swapdip

In other news, that LSD sticker has to be the toughest part of these trucks, they never fall off!

OK cool thanks Im gonna go for it

Hey guys is there any difference between torque converters from an auto 2x4 and 4x4? Talking about 1st gen, 90-95 model. Thanks

Any other ideas?

Firing order is correct yes, timing belt also correct. I actually made a lot of notes when I did the timing belt last spring, recorded how many teeth need to be between the cam marks and crank mark, so we are good on that. As for the distributor, we have been twisting it around trying to find the right spot, so far we can get it to run "better," but still not great. And yeah I thought it was kind of weird that the flex plate might be rubbing making that clanging sound, but the entire torque converter shifts around when accelerating in neutral, more than it should, which indicated to me that something must be off. Flex plate was just a guess, thats all.

OK so after my timing belt tentioner bolt snapped on me, I undertook the long and painful process of saving money for a new engine, getting it shipped up here, getting some guys to help me take the old one out, new one in, now everything is all buttoned up but we still have a few issues, perhaps you guys could lend some advice. My truck is a 1990 4x4 auto, and we stuck in a 1995 2wd auto engine, took a little bit of finesse but we got it in. Last week, the truck would start up pretty easily, but not rev very high. Took the front end apart and found the tbelt was off a tooth, ok that got sorted out now it runs better, however we still can't get it above 35mph, it feels like a vacuum leak but we checked real hard for that, found none. The truck still runs very sub par, wants to stall after revving it hard, lopes at idle. The truck runs better the further we twist the distributor, but we have already twisted it much farther than it was in the previous engine. It is the 90 distributor which we are using in the 95 engine. In a few days they are coming back and we are going to try and advance the distributor even more, see if that helps out. However, I was wondering since we had the intake manifold off the 1990 which was in much better condition, we put that on the 95 motor. That includes sensors wiring and all. Are there small differences in the design of the intake manifold or the distributor from 90-95 which might make it run like this? The truck is throwing no codes so I am disinclined to think it is a MAF or TPS or another sensor. Also I should point out that the gas in the tank is about 5 months old, I topped it off with 3 more gallons of fresh gas and about a third of a bottle of octane booster, no steam noted from the exhaust so i dont think there is water in there. Also I know gas loses its potency after a while, but I have run much crankier engines on much older gas before, and I am hesitant to just blame it on bad gas. Gas pressure is good, spark is good and strong. Additionally, there is a knocking coming from the torque converter below 500rpms. It is a hell of a knocking, and we have been hesitant to run it too far while it is doing this, the bolts are tight but maybe there is a bent part of the flex plate banging around down there? We are also going to investigate that. One of the guys thinks that these problems are related but I am not so sure. Do you guys see any flaws in our methodology? We are all three shadetree mechanics and not entirely sure what the problem could be. Advancing the distributor even more might help us out, and I think we are going to open up the torque converter to see what the hell is making all that racket, but I am not very confident in these solution's ability to make the truck run right again. Any advice would be more than appreciated. Thanks

Cool thanks guys wish me luck

From the book: "Check the deflection of the timing belt by applying 22 lbs of force midway between the camshaft pulleys. The belt should deflect 0.512 to 0.571 inches, 13-14.5mm." Also as a side note, make sure that your tensioner bolt is not actually an old exhaust manifold bolt. The PO of my truck used an exhaust bolt on the tensioner, which I failed to notice when I did my TB, so just 2000 miles after installation it snapped and now I am replacing the engine.

