Well, I have an update.


It's....ALIVE!!
The battery cables did it. I got two ten foot lengths of 4AWG wire and put ring terminal connectors on it and it fired right up. Scared the daylights out of me. It fired as soon as the screwdriver hit the solenoid because of all the fuel in the cylinders from bleeding the system multiple times and cranking it for so long last weekend. There was a giant puff of soot and raw fuel. The fuel shut off works really good, I kinda panic shut it off thinking it was going to run away.

We bled the lines again cause the cranking test was to make sure if the cables were going to work. It cranked for a solid thirty seconds, I let it rest, and then it fires right up. The smoke is raw fuel left in the cylinders and soot (condensation formed in the manifold from the last two and a half days of rain we've had). It was also about 38-40 and it started no problem with no glow plugs, and no knocks or lifter clatter or any weird noises. She's ready to go. Now to find a turbo

Joe

 

Nice!

 

Very nice, I just got a customers motor fired up this morning. It is a good feeling. Sounds healthy.

 

Hey Ken, thanks. I'm so happy it finally started. It puffed some smoke, but with all the fuel I dumped in it from cranking it for hours and the fact that it was 35ish-40 degrees, and I don't know when the last time it ran, I think it earned the right to smoke a bit on start up. Cleared right up, though.

My manifold came in last night. I got a screaming deal on a new v2403t turbo manifold. That's a picture of the turbo flange with a set of feeler gauges for comparison, definitely smaller than the Mack manifolds I'm used to being around. I went with this one over the v2003t manifold simply because of packaging reasons, the turbo is going to be really close to the brake master cylinder because of the cramped engine compartment, and because the price was right. I'm thinking about making a turbo header in the future when I get the conversion all set up and running right.

Now on to turbo's. I've been doing a lot of research on the turbo's everyone runs and have been talking to a few people and I'll be honest, I don't know a thing about any of this I know people are a an of the K03, but it seems like the refrigerator like aerodynamics of a Jeep push the turbo a little hard and the EGT's get kinda high. Has anyone considered a stock td03, just out of curiosity. I saw on a Kubota turbo thread on here that Garret chose a gt25 or something, and Overland Diesel runs a gt15 for their *****'s Jeep conversion. I'm also not looking for an immense amount of boost, as I need this thing to be as reliable as possible, but it still needs to have decent enough power to be able to comfortably run down the highway. Anything is better than my little 2.5 screaming at 2700 doing 65 down the Parkway

Thanks for all the help.

Joe

 

I bought two of those manifolds about a year ago and I wish I was smart enough to have snagged the whole lot. They are nice. Looking good. I am off to pick up another cherokee this morning and full steam ahead on converrting both after the holidays.

Good lunch with the build

 

It should make packaging the turbo easy. I saw you were trying to put together a swap kit for the Cherokee's that drops right in? How's the progress going on that? That would make for an awesome weekend swap. It would probably help the Kubota gain more popularity, as they're plentiful and much cheaper and easier to swap in than the 4bt.

Joe

 

The td03 I have that's stock on the 2003t motor I have is TINY, I'm running the tdo4 on my Sport Trac and the EGT's are normal. My truck weighs 1000 lbs more than your rig, so the ko3 should be fine. You really need to have up to 20 psi in order to burn clean and get the performance you will want, I can push more if I want, but don't usually under normal conditions. EGT's never go above 1150 deg.

 

I know! When I saw the flange, I just laughed and thought it was some kind of joke. It's comically small. The td04, is that a td04L-10T? That's what the Cummins B3.3 runs.

Joe

 

Yes

 

The kit is slowly coming together. I need to start the build thread on here. I am now doing 2 Cherokees at the same time. Both 92 Laredo. One auto one manual. Should be a nice swap.