1990 Jeep Grand Wagoneer Build

[Jeepin' Pete]

Hey everyone! This is my 1990 Jeep Grand Wagoneer. I'm starting this build because I have learned a ton from so many forums and build threads out there, and want to be able to give back a little, but more honestly I know I'm going to need some help (FSJ wiring anyone?!?!?) and this is a great place for that.



I'm going to try and build it into a rig that can tackle mild wheeling, some long road trips, and everything in between - but mainly it will be used for just plain old exploring . I have an engineering degree, so I can be kind of meticulous, but I definitely rush things too. Essentially, I'm going to try and do things right the first time, while not going broke in the process. I'll also be trying to do a lot myself - I'm not the most mechanically inclined, but I love working with my hands with metal, wood, leather, whatever! It currently has the AMC 360 (a 5.9L V8), a freshly rebuilt 3 speed auto, some kind of 2" (maybe?) lift and 30" x 9.50" BFG KOs. The previous owner put the rhino grille from a 1967 Jeep truck, and painted the top white for a 1960's Wagoneer look. It currently has a manual crank rear window, but I have the original motor assembly; and surprisingly there is not much rust. I may find some, but I'm originally from the northeast, so this is nothing!

I'm looking into doing EFI, probably the Holley Sniper, and also maybe the HyperSpark distributor? I know that well maintained vacuum lines work fine, but if I can I wouldn't mind getting rid of as many as possible. Currently, the interior is trashed so one of the first orders of business is to redo the smelly carpet (probably with a kit from BJ's) and somehow redo the seats and missing headliner too. I also have a leaking steering box, so I'm going to replace it with a Redhead unit.



My other vehicle is a 1997 Jeep Wrangler, which I love and planned to live out of around MT, CO, UT, and WY before I met my wife. The TJ has a large storage box instead of a rear seat, so with a wife and her dog, a pretty big Belgian Malinois, there was no way near enough room in it. I looked at LJs, first gen Sequoias, 2 gen Xterras, and all manner of 4Runners, but I really love the old school styling of the Wagoneers and the fact that you don't see them everywhere driving down the road.

Here's a few of my TJ:
It has the 4.0, manual 5 spd, 31" x 10.5" KO2s, 1" H&R springs with Bilstein 5100s, custom front and rear bumpers I built in high school / college, and a high clearance transfer case skid. It's also dead-nuts reliable, which I hope the Wagoneer will be one day as well.




Thanks for reading!

 

[1979bettywhite]

Awesome stuff. Looks like we will be build buddies! I assume you are over on FSJNetwork is well? Wealth of knowledge over there. If you are going to tackle the interior, do it all at once. It really does not take much time to rip it all out. Plus you may find there are some places that need to be addressed in the floor pans etc. And get ready for some stuck bolts. I wound up breaking off a bolt each for my seats. Which was ok, as I just went ahead and drilled them out and thru bolted that corner. I am in the middle of putting down soundproofing and insulation in my Cherokee. The ACC carpet kits from BJ's are pretty nice, especially if you get them with the mass backing. Good layer of extra sound deadening and insulation there. Looking forward to following your progress as well!

 

[Jeepin' Pete]

Awesome stuff. Looks like we will be build buddies! I assume you are over on FSJNetwork is well? Wealth of knowledge over there. If you are going to tackle the interior, do it all at once. It really does not take much time to rip it all out. Plus you may find there are some places that need to be addressed in the floor pans etc. And get ready for some stuck bolts. I wound up breaking off a bolt each for my seats. Which was ok, as I just went ahead and drilled them out and thru bolted that corner. I am in the middle of putting down soundproofing and insulation in my Cherokee. The ACC carpet kits from BJ's are pretty nice, especially if you get them with the mass backing. Good layer of extra sound deadening and insulation there. Looking forward to following your progress as well!

Thanks! Your chief looks sweet - I love those widetracks!
I haven't gotten on FSJNetwork yet, but I intend to. And thanks for the advice on the interior. We just got a garage at our apartment so I'll now be able to pull everything out and do it at once.

 

[Jeepin' Pete]

My first order of business was to buff the paint. I have no intention of having this be a garage queen, and I've never had an even remotely shiny car before, but I think it'd be cool to be able to participate in a small-town car show every once in a while. I bought a Harbor Freight dual action polisher and some pads and compound from Autozone and went to town. The paint was super oxidized, and I swear one of the PO's must have thought a full can of wax was needed every time! I still have to remove old wax from every nook and cranny... I don't have great before/after pictures, but the left side of the tailgate has been polished, while the right is still hazy. I could definitely do it again, as there are still some scratches, but the haze is gone and I discovered there is actually small red metallic flakes in the paint. That's a win!

