It all started with a phone call from Editor Hazel.

Who You?
Dear Verne, who the hell are you?
Bob
Via email

There is no denying that heat kills auto- matic transmissions faster than a coronary will take out a fat man who has won free unlimited doughnuts for life. We’ve talked a lot about transmission coolers, but not so much about what is too hot or how to monitor the transmission. The fact of the matter is that you might need to add an auxiliary cooler, but the only way to be sure is to first install a gauge and monitor just how hot your junk is getting. This, of course, opens a whole other can of worms. Where do you put the sensor? How hot is too hot for your transmission? Well, read on and we’ll sort out the mysteries.

If you regularly spend time out on the trail, you’re probably used to seeing interesting ideas and clever concepts on the vehicles you encounter. However, for new enthusiasts or those of you who do not get out much, let this story serve as inspiration because everything you see here came from fellow wheelers just like you.

Every few years we serve up a smorgasbord of information on tires tested by our esteemed staff. Like discerning food critics, we call ’em how we see ’em. If Trasborg thinks the lowly growl of a mud terrain on pavement sounds like a Cessna during takeoff, we’ll say so. When Stover shreds a sidewall without even trying, you read about it here. If Hazel finds that the lacking of lug spacing on an all terrain compromises traction in the mud, you’ll hear about it. Each evaluation is concluded by a series of scores in the six categories we feel most accurately represents what you do with your Jeep.

Life with an automatic transmission is like dating a high-maintenance supermodel: awesome to be around when everything works out and the mood is good. She can make you feel like a million bucks as heads turn to watch her pass, but when you show her even the slightest sign of neglect, she becomes a stubborn mule, unwilling to do even the simplest of tasks. That’s because automatic transmissions are complex and require constant preventive maintenance to keep them happy. As such, we’ve assembled a buyer’s guide to assist you with preserving the relationship you’ve come to depend on between you and your automatic transmission. Enjoy.

Ever wheel a Jeep with an automatic and a 4:1 transfer case? Most require a ton of brake pedal effort to stop—unless you pop the transmission into Neutral. This scenario can be nerve-racking at first and then downright annoying once you get used to it. We contacted a few of the industry’s better-known Jeep builders to see how they go about resolving the issue on customer rigs. The answers we received were as varied as the customers. As you might expect, each solution has pros and cons. In this story we will explain each method and why you should consider them to overcome torque multiplication compounded by extreme low-range gearing. Check it out.

Jeep transmissions love this time of year. Not only do they run cooler in the winter months, but crappy weather along with seasonal trail closures force many Jeeps into a state of hibernation. Sure, interruptions may come in the form of spur of the moment snow runs, or that pesky neighbor who refuses to plow and instead requests your assistance to free his stuck Honda Accord. Like a grizzly bear holed up in a cave, winter downtime can foster laziness from even the most industrious Jeeper. We are here to combat such neglect and inspire you to crank up the shop heater and put in the hours necessary to prep your rig for the imminent thaw of spring. Winter is the perfect time to tackle those little projects you put off during the summer months. Routine maintenance items such as changing out the transmission fluid and filter are a good start. However, if you want to make the most of your vehicle’s hiatus, consider adding an auxiliary transmission cooler. When the ice cycles retreat, and open top weather returns, your Jeep will thank you.

Stop paying other people $50 (if you are lucky) to put a stereo in your girlfriend’s car. Well, that is, if you are the lucky 1-percent of Jp magazine readers who actually have a girlfriend. If you are unlucky, you are paying some 16-year-old who knows way less than you to do a crappy job putting a stereo in your Jeep. I’ve talked about soldering here. I’ve covered other good ways to connect wires. I guarantee you that the teenager you pay to install your stereo isn’t using any of my good advice. You might not believe me. One guy told me once he didn’t believe in plastic. I’ve seen plastic. It exists. And I am right about wiring a radio.

