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4.2 swap, Weber 38, Nutter bypass??

10K views 57 replies 10 participants last post by  Bigdog223344 
#1 ·
Picking up a completely rebuilt 1985 4.2l tomorrow to throw in my 1985 CJ7. I'm sure with enough swearing and a BFH, we can get this thing installed.

On top of this thing will sit a nice shiny brand new Weber 38 I bought from Tom at Redline a few months ago... Anybody needing a Weber carb, I'd highly recommend contacting Tom at Redline. Very knowledgeable, very patient, and very helpful.

My question is... With this setup, is it possible, necessary, or beneficial to do the nutter bypass?

Is there a ported vacuum line from the Weber carburetor to the distributor to advance the timing, or should I do the nutter bypass and advance the timing manually?

I'll post pictures as I go so hopefully my experience and others knowledge will help anyone who may be interested.
 

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#2 ·
Brought the motor home

Used an old 31"x10.5r15 to set the motor on in the bed of the truck. When using a tire like this, be very careful of the header and the oil filter as they both jut out the sides on the bottom. We used 2 straps to hold it down. Only had to hop out once to tighten them along the 30 mile trip.
 

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#3 ·
Disassebly

It was calling for rain all weekend, so I bought a temporary garage from harbor freight that seems to work pretty well:

http://www.harborfreight.com/10-ft-x-17-ft-portable-garage-62860.html

I got the jeep in the garage and began detaching the fenders, battery tray, grille, and radiator... (doesn't matter how well you drain it, you'll find yourself covered in some sticky antifreeze)

After dismantling the whole front of the jeep, access to the motor can't be any easier. Doesn't take much time to do, and I guarantee you'll end up doing it eventually during a motor swap, so might as well do it from the start.
 

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#4 ·
Out with the old

I started the engine removal at around 10 on friday by detaching all the wires and vacuum lines and anything else that was attached to the motor.

Three Tips That Will Save You Headache:
1. TAKE LOTS OF PICTURES!!!

2. Buy a butt ton (little more than a metric ton) of different size plastic ziploc bags for bolts and misc. items.

3. Use PB Blaster on every single bolt/nut/fastener that may or may not need to come out a minimum of one night before disassembly.

The next morning began by detaching the power steering bracket and whatever I missed the night before. So the next thing we did was supported the engine with an engine hoist.

PROBLEM #1:

We used this engine hoist:
http://www.harborfreight.com/1-ton-capacity-foldable-shop-crane-69512.html

It wasn't until we got all set up ready to pull the motor until we realized the engine hoist arm was too short to reach the center of the engine from straight in front of the jeep due to the foot or so of frame that sticks out in front of the grille.

SOLUTION #1:

We took the bumper off, turned the wheels all the way to the left, and came in from an angle between the wheel and the frame. Not the optimum way of doing it, but it worked.

PROBLEM #2:

When pulling an engine, the two main connecting points are the engine mounts and the transmission bellhousing.. there are three bolts on the top of the bellhousing that are impossible to see or touch.

SOLUTION #2:

First, we had to put a bottle jack under the transfer case cross-member, and pull the 6 long bolts and rubber spacers that mount it to the frame. Then, we put another bottle jack under the front lip of the bellhousing. Using the bottle jacks to slowly lower the transmission, you can easily get to the top bolts using two 10" extensions on your ratchet/impact driver. By the way, you will be covered in grease and oil when you reach above the transmission.

I wanted to have the motor pulled by 10am in order to get the new motor inside the tent before the rain, but it was more like 1pm by the time we got it pulled due to these difficulties... Luckily the rain went just north of us.
 

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#5 ·
Motor for sale!

By the way, I am willing to part with the ol 258. She's got 140k miles, completely stock. Needed a new head gasket, so I swapped the head gasket, and in process of torquing head studs to factory spec, snapped two of them. (I suspect some brake cleaner condensed in the bolt hole instead of evaporating, and when torquing to 110 ft lbs, sealed the threads and created too much pressure.... snap!) Both bolts threaded out, and upon inspection, broke in my hand.

Motor comes as pictured (needs two studs, but I would recommend swapping all head bolts and studs for new) but includes the factory plastic valve cover, rocker arms, push rods, intake manifold, and carter bbd.

Also have the MC2100 that came on my new motor if interested. I am installing the Weber 38 I already purchased.

