Next Up ...

[Blake Noble]

I would have to sell my '81 Fender Bullet so that I could have the rest of the money to buy it, but it might just be worth it: http://lexington.craigslist.org/cto/2451007578.html

Of course, I'd want to do a full on '99 conversion with it; front clip, interior, and wheels. Finding a donor Cherokee for that would be easy and cheap enough.

Here's also a runner up: http://lexington.craigslist.org/cto/2464101824.html

[ocnblu]

Where's that Challenger? You're scaring me, Jacket.

[Blake Noble]

The Challenger isn't going anywhere. Although I'll be going back to college this fall (going for a major in pharmacy), I'm still going to work part-time throughout the week somewhere local to pay the 300 a month on it. I will be quitting my current job (just won't work out in the long-term with what I have to do).

The Jeep is for the upcoming winter months and to keep miles off of my car. I've only had my Challenger since April and I've already put 7,000 miles on it (80 mile 'round trips 5 days a week add up). That's insanity. Comanches with around 200k miles (which is nothing for an MJ/XJ) are going for a solid grand across the board and if I can score one for a few hundred bucks, it will be a worth wile project and a good truck for the winter. The one I linked to is a four-banger, which isn't bad, but I tracked down another one around Louisville that is a five-speed, 4.0, 4x4 truck in the same faded AMC red for the same money: http://louisville.craigslist.org/cto/2434804029.html

What finally spurred this on is that I know someone with a '98 Cherokee Classic that's accrued almost 300,000 miles. It's beat to hell and back and is plagued with (common) small wiring gremlins (hazard signals come on whenever the left turn signal is engaged, for example) but mechanically, it runs like a top and has NEVER broken down because of a powertrain issue.

An MJ/XJ is like a damn cockroach: you can roll them, run them into $h!, and bash them up, but you can't really kill them (especially mechanically) and even if you do manage succeed to do that, it fights back like hell. It's 1980 America's answer to the 1980's Hilux. Why Jeep didn't sell an absolute $h!-ton of them is beyond me.

That, and I've always wanted to do a complete '97 and up conversion on an Comanche, front clip, doors, interior and all (I would also like to make the bed accept a set of Jeep Liberty taillights, but that's for another day when I have more money than I do now). A donor would only cost a few hundred bucks in non-running condition. Add to the fact that most of these $1000 dollar trucks have been spared by Kentucky's fair-weather climate and aren't totally rusted out like the ones you see up north only makes such a project/restoration easier. The last one I linked to had more dents than anything it seemed.