Can I put a engine from a 95 2wd manual tranny vehicle into my 90 4wd auto vehicle, and if so what mods will be necessary? Thanks

Well hell I might just toss in the towel then. Trying to extract that broken bolt I snapped off my extractor inside the engine block, now I'm kicking myself and wishing I had either more experience or more money to do the job right. I might hang around craigslist and look for a pathy with a bad tranny or something to grab on the cheap, but failing that you might see me parting out my poor truck on this forum sooner or later. Feeling super goddamm frustrated. For the time being however, Ive got the Suzuki to get around on, and I am courting my neighbor to let go of a super grown in 2 door for a handful of quarters. Who knows what will happen... Thanks anyways guys

OK, so after replacing my timing belt I experienced a failure roughly 2000 miles later. At the moment of failure the engine simply cut off, no noise of metal smashing or anything like that, and subsequent efforts to start the truck resulted in that "freewheeling" sound which indicated to me that the crank is no longer connected to the cams, hence no compression. I did not hear any sound of pinging or knocking, and I know what an engine sounds like when a spark plug is inserted that is too long, and I expected to hear something like that if there was significant valve contact. So I took it all apart today and I noticed that the tensioner retaining bolt had completely sheared off, skewing the angle of the tensioner and disintegrating the belt. Well, that ought to do it. Not sure how that happened, the bolt, altho old, was inserted by hand to make sure no stripping occurred, and then torqued to 38 ft lb or whatever the Haynes manual said, and then it was good for almost 2000 miles. The tension was correct with the allen hole at 5 oclock, but whatever, on to more important things. I turned the crank by hand, and it turns about as freely as you would expect with the plugs removed. The passenger side cam also turned as freely as I remember, with the indicative "clunking" into place every 15 degrees or so. So I took the valve cover off and everything basically looked like it should, no damage perceived up there. Valve guides and rockers moved as they ought to when I rotated the cam, everything operated symmetrically and freely. I am wary to remove the head to check the condition of the pistons, so I looked around in the spark plug hole and felt in there with a magnet, resulting in nothing I could perceive, altho you all know how recessed those holes are and difficult it is to look inside. Removing the head is something I'm not sure I can do at this moment without some help, never done it before except on little motorcycles, so my question is, does this information so far indicate to you fellows that perhaps I lucked out and all my truck needs is a new belt? Should I do any further diagnostic work at the present moment, or should I proceed now to drilling out that retainer bolt, slapping on a new belt and checking compression? I know I may be grasping at straws here, and believe me I am considering the idea that I am kidding myself about ever running this engine again, however karma does favor the meek and I am meek as a motherf#cker. Thanks guys

I took the Pathfinder to Bonnaroo a couple times, using it to sleep in. On the first morning at 8AM we woke up completely drenched in sweat, it must have already been well above 110 in there with 3 people... thats TN for you. So we taped a bunch of tin foil all over the roof, windows, etc. Not only did it make the Pathfinder super easy to spot in a sea of cars, but it kept it cool and dark well until our hangovers wore off. These days I search high and low for the parking lot with shade.

Riding my bike the other day, I noticed a fairly grown in 2 door on a neighbor's front yard partially hidden by a bush. His pit bulls kept me at bay, but it seemed fairly complete, not rusty (from a distance of 15 feet, anyways), good glass and tires, and a pretty attractive gray color. I'm thinking about asking him about it, and trying to get it to run, and failing that maybe parting it out on this site and then ditching the undesirable parts for scrap. Given that a rolling frame is worth $200 at the scrap yard, what do you guys think is the most I should pay for it? Is it a worthy venture? Is there much desire here for a parted out 2 door? And would you guys be interested in helping me get it on the road, if its still in good enough condition? The summer is looming and idle hands are the devils advocate, after all.

OK so about 2500 miles after replacing my timing belt, I was cruising at around 50mph and the truck just shut off, subsequent attempts to start it revealed no compression, like all of my drive belts were rotating but unusually quickly and it definitely sounded as if there was no compression in the engine. Also I didn't hear any knocking, bangs, pings, nothing, the truck just shut off and when i tried to restart it, all I heard was the noise of the starter, nothing grinding or banging. So I got it towed home and I pulled all the plugs, no damage to any of them, and I fished around in all cylinders with a tiny magnet and was unable to catch any little bits of metal. My plan is to take apart the front again and see what happened to the timing belt, replace it and patch everything up again and then do a compression test. Unfortunately this all happened when we are in the middle of a move (now we have to finish moving our furniture in the back of a Mazda 323)so I can't do any serious automotive work until next weekend, but my question is given the fact that I found no metal in the cylinders and I heard no alarming noises when the truck shut off, what is the likelihood that I managed to escape serious damage?