PM me if interested
 
#6 ·
In with the new

So, after a grueling engine removal, it was time to swap the clutch assembly to the new motor. Was going to put a brand new clutch in, but wanted the jeep done by sunday for Bantam Jeep Heritage Festival this weekend. Looking back now since it's still not quite done, I should have waited for the new clutch.

With the beautiful new AMC blue motor sitting on the back of the truck ready to roll, we used two ratchet straps to lift it. We chose ratchet straps mainly because of the angle adjustments you can make with them to seat it properly with the clutch spindle in the transmission.

Line up the clutch and pilot bearing:
We live in the middle of nowhere so "going to the parts store to get a $3 alignment tool" is not gonna happen. However, we do have youtube..

This is how I did it, and it worked flawlessly:


Damn Brits.... LOL

Take off them headers:
I had to take off the headers because you are not supposed to break in a brand new motor with brand new headers. I know many manufacturers will void the warranty on your headers if you do this. This is why I left the manifold attached to the downpipe in the engine bay.

Here she comes!:
We had to take the same angled approach with the engine hoist for the install. Slowly lowering it into place while sliding it back towards the firewall... Slowly. Inching closer and closer... then..... nothing. Can't slide it any closer. You can hear the thin teeth of the pressure plate gently tinging off the transmission clutch spindle. So, we adjusted the ratchet straps, adjusted the bottle jacks under the transmission and transfer case, got the angle right pushed the motor in.... and still nothing.

Sometimes it's better to stop, take a breather, and resume in the morning. So 7am rolls around, we try tackling the problem we aggravated with for hours the night before.... we tampered with the adjustments, and pushed for about another hour until... there it was. The gap between the motor and transmission closed up... kinda. We had to put a wrench on the crankshaft pulley and turn the motor over a little, and it slid right in to place.

I put the bolts on the sides of the bellhousing in first. Then we lowered the transmission a little and I got the three bolts in up top the same way I pulled them out. Covered in grease and oil from head to toe again, we installed the rest of the tranny bolts, and the bolts in the motor mounts.
 

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#7 ·
Nice work!

To answer one of you earlier questions...since you are installing a Weber carb, you are effectively half Nuttered already, since the ECM used to control timing and fuel both.

You might as well do the full Nutter and thereby simplify your engine greatly.

Also, I and many others prefer manifold vac to the distributor for the stronger, cooler, more efficient idle.

Hope this helps,

Matt
 
#8 ·
Looking good.
Those 3 bolts on top of the bell housing are a bugger, I have a 3ft extension that gets used for one thing.
I have also come to love real transmission jacks, I think the last time I rented one it was $15, and the guy said keep it for a couple days. They make life so much easier.
 
#9 ·
Thanks guys!
I definitely plan on doing the Nutter bypass now that I've been reading some other threads.

I have found this thread to be very interesting posted quite a few years ago by Ken4444:

http://www.jeepforum.com/forum/f8/post-nutter-bypass-wiring-removal-1094891/

I now see what you mean by simplifying the engine greatly, Matt.

Does anyone know if there are any threads like this for removing all the vacuum lines?

I also see that there are many disputes over which vacuum is better (ported or manifold)... where is the manifold-to-distributor vacuum connected on the manifold? I currently have the plug in the Weber adapter plate, I'll just leave it there I guess.

And yeah, a transmission jack would have been awesome, and definitely would have been a wiser choice, but at the time, it was much simpler to use the jacks we had than drive a 40 minutes each way to the parts store.
 
#10 ·
I will post the vacuum layout that worked great for my 258/Weber38 combo when I return home in about an hour.

Beforehand, what vacuum systems do you plan to run post Nutter? I would recommend PCV, vac advance, and the vapor canister as a bare minimum. Also the brake booster if you have one. EGR and TAC systems are optional, but iboth serve a purpose.

Matt
 
#11 ·
I will post the vacuum layout that worked great for my 258/Weber38 combo when I return home in about an hour.

Beforehand, what vacuum systems do you plan to run post Nutter? I would recommend PCV, vac advance, and the vapor canister as a bare minimum. Also the brake booster if you have one. EGR and TAC systems are optional, but iboth serve a purpose.

Matt
If there is one thing I learned, Matt has this carb stuff nailed down tight and has a diagram for many different configurations for reference. Used his extensive Weber thread to get my 38 dialed in and haven't had an issue since.
 
