Do I need to drop tranny cross member to pull the engine?

Do I need to drop tranny cross member to pull the engine? My buddy blew his motor(4.0l i6) I have a spare in the garage. When I pulled that one, I pulled the tranny and engine together. This time I just want to repace the motor. How much of the transmisson and transfer case do I have to take appart, to pull just the engine. Any suggestions would be great. Thanks John McHorney

Unbolt the bellhousing from the engine. Removing the header panel and the hood won't go amiss, either...

The engine should just pull right out. If you have an automatic, you'll be better off unbolting the torque converter before you pull it - sometimes, they spill...

5-90

I have an auto 88 4.0l. I will unbolt the torque convertor. Thanks, I thought that was all I needed to do. This will be my first engine swap.

Personally, I like to pull the header, grille, and radiator. I then pull the engine with the tranny and tcase. It is just easier than trying to stab a tranny in the vehicle. With an automatic, I might leave the tranny, but it is so easy to pull it all together, I tend to do it that way.

I agree with Old Man, the less things in your way the easier it is to manuver the motor around. And with the header ect.. off, its easy to do the whole swap at once, its nice and fast to put in the tranny, tc and motor all in one peice. And buttoning up the front end is nice since you can stand and sit to do it.
Good Luck which ever way you go.

Same here I like to R&R the engine and trans as a unit, less chance of messing something up re-connecting the transmission when you can see what your doing.

When I worked in dealerships, we always took out just the engine, it is less work...especially with 4x4 transfer case.
Tip: at home, I have two floor jacks and four jack stands (tall HD ones). Also 1/2" Air impact wrench with 3 foot long extension...1/2 in to 3/8 in....and 3/8 inch impact wobble sockets for the bell housing bolts/screws.
Tip: lower the trans if you have to (a little)...get the top bolts and then put it back up.

YES...undo the the torque converter...don't let it slip out and spill oil all over the place.

Have only done a few motors at home, but about 500+ in shops.

i just swapped out a motor in one of my '92s. I went with Old Mans method.

It gave me the opportunity to 'see' how everything is bolted together as well as how all the lines and wires run. I think that will help me in future trouble shooting sessions. Before I did not have the visual picture of routing/connection of the different sensors what not.

I did not have to worry about supporting the transmission (or the failing of my support). I did not think is was too much more work to pull as a unit and the time I saved in bolting the tranny up to the replacement engine outside the engine bay with GREAT EASE vs the time I may have had trying to reconnect with the tranny in the vehicle paid great dividends. Also, the two top bolts in the bell housing to motor connection can be difficult. and since a previous owner had stripped the head of one of the bolts...........it took me about 2 hours to get one of the bolts out....trips to the tool stores for a 'magic' tool to vise grips to finally my next to last choice of tools...chisel and hammer to turn the bolt out. (last was to shear the head off the bolt and then remove after separating the tranny) Obviously I would never had gotten the bolts out without pulling the tranny/engine unit.

Just a word of advice from a novice....I have pulled a few engines in my life....this time I bought a container of colored nylon zip ties. I zip tied both the wire and it's connection or the vacuum line and it's connection with the same color zip tie as well as wrote down each step (I am a little retentive) in a spiral note book, and put the fasteners in ziplock bags marked what they were for and numbered the bags as well. Then when it was time to reinstall, I just reversed my itemized list of tasks as well as used the bags to reverse my sequence of removal. It may have taken me a little longer to do the job, but it was the BEST and smoothest motor swap in my life. I will always do it this way from now on. The list and numbering of bags helped keep me from putting the cart before the horse and allowed me to pick up right where I left off when I was distracted from my task at hand and the colored zip ties allowed me to quickly reconnect all connections as well as provided me with a visual alert. since I was removing all zip ties as I reconnected.....if I saw a zip tie I quickly realized I missed a connection.

Just an all round better way.......for me atleast.

Sorry for all the blah blah blah long post.