The Jeep Heap - '49 CJ3a

[squidtone]

The Jeep looks knarly. I love it.

[athawk11]

The Jeep looks knarly. I love it.

I agree! 8-)

[stony]

Chain is pretty easy, standard pitches and link lengths, master links and half links to give you the correct length.� Just take a sample over to your nearest Tractor Supply ( or ag equipment dealer, New Holland, John Deere etc) and match it up.� She�s looking great.� I don�t see any need for paint LOL!

[DaveW]

I've been having intermitent charging issues. When I drove it last night I noticed that even when on the throttle, I was only getting ~12.3v at the battery, but it did seem to run and drive fine and didn't have problems re-starting.

Usually the battery will go dead overnight, but surprisingly it was fine this morning so I decided to take it to work. Mid-morning a co-worker (fellow jeep guy) wanted to go for a ride, again it started no problem. But a few hours later, when I went to leave for lunch it was dead. No juice at the battery what so ever. Not even enough to run the electric fuel pump. So I got one of my co-workers to give me a push start to get it going and drove it the couple blocks back to my house.

[DaveW]

I think my electrical problem is two fold. First, I don�t think my alternator is charging. With it running again today, it maxes out at slightly over 12v



The second thing is even with the key off, there is still something drawing current from the battery. Possibly even the key switch is bad. The battery drops in voltage relatively quicker

[stony]

You need to find out where and how much your battery drain is.  Put your voltmeter on amps function, 10 amps if you have it.  Remove the negative battery cable and then the positive.  Put the meter in series with the battery positive and the battery cable Red on the pos battery terminal black on the cable.  Reattach the negative cable.  See how much you are drawing.  Then you can go through the wiring, and disconnect wires to see where the short is.  Once you find the wire or group of wires that is giving you the problem you can further isolate the problem using the same method.  From what you say you may have a problem in a wiring harness or connection where you have a corroded wire shorting to ground.  Since you do not have smoke it is not a direct short.
p.s.  ALWAYS remove the NEGATIVE cable before reattaching or removing the positive cable.

[DaveW]

It was an eventful weekend.

Friday night we went for a cruise through the park to see the lake.



Saturday since it started no problem, I decided to cruise over to the local car show. I wasn�t sure it would restart, so I packed jumper cables just in case. Quite a few people stopped by to take a look at it. Lots of story�s from guys about how they used to bomb around their family farm growing up in an old Jeep.  As luck would have it, my battery drain issue popped up. Thankfully a few guys gave me a push and it fired right up with a bump start.


With the constant having to worried about the battery dying, I decided to order a simple Dorman universal ignition switch. I got new ring terminals crimped and heat shrunk on the wires and the switch installed this morning and it seemed to solve the problem. Initially I installed the alternator wire on the ignition terminal on the switch. Turns out after it started, that will keep the ignition wire hot even if you turn the key off by back feeding through the alternator. After taking a second look, I moved the alternator wire over to the accessory terminal and it worked correctly and would now kill the ignition in the key off position. After getting it all wired up, I was now getting +13v at idle at the battery. So a combination of half broken ring terminals and a faulty switch seemed to have been my problem. I took a short run around town to get some coffee and cruise around and it restart every time without issue. I�ll have to let it sit until tomorrow and see if it starts and the battery drain issue is fully resolved.



Another thing I noticed was that after the Jeep gets warm, the oil pressure is pretty low. I have no idea what the history of the engine is or if it�s been rebuilt, but judging by the oil pressure (20-40 when cold vs 3-20) when warm while using 20W-50, it might be approaching time for a rebuild.

[DaveW]

I�ve spent the past few days bombing around town and driving the Jeep as much as possible primarily because this thing is So damn much fun to drive and secondly to see what other reliably issues might be hiding. I did notice the steering is still a little loose and is much harder to turn left than right, but does seem to be loosening up. I�ll have to take a closer look at the guts of the steering box next time I have the fender off.

I filled it with gas on Sunday and didn�t think I�d be anywhere near going through a full tank of gas, but I was quite wrong. Managed to run out of gas last night (gas gauge doesn�t work) thankfully I was able to limp it a few blocks closer to the gas station and even more thankful that a buddy gave me a gas can over the weekend when I stopped in to help him with some welding.

[RICKG]

They have GREEN nozzles for gasoline where you live??

[DaveW]

They have GREEN nozzles for gasoline where you live??

It was a BP station. I think maybe just the premium (ethanol free) nozzles are green, though I could be wrong.

[aboyandhisdog]

They have GREEN nozzles for gasoline where you live??

It was a BP station. I think maybe just the premium (ethanol free) nozzles are green, though I could be wrong.

I was in Ecuador a long time ago and we had rented a Trooper for the week.  Time came to fill it up and I made two critical mistakes:  1) Their diesel pumps are not clearly marked, and 2) the pumps are not 'self serve'.    A guy rambles out of the station booth in a ski mask and carrying an AK57 across his chest.  Scared the crap out of me!  I'm sure he had the last laugh though knowing that I had just put diesel in a gas Trooper.  The Trooper died about 2 blocks away and we hoofed it for the rest of the trip.

[DaveW]

I do think after driving the last few days, my alternator has crapped out. Through the rpm range, it tops out at 12.5v at the battery. With the lights on, it drops to 11.5v. I ordered a rebuild kit off ebay that should be here early next week.



I had a few extra minutes this afternoon and got my jerry can mounted to my tailgate.




My new undertaking is going to be rejuvenating the fuel system. Currently it has a Solex carb and an electronic fuel pump. I'd like to:

[list bull-blackball]

• Rebuild and install an original Carter WO

Add a Carter fuel filter
Install a glass top fuel pump
New fuel lines[/list]

I did pick up a correct Carter WO 636S which would be correct for the '49 model year. I snagged it a few weeks ago for $35. My plan was to fully rebuild and adjust it. As you can see it was pretty cruddy when I got it.


After a few minutes with the soda blaster this evening, it cleaned up pretty well and I don't think I'm going to freshen it up cosmetically because it doesn't look half bad.


To add to the new fuel pump and carb, I wanted to find some sort of fuel filter to avoid lots of trash making it to the carb. After some searching, I thought this old style of Carter with the ceramic filter was kind of neat. I found one on ebay that listed and appears to be un-used aside from a little shelf wear and paid about $40 for it. When I went to take it apart, the gasket crumbled, so I'll have to order some gasket material to make a new one.

[DaveW]

The Jeep heap seems to be running into some more issues this week. Last weekend I run a can of seafoam through the carb and periodically when warm it seems to die. I haven�t torn into it much, but I speculate it�s something in the fuel system (about to get completely overhauled), the coil, of the condenser. When it dies, it usually fires back up with a little more cranking than usual and dies above idle.

Thankfully it died a block from the office on my way back from lunch


Aside from that, the cloudy speedometer has been bothering me, so I cleaned the glass this weekend.


It was pretty easy to uncrimp the bezel and get it taken apart.



As you can see, the glass was pretty dirty. I tried to carefully clean the dial, but it didn�t seem to make much difference.



My running issue seems very sporadic, so I drove it around a bit more yesterday and it didn�t want to idle too well. Thankfully the last few brackets and springs needed to swap the Carter back in should arrrive this week.

[stony]

Dave, when you did the brakes, did you use the stock master cylinder?

[DaveW]

Dave, when you did the brakes, did you use the stock master cylinder?

Yessir. Everything is stock from the pedal to ends of the hardlines on the axles.