Most Jeepers fall into one of two categories: a rock hound or a mud freak. But every once in a while we run into one of those Jeepers who likes Jeeping so much, it doesn’t matter what kind of terrain it is. The Cooper Discoverer S/T Maxx is the newest member of Cooper’s lineup and it is a lot like that. Its mild-mannered looks are somewhat deceiving as we didn’t find any terrain it didn’t like. Upon first glance we were sure we’d end up with banana peels in the mud, but that wasn’t the case. Sure, it did better in some than others, but what tire doesn’t?

Much like a fat guy in a speedo, there are just some things that jump out at you and are impossible miss. Unfortunately, many of the things that go awry with our Jeeps are not so obvious. Our past story (“Gaining Through Losing,” Oct. ’11) got us thinking about it. Not the fat guy in the speedo, but the impact that tire selection has on mileage. In that story we picked up 0.63 mpg by simply losing 28 lbs of rotating weight at each corner, or 112 lbs of total rotating weight lost. But what about the tread design? Despite using two different brands of tires, we kept the tread design as similar as possible for that test. As we kicked the idea around more and more, we decided we likely had enough data from enough different vehicles to figure out just how different tires affect mileage.

Have you ever watched a runty little dog try to take a bone away from a much bigger pooch? Most will keep at it, getting knocked down repeatedly—until they score that bone. There’s some of that plucky spirit in the Kelly Tires Safari TSR all-terrain tires we’ve been testing. Indeed, they’re willing to take on much more aggressive terrain than their mild-mannered tread blocks would suggest—sometimes successfully, sometimes not.

Wanna rip up the trail on the weekends but not your eardrums or kidneys during your weekday commute? Go Baja Claw TTC, man. With only minor exceptions, about the only negative we could come up with for these Mickey Thompson tires is the fact that they’re directional. That means you can’t rotate ’em as frequently or as easily and your spare tire may be running backwards…not that you’ll probably ever use your spare. These things are as tough as nails.

Maybe it’s just us, but we usually reserve the BFGoodrich tires for the rigs we really care about. It’s kinda like busting out the fine China or those sniffy bathroom soaps for special guests. Sure, some of our rigs would be just as happy chugging fortified bum wine from a Styrofoam cup, but others deserve something with proper vintage and pedigree. For those vehicles, we reach for the top-shelf BFGoodrich label.

Disappearing Gas
I have a ’72 CJ-5 with a 304 that was rebuilt a few years ago. It’s running a Motorcraft 2100 carb with a K&N air filter, a low-end cam, and a DUI ignition. The engine compartment (hood and firewall) get quite hot, which is not such a bad deal in the cold and snow but is downright uncomfortable in the desert. The problem is that when I stop along the trail and turn the engine off, it takes a long time cranking before it fires. It seems to be gas starved. The same thing happens when the Jeep has sat for a week or so. Of course, all my buddies are looking at me wondering what the heck is wrong with my Jeep.

Okay, see if you can follow this. When I first built my ’53 DJ-3A I used low-pinion Ford 9-inch axles with 5.83s and stock 2.46:1 gears in a Spicer 18 T-case. With the junkyard Warn Overdrive engaged, I could turn 2,850 rpm at 65 mph on the street, and the SM420’s 7.05:1 First gear gave a 101:1 crawl ratio, which was just about perfect for my relatively low-torque 3.5L Shortstar DOHC V-6. Then the hardcore bug bit and I replaced the Spicer 18 with a built Dana 300 running stock 2.62:1 gears and 32-spline front and rear output shafts. The Dana 300 has a much higher rear output location than the Spicer 18, so to get a rear driveshaft in the thing I had to build a new centered rear axle with a high-pinion True Hi9 centersection. The axle build required a gear change to 5.38s since that’s the lowest ratio offered for the True Hi9. But even with the high-pinion rear diff, to prevent U-joint binding at full droop I had to run offset-trunion U-joints in the Tom Wood’s 1350 rear driveshaft. The crawl ratio of the new setup was nearly identical at 99:1, but without an overdrive, my engine speed was a whopping 3,500 rpm at 65 mph. Not that I could ever reach that speed since the crazy rear driveshaft U-joints caused the Jeep to feel like you were riding a paint shaker even at modest road speeds.

