| This Jeep Started life as a fourbanger '85 CJ-7 widetrack. Well, it's still a -7 and a W/T, But it may be hard to pin down a year to label it as. But first We have to start at the beginning. He bought it quite some time ago, during high school, (I'll find out when soon) From a guy that used it to get from the main road to his camp, A mile or so in the woods. It came to James With an AMC 2.5 four cylinder and a T-4 / Dana 300. Dana 30 front and 20 Rear. Well, He Had been complaining about the lack of power with the Four when I met him a year ago, and shortly thereafter- at the most two months- the ignition box died on him. That was in August 2001. I knew Of a Concord with a 258 in it and Assumed that it owuld be a bolt in. We werent able to get the flywheel to line up with the crank , and Thats where the Concord came from. He looked at having a flywheel fitted to it, but Nobody was keen on that idea. He also ran into the problem that the AM 4cyl T-4 input shaft was different from the Standardized 10 spline input shaft (for the sixes and the GM 4). December 2001 After searching though a few auto ads I located a 258 for 50 dollars.He called the guy but there was no transmission or case. The guy however, pointed us to a wheeler in Unity ME That might be able to hook him up. (I later bought the $50 258) James ended up buying an '80 258, T-176 and Dana 300 from the Gentelman, and what was even better; they were all hooked together. I think it was Three days that it took us to Install the whole combo. You see, We pretty well had to get It together in one weekend because James was starting a new job Monday the 21st, for which he would need a method of transportation other than his feet. It was a marathon session of Mechanic-ing where James and Travor worked for four hours, then the three of us worked a two twelve hour days, then James and I Worked another four hours on the finishing touches, like the hardtop and exhaust, and the clutch linkage, We neglected to get any pictures of the process. |
