My brother is getting his license soon, so we found a good beginners vehicle for him, a 1998 Jeep Cherokee, 4 banger with a 5 speed. Got a deal on it, just needed a few minor repairs. Leaking valve cover, SES light telling me the cat was bad, serpentine belt was cracking pretty bad.

The layout of the engine made everything fairly easy, inline 4. Valve cover was a snap to remove, exhaust dropped down nice and easy for the new cat, 3 of the spark plugs came right out. There'* always got to be one tricky guy though.

All I had to do to pull the valve cover is remove the air box.

You can see where the gasket failed.

Had a little oil in the throttle body, not sure how that got there.


When I finally got to the cat, I found it to be completely hollow.. Guess it'* been ignored for a while.

I'll probably end up driving it for the next couple months while my bonne is in the shop so I figured I would share. Should get better mileage than my truck I'm hoping.

Great find!

Those 4.0L engines run strong for a long..long time...

Good project. Hope you get it running great with as little money as possible.

That is a good find!

You should try and get sparkplug #3 out of a 4.3 in a Blazer.

so thats the 2.5L? man that things a dog if your trying to do any wheelin

Didn't realize they made a Cherokee with a 4 banger.

"You should try and get sparkplug #3 out of a 4.3 in a Blazer. "

MIke- what is your preferred method? I have heard going through the wheel well is one method, another is to remove the steering shaft.... I am soon to replace the plugs in my Wife'* 1999 Bravada. I have had very good luck with the 4.3L engine itself. Winder why GM quit using it. Everything else connected to the 4.3 has been a disaster, but my last 4.3 went 230k miles and ran like it was new- never did anything to it except changed the oil.

If it was going to be a "wheelin" vehicle, we would have found a v8 with 4wd, this is more for my brother to learn on and for a little better gas mileage.

More like, thank god I didn't get a blazer with a 4.3 lol.

When I fired it up to pull it in the garage, it was slow to start, granted it was a little cold. After I got everything done it fired right up and no SES light. Total cost of repair was $160. We paid $1200 for it, so total cost $1360. The previous owner had an aftermarket audio system. They left the head unit, rca'*, power wires. So all we have to do is find a cheap 4 channel amp and some speakers and it will be good to go for audio. Only 101,000 miles.

Through the wheel well, use a normal spark plug socket, instead of ratchet, use a open-end combo wrench on the socket. 3/4 I think.

That is a good price. Too bad it wasn't 4wheel drive.