My finacee is currently driving a shitbox Geo Metro, so I have been looking to get her into a safer, more reliable rig.
I found an ad in the local paper for an 89 Cherokee. Last night they brought it over so we could take a look at it.
It's a 1989 Cherokee, Inline 6, manual AX15 transmission, 4x4 w/ vac disconnect front axel, manual windows/locks, new O2 sensor and new muffler. It has a 2" block in the rear and 2" coil spacer in the front, sporting 31" Toyo ATs with 60% tread. The paint is very faded, and 159k miles. Also has idiot gauges. AC works and blows cold, recently serviced. Clutch supposedly replaced 1.5 years ago. No service records of any kind. Owner was asking $2,000.
After inspecting this jeep in my garage, I noticed it needed a few things. The coolant was very brown, and the breather tube on the front of the head was broken off. Also the rear hatch shocks were not working, and a few other minor things.
I asked to drive the vehicle, and the owner tossed me the keys and said have at it, and did not express interest in coming with me. So I went out for a couple miles and drove on the highway. The motor is quiet, ran smooth, and had plenty of power. The transmission shifted smoothly, was crisp, and didn’t appear to have any problems. I did not check the clutch fluid when inspecting the vehicle.
On the way back home I decided I would try out the four wheel drive, and ensure everything was working properly. I drove back past my house and into an empty dirt lot, covered with grass and lots of tumble weeds. I have walked through this area before and didn’t see anything big, just tumble weeds and grass.
Well I drive into the lot and engage 4 high. Works fine. Keep in mind it's pretty dark out, and cloudy. I go a little further, and engage 4 low. I decide to drive it back towards the road, but I have to go over this big tumbleweed. Well when I drive into the tumbleweed, apparently it was concealing a large rock. I hear a bang and a scrape. So I stopped immediately and looked under the jeep, it wasn’t my rig so I didn't want to damage anything.
Turns out I drove the driver side control arm onto a rock. Now this isn’t my rig, and I didn't want to potentially damage anything by driving it off the rock, which would have been very doable. So I jogged back to my garage and drove the owner back out to the lot in my jeep.
I explained what happened and asked him to drive it off the rock. Well, I don't know what to say about him other than he just made the situation a lot worse, and basically moved the rock against his front diff, leaving both front and rear tires without traction, after the wheel spin. In hindsight I should have driven it off the rock myself, but it's too late now.
At this point we decided it would be best for me to pull his jeep from the rear with a tow strap. And we did so. I pulled him in reverse and freed his jeep completely. BUT while he was reversing back to the street, he somehow ended up running over another rock all together. I watched as he attempted to "rock" the jeep out, and what he ended up doing was scraping the undercarriage of the jeep on this second rock. He was rallying it pretty good, rolling the rock with him as he went forward and backwards. Eventually he worked it to the side and was able to turn, and pivot around the new rock. I had suggested we just move the second rock, but the owner decided against it. It would have been easy to slide it from out under his jeep.
So the jeep is finally freed and we drive it back to my garage and inspect it for damages. Both the owner and I crawl under to look at the jeep, and we both agree there is no damage, other than some light scraping on the front diff, control arm, and unibody. All is well.
My finacee and I tell the owner that we are going to sleep on it, and we'll call him with our decision the next afternoon. Fast forward to the next day (today), and like I stated the previous day, I called him with our decision. My fiancee and I agreed we should offer $1400 for this jeep, which is the Kelly Blue Book private party value. The owner tells me he has someone else interested who wants to look at it, and he'll think about it and get back to me. He mentions nothing about the condition of the jeep, or any problems.
Several hours later he calls me and says my fiancee and I should come over to his house and discuss my offer. We agree and go over there a few hours later, after I got off work.
When we arrive, little did we know, we were in for a surprise. The owner tells us there is much more damage to the jeep, supposedly caused by last night adventure. He tells me that one of the rear shocks is really scraped up, and the muffler is dented. I look under the jeep and verify this is true, the shock has a scrape that took off the white paint, and the muffler has a couple small dents in it. He implied this was my fault. Although he was the one who caused the damage while driving the jeep out, I do accept responsibility for putting him in that situation and have no problem with paying for him to get a new shock and muffler, if we decide not to buy the jeep.
