"it over heated, then i had it towed"

[61scout80]

thats the response i got when i asked why she was selling her xj. apparently she was driving down the freeway and the jeep overheated to the point where it shut off & had to be towed back. i've never had a vehicle over heat to this point, so what should i look for as far as damage? i could use the transmission and i was thinking i could part out the rest. any insight would be appreciated, i'm going to look at it in an hour. thanks

[Rev Den]

I drove mine for 2 years after that happened to me due to a blowen radiator.

Rev

[hankthespacecowboy]

welcome to the xj club. Mine has been doing that on a regular basis as I try to track down cooling problems.

[61scout80]

she said it won't start now....

[Rev Den]

That could be a problem.

Unless its really cheap....I would not bother.

Rev

[61scout80]

asking $700obo. i'm willing to go to $500. i could use the transmission for another one i have, and i was hoping to get a little $$ back selling off parts.

i have another 4cyl/ 5 speed xj that needs a trans....

[Rev Den]

if it has a 5sp, grab it.

Rev

[61scout80]

its 2wd, and in my garage. front and rear bumpers bent, tailgate has a half dollar sized chip, body and interior are sweeeeet!

[Matthew Currie]

I'd check the compression.

[90xj06]

mine did that and it started right up. and i had to drive it one more mile with it out of coolant. fixed rad and there was no damage.

[Saudade]

My '88 did that when I blew the coolant bottle on the freeway. Once it cooled down, it started right up. Babied it the 2 miles I had left to get home. Replaced the bottle, burped it and it ran fine.

[61scout80]

ok, here is the long story:

it was partally disassenbled, thats why she told me on the phone that it wouldn't start. the water pump is off, and all the ball bearings are missing. i'd say that might have something to do with the overheating. :roll: i hooked i jump box up to it and it started right up, and idled quite nicely. i immediatly shut it back down, just wanted to see if it would fire before buying a new pump. the oil is clean, the antifreeze is bright green and the girl gave me a hefty stack of maitenence records. this xj was taken care of.

the body on this thing is perfect, only one small mark on the hood, and with a coat of cleaner wax i bet the white paint would shine nicely. it has 4 new tires, but one is flat, she said it went flat while it sat in her drive way (about 2 months). i think i might have a nice daily driver here.....


so my question. how can i tell if there is any major damage to this jeep? her story for over heating "i was driving and the gauge went to high, i pulled over and shut it down for about 30 minutes, i started it back up and started driving again, it went to high again and i pulled off and had it towed home" i don't know if she drove it to the point that it shut itself down or not, i didn't really ask a direct enough question about it. i'll try to get it together and take some pics tomorrow in the day light and post up here..... tanks for following along and your input.

[Yucca-Man]

So - where are the water pump bearings? Hopefully not in the block someplace...

[JeepFreak91]

water pump coulda took a dump.

[61scout80]

So - where are the water pump bearings? Hopefully not in the block someplace...

this is a huge concern of mine, that i have no idea how to check.... i don't even have access to a hose to attempt to flush the block (i live in an apartment)

i'm going to put a ner pump in and comp test it tomorrow. hopefully things go well, if not you'll see me hawking parts in the four sale section...

[JeepFreak91]

if you do get access to a hose prestone or how ever you spell it has a flush kit for under $10 that cleaned out a bunch of junk on mine. its worth a shot.

[61scout80]

if i do find one it will be after the new pump is in, i'll fill it with water and pay some place to do a flush and fill, if not the little balls would hopefilly just get trapped in the radiator... or i'll be buying another pump, i'm sure i'm not the first person to havbe this happen to.

[carnuck]

The 4.0L uses the same pump unless it's Vee belt. I would use a flexible magnetic parts grabber (sold at parts stores for cheap, but make sure it's epoxied on before sticking it into the block!) and see if anything can be fished out. Remove the closest freeze plug and try pouring water into the waterpump hole.

[61scout80]

todays update:

i put on the new water pump ($30) and belt ($25), then fired it up, and went for a ride around my complex. it ran rough, stalled if i wasn't on the throttle and heated up quickley, but it only has a high temp light ( need to fix this if i can get it to run good) the radiator and hoses were hot to the touch, but it cooled quickly. after it cooled and i picked up a new battery and lunch. i took out the thermostat to find a rush of green antifreeze, i had only put water in the radiator and the stuff in the radiator was still crystal clear. i took the thermostat out completely and resealed it up w/ rtv ( big mistake), i also installed my new battery ($35), the old one was stone dead and i had to use my jump box to start it. started it again, it still ran rough so i pulled a few plugs, they were fuel fowled bosh platnums and they were gapped at about 1/4 mile. i cleaned them up a little and closed the gap a little, refired; still rough. took off the dizzy cap to find the metal on the rotor was broken in half and laying on the bottom. so i ran to the parts store, got the cap and rotor, ($18, i thought that was pricey) completely forgot about the thermostat gasket. came home, put the cap and rotor on, fired it, ran rough, reved it, it smoothed out, came back to idle and ran rough again. I don't feel like running out again today, so tomorrow i'll go get the gasket, spark plugs and a gapper (don't have one in my tool kit, must have lost it in the move). maybe tomorrow evening i can get this thing running.

