2000 Cherokee Stroker Build
Posted: November 21st, 2016, 9:16 pm
Hi everyone, I've looked over this forum for sometime now and finally decided to make a thread for my 2000 Jeep Cherokee stroker project. I started a build thread on a local forum in my area and decided I would like to bring it over to this forum in hopes of better input and advice. I am already well on my way with the build but have a few things left to complete and plenty more projects to do.
My name is Alex and I am 24 years old. This is the second Cherokee I have owned and I purchased this Jeep knowing that it had a very bad engine problem and would need to be torn apart to determine the damage. I have always been mechanically inclined so I thought this would be a great learning opportunity; basically everything I have done on this build was the first time. First thing I had done was take some of the goodies off my original Cherokee that where better than the new Jeep and swap the parts. I sold my Jeep and got my old commuter car back on the road and started the work on the new Jeep. First up was to get it in my shop and start tearing the thing apart. Within one weekend and some help from my dad and some buddies we had the motor pulled and disassembled. I had the infamous 0331 cylinder head which had a fracture between the #3 and #4 cylinders. I knew there was lots of water in the motor when the radiator was nearly empty and the oil looked like gravy. Also I checked underneath the valve cover and it was completely full of thick goo.
What is has:
33x12.5 Wrangler Duratracs
4.5 inch longarm lift kit
Bushwacker style flares
Heavy duty winch front bumper
Rear tire swing carrier bumper
Rear lower quarter panel armor
Alpine deck with a custom speaker box in the back
8 inch sub and a 5 channel JL amp running all speakers
Slip yoke eliminator
Gas tank skid
Hood vents
Tinted windows
62 mm BBK throttle body
Poweraid throttle body spacer
aFe Power 409 stainless steel dual collector header
Scat performance 3.895" stroke crankshaft
Scat forged 6.125" rods
Icon forged pistons - 21cc 0.030" over
Hastings moly rings
King main and rod bearings
Durabond camshaft bearings
Ford racing 24 lb injectors
ARP Head studs
Melling oil pump
New lifters
New pushrods
New rockers
Cloyes timing chain /sprocket kit
Howard's camshaft
Titan Engines new cylinder head with 1.94" intake / 1.5" exhaust valves + a dual valve spring setup - custom porting job
Valve cover studs
Aluminum valve cover
Brown Dog offroad motor mounts
Stainless 2.5" exhaust/high-flow cat/muffler
New radiator
Custom 3 10" electric fan setup
All new brake lines
New highlights / harness
AEM high-flow fuel pump
My engine bay wasn't looking the greatest so I decided to freshen it up a bit. I first scuffed up the entire surface (as much as I could atleast), used etching primer and then went over it with a semigloss black. Some of the brackets are done with the Chrysler orange and various brackets and the booster are done with gloss black for a bit of contrast.
After the engine bay was finished I moved onto updating the brake system and replacing all of the brake lines. The brake booster had some rust issues so I wire wheeled it up and gave it a fresh coat of paint. I got all new brake lines and my dad was helpful enough to bend the majority of them for me. I replaced the bleeder nipples on the brake calipers because they where screwed and I also replaced the master cylinder with one from a Dodge Durango.
[/quote]
I got the block back from the machine shop along with the pistons assembled onto the rods. First speed bump hit me when I was designating all the rings to each piston and cylinder when one of the oil rings got stuck in the groove.. Unfortunately one of the pistons was slightly damaged from the shop while they where putting the pin in and bent the lip so I brought it back to the shop and they fixed it up for me.
After checking all the gaps with a feeler gauge and designating each piston with its own rings and cylinders I then installed the rings and moved onto checking the clearances for the crankshaft. I checked each main bearing cap using plasti-gage and all cylinders came out with great numbers. The ideal measurement would be 0.002 0 " and I came out with a 0.000 3 " difference between all cylinders with an average of 0.001 8" which I was pleased with. I then cleaned all the surfaces lubed it all up and torqued the mains down. Here's some pictures of that process:
Once the crankshaft was in it was time to install the pistons and check some more clearances. After setting the ring gaps we installed the pistons 2 at a time, using plasti-gage once again. Removed the caps to check clearances / record and permanently install pistons and rods using the supplied ARP torque lubricant and torquing them down to spec. These clearances where on the tighter end of the tolerance but I figured they will loosen up a bit after some hours of running time so I was okay with that; no surprises during this process. Here's a few more pictures:
After that was finished up we installed the crankshaft and timing chain/sprockets. Next up was the second major speed bump which I was prepared for but definitely took a while to figure out what I wanted to do whiche was the girdle / oil pan clearance issue. What I ended up doing was getting some nice hardened 1/16" washers and used 3 on each bearing cap which gave me a clearance just shy of 1/8". I then grinded the one corner off of the girdle for additional clearance and then bashed in my oil pan a bit until it was clear.
Next up was checking the header and intake manifold as well as the gasket on the new cylinder head to check how all the ports lined up. Holly shit where they ever bad.. I had a new intake gasket from a job I did on my old Jeep and then one supplied with the header I purchased from aFe which are both significantly different. Both of which didn't fit as nice as I hoped on the header or on the cylinder head. What I ended up doing with my dad was using both gaskets as a reference and finding the best fitment that we could make with the gaskets. Down below you will see some pictures of the porting I did to the cylinder head. The purple sharpy marks are where the supplied gasket holes where located, the red marks are where the water jackets are (so clearly I couldn't port the holes that big) and the black filled in sharpy marks is where I would port the cylinder head to.
