'65 Gladiator 230

[offthebeatenpath]

Here’s my introduction and the start of my build thread.

Picked this up last weekend from a local seller, seems it spent most of its time as a farm truck. It was repainted on the exterior at some point, and the bodywork was done fairly well, but not the paint.

Drove it 10 miles home with my foot half on the gas most of the way due to poor carb tuning, possibly getting too much fuel from the retrofitted electronic fuel pump.

Floorboards are toast, tailgate bottom edge is shot, corners of the bed need work, but there’s a lot going for it.

It runs! Decently too, but the valve train is pretty noisy right now. Shifts good, most all the interior and emblems are present and accounted for. Body is quite straight. Cooling system works.

I lost probably a quart of oil on the 10 miles home, so spent a couple evenings on Google sourcing 230 engine parts.... no small feat. I’ll post links to what I found tomorrow, but if anyone has any to add, I’m all ears!

I’m no stranger to Jeeps or mechanics, but I’m a cabinetmaker by trade, so metal can be a bit foreign to me at times. Had an 85 CJ7, 88 Comanche, 98 TJ, 98 Cherokee, those are all gone. Have another 98 TJ in the driveway, but I don’t think it’ll be staying long.



And a couple of my helpers...

[offthebeatenpath]

Sorry, I've got to sort out my photo hosting, I'm not quite sure what's going on here....


That's better. Fricken' Flickr.

[Wagoneer Taylor]

Looks like a great truck to start with! Looking forward to seeing more.

[offthebeatenpath]

My current plan here is to get the 230 running well if possible so that it's driveable while I sort out the other issues. We'll see how that goes, but I know it runs now, so that seems like a decent place to start.

It has a 1 barrel intake with the Holley 1920 carb. I ordered a rebuild kit for it from Mikes Carburetor Parts, at www.carburetor-parts.com a super helpful website with a ton of YouTube videos too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkOxvi6TD2o

The truck was having a lot of trouble idling at all, which is why I ordered the kit. After I ordered the kit, I watched one of his videos where he mentions as a side note that a lot of electric in line fuel pumps have too much pressure for carbs like this and cause them to run rough. The PO stuck inline electric fuel pump in and bypassed the mechanical fuel pump. I think that may be a part of my problem, so I’ll have to add a fuel pressure regulator in somewhere.

Not sure if I'll try to go back to the mechanical pump or not, from my findings, no one makes a replacement pump for this 230 anymore. It seems like mine is functioning okay, so I'm not sure why it was bypassed. I'll dig into that later.

It also has the old school oil bath air filter on it, which I’ll either swap out or alter to accept a round paper filter. I like the idea of keeping the original housing, but I don't really want to mess with the oil.

[SOLSAKS]

GOOD find !

it is obvious you are not afraid to tear into it.

you will have it singing like a bird in no time.

your helpers will never forget the truck project.

these are all good things for you, the helpers and the jeep !

welcome to the forum.

dave in NC

[miracleed]

Good looking truck! Good luck.

[offthebeatenpath]

I dropped the oil pan the other night and found good news and bad news:



See the brazing on the left and right sides of the top end of the pan? Looks like somebody threw the #6 cylinder rod at some point. The oil pan is dented from the inside out right under the #6 cylinder. That’s the bad news.

The good news is that the oil in the pan was clean. No water, nothing metallic at all

This does confirm my need to do a compression test, which I’ve never done before, but I’m sure I can figure it out. I probably should have done that earlier, but it'll have to wait at this point.

Here’s a shot of the cylinder head, things look fairly clean to me, nothing super grody looking. The truck didn’t come with a title, so I don’t have a previous mileage on it except the odometer which reads 15k and change. I assume that’s more like 115k, but who knows!



I also ran through and adjusted all the valves, which was way easier than I expected. I've done it on a couple Honda CB550 motorcycles over the years, but not on a truck. It couldn't be simpler!

Especially on this motor with a single OHC, it's a piece of cake. Turn crankshaft til cam lobe points down to 6:00. Find the .008" feeler gauge, stick it between the valve and the lifter, tighten nut til the feeler gauge is snug. Move on to the next valve. I don't think it took me 10 minutes.

Before:


After brass brush, Gunk citrus degreaser and elbow grease:

[rws31]

Very nice. Looks like your making good headway already. I love those old trucks. If I can find one in decent shape, would love to have one. Good to see the kids helping.

