Hello from Idaho / A little smoke

[KENNETH E WEAVER]

Quarantine greetings from Idaho. Brand new to this forum and am looking for some advice.

My 20 year old daughter and I recently bought a 2004 Liberty at auction as a project vehicle for her. She wanted a smaller Jeep to develop her wrenching skills on before she applied to the Diesel Mechanics program at our local college.

The upsides of "Stein" (short for Frankenstein because of zip ties holding a front fender flare on) are that it has 164K miles, straight body, and very clean interior. The downsides are sun faded hood and roof, moon roof that needs replaced, shocks and possibly struts, and a weak AC.

She has already replaced both driver's side window regulators with parts from our local U-Pull, and a few other cosmetic items

However, the biggest immediate issue is that once it has been driven for 20 to 30 minutes it will start showing some bluish white smoke.

Has thrown one P0133 code, but that did not come back after it was cleared

She did a compression test yesterday. Low cylinder was #4 at 115 and high was #6 at 130. All others were between 120 and 125.

These values seem low to me, so I think we are headed toward a full rebuild.

Any suggestions that might point in a different direction before we start tearing into it?

 

[LibertyTC]

Welcome. Sure would be nice to get that 04 Kj back running in top shape again!
How many miles on engine now?
Re Compression- see post #4 here: https://www.jeepkj.com/threads/compression-test.38727/
A rebuild may be in order. Overall compression should should be between 170psi-225psi

 

[KENNETH E WEAVER]

Thanks for the reply. 164,271 miles. I figured the compression was low, but not quite that low.

I'll probably have her pull the heads of a junker just to see how she handles it. Then decide if we want to overhaul this one, or drop in a new engine and crankcase.

She got it for $1200, so there's some room before we go totally upside down.

 

[LibertyTC]

I don't know if you have access to regulated shop air etc, but a cylinder leak down test may help diagnose the engine further.
There are videos out there to explain if you are not familiar, there is also a wet compression test.

 

[KENNETH E WEAVER]

I don't know if you have access to regulated shop air etc, but a cylinder leak down test may help diagnose the engine further.
There are videos out there to explain if you are not familiar, there is also a wet compression test.

I'll have to look that up. I've never heard of a cylinder leak down test, but I'm always willing to learn something new. Thanks for the reply and the suggestion.

 

[jnuncio3]

Hello Ken,
If she's headed to diesel school, look for a 2006 CRD Libby with the 2.8l diesel engine. 05 had a 2.5l and 06 had a 2.8l. A little harder to find and most folks that have one try to hang on to them. Lots of mods available for the CRD engine.

 

[turblediesel]

Hello Ken,
If she's headed to diesel school, look for a 2006 CRD Libby with the 2.8l diesel engine. 05 had a 2.5l and 06 had a 2.8l. A little harder to find and most folks that have one try to hang on to them. Lots of mods available for the CRD engine.

All US KJ CRDs are 2.8. Export KJ CRDs were 2.5 until 200? when they became 2.8.

US CRDs are hard to find because they've blown up and gone to the junkyard, usually due to neglected timing belt replacements. The EGR system cakes up the intake system and causes many problems as well. There are mods available which seem to be a necessity to keep the engine together. They add up quickly and some mods and parts are no longer available.

I think it's great your daughter has an interest in wrenching but she might be happier working on a Cummins. Lots more room to work and more relevance and parts available than a KJ CRD.