BUT here's where it gets good. He lives about 9 miles from my house, while driving the jeep home last night, he claims it was driving great until he got about 1/4 mile from his house, and the clutch went to the floor, and would not shift.
I immediately checked for clutch fluid, which were was none. We filled it up and the clutch began working just fine. We test drove it for about 3 miles. The owner pointed my attention to two lines going into the AX15 transmission. I crawled under there and looked. On the driver side of the trans, there are two places which it looks like a hardline connects to. One of the ends didn’t have anything connected to it. I am unfamiliar with the AX15, so I am assuming the line with no hose connected to it, is possibly a breather tube, only with no rubber line running up to the engine bay. Is this correct?
The other hardline right next to it, I traced, it was hard, then went to rubber, and up to the master cylinder/clutch area in the engine bay. I noticed there was fluid leaking from this line. It went into this rubber gasket thing on the transmission. I was able to move it several inches in and out of the trans. I do not know if this is normal or not. I did notice that it appeared to have been slightly leaking for some time. It did not appear as if a bunch of fluid had suddenly poured out.
Like I said, after we added more fluid to the clutch reservoir, it started working fine again. I do not know what the problem is, and was hoping someone here could point me in the right direction as to why the reservoir lost all its fluid. Does the line need to be replaced? What are the two lines, that goes into the rubber gasket thing, coming off the AX15 for?
The owner was implying that whatever went wrong with the clutch was also my fault. I will accept responsibility for the shock and muffler, but I do not think the clutch failing was caused by me. I believe it was just a coincidence. We do not even know exactly what is wrong, which is why I'm posting here. I hope that someone can help me out.
The owner and I agreed to take the jeep to a mechanic tomorrow, see what he says, and we'll go from there.
Help me out guys. What's wrong with this jeep, and do you think I caused whatever is making the clutch not work properly? Oh I also checked and there was no fluid running into the fuse box.
I found an ad in the local paper for an 89 Cherokee. Last night they brought it over so we could take a look at it.
It's a 1989 Cherokee, Inline 6, manual AX15 transmission, 4x4 w/ vac disconnect front axel, manual windows/locks, new O2 sensor and new muffler. It has a 2" block in the rear and 2" coil spacer in the front, sporting 31" Toyo ATs with 60% tread. The paint is very faded, and 159k miles. Also has idiot gauges. AC works and blows cold, recently serviced. Clutch supposedly replaced 1.5 years ago. No service records of any kind. Owner was asking $2,000.
After inspecting this jeep in my garage, I noticed it needed a few things. The coolant was very brown, and the breather tube on the front of the head was broken off. Also the rear hatch shocks were not working, and a few other minor things.
I asked to drive the vehicle, and the owner tossed me the keys and said have at it, and did not express interest in coming with me. So I went out for a couple miles and drove on the highway. The motor is quiet, ran smooth, and had plenty of power. The transmission shifted smoothly, was crisp, and didn’t appear to have any problems. I did not check the clutch fluid when inspecting the vehicle.
On the way back home I decided I would try out the four wheel drive, and ensure everything was working properly. I drove back past my house and into an empty dirt lot, covered with grass and lots of tumble weeds. I have walked through this area before and didn’t see anything big, just tumble weeds and grass.
Well I drive into the lot and engage 4 high. Works fine. Keep in mind it's pretty dark out, and cloudy. I go a little further, and engage 4 low. I decide to drive it back towards the road, but I have to go over this big tumbleweed. Well when I drive into the tumbleweed, apparently it was concealing a large rock. I hear a bang and a scrape. So I stopped immediately and looked under the jeep, it wasn’t my rig so I didn't want to damage anything.
Turns out I drove the driver side control arm onto a rock. Now this isn’t my rig, and I didn't want to potentially damage anything by driving it off the rock, which would have been very doable. So I jogged back to my garage and drove the owner back out to the lot in my jeep.
