This is Manch.
It's a 1990 Jeep Comanche; 4.0 (Renix), AX-15, NP231, shortbed, with a kick ass camo(?) paint job...
I'd been looking for some time for a small, fun, 4x4 to use as a daily driver/back road and mountain road explorer/mild-ish wheeling rig. I wanted something fairly capable near stock form, small, kind of unique, and not expensive... I'd narrowed down my search to either a Suzuki Samurai or Jeep Comanche. I came across this truck in Northern Utah near the border last winter; the guy gave me a good price so I pulled the trigger and brought it home.
I backed it off the trailer and into the shop and there it's sat ever since. I don't plan on working on this at all until I button up the changes I'm making on my buggy; I have a bad habit of getting too many projects going at once. That being said, I am keeping an eye out for parts here and there and picking them up as I find good deals. Even though I'm not going to work on this for a while, I figured I'd start the thread, list out my plans, and get your guys' thoughts. I'm pretty open on this, so if you have any cool ideas, suggestions, recommendations, stories, whatever, throw them out there.
Goals for the truck:
I did pick up my wheels and tires off KSL a month or so ago! 33"x10.5" BFG K02's on 15"x8" Mickey Thompson Deegan 38 Pro 4 wheels with only a couple thousand miles on them. I was hesitant to go with the fake beadlocks... just seems kinda corny to me (no offense if you like em ha) but they actually do look pretty good and it was a solid deal.
33s vs 45s
A little bit of rubbing... ha
So that's it for now. Thanks for looking.
It's a 1990 Jeep Comanche; 4.0 (Renix), AX-15, NP231, shortbed, with a kick ass camo(?) paint job...
I'd been looking for some time for a small, fun, 4x4 to use as a daily driver/back road and mountain road explorer/mild-ish wheeling rig. I wanted something fairly capable near stock form, small, kind of unique, and not expensive... I'd narrowed down my search to either a Suzuki Samurai or Jeep Comanche. I came across this truck in Northern Utah near the border last winter; the guy gave me a good price so I pulled the trigger and brought it home.
I backed it off the trailer and into the shop and there it's sat ever since. I don't plan on working on this at all until I button up the changes I'm making on my buggy; I have a bad habit of getting too many projects going at once. That being said, I am keeping an eye out for parts here and there and picking them up as I find good deals. Even though I'm not going to work on this for a while, I figured I'd start the thread, list out my plans, and get your guys' thoughts. I'm pretty open on this, so if you have any cool ideas, suggestions, recommendations, stories, whatever, throw them out there.
Goals for the truck:
- Daily driver yet capable of mild to medium level wheeling
- Low cost, nothing too fancy
- Simple and reliable (think solo vehicle camping trips)
- Drive Train
- Engine - It ran well enough to pull it on the trailer but that's about it. The engine has ~186k on it, I plan to pull it and do a full rebuild to stock specs.
- AX-15 - rebuild if required, not expected
- NP231 - rebuild if required, not expected
- Axles
- Currently the truck has the stock CAD Dana 30 front and Dana 35 rear. The transfer case engages into 4wd just fine but the front end won't pull, I'm guessing it's the CAD system (vacuum hose, wiring, whatever). Hoping to find a 1995.5 - 1999 Dana 30 to swap into the front and just get rid of the CAD system. I kind of liked the idea of keeping the CAD system for on-road driving, but with simplicity and reliability goals in mind I think swapping for a non-CAD 30 makes sense. In the rear I'll swap the Dana 35 for a 1995 - 2001 Ford Explorer 8.8 and add narrow wheel spacers to match the front width. A rear locker of some type ideally. I plan to run 33s so I'm thinking 4.56 ring and pinion.
- Suspension
- I've gone back and forth on this a lot. Here's my current plan... In the rear I want to stick with leaf springs but I haven't been able to find a lot of options for the MJ; so I'm going to give it a shot building a bastard pack and a spring over. I want to keep the truck as low as I can, while still being able to clear 33s. In the front end I'll find coils to match the ride height of the rear and rebuild the linkages. New shocks on all four corners.
- Wheels and Tires
- 33s x 10ish, on/off road capable, 5x4.5" pattern, 8" wide wheel.
- Frame/Body
- I was actually very surprised how little rust this truck has, i plan to pull the bed off the unibody and clean everything really well, repair what's necessary and paint. The hood and front fenders are a bit banged up, I may be able to fix them or just scrounge some up from the salvage yard off a Cherokee. Removable doors would be cool. From the doors back is actually really straight. Sand, prime, paint (never done this before so that'll be fun). Build some bumpers, sliders, roll cage, etc. Clean up the interior and install a decent yet simple stereo.
I did pick up my wheels and tires off KSL a month or so ago! 33"x10.5" BFG K02's on 15"x8" Mickey Thompson Deegan 38 Pro 4 wheels with only a couple thousand miles on them. I was hesitant to go with the fake beadlocks... just seems kinda corny to me (no offense if you like em ha) but they actually do look pretty good and it was a solid deal.
33s vs 45s
A little bit of rubbing... ha
So that's it for now. Thanks for looking.