My name is Alex and I am 24 years old. This is the second Cherokee I have owned and I purchased this Jeep knowing that it had a very bad engine problem and would need to be torn apart to determine the damage. I have always been mechanically inclined so I thought this would be a great learning opportunity; basically everything I have done on this build was the first time. First thing I had done was take some of the goodies off my original Cherokee that where better than the new Jeep and swap the parts. I sold my Jeep and got my old commuter car back on the road and started the work on the new Jeep. First up was to get it in my shop and start tearing the thing apart. Within one weekend and some help from my dad and some buddies we had the motor pulled and disassembled. I had the infamous 0331 cylinder head which had a fracture between the #3 and #4 cylinders. I knew there was lots of water in the motor when the radiator was nearly empty and the oil looked like gravy. Also I checked underneath the valve cover and it was completely full of thick goo.
What is has:
33x12.5 Wrangler Duratracs
4.5 inch longarm lift kit
Bushwacker style flares
Heavy duty winch front bumper
Rear tire swing carrier bumper
Rear lower quarter panel armor
Alpine deck with a custom speaker box in the back
8 inch sub and a 5 channel JL amp running all speakers
Slip yoke eliminator
Gas tank skid
Hood vents
Tinted windows
62 mm BBK throttle body
Poweraid throttle body spacer
aFe Power 409 stainless steel dual collector header
Scat performance 3.895" stroke crankshaft
Scat forged 6.125" rods
Icon forged pistons - 21cc 0.030" over
Hastings moly rings
King main and rod bearings
Durabond camshaft bearings
Ford racing 24 lb injectors
ARP Head studs
Melling oil pump
New lifters
New pushrods
New rockers
Cloyes timing chain /sprocket kit
Howard's camshaft
Titan Engines new cylinder head with 1.94" intake / 1.5" exhaust valves + a dual valve spring setup - custom porting job
Valve cover studs
Aluminum valve cover
Brown Dog offroad motor mounts
Stainless 2.5" exhaust/high-flow cat/muffler
New radiator
Custom 3 10" electric fan setup
All new brake lines
New highlights / harness
AEM high-flow fuel pump
My engine bay wasn't looking the greatest so I decided to freshen it up a bit. I first scuffed up the entire surface (as much as I could atleast), used etching primer and then went over it with a semigloss black. Some of the brackets are done with the Chrysler orange and various brackets and the booster are done with gloss black for a bit of contrast.
After the engine bay was finished I moved onto updating the brake system and replacing all of the brake lines. The brake booster had some rust issues so I wire wheeled it up and gave it a fresh coat of paint. I got all new brake lines and my dad was helpful enough to bend the majority of them for me. I replaced the bleeder nipples on the brake calipers because they where screwed and I also replaced the master cylinder with one from a Dodge Durango.
[/quote]
I got the block back from the machine shop along with the pistons assembled onto the rods. First speed bump hit me when I was designating all the rings to each piston and cylinder when one of the oil rings got stuck in the groove.. Unfortunately one of the pistons was slightly damaged from the shop while they where putting the pin in and bent the lip so I brought it back to the shop and they fixed it up for me.
After checking all the gaps with a feeler gauge and designating each piston with its own rings and cylinders I then installed the rings and moved onto checking the clearances for the crankshaft. I checked each main bearing cap using plasti-gage and all cylinders came out with great numbers. The ideal measurement would be 0.002 0 " and I came out with a 0.000 3 " difference between all cylinders with an average of 0.001 8" which I was pleased with. I then cleaned all the surfaces lubed it all up and torqued the mains down. Here's some pictures of that process:
Once the crankshaft was in it was time to install the pistons and check some more clearances. After setting the ring gaps we installed the pistons 2 at a time, using plasti-gage once again. Removed the caps to check clearances / record and permanently install pistons and rods using the supplied ARP torque lubricant and torquing them down to spec. These clearances where on the tighter end of the tolerance but I figured they will loosen up a bit after some hours of running time so I was okay with that; no surprises during this process. Here's a few more pictures:
After that was finished up we installed the crankshaft and timing chain/sprockets. Next up was the second major speed bump which I was prepared for but definitely took a while to figure out what I wanted to do whiche was the girdle / oil pan clearance issue. What I ended up doing was getting some nice hardened 1/16" washers and used 3 on each bearing cap which gave me a clearance just shy of 1/8". I then grinded the one corner off of the girdle for additional clearance and then bashed in my oil pan a bit until it was clear.
Next up was checking the header and intake manifold as well as the gasket on the new cylinder head to check how all the ports lined up. Holly shit where they ever bad.. I had a new intake gasket from a job I did on my old Jeep and then one supplied with the header I purchased from aFe which are both significantly different. Both of which didn't fit as nice as I hoped on the header or on the cylinder head. What I ended up doing with my dad was using both gaskets as a reference and finding the best fitment that we could make with the gaskets. Down below you will see some pictures of the porting I did to the cylinder head. The purple sharpy marks are where the supplied gasket holes where located, the red marks are where the water jackets are (so clearly I couldn't port the holes that big) and the black filled in sharpy marks is where I would port the cylinder head to.