Project ReXJ

[HAULN-SS]

We got ~6" at my house. Ive been having issues with the battery in my jeep lately, and the hood latch wasnt working to hold the hood down. I WD-40 everything underneath and finally got it moving again, and then the damn hood latch handle pulled off the cable. Ended up just cutting hte cable under the dash and putting some vice grips on it to operate the cable. tldr; my jeep needed like an hour of screwing with to get out in the snow Saturday

[Jeff]

Injectors come yet?

[CaptainHenreh]

Injectors come yet?

I emailed the guy yesterday saying basically "Dude wtf are my injectors?"

I get this:
Rex,
My apologies.

I shipped these last week and forgot to put your address on the box so it showed up on my door step yesterday. Yes, apparently I'm a genius.

I've got them packed in a USPS priority mail box and will drop them off in the morning.
Your USPS tracking number is:
14cosX*15^2

Sorry about my stupidity.

*le sigh*

So that means the earliest I will get them is by friday, and I have to work this weekend. So *maybe* I'll feel froggy enough to do it on friday evening, but seems unlikely. More probable it'll be done Monday, and then that'll give me all day monday to shake it down before I hop on the interstate to start my 12 hour shift.

[Jeff]

I have a set of yellow topped ford injectors from a 4.6L F150. Wonder if they would work?

[CaptainHenreh]

I have a set of yellow topped ford injectors from a 4.6L F150. Wonder if they would work?

Prolly. These are from an assploder. Samesame.

[D_Eclipse9916]

Soo..when are we taking this offroading, I want a passenger spot.

[CaptainHenreh]

Soo..when are we taking this offroading, I want a passenger spot.

Hah. Gotta fireproof it first.

[CaptainHenreh]

Injectors are scheduled to be here today.

*crosses fingers* With any luck, I'll install tonight, shakedown tomorrow, and have a car to drive again, just in time for my "weekend".

[CaptainHenreh]

Injectors are in. Truck started right up, "high idled" fine, but I have a small leak at the FPR. There's a little plastic QD clip in there, and only one side is "clipping" in. The other side is just sort of bleh. It's a drip drip drip with car off but ignition on.

I think I may have lost the o-rings that go inside, as I don't think the clip is supposed to come out with the hardline, but it totally did. So I think this: is what I need, to replace both the o-rings and the clip.

Other than that, didn't see any leaks (not fuel anyway) so great success, I guess.

[CaptainHenreh]

Well, I'm pretty sure that's what I need, but after calling NAPA, Fisher, Carquest, Advance, and Autozone...nobody could get it to be faster than Amazon, and for 10 dollars cheaper and no tax.

So looks like it's going to be another jeepless week.

[CaptainHenreh]

Well, it's fixed.

Sort of.

The part I bought from amazon was too large to fit in the fuel pressure regulator. (twss) However, it came with a pair of o-rings that seemed to fit ok, so I put those (actually just one) in there and jammed the old pastic clip in the FPR. So far, no leaks.

Runs good, might actually have a hint more power, or at least better fuel delivery, as at highway speeds I seem to be accelerating much faster without gearing down. Could be my imagination. But whatever, didn't catch on fire this morning so I'm calling it a win.

I think I'll go to the local Jeep dealer and see if I can get the correct new clip & o-rings, but for now, I guess this will do?

[Kaan]

add fuel pump, filter, and all that crap to your list. and new hanger hardware

[CaptainHenreh]

So, the smoke is still inside my XJ, so those injectors must be fine. Everything is cool in ReXJ land, I'm just lazy.

So, funny story. Before Sean Schutte decided to steal my fucking thunder and go balls deep into a 4.7L stroker project, I'd had an ad in the valley trader for a couple of weeks:

WANTED: AMC 4.2/258 Crank&Rods or Full Engine.

