January 2nd
This is what happens when you *think* you have it together right.
Healthy

Unhealthy

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January 21st
So, I had a transmission adventure. I learned that the trans in the car was severely overheated. "Cooked" would be a good description. So, I went back to the car wreckers and traded them for a (presumably) good transmission. That went well, and I brought the new one home and began dissection so I could install the new output shaft. That went well also, I was practiced now. The new trans was not overheated, but it was dirty. On the left is some of the dirt flowing out, the right is the underside of one of the cervo's. Gross.

Here is the AOD empty.

And here is all the guts on the table.

New output shaft (black) vs old.

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For anybody that thinks they *might* be up to working on your own automatic transmission, my advice is NOT TO. Here is why.

Stuff like that little ball can fall out. Then what, your up ____ creek.

Or, this little cup could jump out and skitter across the shop floor, narrowly missing a hole in the floor drain.

I do not know 100% if mine will work properly, which could turn into alot of hassle.

Here we are, assembled and washed, and painted.

Pretty blue engine.

I hope this to get the engine and trans in this weekend!
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The next weekend.
It has been a LONG time since I updated this page.
The engine went in. Exhaust manifold VS. steering linkage, engine mounts got built to deal with that. Then the other exhaust manifold VS. frame rail. I cut a bit out of the frame rail to clear exhaust. My awesome wheeling buddy lent a huge hand and extended my manifold for me.

Remote oil filter.

Lower Rad hose.

Tire groovers can do some damage!

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April 6th
Trans lines took way longer than I planned, But I'm happy with them. I ran hard line to the up to back of the engine then went with soft line to the cooler.

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Updated April 13th
Ahhh the joys of wiring. Me and my Dad managed to get it all buttoned up, and we did it right. But when we went to start it up we didn't have spark.... :(
Turned out to be a bad coil! I robbed the one off my old 2.9 and VROOOM she fired up! It kicked so much ass.

I decided to 'modify' the power steering bracket where the alternator bolts on. The bolt that had been in there was about 9" long which ment when I wanted to change the alternator I had to remove the radiator. That would suck. So I zip-disced' part of the bracket off so I could put a bolt in from the backside.

Here is what the engine side of the rad is going to look like. Trans cooler on the passenger side, and 10" fan on the drivers side. I ran one 3 1/2" bolt through the fins on the rad to get to the blue angle iron. (Easier to make three holes line up than four)

And here is something that I *had* been worried about. I was worried where I was going to find a hose that had a bend in it greater than 90deg to fasten on to the rad. Lucky for me I stumbled upon this one at Gregg's Distributors. (1.5" ID, Goodyear Molded Radhose, pt# 61086) I had to splice it to get the correct fit form myself, but, does that fit good or what??? (On the right is how much material I removed from the hose)

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April 17th
Transmission shifter.

Once I finish the throttle cable it can drive all on it's own!
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Here is just a random, in the shop mid-progress picture.

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I was not overly impressed with the adaptor I bought from Advanced Adaptors.  It was transmission specific and there was no instructions whatsoever (that didn't stop me obviously, just slowed down abit, lol)  and I had to modify my T-case shifter, which was just another chore. 

I got the engine running, but chased gremlins for most of the summer.  This is what happens when you dont have a running donor.  Lotsa chaseing gremlins. 

A big bad ugly gremlin came in the form of the 60 pin connector to the Computer, the female sides of the pins were not makeing contact, so I crimped them a tiny bit with snap ring pliers.  That helped alot!  I also had a failed fuel pressure regulator, and was running at 120 PSI fuel pressure, thus overfuling 3X as much as I needed.  These were only a few of the gremlins I had to fight with.  I'm still not 100% happy.

If you do a swap, be patient and get a good running donor that has been rolled or something.

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To be continued.

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Page 1: The Beginning,
Page 2: The Lift Build
Page 3: The Bumper Build
Page 4: Summer of 07' Wheeling
Page 5: Fall of 07' Wheeling
Page 6: Winter of 07' Work
Page 7: Ongoing/Winter of 08' Work - YOU ARE HERE X
Page 8: A cool day of work
Page 9: Uploads for other pages, Ignore...