question: i'm sure this can be answered by a search, do i have to remove the a/c compressot to get to the forward most spark plug?

thanks for following along!!!!

[61scout80]

The 4.0L uses the same pump unless it's Vee belt. I would use a flexible magnetic parts grabber (sold at parts stores for cheap, but make sure it's epoxied on before sticking it into the block!) and see if anything can be fished out. Remove the closest freeze plug and try pouring water into the waterpump hole.

did you watch me this morning? pretty much what i did! i got a lot of shavings out with the magnet...... :)

[ChiXJeff]

question: i'm sure this can be answered by a search, do i have to remove the a/c compressot to get to the forward most spark plug?

Nope. It's possible to get the plug out without pulling the compressor, or a universal joint.

[61scout80]

ok, i;ve been shuffling this thing around my apartment complex, and yesterday i moved it into its very own garage. I've scrapped the idea of parting it out, now i want to fix it and i have some questions:

is there a jeep overheating FAQ thread on here? i can't seam to find one, and with all the cooling problems maybe we should create one for newbs like me. :)

I'm beginning to think the head gasket is gone. i haven't got the thermostat gasket in yet, so most the water i put into it was pushed out through the thrmostat cover. the jeep would run almost like it had a miss (even after replacing the cap&rotor), but if you give it some throttle it will clean up. Now that most the water was pushed out the jeep idled a lot smoother, but i still haven't found signs of coolant or oil where they shouldn't be. I'm going to buy a compression tester tonight, and friday night i'll be able to get back to work on this beast. so, to sum it up, is it possible that the coolant is being pushed into the cylinder(s) and causing the burn to be un-efficient? is a compression test the best method to check the head gasket without pulling the head?

the jeep seams to be running really rich as well, but now that i've decided i'm keeping it i'm going to go over the ignition system, not just the broken parts. I'm also going to try to pull codes from it, i'll be searching for a how to on that shortly......

and the garage i rented had a half dollar sized black spider w/ a white mark on its back living in there. raid is my friend :shocked:

[Rob Mayercik]

I don't know if there's a FAQ, but there have been many threads on overheating. A search should turn up much food for thought.

As to the running rich, what year and mileage? A dead O2 sensor can cause overly-rich running, as can a thermostat that's too low (stick with 195*). Additionally, if the Coolant Temp sensor that feeds the computer (not the one for the dash gauge, which you'll be putting in place of the one you have now for the dummy light) is not properly showing the coolant temp coming up, it may cause the ECU to remain in warm-up mode, which is noticably richer than normal running mode. You could also run some injector cleaner through the tank.

I had a bit of a running rich problem back on NACFest weekend. I was 5-6 points off my usual mark, and was concerned because I had just had the entire exhaust system replaced (downpipe, cat, muffler and tailpipe were all baddly ragged out - the first two were factory original with 215K miles). I decided to try Marvel Mystery Oil as an injector cleaner, since it seemed to help quiet my lifters a little. By the time I had cleared another tank or two, I seemed to be back into my normal range.

Now, I suspect that the MMO, which probably cleaning the injectors a little, probably didn't make the difference. More likely, the cat was clogged after all those miles, and the computer needed some miles to get itself adapted to an in-spec exhaust system.

Good luck,

Rob

[61scout80]

you have a tdi, i'm jealous..... :)

the cherokee is a 96 2.5L 5 speed w/ 138,000 (i think, i'll update later if i'm wrong)

the battery was completely dead when i got it, so maybe the computer needs time to re-learn? unfortunatly i can't take it for a ride, not registered yet...

[90xj06]

if you have the coolant leaking into the head one spark plug will be cleaner than the rest.