I mean, that engine was in fucking everything. CJ Jeep? 258. AMC Matador? 258. International Harvester Scout? Fuckin 258. 4.2 when metric shit became en vogue. I figure someone has one of these lying around somewhere in this Valley, collecting rust, and I'm going to save it from the scrapper. Or at least, you know, some of it. The crank, and probably the rods.

Anyway, I get a few calls. Mostly from people who are idiots, and want like 400 dollars for their engine that ran when it was pulled 2 decades ago, to make room for whatever big block chevy they thought was a good idea. Or the guy who called me and said he had one "Ran good, but had a knock at the bottom end." Dude, how did you even read far enough to get my number? Did you miss the bit how I wanted the crank and rods? I'm not building a mailbox, dude. I'm building an engine.

So I get a call from a reasonably sane person: "Hey man I saw your ad. I have a 4.2 out of a 1990 wrangler that I blew the transfer case up on and decided to just put a whole chevy powertrain in to replace it. You can have it for 150 bucks. Hell, come get it and you can have it for a hunnert." I said "Well met, good sir! I'll come calling on friday morning to retrieve your locomotion unit, and pay you the agreed-upon price. I assume that federal reserve notes will suffice, as I am afraid that specie has fallen out of favor for large transactions. Ha-HAW! Good show!"

So I call my dad, ask him if he's up for an adventure. We hook up the trailer (figure it'll be easier to load an engine onto a trailer than the high dump bed in the truck) and head off over the mountain, to the land of my mother's people: Culpeper/Madison County. This isn't the Madison County with the pretty bridges. Oh no, that's in Iowa. This is the Madison County famous for...er...um...oh wait! James Madison! And also...um...not a damn thing else. So we get on [Redacted] Road and start looking for this place. After a few misadventures, we figure out that [Redacted] road changes to WEST [Redacted] Road when you enter Madison County from Culpeper County. Thank God my Dad was a truck driver in another life, I've never seen anybody able to u-turn in a trailer like this man. Anyway, we think we have the right place, so we flag down a guy who's pulling out of it.

Me: "Yeah, I'm looking for Aaron, I am supposed to buy an engine from him. Am I in the right place?"
Driver: *spits* "I reckon you are, but I ain't seen hide nor hair of the boy. He might be inna house, though." *spits*
Me: "Thank you, sir!"

So we approach the...house. I was about to say "hovel" but it's an old farm house, so we'll go with house. Probably has been there since some old reb got his leg shot off in the War of Northern Aggression and him an' his kin decided that this piece of property had a nice lay to it, and reckoned they ought to help build him a place to call his own, on account of his leg 'n' all.

There was the prerequisite bigass mean dog barking her fucking head off, there were squat little horses frolicking behind some old fence. A half dozen pot bellied pigs wandered around the yard. Some foraging for grubs or scraps or whatever the fuck pigs forage for, some were lazing about in the winter sun. The big ole momma sow (big for a potbelly, anyway) was trying to scratch her back, her giant teats swaying like oaks in the breeze with every stroke. The yard was filled with various equipment. A full size dodge van, a kubota tractor. An old Massey Furgeson hay rake, and (a sign I was in the right place) a Wrangler hard top.

I got out of the truck, looking left and right. Speaking softly to the baying dog, thinking out my best course of action, and taking comfort in the weight and warmth of the polymer and steel riding on my hip. Smith and Wesson might prove useful allies today, if Atropos willed it. I knock on the door, through the screen-less screen door and the grandson of the ole Reb came to it. I apologized for rousing him from however he had decided to spend the august of his life, and told him I was looking for Aaron. He replied that he hadn't seen hide nor hair of the boy, and didn't know anything about any engine, neither.

Shitballs. Here I am in Bumfuq, VA. I've driven an hour and a half to get here, and this dipshit is passed out drunk in a pickup bed next to some Madison County High School Cheerleader, or dead in a ditch, or forgot I was coming and is up in a treestand on the side of some god-forsaken hill.