[joe]

Cool truck and nice condition! That'll be fun as a part time driver/hobby truck. Keep it near stock as feasible and it should be pretty reliable.
The 230 is a good solid motor if maintained.
You mentioned <"I lost probably a quart of oil on the 10 miles home."> That's even more than usual for a 230. But... at least you know it's a leaker (most 230's are).Oil level is "CRITICAL" on the 230! Most likely leaking from the timing chain cover. Poor eng mount design. Check oil "often" cause leaks(low oil) killed a lot of 230's cause oil starvation wipes out the cam and cam bed. Rare and $$$$. When you replace the timing cover gasket check the chain. It's a really looong chain and prone to stretching. When you need a new chain...buy two. Also keep up on valve adjustments. If you're lucky enough to ever find a used one I'd go wth the optional 2v carb intake manifold. I think it's for the Holley 2100(??)2v carb. Nice little performer carb w/o being too big.
In the past I've had decent luck getting 230 stuff from Kanters. https://www.kanter.com/customerservice.aspx Use their phone number not the web site. I haven't messed with a 230 OHC in prolly 10 years and even back then my rule when finding available consumable maint parts was...buy two. One trick I learned chasing parts was call the part manufacturer that made the orig part. Just for an example: Fel-Pro gaskets. and see if they still make them.Lota times they have a stash of NOS stuff they don't generally offer their retailers cause of low sales volumes.
You'll have fun with that truck. Tough and super easy simple maint.
Enjoy

[63J200atLSU]

As someone who also brought an early rig with a 230 back from the dead, I second everything Joe said. I was lucky and found a 2bbl intake manifold on eBay that came with 3 Holley 2300 carbs, I bought rockauto clean out of one of the rebuild kits that was on clearance, frankensteined the three carbs into 1 during a rebuild and tuned per the TSM. Been running great ever since. Only thing I REALLY want mechanically is one of the BW overdrive units so I can go faster than 60 and not be revving the engine to all hell... If you have any questions about the 230 specifically, feel free to drop me a line!

[rang-a-stang]

AWESOME!! 'scribed!

[offthebeatenpath]

Cool truck and nice condition! That'll be fun as a part time driver/hobby truck. Keep it near stock as feasible and it should be pretty reliable.
The 230 is a good solid motor if maintained.
You mentioned <"I lost probably a quart of oil on the 10 miles home."> That's even more than usual for a 230. But... at least you know it's a leaker (most 230's are).Oil level is "CRITICAL" on the 230! Most likely leaking from the timing chain cover. Poor eng mount design. Check oil "often" cause leaks(low oil) killed a lot of 230's cause oil starvation wipes out the cam and cam bed. Rare and $$$$. When you replace the timing cover gasket check the chain. It's a really looong chain and prone to stretching. When you need a new chain...buy two. Also keep up on valve adjustments. If you're lucky enough to ever find a used one I'd go wth the optional 2v carb intake manifold. I think it's for the Holley 2100(??)2v carb. Nice little performer carb w/o being too big.
In the past I've had decent luck getting 230 stuff from Kanters. https://www.kanter.com/customerservice.aspx Use their phone number not the web site. I haven't messed with a 230 OHC in prolly 10 years and even back then my rule when finding available consumable maint parts was...buy two. One trick I learned chasing parts was call the part manufacturer that made the orig part. Just for an example: Fel-Pro gaskets. and see if they still make them.Lota times they have a stash of NOS stuff they don't generally offer their retailers cause of low sales volumes.
You'll have fun with that truck. Tough and super easy simple maint.
Enjoy

Yeah those engine mounts are something else... that was one of the first things that I noticed after I got done marveling at the valve cover...

The timing chain is long, no doubt. Does anyone have a baseline for me on what the chain deflection is on a new chain? The Jeep Service Manual states that with the tensioner in place, the distance across shouldn't be less than 3.38". Currently, my chain tensioner is nearly straight with very little curve to it. Also, there's very little wear on the tensioner itself, so those two things tell me that it wasn't replaced too long ago.

I keep waffling on what to spend money on and what not to, but I've got to draw the line somewhere, so I think I'm going to roll with the existing chain and tensioner and just keep tabs on it.

Thanks for the tip on contacting Fel-pro direct, I hadn't thought of that. Good call!

[offthebeatenpath]

Axle swap???

Just ran across a local (10 min. away) ad for a pair of J-truck D44 axles with 4.27 gears..... asking $100.

What do I need to look at in order to evaluate these as candidates for an axle swap into my '65?
I'm hoping they're open knuckle, but the ad photos only show the rear.
What year did the axle configuration change?

I'm currently running a T98 4 speed with I assume a Dana 20 transfer case. So, that's a passenger side front diff, and centered rear I think.

[rang-a-stang]

Do you know what year they are from? In 80 or 81 J trucks went to driver side front pumpkin. If they are QTrack axles, the rear will be passenger side offset, but don't let that bother you; there are PLENTY of stories of folks on here running offset rear with a centered case. it really is a non-issue. If the front is Disc brakes, you will need to get a proportioning valve (not $$$$ or hard but be ready).

Sounds like a steal!!! If they were in my area, I would go snatch them up JUST for the gear sets!

[offthebeatenpath]

It doesn't sound like he knows exactly what they came out of....
He said '73, then '68, but neither of those would be wide track.

I'm kind of hoping they are front disc, that would be a sweet upgrade in the process. What year switched to disc brakes in the front?

I'm trying to get more info, but it sounds like they're semi-buried in a storage unit, so he wants me to tell him if I want them before he digs them out. I said I wanted to see them before I committed to it.