 

[DGarman]

Great looking Wagoneer!

 

[Zeep]

I like the old Gladiator front end.

 

[Jeepin' Pete]

Great looking Wagoneer!

I like the old Gladiator front end.

Thanks guys!

I've been putting off the tear down of my steering column to fix a really weak horn (needed for registration) and planning small projects in the mean time. I'm somewhat nervous of fire due to all the wiring problems, so I decided to put an inline fuse on the chose/emissions wire as seen in this thread:
http://www.fsjnetwork.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11134
I looked under the hood, and it was already done - thanks PO!

I also picked up a set of the LED taillights from BJ's. I don't want the lighting to be super bright, modern LED looking, but these use the OEM lenses which break up the individual light pattern of all the LED's. These should be much brighter than the dim stock taillights, and are much lower draw which are both big wins.

Here's whats in the kit (the electronic flasher module is an add-on):

I'm excited to wire them up tonight. Does anyone know where the flasher module is located?

 

[1979bettywhite]

I actually just ordered up some LED bulbs to use in place of the old ones. Actually pretty bright, and cheap as well. Look forward to seeing what yours look like. I also converted my headlights to LEDs as well. Went with a 7" bucket that was open in the back, not like the old sealed beams. Threw in an LED bulb with an H4 plug, good to go, and much brighter than the sealed beams.

The fuse should be on your fuse block, big round one. This might help you out as well, I know it has for me, as the old PDF of the TSM is very hard to read:

 

[50 fiver]

Nice late model, for wiring diagrams: http://oljeep.com/

 

[uberhahn]

I too have been bitten by the FSJ bug. Recently followed me home. I dedicated a youtube channel to document my rebuild / fixes. I’m not a huge youtube edditor, so my vids are mainly so I can trace my steps. But more is better.


https://m.youtube.com/channel/UC7whuaEuw4OKpDOiPAPt3rw

 

[Jeepin' Pete]

I actually just ordered up some LED bulbs to use in place of the old ones. Actually pretty bright, and cheap as well. Look forward to seeing what yours look like. I also converted my headlights to LEDs as well. Went with a 7" bucket that was open in the back, not like the old sealed beams. Threw in an LED bulb with an H4 plug, good to go, and much brighter than the sealed beams.

The fuse should be on your fuse block, big round one. This might help you out as well, I know it has for me, as the old PDF of the TSM is very hard to read:

Thanks! I'm not all done wiring them (not hard just time consuming with a crappy soldering iron) but I think if I were to do it again I would just do the LED bulbs. Who knows, maybe the final product will surprise me!

Nice late model, for wiring diagrams: http://oljeep.com/

Yeah, that guy is great! The first thing I did after buying the Wagoneer was to print out all 55 pages for the 90 wiring diagrams

I too have been bitten by the FSJ bug. Recently followed me home. I dedicated a youtube channel to document my rebuild / fixes. I’m not a huge youtube edditor, so my vids are mainly so I can trace my steps. But more is better.


https://m.youtube.com/channel/UC7whuaEuw4OKpDOiPAPt3rw

It sure is a great bug to be bitten by! And thank you so much for those videos, I found the window and door lock switch cleaning one the other day and put it on my to-do list. Your in-depth walkthrough was super helpful!

 

[Jeepin' Pete]

So my main project right now is getting the horn fixed so the Wagoneer can be inspected. Horn and brake lights are all I have left.
I have checked the fuse, replaced the horn relay, replaced the horn and the original wiring connectors, cleaned the ground and I still have a very weak horn. I'm sure if the engine was running you wouldn't even hear it. My next step was the replace the turn signal switch as the ground (on the horn button side) conducts through that switch. (Also my wipers weren't working unless on max speed, so I'm hoping the new switch fixes that too). I used Autozone PN SW324.
A couple tips:
1) This is a great writeup for tearing apart the steering column! http://street2mud.com/webfiles/Tilt Column Fix.pdf
2) Because of the space constraints (everything is up under the dash by the pedals) this took me way longer than I had planned
3) The horn is actually keyed power so the ignition switch need to be turned

I removed the steering wheel with a steering wheel puller, and the lock plate with a lock plate removal tool (Autozone has both available to rent) The lock plate removal tool makes the job easier, but by no means easy. The little circle clip that hold the lock plate on is an absolute pain to get out!!! There might be some helpful set of pliers or something, but I just mauled at it for a half an hour until it kind of loosened up. The best luck I had was to pry it up right near the split in the ring and slowly wedge the pick or small screwdriver around the circumference of the steering shaft to kind of ramp it out of the groove- I'm definitely no pro though!

