Times are tough. Our world economy is in the toilet, and the average American is cutting back on expenses more than ever. While many are losing their jobs, or worse, most wouldn’t even consider the thought of picking up a new project to dump a bunch of money into. Remember, “a healthy economy and a disposable income”? Yeah, we don’t either. So when we recently went out in search of a Budget Project, we were already experts in watching our pennies.
There is a sad but bright side to our country’s economic dilemma! With many struggling to pay bills and stay afloat, quick, and sometimes desperate, decisions must be made. Some of those decisions are in form of selling off a beloved Jeep or project rig to raise enough capital to get by for a while.  Unfortunately, those sad losses can be our gain. Jeeps are popping up all over the country at bargain bin prices that we’ve rarely seen before. Many can be easily picked up for under $1,000, and a quite a few of them are ready for the backcountry as they sit. 

Our Jeep Cherokee … all $450 of her! One good thing about our rough economy is there are deals to be found if you know where to look.

By researching and shopping for less than 60 days, we found many bargains and learned that anyone can grab up a Jeep for cheap and turn it into a trail rig that can be built extremely capable on a super tight budget. What we found was this sweet little 1994 Jeep Cherokee with 130,000 miles that just couldn’t be passed on.

Are you ready for this? The Cherokee was negotiated down from $3,200 to $450. Heck … we’ve seen people pay $450 for a used NP231J transfer case from an XJ! The owner told us he was going to “have to rebuild the engine due to how much oil the rig was leaking” and the excessive “blow-by found in the air cleaner,” so he was willing to lower the price substantially.  After close inspection (and a poker face), we quickly determined that an oil filter adapter O-ring change, perhaps a simple rear main seal replacement and some Crank Case Valve (CCV) work, was all that this sad little XJ really needed. 
Aside from an affordable price, an XJ also has other amenities that many other Jeeps don’t. Its size is almost perfect. While we can’t get that open top feeling from a Cherokee, we do get a wheel base of 106 inches, which will be welcome in places like Moab and its extremely steep climbs and descents.   The Cherokee is still a small enough package to snake between huge rocks and trees and is extremely maneuverable. Its fully enclosed cab makes it nice and warm in the winters, and a flip of the AC switch will cool down all passengers during the hot summers on the slick rock.

Speaking of passengers, you’ll have a hard time putting five people into your Jeep unless you snag yourself a $30,000 Unlimited JK.  Five people fit fairly comfortably in an XJ … and yes, you can take the doors off fairly easily!  Sure, the uni-body is not ideal for hard-core use, but there are suspension kits on the market that use fully bolt-on systems, so as not to weld onto the thin uni-body construction. Also available from the aftermarket are full-body stiffener kits.  Suspension companies like Iron Rock Off Road offer their 6.5-inch kit that makes use of a new bolt-on cross member to mount their lower long arms.  It also aids in strengthening the uni-body structure that XJ owners worry about. 

We plan to concentrate and center the build on a super rugged and flexible suspension system like this since we only paid $450 for the Jeep itself, and then leave it to the suspension and aggressive tires to work through the worst terrains we can throw at it.  By spending so little on the cost of a Jeep, any builder can free up more cash for upgrades like a hard-core suspension, new tires and lunch box lockers. 

While we wait for our Iron Rock Off Road Suspension to arrive (where you will see a complete review of this new suspension here at off-road.com), we’ve been going through the 4.0 engine and fixing the minor oil leaks and performance inhibitors. Our first task was to remove the oil filter adapter that is notorious for deteriorated O-rings, which deceptively drip oil, mimicking a rear main seal leak. A package of $6 O-rings, a $7 T-60 Trox bit and one hour of simple work and the leaking adapter was dry as a bone.

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With some lingering drops of oil in the driveway, we still suspected a rear main seal leak but first checked the leak-prone valve cover of our 4.0. Sure enough, the far back valve cover bolt was loose, allowing oil to leak profusely down the back of the engine and onto the exhaust cross pipe. We planned to replace the gasket when tackling the Crank Case Valves (CCVs), as the valve cover should be removed to do this. Many Cherokee owners find their air filters to be soaked in oil and conclude that the blow-by is due to faulty or worn piston rings. This could be the case but usually isn’t, even on a high-mileage 4.0 motor. The common problem is that the CCVs, typically the rear one, gets clogged up with debris, forcing oil up to the front valve and into the air cleaner box.  By replacing both CCVs, you will almost certainly stop any blow-by. We chose a complete factory kit that replaces the CCV’ and all the vacuum lines. After replacing the CCVs, we bolted the valve cover back into place with a new gasket and torqued it down to factory specs. Since doing this, we have not seen a drop of oil from the XJ!

The tired suspension on our XJ are on their way out to make way for more rock-worthy components.

We performed a quick oil change on the Jeep, as well as replacement of all other fluids. During our oil change, we substituted one quart of oil with one quart of Automatic Transmission Fluid (ATF). ATF is basically motor oil that contains a high amount of detergent. Have you ever seen the inside of a transmission, even after years of use? The ATF keeps the internals shiny and new for years!  The AFT in the engine oil will clean and scrub much of the sludge and grime from your engine, so we ran it through for 500 miles before doing another oil change. We’ve never seen such dirty oil after only 500 miles of use, and you could actually feel a slight performance gain afterwards.

Plugs, wires, rotor and cap looked fine but we replaced them for added insurance. We ran tank cleaner and fuel injector cleaner through our fuel system for good measure as well and replaced the filter.  With these super simple maintenance items taken care of, the XJ’s 4.0 engine is running like a champ! Burn outs are possible again and she feels like a rocket ship in every gear.

With the XJ running so well, our next step is to get our Iron Rock Critical Path suspension installed to allow more flexibility and larger tires. But before that, we shot some “before” photos of our slightly rusty and abused Jeep. We’d say it had worn the Dayton Timberline Tires on black painted factory wheels (above) for long enough. The suspension? Typical XJ, with sagging springs, rusted components and rotted rubber bushings.  Yes, times are tough but our mission is to build a capable Jeep in our garage with components that will not break the bank in our economic downturn. Look for a complete suspension install and review, along with other great tips and ideas coming soon!