[61scout80]

well i have a few updates:

pulled the plugs to change them and found that the porcilan on the forward most plug was cracked, and the plug had little pieces of slag stuck to it. replaced the plugs and it ran a little better, sounded like it had an exaust leak.

i took a little time off, had some family in town and couldn't get back to the garage. when i did get back in there i found a black widow spider had built a very intricate web, spanning from the rear axle to the rear bumper than to the ground. she was pretty, and the first time i got to see the bright red hour glass on a black spider. it almost looked like it had a tiny LED light in it, i was really impressed at the beauty of the creature and the brightness of the red, it was like nothing i have seen before. then i got the raid, soaked the spider (then had to stomp it, she started running, didn't want her to multiply), web, garage and jeep. i swept the carcass outside and soaked the splat w/ carb cleaner in hopes to kill any eggs. spider bites scare me.

ok, enough wild life. started (carefully, didn't want to find another widow) looking for the exhaust leak. I found one very minor exhaust leak at the end of the manifold, tightened the bolts and it went away, still sounded like it had a minor leak but i couldn't find it. i took it for a ride around my apartment complex for about half an hour, still sounded funny, but ran fine, idled and started to get better the longer i ran it.

today i bought the temp. registration and got insurance on it. i took it to the store to get some light bulbs i needed and it lacked power, but rode nice, shifter sweet and felt solid. this time the more i ran it the more power went away. went into the store, got my bulbs, came out and pulled the dip stick. either the head gasket finally let all the way go or some prankster swapped my oil for chocolate milk. i'd put my money on the head gasket. i have to go see an oral sureon tomorrow, so i don't know when i'll be well enough to get back to the jeep, but i'll update when i do.... if there is a vendor reading that sells head gasket kits, please contact me, or i'll be picking one up at auto zone this weekend.

[61scout80]

ok, another update on the resurection.

got the head off to find the forward most piston is missing a size able chunk. i didn't look to deep into it to see how bad the cylinder walls were, i just kinda got disgusted and left the garage. so, assuming the block isn't too damaged it will be time for a rebuild, can anyone recomend a good source for a master rebuild kit and pistons?

[Gator4x]

Wow. Crazy story man. I guess you know why it was running like crap and low on power now, huh? Ina couple months you'll have a Three thousand dollar/$500 beater. :D

[61scout80]

Wow. Crazy story man. I guess you know why it was running like crap and low on power now, huh? Ina couple months you'll have a Three thousand dollar/$500 beater. :D

ya, but its kinda fun. i just wish i didn't need it to get to work. sharing my girlfriends jeep sucks. but i work close to home, and need to drop some weight so i'll be picking up a bike to commute with for the winter months.

If i can get a rebuild kit for a decent price, it might still be worth it. so far i think i have about $650 into it, the body and interior are in excellent shape and i can use the AX5 for my other one and part it out, like i was orginally going to do until i got the bright idea to try to fix it. .....:banghead::banghead:

[Saudade]

Wow, the slag on the plug was a "dead" giveaway. You can remove the oil pan and get to the rod end to remove the cap and push the piston up from below to remove it. That should allow you to check the cylinder wall. If the wall is badly gouged, it may be short block time.

Good Luck!

[61scout80]

Wow, the slag on the plug was a "dead" giveaway. You can remove the oil pan and get to the rod end to remove the cap and push the piston up from below to remove it. That should allow you to check the cylinder wall. If the wall is badly gouged, it may be short block time.

Good Luck!

I wasn't sure what the slag on the plug was, but i certainly learned :thumbup:

thanks for the info on the rod. i'll be doing that later tonight, i'll have some pics uploaded in the next few days.

[Saudade]

After you pull the cap, slide some plastic/rubber tubing over the studs so you won't damage the journal when you slide the piston up.

[Blaine B.]

Go find a hose somewhere? :)

[61scout80]

Go find a hose somewhere? :)

sounds like you need cliff notes.... :doh:

[slingblade]

auto zone has rebuild kits for about 500 and rebuilt long blocks for about 1200 or have some fun with it and get a stroker kit for about 2500

[61scout80]

back from the dead, got it running this week.

so, the rest of the story. i found a 2.5 from a local jeeper who swaped to a 4 liter. i paid a whopping $50.00 for it. i swapped in my water pump, alt., throttle body, a/c compressor and the like. i also had to swap the intake manifolds, since the yj and xj's power steering pumps are different. after letting it sit for a few months, my lease was up and it was time to move. so i spent a few days wrenching to swap the engines. got it running, took it for emissions and passed today. now that i have a longer commute this will be used daily. thanks for following along, just one or 2 tweeks and its done.

[Blaine B.]

So was this a 4 cyl Jeep to begin with or did you swap a 4.0 for the 2.5?

[61scout80]

it was a 2/5 from the factory. didn't care for a 4 liter swap since its 2wd and i don't plan to run jeepspeed, and want good mileage.

[Blaine B.]

Ok, that's fine then.