Everybody loves to hate the Quadra-Trac. It’s like gum on the bottom of your shoe, diarrhea, and fat Kirstie Alley all rolled into one. Jeep introduced the BW1339 Quadra-Trac to its full-size pickups, Cherokees, and Wagoneers in 1973 and then plugged it into the ’76-’79 CJ-7 platform for good measure. It was always found behind the TH400 auto transmission, so if you got a manual gearbox you escaped the humiliation. But why the bad rap? In most instances it’s a pretty durable unit with (for its time) very advanced O-ring seals and a clutch-type differential for full-time four-wheel drive. Its biggest problem, in short, was the people who owned ’em.

If you are like a lot of Jeep guys I run into, the Jeep often gets parked in the winter until the snow gets too deep for the commuter car to handle. So, that often means that it sits through most of the fall and early winter neglected and the first big snowstorm finds you guys either hooking up the jumper cables or charging box or, worse, replacing the battery.

Last issue we showed you the T-boned ’07 JK we picked up for cheap (“Penny Pincher,” Dec. ’11). Our Wrangler was capable of driving down the road, but not well. It needed work. The initial goal was to get it into daily operational status without it driving itself into a ditch or constantly fighting the electronic stability control (ESC). The Jeep doesn’t need to look good, it just needs to kinda share colors with adjacent body panels.

If you are like us, you probably don’t have a lot of extra cash to dump into a Jeep nowadays. We feel your pain. However, with dwindling funds and ever increasing debt loads, opportunity still knocks. Despite an upside-down economy and high unemployment rates, the crafty Jeeper can still score big on a used ride. In times like these, a little cash in hand goes a long way. The secret to getting a good deal is patience—and a good knack for negotiation. Many Jeeps are secondary vehicles, and when times get tough, these unessential rigs are first to go.

Do all Jeep T-cases look the same to you? In the junkyard, did you ever mistake a Quadra-Trac for a rare aluminum Spicer 18? Are you as lost as Pee-wee Herman at a rodeo when it comes to identifying what T-case your Jeep left the factory with? Don’t know if your factory case is a keeper or junk; or where to get upgrades for it? If so, this guide may be worth keeping around in your garage or shop. We wish we had enough space to go into every little detail on every unit built, but we don’t. So, instead we picked those we thought were most important and put together this guide.

2.5L Mileage
My question is about your ’89 four-cylinder YJ. Specifically, when you went from 4.10s to 4.88s with the 31-inch Swampers, how did the gear change alter the mileage?
Dan Thomas
Via email

We slammed the 4.7L inline-six stroker engine from Mopar Performance in our ’91 Comanche in a weekend (“Weekend Mopar 4.7L Stroker,” July ’11) and have been enjoying it ever since. Just enough time has passed since daily-driving our last 258ci-powered Jeep that we forgot what that low-end grunt was like. Once we got through the break-in period and stomped on the gas we got a very pleasant reminder. For those of you that don’t know, this stroker engine is basically a 4.0L block and HO head with a 4.2L (258ci) crank adapted to it. The stroker provides the high-end power and drivability of the 4.0L with the low-end grunt and locomotive-like pulling power of the 4.2L. It’s the best of both worlds.

Today’s Jeep culture embodies the same principals of freedom that the manufact- urers had in mind when they build the first MB and GPWs that won World War II, but with each passing decade, outside influences have changed the way we think about Jeep vehicles. Consumer demand and technological advancements have transformed the utilitarian stud of yesteryear into the recreational mainstay we know today. Along the way, more and more folks became fans of the seven-slotted grille, embraced it, and took it out on the trail.

Ambition is a wonderful thing. Without it, mankind would never have learned to fly, explore the depths of the oceans, or pull apart perfectly good, running Jeeps for a major buildup. But ambition can be a fickle mistress, and sometimes she leaves just when she’s needed most. Search on various off-road web forums, online sales sites, and within your local wheeling club, and you’ll come up with several abandoned project Jeeps for sale in any stage of completion and complexity. Sometimes the funds run out and sometimes just the builder’s motivation. But whatever the reason, you can often pick up these incomplete builds for much less than the sum of their parts.