#15 ·
Thanks for the diagram Matt. I will let you know when I get to the TAC plumbing. When I was ordering the carburetor a few months back, Tom recommended the heavy duty needle and seat and also the factory air cleaner adapter to ensure fuel atomization in colder temps. I've read about guy's carbs turning into blocks of ice. Maybe Weber should think about making the adapters a standard item in the carb kits, and making the fancy chrome air cleaners a separate product?

Also, thank you kieth for giving me a couple solutions for the brake booster and spring mounting issues. Very clean looking. Also a very clean engine in general.
 
#16 ·
Nutter Bypass

Finally got the new motor completely hooked up and ready to rumble. Before starting it, I decided to go ahead and finish the nutter bypass that the new Weber carburetor had initiated. I spliced the famous orange and purple wires about 6" from the firewall on the passenger side, twisted the wires with a drill, and ran them across the motor to the drivers side where they will connect to the ICM.

Problem: I'm looking at the wiring harnesses going into the ICM, but there are no orange and purple wires.... There is a yellow, red, black, green, orange and a **** green looking wire. Where's the purple wire?

Solution: I took the ICM off the fender and brought it up to daylight. Using a magic eraser, I cleaned about a half inch of grime off the wires.. Still no purple wire. If you flip the module over, you can clearly see a purple wire connecting to the inside where the **** green wire was connecting. Spliced and done. Next I'll be looking at removing electrical garbage no longer necessary in the jeep.
 
#17 ·
Fire up!....or not

When timing this motor, we rotated the crank so the number 1 piston was at top dead center, then rotated it back so the line on the harmonic balancer lined up with the 8* BTDC mark. Reset the distributor so it was firing on the number 1 spark plug

The next day, I picked up some MSD StreetFire plug wires from Advance auto. When I returned, I plugged the boot onto the spark plug, measured each wire to the correct distributor terminal, cut the wires to length and attached the terminal and boot to each wire.

Next, we disconnected the coil wire, and primed the motor by cranking for approx 30 seconds until it was good and lubed up.

Then after everything was ready, time to start her up. But it never started. We assumed it was 180* out of time because it kept backfiring through the intake. We spun the motor around, retimed it for the correct stroke, and poof... Like a brand new car, she started on the first crank.
 
#18 ·
Purring like a brand new motor should, it initiated the break-in period. Obviously not having the carb set up correctly, I stood there holding the throttle to about 2500 rpms for about 20 minutes, monitoring oil pressure and temperature.. There always seems to be a lot of smoke and a funk in the air with a brand new motor running.

The next day, I wanted to see how she would fire up. It took a few cranks to get it to actually fire up for some reason... While holding the throttle where it's supposed to be to keep it running and inspecting the motor, we noticed a puddle of oil developing underneath coming from the bellhousing... So here I am. I believe it is the rear main seal leaking. I read in another post about problems arising with the rear main seal leaking if you wait too long to start the motor after the build. I'm not sure how true this is, but it seems plausible given my situation. So.... I guess I'm gonna drop the tranny and put in a new rear main seal.. :brickwall
 
#20 ·
Thanks for the info, sorry you had to learn the hard way Matt.

I ran into a pickle though....... I might have found another craigslist gem.. It's a beautiful looking T18 tranny out of an early 80s 2wd ford. I'm picking it up friday, possibly rebuilding depending how the gears look. The guy selling it got it in a trade, so mileage is unknown. I am gonna use my t5 bellhousing, but I hear I need to tap and drill 2 holes.. Worth saving the nickles on a new one though. Give me a chance to clean it up too. Also need an adapter from Novak for my Dana 300 transfer case.

Are there any good articles on this build?

Do I need to adjust drive shaft lengths?
 

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#21 ·
Nice find on the T18!

Does it have the low granny? Depending on your gear ratio and tire size, you might find the granny useless for normal driving, so you will basically have a 3-speed on pavement.

The T-18 will need a adapter to mate to your D300, and a custom pilot bushing. With adapter, it will be almost the same length as the T5, so you won't need to change driveshafts.

Good luck,

Matt
 
#22 ·
Nice find on the T18!

Does it have the low granny? Depending on your gear ratio and tire size, you might find the granny useless for normal driving, so you will basically have a 3-speed on pavement.

The T-18 will need a adapter to mate to your D300, and a custom pilot bushing. With adapter, it will be almost the same length as the T5, so you won't need to change driveshafts.