I explained what happened and asked him to drive it off the rock. Well, I don't know what to say about him other than he just made the situation a lot worse, and basically moved the rock against his front diff, leaving both front and rear tires without traction, after the wheel spin. In hindsight I should have driven it off the rock myself, but it's too late now.
At this point we decided it would be best for me to pull his jeep from the rear with a tow strap. And we did so. I pulled him in reverse and freed his jeep completely. BUT while he was reversing back to the street, he somehow ended up running over another rock all together. I watched as he attempted to "rock" the jeep out, and what he ended up doing was scraping the undercarriage of the jeep on this second rock. He was rallying it pretty good, rolling the rock with him as he went forward and backwards. Eventually he worked it to the side and was able to turn, and pivot around the new rock. I had suggested we just move the second rock, but the owner decided against it. It would have been easy to slide it from out under his jeep.
So the jeep is finally freed and we drive it back to my garage and inspect it for damages. Both the owner and I crawl under to look at the jeep, and we both agree there is no damage, other than some light scraping on the front diff, control arm, and unibody. All is well.
My finacee and I tell the owner that we are going to sleep on it, and we'll call him with our decision the next afternoon. Fast forward to the next day (today), and like I stated the previous day, I called him with our decision. My fiancee and I agreed we should offer $1400 for this jeep, which is the Kelly Blue Book private party value. The owner tells me he has someone else interested who wants to look at it, and he'll think about it and get back to me. He mentions nothing about the condition of the jeep, or any problems.
Several hours later he calls me and says my fiancee and I should come over to his house and discuss my offer. We agree and go over there a few hours later, after I got off work.
When we arrive, little did we know, we were in for a surprise. The owner tells us there is much more damage to the jeep, supposedly caused by last night adventure. He tells me that one of the rear shocks is really scraped up, and the muffler is dented. I look under the jeep and verify this is true, the shock has a scrape that took off the white paint, and the muffler has a couple small dents in it. He implied this was my fault. Although he was the one who caused the damage while driving the jeep out, I do accept responsibility for putting him in that situation and have no problem with paying for him to get a new shock and muffler, if we decide not to buy the jeep.
BUT here's where it gets good. He lives about 9 miles from my house, while driving the jeep home last night, he claims it was driving great until he got about 1/4 mile from his house, and the clutch went to the floor, and would not shift.
I immediately checked for clutch fluid, which were was none. We filled it up and the clutch began working just fine. We test drove it for about 3 miles. The owner pointed my attention to two lines going into the AX15 transmission. I crawled under there and looked. On the driver side of the trans, there are two places which it looks like a hardline connects to. One of the ends didn’t have anything connected to it. I am unfamiliar with the AX15, so I am assuming the line with no hose connected to it, is possibly a breather tube, only with no rubber line running up to the engine bay. Is this correct?
The other hardline right next to it, I traced, it was hard, then went to rubber, and up to the master cylinder/clutch area in the engine bay. I noticed there was fluid leaking from this line. It went into this rubber gasket thing on the transmission. I was able to move it several inches in and out of the trans. I do not know if this is normal or not. I did notice that it appeared to have been slightly leaking for some time. It did not appear as if a bunch of fluid had suddenly poured out.
Like I said, after we added more fluid to the clutch reservoir, it started working fine again. I do not know what the problem is, and was hoping someone here could point me in the right direction as to why the reservoir lost all its fluid. Does the line need to be replaced? What are the two lines, that goes into the rubber gasket thing, coming off the AX15 for?
The owner was implying that whatever went wrong with the clutch was also my fault. I will accept responsibility for the shock and muffler, but I do not think the clutch failing was caused by me. I believe it was just a coincidence. We do not even know exactly what is wrong, which is why I'm posting here. I hope that someone can help me out.
The owner and I agreed to take the jeep to a mechanic tomorrow, see what he says, and we'll go from there.
Help me out guys. What's wrong with this jeep, and do you think I caused whatever is making the clutch not work properly? Oh I also checked and there was no fluid running into the fuse box.
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