+1 on DoctorBill's authority, altho you don't need to purchase a brand new cooler like he did. I pulled a tranny cooler out of a Ford Explorer in the junkyard, spent about 8 bucks on 2 3' lengths of transmission fluid line, and rigged mine up in front of my radiators, works great. It's actually a fairly simple procedure, check out the writeup and ask if you have any further questions.

Quite a charitable fellow

Once on our way out to Bonnaroo I got pulled over in the typical corridor for speeding, anyways I made the mistake of leaving some rolling papers on the dashboard and that brought out the dogs. Well, we were a bunch of stoners with a lot to hide, but luckily we jammed everything into a peanut butter jar. The cops took apart every single thing we owned, and once when one of the cops was holding that peanut butter jar my heart was ready to leap out of my chest, later my gf told me I was looking super vascular because my heartrate must have been a mile a minute. Anyways fortunately they passed it over and we were released without even a speeding ticket. I will say one thing tho, Tennessee cops are true gentlemen. Even tho we beat them this time they were very polite and professional, I have a lot of respect for them. So yeah lesson learned if you are going to drive halfway across the country in a truck full of tye dye on your way to the biggest festival in the country, take it easy on the throttle.

MAF is clean, I cleaned the connections and the sensor wires with some alcohol and a qtip when I first discovered this issue. Any other thoughts?

OK guys, after replacing my timing belt, dist cap, rotor, thermostat, 6 Autolite platinum plugs, my truck runs great but idles a little strangely. With the AC comp on everything is smooth as butter, but idling without the AC on, it will stay at 800rpm, but dip down to about 650rpm once every 2 seconds or so. Cold starts are a little rougher, and every now again the engine will die if I shift into reverse too quickly. But the truck always starts right up, pulls smooth and hard throughout the powerband, gets decent MPG, MAF sensor is clean, injector cleaner passed thru every 3000 miles, so all that should be good. This isn't such a big problem but it can get annoying sometimes to always be hearing the engine dip and surge, dip and surge, and I'd like to get it worked out to how it was since before the timing belt change. I posted a timing belt video in the how to section that shows everything I did to the truck, it is a 1990 so I didn't set the timing, anyone else had this problem or have any ideas of things I should look for? Thanks

Thanks Greg found it

I noticed an unaccounted-for vacuum nipple back by my #6 spark plug, no super obvious vacuum lines lying about, where does it want to go to? Thanks

Unfortunately I can't say from whence that alternator came, it was there when I bought the truck. But yes at idle speed it is at 12v or less, and doesn't produce anything until I get it going. If you want I can look into it, but more likely than not you are right.

Yeah you have fuel injection... so I guess like me you won't need to time your truck after timing belt changes, something I just learned actually. Also yes I do have the spark plug puller, however I ruined it last month while using it as a breaker bar. It is still employed as a breaker bar, and one time as an aggressive dog deterrent, however as a spark puller it has passed its usefulness.

Cool that was exactly my intention with this video, I know I didn't do everything orthodox but it worked out so hopefully some other people can find a way to use the experience. BTW, if you ever wanted to know how to synchronize the carbs on a motorcycle, or appraise the condition of an old bike, or make compost in your backyard, or disassemble and clean motorcycle carbs, I have videos for all of those too on youtube. And more to come, yes many more to come.

We can go halves on the distribution rights.... BTW try out that trick with the transmission hose, it has helped me out a ton and made getting in those back plugs so much easier. Good luck on the repairs!