FREEZEPLUG ....Z o i k s !!

[88AMCOMANCHE]

The other day I noticed a tiny drip of what looked like water coming from the drivers side towards the front of the engine,but not quite at the front. More like 5-7" back. But with water leaks it could be from anywhere sometimes.
Today...as I was FINALLY adjusting the amount of Tilt my front bumper has (neglegence from from when i 1st put it on being in a rush) ......I happen to notice way up what appeared to be RUST on the side of the engine, which i found odd. Long story long......Its a super rusty freezeplug which looks corroded & Im gonna assume thats why i seen a tiny water drip coming from that area a few days ago. ........I am not in the slightest familiar with how a freeze plug goes in or comes out. Anyone have any expericnce with replacing one before?? what does it entail as far as replacing it ?

[88AMCOMANCHE]

Sorry theres no pix. I dropped my Digicam few months ago & havent bought a new one yet. but i do know pictures help.sorry.

[bluedragon436]

I would say check out Youtube, honestly... I had to help a friend of mine replace his on his Cummins once, and have never done one up to that point.. and we checked out youtube, and figure out that it really wasn't too hard at all.. almost a knock the old one out a bit, and pull with pliars, and tap the new one back in job.. not too bad really..

[ralphy]

Bluedragon is right youtube may be helpful. I've done a few,, not on jeeps but it is pretty standard the hardest part is getting to the freeze plug to knock it out. take a punch or chisel and hit one side to turn it sideways then pull it out with pliers then line the new one up and "heres the fun part" try to drive it in square till the outer edge is flush with the block. or they do make a rubber one you put it in till it is seated then tighten up a nut and your done, hope this helps! good luck.

[LizardRunner]

BD and Ralphy have it right, the hard part is getting the new one in correctly. I use a piece of wood and a BFH to get new ones into a motor. get the new ones in copper or brass they go in much better than steel ones. It doesn't take the strength of arnold to put them in either, medium hammer hits do the job just fine and keep you from messing up the install. I usually have a motor out of the vehicle when doing this operation but it can be done with the motor in place, just is harder with stuff in the way. You might be able to use a jack as a press too.

[4.3LXJ]

Yeah, isn't hard. But you might end up having to take the manifolds off. But this reminds me of a similar situation that happened to me.

I had this 64 one ton civilian Power Wagon. And it was a powerful wagon. I dropped a 383 in it left over from my high school years using one of only two special bell housings in existence. It was big, black and a real beast with D70s at both ends and custom rear spring work, huge brakes, a 9 foot bed and headers on that big block. I went out in the snow to get some fire wood since we were running low in a cold winter. There was this Nissan pick up in the way, and I finally got around him and out to the landing where the real wood was. While he was messing around with his toy chain saw and getting a little wood, I got the big boy saw out and winched up some logs and filled up the back with wet alder. Probably weighed in at around 5000#. But it didn't squat, it was sitting level. I headed out and that Nissan was in my way again squatting with a little bit of wood in the back. I had to follow him out to the highway. When we got there, we were at the bottom of a long hill with a passing lane, so I decided to show him what a real truck would do. I opened it up and roared past him and was doing 55 mph at the top of the hill feeling really good about me and my machine when there was this huge cloud of steam smelling like antifreeze. So I stopped at the top of the hill still spewing steam while that little Nissan struggled past me. I had to laugh about it, what else could I do?. Anyway, all it was was a hole in the freeze plug squirting water on to the hot headers. Coasted down the hill into a loggers driveway, put a giant sheet metal screw in the freeze plug and filled her up and headed home.

[88AMCOMANCHE]

Someone at work suggested the same thing......just pull the motor & replace them all & be done with it. But with all the sensors & lines etc etc etc .if I pull the motor, id never get it all hooked up aghain right. So for me, I'll just have to get to the plug somehow. I can see it from underneath under the front end & it looks as though i have about 5-6" clearence & thats It. may be impossible. But i wont know till i try. Just getting yalls opinions before i try it. Ty.

[LizardRunner]

You might need to get down there and remove only the items necessary to get a little more room to work. I did a freeze plug replace once that I had to remove the header and one motor mount, then use a jack to tilt the engine so I could get to it, once that was done it was pretty easy to remove the old, leaking plug and put in the new one.

[88AMCOMANCHE]

Well.....as usual ,no working camera so...no pix. - just wanteed to update my situation here though. - Ive gotten to the freezeplug & poked & scraped at it witha screwdriver & ended up poking a hole right in the freezeplug to where all my water started coming out. Good?? It sorta appears like possibly they put JBweld putty all over it to avoid changing it. Now its heavily corroded & just a mess. - I really need o get a camera* .....I suppose all i can do at this point is get out there & dig at it somemore and hopefully get the old plug (or whas left of it) Out so it can be cleaned up and see what Im working with.

[Mudderoy]

Well.....as usual ,no working camera so...no pix. - just wanteed to update my situation here though. - Ive gotten to the freezeplug & poked & scraped at it witha screwdriver & ended up poking a hole right in the freezeplug to where all my water started coming out. Good?? It sorta appears like possibly they put JBweld putty all over it to avoid changing it. Now its heavily corroded & just a mess. - I really need o get a camera* .....I suppose all i can do at this point is get out there & dig at it somemore and hopefully get the old plug (or whas left of it) Out so it can be cleaned up and see what Im working with.

I had mind changed a while back. Just just took off the intake and exhaust and changed them all, bolted the manifolds back...

[88AMCOMANCHE]

Forgot to update here ......I got the freezeplug in Tuesday. Went in easy. Refilled the water reservious bottle with water & fired it up and let it run a few minutes to make sure it didnt leak.It didnt so I went inside to get a drink,came back 1 minute later to find my temp gauge on about 250 . Im assuming since the engine was empty of water, the only thing i did was fill the reservios bottle,only.

[4.3LXJ]

So right. You have to fill the engine first. You will need to take the tstat out and fill then replace it. Blue XJ has an upgrade to take care of filling. PM him for details.

[ralphy]

Hmmm. That's odd, I recently had to change the rad and I did all the hoses, tstat, and wpump gasket, all I did was to fill the rad and res bottle, warm the engine till the tstat opened then top it all off. my temp is fine, you need to stay with the jeep while it's warming up JD, I do hope you didn't have any engine damage.

[88AMCOMANCHE]

Thats the trouble....I didnt "top it off" once the thermostat opened & sucked the water down in the engine, it left the bottle bone dry. I just wasnt thinking ........i had just finsihed the freezeplug & was tired of rolling around on dirt & rock lol , It was fine after i let it cool & fully reffilled it.Just had me worried is all. But it was becuse i forgot to top it off once the thermostat opens

[ralphy]

Good to hear it's all ok. Engines can take a little heat "drag cars for example" but we don't want to push our luck! happy motoring.;)

[88AMCOMANCHE]

especially with 193k+ on the dial :-)