After removing the hazard knob (just unscrews) and the wiper arm, the turn signal switch comes out with three screws. The tricky part is getting the wiring to come through the steering column. In the writeup above the steering column is out of the Jeep on a bench, so the following is what I discovered while keeping the column in the Jeep.

I tried electrical taping the connector parallel to the wires like suggested in the writeup, but I still couldn't get the whole package to come through. I ended up removing the bracket shown by the red arrow below (4 bolts to the column and two nuts from the dash above), and the steering column doesn't fall to the floor like I was worried it would. Under that metal bracket is a plastic wire protector which just pops off.

Even with the bracket and wire protector off I still couldn't get the wires and connector through the steering column. I would suggest doing the following because I think it makes it a lot easier:
The wiring connector for the turn signal switch is essentially just flat terminals that are snapped in place in a plastic connector. I removed the wires with a pin - just depressing the little clip on the terminal that held them in place. Just be sure to take a picture of the wires before you remove them to get the color order correct!

Then I cut the wires on the original turn signal switch and wrapped up the ends in an electrical tape bundle with a piece of string taped in. With the large plastic connector now removed the wires pulled up through the column, pulling the string with them. Then I taped the new turn signal switch wires up and put the same end of string in the wrap. The string just lets you pull the new wires back through the column. Then you can just click the flat terminals back in the plastic connector out the bottom side of the steering column, using the picture took before as a guide. Just don't forget to bend the little wire clips out so they stay in the connector.


Wires all routed through the steering column!
Had I thought of this earlier, I would have saved a lot of time lying on my back on the floorboards removing the metal bracket.

I haven't put everything back together yet, but hopefully this fixes my problem!

 

[1979bettywhite]

Nice work. I think I would have told you to just drop the column in the first place. That's what I did when I pulled my dash to reconnect my heater temperature control wire. Also had to re-glue my indicator lenses back in place as well. Pretty easy to just drop the column down to gain access to a lot of stuff.

And on a similar note, I finally have my AC back working again after a complete re-do of the whole system! Evaporator core, under dash box, and condenser are the only original parts left. Everything else is new.

 

[Jeepin' Pete]

Nice work. I think I would have told you to just drop the column in the first place. That's what I did when I pulled my dash to reconnect my heater temperature control wire. Also had to re-glue my indicator lenses back in place as well. Pretty easy to just drop the column down to gain access to a lot of stuff.

And on a similar note, I finally have my AC back working again after a complete re-do of the whole system! Evaporator core, under dash box, and condenser are the only original parts left. Everything else is new.

What all is involved in dropping the column? Just the metal bracket I removed and those two screws where the column meets the firewall?

As my Wagon has no roof rack right now, and the original holes are all sealed up and painted over, I was thinking of doing a gutter mount system. I think a wooden rack would be really cool, and I've seen some decent examples, mostly on BMWs or old VW's. I will use it for sheets of plywood, hi-lift/shovel combo, firewood, platform for camp chairs... so it's not just for looks. I don't think I'll ever put a RTT on the Wagoneer, but I do want it to hold weight.

For mounts I really like the NRS Quick N Easy brackets, but they're not made anymore and I can't find them anywhere... I think they fit the retro look of the Wagoneer really well
Here's a really well done rack with those brackets: http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/showthread.php?t=531422
Picture is from above thread

The other option is the JCR Offroad brackets. They're probably stronger, but they don't look as good. https://www.jcroffroad.com/product/RCK/XJRK-MT.html
Has anybody made a wooden roof rack that isn't just 2x4s? Any different recommendations on gutter mounts?

 

[1979bettywhite]

I went with rhino rack for mine. Although I still have the original roof rack that I can put back on anytime. I love the nostalgic look of the old rack, but for what I want to do with the jeep it really won't be functional.

The rhino rack stuff is top notch and the customer service staff is great for information. The put together all the rack stuff for the Roamr waggy a couple years ago at Sema.

So far so good on mine. Let me know if you need part numbers etc.

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