Bikley

I'll start with a little history. I have a 94 GMC Safari AWD that i dearly love. Recently a cheap Chinese radiator ate my lovingly rebuilt 4L60E and we were in need of a running vehicle. Enter my new love. We bought this Jeep cheap because it has what some may see as major problems.

The front end is shot and it leaks oil like a sieve but it runs and drives! Needless to say a lot of other problems have surfaced since we bought it, but it's so easy to work on. As I go I'll discuss the work we have done so far and what we plan for the future. I'm very enthused about making a quarter million mile Jeep run like new and I think we are off to a good start!

94zj318

Welcome to the Club! The 4.0L I6 is a VERY reliable engine, and as long as you take care of it, it'll run well past 350k. I've owned a GMT400 Chevy K1500 with the 4L60-E and almost 306k miles on it when I sold it. It was still shifting well, but was likely on its way out, which is one of the reasons I sold it. The 42RE in these Jeeps (along with the Selec-Trac system if you have a Laredo) is great, and is probably a bit more reliable than the 4L60-E.

-Vince

Bikley

Thanks Vince. Yes it's a Laredo. Even though it has a lot of things to address this Jeep is pretty solid. The body is straight and the interior is in pretty good condition. It shifts nice and the engine runs really well considering it has 246,000 miles on the clock.

When we got it I'm assuming the PO had cleared the codes because within a couple days the check engine light came on.
P1282, (fuel pump relay circuit)
P0138, (downstream O2 sensor)
And the dreaded P0455, (large evap leak)
A new fuel pump and new O2 sensors, I replaced both, solved the first 2 problems but the P0455 was a bit more of a challenge. We started with the gas cap and then moved on to the rubber connectors between the PVC lines. Still no joy.

Finally we took the front bumper off and found one of the hoses into the canister was rotted through. After replacing that we thought it was fixed. Nope, the next day it came back. Finally we took the bumper back off and pulled the canister out and found a hole on the backside. How that happened we will never know. I had a roll of JB Weld fuel resistant epoxy so I patched the hole and wrapped a good amount of box tape (all I had at the moment) around it and Viola! No more evap leak.

Bikley

Next up was the cooling system. When I took the radiator cap off there was a lot of rusty sludge in it, so I drained it and flushed the system with a solution of 2 cups of powdered dishwasher soap dissolved in a gallon of hot water. Dishwasher soap works really well because it has degreaser in it and it doesn't foam. Don't ever use regular dish soap. After driving it and getting it good and hot we drained it and filled it with plain water and drove it some more. After draining it again we used a flush kit and ran it until the water came out clear. At this point we discovered a leak where the aluminum part of the radiator meets the plastic part.

I was not about to repeat the nightmare I had with my Safari so I bought an all aluminum 3 core radiator, new lifetime warranty water pump and a new thermostat and housing. I have to say that so far I'm very pleased with the results. No more rusty sludge, just nice green coolant and it runs at a steady 195-200 degrees.

Bikley

After putting in a brand new set of Champions, new wires and cap and rotor it's purring like a kitten. Now it's time for emissions.

Not so fast! Looking under it we discovered that the muffler was split at the seam. The downpipe and tailpipe are still solid but the muffler had a lot of rust, so after pricing them we ended up with an inexpensive Thrush cherry bomb. I actually like the way it sounds. Off to emissions we go.

HC: Pass
CO: Pass
NOX: Fail!

So far I have ran a can of BG 44K through it and dumped a quart of water down the intake. That helped a little but it failed again.

We took it out driving with the scanner hooked up and the fuel trims were all over the place. We noticed before that we had a rattle that seemed to come from the exhaust so with the stethoscope I isolated the cat as the source. When we took it off big chunks of honeycomb came out! We replaced the cat and the MAP sensor and now everything seems to be working correctly.

We haven't retested it since we replaced the cat but I'm pretty confident that it will pass this time around.

Bikley

Now I'll talk about the things to come.

The steering wheel is off so we took it to be aligned. Nope. They had a laundry list and dollar signs in their eyes. We politely said thanks but no thanks and went on our way.

After some thought and pricing I bought a TRQ kit from Parts Geek. Rock Auto won't ship to my zip code so I have to go elsewhere.

I'm aware that sealed parts wear out quicker but we are still dealing with a budget and going piece by piece got costly real fast.

Otherwise does anyone have an opinion either way on TRQ parts? We bought the TRQ shocks too.

At the same time while we have the steering stuff out of the way we'll change the oil pan gasket and that will take care of the major problems. Later when the budget allows we'll work our way back and do new motor and trans mounts and rear sway bar links and bushings.

Bikley

Here's a couple pictures of our "new" Jeep.