By accident I discovered what the actual name and part number is for the original AMC diagnostic unit I mentioned earlier in the thread.

CEC Fuel Feedback System Tester - Model ET-501 - Manufactured by the Owatonna Tool Company (More commonly know today as OTC)

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...iag_module.jpg
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1..._module_PN.jpg

It's a small box with a VFD screen. Not pictured was the grey carrying case that held it, the documentation and about a half dozen other cables used to test the various other computers the Eagle/Concorde Jeep used. Of course at the same time the opinion on the use of these things is out there. Some people want $500CAD for the whole kit, others want $60USD for the module and nothing else, plus no shipping out of Buttstown, IL. There's forum threads talking about how it's a great tool while others don't even get to that point and tell you to rip that parasite off your carb before it saps any more life out of the engine. It's like listening to mac people. Some of the crap they spout is amazingly stupid.

I'm sure it has all the logic of a Speak 'n Spell.

LOL

Ah, ignorance. It only saps the life out of the engine if it's not working right!

I'm assuming the CEC tester is basically just a glorified datastream reader? I wonder if that means the 'data' plug on the car actually does have serial data, and not just a bunch of outputs. Anyhow, I'm sure it's hackable... only problem is, you don't have much of a way of knowing what any given piece of data actually is.

Nope. No data bus at all.
If there is any data bus it's exclusive to a tester that plugs directly into the CeC and evaluates standalone.

Anyways, the time has come to slosh the six month old gas out of the tank and get it insured for March. It badly needs a new battery and clamp. The current "Certified" brand unit is seven years old and fails every load test you can imagine. My problem however is the battery pan dimensions are weird.

To spec, the pan fits a 25.4 x 15.4 x 21cm battery. I cannot use the stock 330 Cranking Amp battery that you can still find at Wal-Mart or Canadian Tire because it likely will not have the umph to start the car in -25, or keep all the goodies I'm cramming into this car alive for any period of time with the engine off. Plus for $30 less I could get a battery with 800 Cranking Amps and 40% more reserve capacity.

Problem is all the replacement batteries I have found so far are 16.1cm wide. Lengthwise they all fit in the battery pan but the slightest amount of width prevents it from completely falling into the tray and being clamped down. What should I be doing about this?

Oh god, it uses a 56 battery. Never seen one. It looks similar to a Honda battery (51 or 51R), though just slightly bigger, but also shorter. Idk what kind of clamp setup you got. The problem you're having is that Honda batteries are abnormally skinny. My local Advance has a cheapie house brand 56 in stock, so it really should not be that hard for you to find one. Also, the specs on that one are: CCA: 550 / CA: 668.

You'd probably be able to fit a 51 or 51R (One has the terminal sides reversed) in your battery tray, but it has considerably less CCA. On the bright side, they should be readily available literally anywhere because so many Honda's use them.

Otherwise, modify the battery tray to fit a larger, more common battery. That's about all I can offer.

Photos for perspective.

Here is the battery tray. Facing the wheel well you have a chunk of metal that accepts the plastic foot of the battery. On the other side is a bolthole for the clamp that secures the other end down. The battery is further held in place with raised edges.

https://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a...t/CGS_8317.jpg

Now lets add a Group 124R battery.

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...t/CGS_8319.jpg
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...t/CGS_8318.jpg

Again, length is perfect but you can't see it in the photo. It sits in the tray and cannot side back and fourth on hard braking or acceleration. The problem arises that it's oh-so-slightly too wide, so your options are either hook it into the back catch or hook into the clamp but it sits at an angle and not fully in the pan, nor is the bolt hole out far enough for me to still install the clamp and hope the battery doesn't care about sitting on an angle. A hard turn and you run the risk of it rolling out of the pan.

https://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a...t/CGS_8320.jpg

I'll keep poking at this. It's infuriating how annoyingly close this is.

Edited: as a reminder for why I'm needing such a larger battery than the car needs, remember the accessories I'm adding:

-Satellite radio*
-Minidisc head unit*
-Carphone
-MDT 9100 computer terminal*
-Onboard GPS
-300W AC power inverter*

*may be used for extended periods with the engine off

If however someone has a better idea for a battery rating and my solution of just throwing more amps at it is no good, I'm open to suggestions.

It would cut down on storage space, but how about mounting the battery in the rear? (cables probably not super cheap, though...maybe you only need to run the positive to the front)

They make universal battery trays, is replacing the battery tray an option?

Handful of goofy ideas:

Could you make an adapter tray? By that I mean a small tray that on the bottom fits securely in the stock tray and bolts/Lock into the stock tray, and on the top of the adapter has provisions to securely hold the battery you want to use.