Good luck,

Matt
It does have the 6.32:1 first gear ratio which is good for out at the farm and wheeling around, but like you said, useless for driving on pavement. Unless it's on the Pittsburgh parkway in the winter time, then it will be good for stop and go traffic haha.. :eek:ntopic:

I've read in other postings about using this pilot bushing:
http://www.oreillyauto.com/site/c/d...ck=Search_C2325_1437913_-1&pt=C2325&ppt=C0015

For $3, it's worth a try.

I understand 4th gear in these transmissions have a 1:1 ratio just like the t5, so really the only thing I'm losing is 5th gear which I rarely saw anyways due to these here appalachians.
 
#23 ·
Also, I understand there are different transmission to bellhousing gaskets for the ford and the jeep... jeep being the rectangle, and ford being the rectangle with the bump out in the lower left corner.. I need to use the ford gasket even though it's connecting to an AMC bellhousing, correct?
 
#24 ·
I've never heard of any trans to bell gasket on this setup.

The input bearing you linked to doesn't appear to be the correct one. If you get the t-case adapter from Novak or Advanced Adapters, the necessary pilot bushing will be included. See pic.

Matt
 

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#25 ·
There most likely isn't a gasket then. I guess they're just showing a profile of the transmission at the bottom of this page:
http://www.4wdhub.com/trans/t-18.html

Looking at it now, it doesn't say anything about a gasket. No reason to have one there.

I will be getting an adapter kit... A little pricey, but definitely worth not having a headache piecing used parts together. Any preference between Novak or AA?
 
#27 ·
Now that I look at the Novak T-18/300 adapter, it doesn't look as thick as my AA adapter, so my comment about driveshafts may not apply with the Novak part.

Here's a pic of my T-19 with the AA adapter.

I'm pretty sure the input shaft swap only applies to T-18s that come from FSJs. You may consider customizing the Ford shifter, as it will be much longer than you need. Or, you could keep your eyes open for a CJ T-18 shifter (second pic).

Matt
 

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#28 ·
I'll have to keep my eyes open for a CJ T-18 shifter. I haven't ordered an adapter kit yet.. do you think I should go with AA for ensured fitment?

Also, AA has 2 selections for the same thing and both are for a Ford T-18 4WD to Dana 300... not 2WD. Do you think that adapter will still work with my T-18 2WD tranny?

They say the Ford T-18 2WD are way easier to convert than the 4WD
 
#29 ·
I think the only difference between the 2WD and 4WD versions is in the tailpiece, but the conversion kits take care of all that. Otherwise, the only difference is the 2WD versions are probably more abundant and cheaper.

Here's what Novak says:

All Ford versions of the T18 are automatically compatible with Novak adapter assemblies and these transmissions make for excellent conversions due to their adaptability into most Jeeps. Both 2wd and 4wd versions of the T18 can be used equally well, and there are no inherent advantages to either one once you have installed our adapter assembly.
http://www.novak-adapt.com/knowledge/transmissions/manual/t18-t19

I'd call AA and ask them about their adapters.

Matt
 
#30 ·
The link to add the kit to the cart on Novak isn't working. I contacted them but it hasn't been resolved yet. I'm looking at the kit from AA: #50-7500. I also want to replace my clutch while I have it apart.. I understand I have to use a Ford clutch disc with the 1 1/16" spline input shaft, but will the pressure plate in a ford clutch kit line up with my motor? Or do I need to piece everything together? I want to go with LUK since they are very good quality and this isn't a ridiculous performance machine.
 
#32 ·
What you'll need

I called Novak to inform them that their link wasn't working, and was told their IT guy was looking into it. While I was on the phone with them, I might have accidentally ordered the:

Adapter kit: #183-F (has to have the ford bolt pattern)

Clutch kit: #01-015 (1-1/16 in. x 10 splines x 10-3/8 in.)

Pilot Bushing: #PB-5181176 (AMC I6 & V8 cranks (1972-2006) to Ford transmissions (T18, NP435, etc.))

Can't believe how fast the order processed and shipped. Ordered and shipped on the 19th, estimated to get here (from Utah to PA) by the 26th!

I could really use a bellhousing for a T176 or T150 though. Heard of people picking them up for like $30, but everything I can find is $80+

So if you know anyone selling a T176 or T150 bellhousing, let them know I would love to get in contact with them haha
 
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