PSYCH! He's right behind his grandpa, putting on a shirt as the old man explains to me that he doesn't know when Aaron will be back...and he literally continues talking as he turns around and heads back in the house. Talking to me? The 12 little pigs? The second big-ass pittmutt to greet me with thunderous throat and slavering jowels? Prophesying the end of the world at the slimy tentacles of Cthulhu? Fucking pick one.

SO good, Aaron is here after all! He trots out in his bare feet, mud squishing up between his toes, to inform me that the gentleman I spoke to earlier would have to return so we could "fire up the cat" and "get the engine down." Down? Is it in a tree? "Oh no," he laughs. "Don't be silly. It's up on top of that box truck." Behind the barn is a broken down U-Haul truck, with the body of a wrangler perched precariously atop its metal roof.

Dear God. This is all some complex plan for the Lothar of the Hill People over here to eat my father and make me into Queen Pretty for the rest of his tribe to have their way with. Well not today, Bubba! I got 17 rounds...that's 15 for you and the best you can bring, and 2 left over for myself and my father. Your sick cult can feast on our flesh, but our brains will be scattered around the yard for the pigs, you hear me?!

I'm being dramatic, but only just. He showed me where the night before some poachers had opened fire on his pickup when he went to investigate some strange lights on the hill. Punched a fist sized hole in the bed with 00 buck, (by my estimation) been all that far away. I asked him if he'd called the law, and he reached into his cab to retrieve his ruger blackhawk. "Hell naw, I returned fire!" Jesus wept.

Mr. Spitter returned to fire up the fucking bulldozer, stopping only briefly to blind Dennis Nedry. The diesel engine roared to life, and the tracks began grinding their clacking, sinister path across the Rhine, over to the box truck. Spitter lifted the bucket impossibly high, and then Our Aaron clambered up the earth mover like a freakishly large spider monkey, (keep in mind, in his bare, muddy, hobbit feet) motioning me to follow. As a Jeep Inline Six isn't exactly a paperweight, I had no choice but to discard my jacket and join him on his perch, though I chose what seemed to me a less dangerous route up. We shoved the engine into the bucket and proceeded to dump it onto the floor of the trailer with no incident.

I handed the man his money and practically leaped towards the cab of the truck. "Hey man, if you need any chevy parts you just let me know! I got plenty!" Dad moved as fast as his artificial knee could carry him into the truck, having not said a word this entire time. We fired that mother up and headed back across the mountain.

Moral of the story: When you buy shit from the Redneck Craigslist, ask them to meet you with it somewhere.

[WRXtranceformed]

You found your second calling as a writer sir. I have the most awesomest vision in my head of Boo Radly and his band of mutated hill-hicks of bum-F VA.

[CaptainHenreh]

You found your second calling as a writer sir. I have the most awesomest vision in my head of Boo Radly and his band of mutated hill-hicks of bum-F VA.

That was pretty much it. "You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land. The common clay of the new West. You know... morons."

Seriously, I doubt Burt Reynolds or John Voight would have...turned their back on these guys.

[ScottyB]

i LOVE uncle Rex's story time.

edit: agreed with Lee. there are more people that need to read this, because it is art.

[D_Eclipse9916]

low clap: If I could afford to hire you to just follow along my entire life would be ten times cooler. Best stories EVAR!

[Jeff]

Wow that really was Uncle Rex's story time. Good show son. Glad you made it out alive.

[Dave]

Well met, sir Rex. Another great story - any time I partake in a voyage and you can't come, I'm going to record it so you can write the resulting story.

[Seantn1k]

So, funny story. Before Sean Schutte decided to steal my fucking thunder and go balls deep into a 4.7L stroker project, I'd had an ad in the valley trader for a couple of weeks:

Yes I certainly went crazy on jumping into my build, but looks like you're doing well with yours. lol I need to catch up and start doing my write up already!

Yes sir, you do spin a fine yarn.

-Sean