Have you considered adding a super capacitor booster box? Some folks have replaced their car batteries with smaller super capacitor banks and have demonstrated that they hold starting charge for many days, work in winter, and can sustain some accessories for some time with engine off... I'm not sure I'd trust one for replacing the battery in normal use especially in Canada and under your circumstances....But what if it was used only as a starting reserve(along side a regular battery)? You could add a high current diode in series with one of the leads to the cap bank to make it such that the car can charge but NOT discharge the cap bank. You could then add a high current starter relay in parallel with the diode... you could wire that relay to the start position of the ignition (to give you a jump every start) or to some emergency jump switch.... I've actually considered this for my car.

I'm assuming in the last picture, you have the ass end of the battery sitting on top of the metal chunk that holds the 'foot' of the battery. If the battery tray is welded to the car, you could buy a universal battery tie down. Like this, but the J-shaped bolts are sold separately with that one. You could drill 2 holes for the J bolts, and there you go. If it's not welded, get a universal battery tray.

Sitting at a slight angle is not a big deal. Not being held down is actually way more detrimental to a battery. I would be more concerned with the bottom of the battery sitting on the sharp metal edges of the battery tray for long periods of driving, it might cut into the bottom. Though they're usually pretty thick. If you wind up leaving it at a slight angle, I'd get a strip of wood, the thickness of the vertical walls of the battery tray, and maybe 3cm wide, just for the high side of the battery to sit on top of, so the sharp metal doesn't rub through the battery.

If you want a more redneck solution, get one of those little ratchet straps, hook one end to somewhere on the fender side, behind the battery, throw it over the top of the battery, hook the other end to somewhere below, and tighten it.

Is a 124R satisfactory for you? Or you still want more juice?

Like Bryan said, you could put the battery in the trunk... or you could keep the battery under the hood and ADD a battery in the trunk / rear / whatever. There are certain issues, but simply having a second battery should be fine. You can get a heavy gauge cable for the positive run to under the hood, which are a little costly. If you wanted to do it more properly, they have a switching device that will automatically switch the car's charging/load to either battery, depending on which needs it, while the car is running. Not sure what it's called.

Gentlemen! I present to you....

A booster seat. .3.

https://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a...t/CGS_8323.jpg
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...t/CGS_8322.jpg

A sandwich of two sheets of plywood drops straight into the battery pan and raises it above the old flange and bracket. New brackets and flanging (with two inch long screws, so relax) hold the battery in place while the old clamp can still be used, albeit with a longer bolt.
It should be ready to go tomorrow once it's painted to keep the weather out of the wood and I buy a boot for the positive battery cable. :banana:

It should be more than plenty.

Now that's good thinking!

Nice adapter tray! Sometimes craftsmanship is the most satisfying solution.

I like it! I would...I once mounted an AMC radiator in my International pickup truck using 2x4's.

Well the car has now been officially on the road for a week and after swallowing the bill for the first full-tank fill ($86CAD for 70L of regular....) and driving it in both clear roads and snow using 4WD it's becoming apparent just how out of tune the entire engine is.
The ignition is off, the mechanical timing is off and the carb has very clearly had the idle jets mucked with. When it's -17 out the car is about impossible to start and no matter what you're up to it's running so rich you can stall and flood the car too easily. Methinks that when the computer was first bypassed and the car retuned it was much warmer. Now as I gather all the parts needed to be positive it's not cabling, vacuum lines or filters I need to ask what I should be adjusting first to get the car ready for a proper tune-up as I am assuming every adjustment is currently incorrect.

Where would I start?

To be honest, I don't work on carbureted cars often enough to know for sure. My suggestion is to make damn sure all the vacuum lines are routed correctly, and not leaking vacuum. In fact, make especially sure zero vacuum is leaking. This can be very difficult. Large vacuum leaks can be found with a can of flammable brake cleaner and a big pair of balls. Little leaks can be impossible, unless you put eyes and hands on every single thing that has vacuum to it, and even then, it's unreliable at best.

Me, I could just hook up a smoke machine to the intake and watch where the smoke escapes. And yeah, that would probably be MY first step. Second, I'd make sure the ignition timing is in spec. Need a timing light and a tachometer, which I think you have. Easy to get, if not. Which, btw, idle speed has to be set right before doing ignition timing. Ignition timing should probably also be double checked after everything else you do.

Valve timing is pretty unlikely to be off. Perhaps a little with an old, stretched chain. But a jumped chain is unlikely. Besides, you'd know. It'd probably run ok, but have very little power when driving, all the time, not just when cold.

