Timing cover is a new Mopar from a few years ago.




Not really much to talk about beyond that, but my summer has been very busy since then and I am still not done wrapping up the engine stuff. In the process I did change the RMS again. I also got a rear oil pan support out of the new engine, so that’s nice.

For now, I am going to keep that engine and plan on rebuilding it. The physical problems with the block are not actual problems. Engine plates will take care of that. I want to do a clean stock engine build with minimal overboring and as stock as I can make it, for reliability and smooth performance. The main thing is I don’t have the time or money to spare in a project like that, not so I know where I’d want to get the work done. So for now, the Jasper goes back in and hope that the ticking is gone.