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Rework cost 3x as much as doing it right the first time.
(as long as you know what you're doing)
Update June 16, 2019
First full refill of the fuel tank. 602 miles traveled, 30.5 gallons added, 19.7 mpg! Not bad. All commuting and random driving, zero sustained hwy miles.
Update June 18, 2019
I spent a few hours building half my exhaust. It's so much quieter. The only problem is that now I can hear all the other squeaks and noises the Jeep is making.
Pay no attention to that weld wire exhaust hanger. I need more time to build the hangers and get isolators.
Update June 23, 2019
Took the Jeep out to the woods for a night of camping and climbed some pretty good hills up to about 3000'. Nothing that needed 4WD, but it was long 1st gear climbs. Highest temps yet at 185F water and almost 900F EGT. Still well within reason. Makes me think that a radiator shroud would help for those slow hill climbs.
On the way back I rolled the scale. Just me, some gear, some tools, and 3/4 fuel:
2650 front
2400 rear
5050 both
As I was leaving the scale I finally had a flat, straight, no traffic on ramp, so I did a 0-60 test with the stopwatch on my phone.
17.95 seconds. She's not a drag racer at all. I used an online calculator and working backwards that means I have about 104 HP at the crank.
If that's true, and I can actually turn up the fuel to 200 HP, my 0-60 time will drop to 10.9 seconds. Still not blistering, but decent.
Update 8-18-2019:
This is by no means a complete list of parts that I've bought for this project, but it is most of the big stuff. It's listed here for me as a reference just as much as it is for you if you're curious.
Update 2-14-20
Once it started raining and getting cold, the Jeep has been parked. I decided on a whim to drive it home for a weekend in February and it was really cold and hard to see out the windows if you breathe. My first step was to block off the holes in the firewall with cardboard. It was like driving around with the windows open in 41F weather. My daughter was not a big fan of the ride at all. Even with blankets. I really need heat, more importantly defrost so I can see if I'm going to drive it in the wintertime. The biggest dread in my head is that the heater coil housing is going to interfere with my custom intake pipe that I'm so proud of. I also have no idea how much time I need to spend refurbishing one of the two heater coil housings I have to pick from.
So the good news is that I didn't have to modify the heater core box or my intake pipe! It went in so well that I took a short cut getting hot water to it. This is just a quick fix to get me down the road, but it works awesome. So the heater controls operate on vacuum if you didn't know about 70's jeeps. This is a problem with diesels as there's not a good vacuum source on the motor. Those smart Japanese knew that and put a vacuum pump on the back of the alternator, most likely for the brake system in the medium duty trucks these motors lived in. I converted to hydroboost, but I used the vacuum source to power my heater vent controls. Today, 2/14/20, I drove my daughter to school then my self to work with the defrost blasting in a nice and warm vehicle. After I properly wire in the heater fan switch (you don't want to see how it's wired right now) then I'll get some 5/8 SS tube and make a proper and nice metal routing for the heater lines. I think I also could use a new thermostat as I'm only seeing a max of 155F coolant temp. I think the spec is 185F (85C). I know they wear out and this one could be and probably is the original '89 unit. The only other thing the wife and daughter demand is a radio. If I do that, maybe they'll ride with me!
Fuel update: 598 miles driven, 25.7 gallons added, 23.3 mpg. (last fill up 6 months, 10 days prior)
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