The rest would be carburetor adjustment, which... I'm not sure about with the computerized carb. I'm sure your big fancy book will detail it well. I'd imagine there's some way of locking the computer in default mode, perhaps unplugging some sensor or such. And then likely turning a screw while watching a vacuum gauge. Hopefully. It might be more complicated.

Boy gas is expensive up there. I filled up my burban yesterday to the tune of 2.6$ a gal for midgrade.

Already ahead of you on the vacuum lines. New rubber line for all the vacuum routing and the fuel lines has been ordered. My initial work back in the beginning of winter found either cracked or deteriorated lines.

Carb adjustments are made by placing the computer in a set mode which locks the timing and lean/rich adjustment to a known static value, then it's the usual method of setting the idle adjustment, unless they've also tempered with the metering pins and jets, in which case it might be better to just rebuild the carb. :thumbsdn:

Yes, but are you *able* to put the computer in set mode? Or do you need the "scanner" for that?

If the jets have been messed with, you might have to have an actual carburetor shop rebuild the carb. They should have one of those devices that can actually measure the amount of gas being carbureted out of it. But idk.

Wouldn't be a bad idea to buy a rebuild kit for the carb, knock it down, get the whole thing surgically clean, and try again.

FWIW, and Madmen touched on it, vacuum leaks. Dont overlook that at any step. They have caused me too many problems to mention. Various gauges can be used to test it. Hand held pump type gauges test it well (brake type). Im sure many other ways with accuracy. It doesnt take much of a vacuum leak to really screw thing up, especially with engine idle.

Just for giggles, I looked on ebay for smoke machines...

LINK

And people are selling homemade ones. They're literally a paint can with a small electric heater in it. While I knew the concept was simple, I really didn't think people would be making them out of junk and selling them on ebay. So really, you could easily make your own, probably for real cheap.

I actually have one of those small smoke machines Wal-Mart sells during Halloween. I've been thinking of ways to make it practical to do smoke testing, otherwise I'm stuck with a vacuum gauge and testing various points with the engine running.
Speaking of vacuum leaks, all is not well in the valve cover. Before I change the air filter I inspected the PCV breather and again after a week on the road I've had oil burping out of the valve cover, up the breather hose, through the PCV breather filter and into the air cleaner, so there's no point changing the air filter yet.

http://repairguide.autozone.com/znet...52800853e4.jpg

I tested the PCV valve and found it was behaving as it should and found a decent vacuum going through it and into the valve cover and sharing the same vacuum with the charcoal canister. What I did not find however was a vacuum at the air cleaner breather. It must be pulling a LOT of air from somewhere to defeat a 20 inHG vacuum and there was not a lot of indication of serious blow-by. There's an oil leak from the valve cover gasket above the manifolds, so we might have to first start there.

Yes you can set the computer into various open and closed loop modes manually. The mechanics handbook specifies how to jumper the diagnostic connectors to fool it into various states. Speaking of carb rebuilding, there was a partial rebuild kit that came with the car so indeed, there has been people inside the carb body. I know there's at least one shop in town within a stone's throw of my workplace who does rebuilds.

Eh, a lot of old cars get oil up the pcv hose. Hell, a lot of cars in general. There's a reason manufacturers stopped putting the pcv breather hose near the air filter - it just gets the filter all soggy (and leaves oil deposits on the throttle plate) - so most modern cars usually have the hose routed to the intake or some place down the line from the air filter. I think your car should probably have a little square of felt in the air cleaner, over the pcv hose place. To sop up the oil it squirts out. Not 100% sure though.

It does. It's a little orange plastic cartridge with a FRAM part number and packed with a wadding that is plugged into the side of the air cleaner.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/i...9hTPHpA_7OxVEQ

It's completely filled with oil. I need to find new wadding to replace it. My aftermarket metal valve cover apparently lacks a baffle for the breather port to keep oil out, so I'm wondering if that is something I should install when I redo the gasket.

OUCH

So my first tank-to-empty calculation was done today when I started stalling down the hill to the highway. Good thing there's a gas station down there.

70L of gas, at $1.29CAD/L it cost $85.38 to fill the tank to full.
70L of gas with short highway driving, mainly city driving and hills everywhere in between lasted 9 days and allowed the car to travel 391km.

