Well I guess I need to say this to follow up.
The Comanche I was so excited about, as it seems so were some of you... Well as you can see its back in the driveway with the hood up. Things are, well, not so good.
I don’t remember where I left off. Saturday I got the water pump and radiator install done, and filled the cooling system. It took the full rated capacity so I figured it was good. I’m pretty sure it was full, at least. It started rough a couple times during the burping process, and then it didn’t want to start at all when I tried for a test drive, but it was late so I called it a night.
Sunday morning I put new plugs, wires, cap, and rotor on, then drove it to the gas station. It was still not the greatest start. It almost immediately started pushing out coolant, but I expected that, as I’d left the overflow hose off due to not wanting to suck the musky nasty from it back into the cooling engine. It died twice on the way there coming to a stop, the first time I started it back up on the key after ~10 seconds, but the second time I just clutched back out in second and bumped it back to life. Just before I got to the gas station, the temp gauge pegged itself, at which point I knew something wasn’t right, at all.
I got it going again after topping up (good news, the gas gauge seems fairly accurate) and drove home, but didn’t make it. I coasted over to the side of the road, and left it there for a couple hours. Then I came back to this:
I have a new head gasket set coming, and hopefully a bolt set (we’re not positive on this, I’ve ordered a set for a “2.5L ‘96 Wrangler”... whatever that is, because I couldn’t find a listing for a ‘91 MJ.) and I’m about to start the tear-down.
As much as I want it to only be the gasket, I’ve got a gut feeling it’s far worse than that.
I has a sad, Oppo.
:’(