My math puts it at 15.75MPG at a cost of around 21 cents per kilometer.
Not.....great...but the Tracker was doing 21MPG when it was retired and the engine still needs a full tune-up, so there's likely improvements in those numbers once things are baselined and properly set. A bunch of that work starts tomorrow when the plugs, distributor rotor and cap, the cables and the smaller diameter vacuum lines are replaced followed by resetting of the ignition timing. This also gives me my first chance to liik into cylinder compression to verify if the source of my PCV issues are bad blow-by or something else. I have now verified there's 18 InHG present at the PCV valve but with the breather plugged I cannot get the crankcase to pull a vacuum below 1 InHG, which isn't enough to overcome the seemingly small amount of blow-by at unloaded revving that pushes the case pressure above 1PSI.

A replacement Sol-Vac solenoid has also been sourced and ordered. What I was not able to find however was a repalcement dashpot as mine is completely missing. The closest thing I could find was the Carter 202-462 (AMC 8127323) but it's listed for the 2BBL, not the 2BBD and I don't know what the difference is.


Edited: aaaaah drat. I tried to test fit my compression tester and the threads are not long enough to properly fit the 258 block. I can make it barely thread in with the O-ring removed but then the readings will be unusable due to a poor seal.

Well if you can't get it better and the novelty factor wears off you can do as good maybe better fuel economy with a Suburban, S10 based SUV, or the Trailblazer that replaced it...All were available with some type of 4WD as an option, and the suburban and Trailblazer extended body version can haul an absurd quantity of stuff INSIDE the vehicle (no more sony screens strapped to the roof to fight a death match with a sharp tarp, or driving with the back open in winter to haul a vending machine)...The GMC Envoy version of the trailblazer even had a special version of the extended cab body Envoy XUV where the cargo portion of the roof could open and a weather tight partition put up behind the back seat making it into something akin to a small crew cab pickup truck...My Suburban is so good in the snow that I can comfortably pass slow people in conditions that I'd BE one of the slow people in if I were in some other vehicles I've driven in winter.

I'm not a 100% sure, but I don't think the 'D' means anything. '2BBL' is a very typical - almost colloquial - 'abbreviation' that just refers to the carb having 2 'barrels' (jets). Unless the different 'abbreviation' is deliberate to mean having an electronic carb. My money's on '2BBD' being either a misspelling, or just a idiosyncrasy of AMC.

Also, as a piece of advice, don't go too far down the rabbit hole with your PCV issue. You might be on to something there, but it's always best to start with the simplest things (Occam's razor, anyone?) AND the more common failure points, like plugs, wires, etc, etc.

EDIT: so I did a little >research< and apparently, BB is an actual abbreviation for 'Ball and Ball,' which are some people's surnames. So technically, BBD means Ball & Ball Dual barrel, as opposed to a Carter or Holley, or what have you. However, Carter bought out and made the BB design, so it's technically a style of Carter carburetor. However, it's still important to remember that '2BBL' IS a colloquialism that's used to refer to any 2 barrel carb, and it's not necessarily indicating that it's any particular brand or type of carb, other than that it has 2 barrels.

Also, also, you might want to thumb through Allpar and see what you can gleam about your Eagle.

I know my suggestion might be simplistic, but why not get a regular 2 barrel carb for this?

I had a '79 Toyota truck with a 20R 2.2L 4 banger that had a 2 barrel Aisin-Seiki carb with tons of emissions spaghetti on/around it. I got rid of it and put a Toyota specific Weber 32/36 DGEV 2BBL carb on it and it solved all my carb related issues. I did have to regulate the fuel pressure down to 3 psi though.

If a guy was really ambitious, he could maybe fit a RENIX fuel system off a Cherokee :scratch2:

Is the ignition system tied into the carburetor computer somehow?

...why? He'd still have to tune it.

Back when I had an old IH pickup powered by a 258 I did a lot of reading on the subject. Mine was (mostly) pre-emissions with a very simple Holley 1bbl. Many of the Jeep guys online talked about the hot ticket being a Motorcraft 2bbl, I think from the later 70's.

(See what I mean about the 'BBL' term being a colloquialism?)

New sol-vac came in. Woo, I have high idle again! :D

https://oi11.photobucket.com/albums/...t/CGS_8369.jpg

Also did a parts inventory and it turns out that the heater core bypass I salvaged is not actually needed on my car. It's only needed on models with Air Conditioning and it's a VERY common failure point.
So it was a surprise when I found people pretty much throwing parts at me in exchange for the thing, simply because the diaphgram held a vacuum, so it's been refurbished.

https://oi11.photobucket.com/albums/...t/CGS_8375.jpghttps://oi11.photobucket.com/albums/...t/IMG_2849.jpg

Also had the front hub actuator tested when the car was in for seals. They confirmed that it operates with relatively little vacuum, however the transfer case actuator still will not pull it into or out of 4WD. They were not being billed to service the 4WD so it looks like I'll be spending more time underneath testing all the vacuum lines for a leak.

That's cool that you got fast idle back :thmbsp:

Does this car have a dana 30/35 with a vacuum actuated center axle disconnect? I'm just curious.....

I hate those heater valves. Most of them are plastic nowadays, but even the old metal ones, all they EVER do is leak coolant. One of our customers is a limo company, I swear their one stretch limo must've gone through 20 of those damn things. On one of their party buses, it got to the point where we just bypassed the fucker in winter, and then blocked the hoses in summer.

It cooled off this week and I got fed up with the crap cabin heating so I spent today swearing in the rain as I drained the system, replaced all the hoses, flushed it several times because jesus christ it was pretty filthy and then reloaded it with 10L of new coolant.

https://oi11.photobucket.com/albums/...t/CGS_8376.jpg
https://oi11.photobucket.com/albums/...t/CGS_8379.jpg
https://oi11.photobucket.com/albums/...t/CGS_8380.jpg

The system must of really badly needed a flush because the heater core works a hell of a lot better now and both the upper and lower radiator hoses were about to fail. I also located a leak in the radiator. The bottom of the upper radiator hose port has a hairline crack that needs to be brazed shut.

Also I'm STILL finding oil in the air cleaner. It's not the PCV. The contamination is staying isolated to the cavity between the filter and the carb inlet.

https://oi11.photobucket.com/albums/...t/CGS_8377.jpg
https://oi11.photobucket.com/albums/...t/CGS_8378.jpg

It looks like the carb is just coughing it out. Either that, or it's coming from that little thing next to the carb hole.

your building up pressure in your engine and its shooting/sucking oil into your cleaner. Try putting a vented cap in place of the oil fill cap and see if that stops it. Im betting it will.

I once blew head gaskets out by not having a vented cap. It can happen. Your engine needs to breathe a little more. If you already have a vented cap I cant see then make sure it isnt plugged.

How?

For whatever reason. I just found this thread. MY experience w/AMC cars goes back to 1974, when my dad bought me a stripper Gremlin w/the small 6-IIRC, it was a Vroom, Vroom motor w232 cubic inches.. About 6 months later I came home from school & there was a LOADED Gremlin X w/Levi's interior, flipper rear windows, A/C AM/FM, the whole 9 yards, along w/a 258 CID BIG Vrooom, Vroom mill.. The problem w/both of these cars was in their basically ABYSSIMAL build quality. In the snazzier one, the dashboard must have had no less than 378 pieces, which all 752 squeaked, beeped & rattled. The later car would routinely overheat if you ran it w/the AC, but the Levi's seats were pretty comfortable & wore well. The Driver's Door, the weld that held the window-top part- broke from the lower part of the door, & while it never came off, I was always worried about it, or just having it fall off going down the road. Gremlins weren't much longer in wheelbase length than they were wide, you could spin one easy peasy-And not even have to TRY hard. The back seat area was a sick joke, you could only sit back there if you had NO legs. You COULD fold the back seat down & it'd hold 2 kegs, which was all I cared about then... I hope AMC learnt a few lessons on build quality thru the years on yr Eagle..

The Eagle uses a PCV breather system and cannot use a vented cap. That orange thing at the top of the photo is the inlet cleaner. It's a FRAM part but the element pulls out easily and and can be repacked with cushion foam.

https://oi11.photobucket.com/albums/...t/CGS_8381.jpg

I was having major issues with oil coughing back up and into the filter and into the air cleaner but after I redid the valve cover seal it seemed to go away. The AMC Forum has recommended just replacing the old air cleaner element as at this point the oil is likely coming from the contaminated filter and not the PCV anymore. I just was not aware those filters could hold so much oil.

Anyways, today was Fuel and Oil day. New oil and filter, plus all the filters and rubber lines on the fuel system were replaced. The rigid lines were also bent back into shape as the previous owner apparently mangled them a little when he installed the aftermarket valve cover. Careful routing and maintenance of the fuel system is essential since the exhaust manifold directly below makes these cars notorious for fires.

https://oi11.photobucket.com/albums/...t/CGS_8384.jpg
https://oi11.photobucket.com/albums/...t/CGS_8383.jpg

Note the silver marked vacuum lines. Those were scheduled to all be replaced today however I only got as far as the vacuum lines for the Air Cleaner before I had enough of the gas fumes. :drool: