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engine swap

96_2dr_5spd

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October 9, 2012
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City, State
pittsburgh pa
Year, Model & Trim Level
1996 explorer sport 4.0
Hello all,

I have a 96 4.0 ohv sport 5 speed and I recently had a headgasket blow,
looking for used engines on craigslist I found a 98 4.0 ohv from a 5 speed ex,
however it has the 8 bolt crankshaft, I asked if it came with the flywheel and he said he put a flywheel from his 4.0 Sohc on it.

my question, I know I cant run my flywheel on this engine because its a 6 bolt, however can I run it with my current setup and the Sohc flywheel?
will the starter work? are the clutches the same size?

any help is greatly appreciated
 



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Ok, well I scrapped the idea of that last motor,
I picked up a 96 OHV from an automatic donor with 80k miles.
the harness' looked extremely similar on the auto vs the pulled out manual engine. I figured it wouldn't need to swap harnesses over from my old engine.
I put everything together with my new junk yard motor, and the key wont turn the engine over, it turns the accessories on and I can jump across the leads of the starter solenoid on the drivers fender to get it started. im thinking maybe the auto trans plug on the engine harness is looking for a neutral safety switch and not finding it because I have nothing plugged into the extra connector? do I have to swap out the engine harness (after I already put everything back together) is there a way I can just jump the pins on the automatic plug to get it to start? I don't even know that this is the problem, just guessing for now..
any help or insight would be greatly appreciated
 






I think you are correct in that the lack of the neutral safety switch is your problem. i'm sure you can jump the wires to make it think it's in neutral/park, but as to which wires are involved I have no clue. I can provide a link to a site where you can get free wiring diagrams. If all else fails, get a neutral safety switch from the junk yard and plug it in.

Free Wiring Diagrams: You can find one at http://search.ebscohost.com/. Use RRCC and rebsco when signing in
 






wow! that's a great resource, thanks, however I didn't find the neutral safety switch listed in the automatic transmission wiring diagram heres all the things it listed

Pin 8,4 transmission fluid temp sensor
Pin 3,2 turbine shaft speed sensor
Pin 5,1 Torque converter clutch solenoid
Pin 11,12 Electronic pressure control solenoid
Pin 16,10 shift solenoid 1
Pin 14 shift solenoid 2
Pin 7 shift solenoid 3
Pin 9 coast clutch solenoid

also thinking about it, I still have my manual ecu plugged in, so would that even be looking for a neutral switch or just a clutch switch, makes me wonder where the clutch safety switch is wired to... I doubt it has anything to do with the engine harness

now I think im more confused
 






clutch pedal position switch

According to the starting circuit wiring diagram there must be a clutch pedal position switch circuit in place of the transmission range selector circuit.
StartingDiag1996.jpg

I would think that wiring is independent of the engine wiring harness and transmission harness.
Did you have the clutch pedal depressed all the way when attempting to crank the starter?
Did you use the original manual transmission flywheel instead of the automatic transmission flexplate and spacer on the replacement engine?
 






I would think that wiring is independent of the engine wiring harness and transmission harness.
Did you have the clutch pedal depressed all the way when attempting to crank the starter?
Did you use the original manual transmission flywheel instead of the automatic transmission flexplate and spacer on the replacement engine?

Yeah, this is what im thinking. However I don't know what else could be the culprit, I am trying with the clutch completely depressed, and the original flywheel and starter from the manual engine, and it starts and runs fine, it just needs jumped at the fender solenoid (brand new part)

I did have problems with it starting before the swap but that was just a bad ground at the starter, I made sure everything was connected extra tight when I put this new motor in and it starts fine, just not with the key

maybe ill try to hardwire the clutch switch tonight, just as a test.
 






Turns out my clutch switch works fine, checked both fuses associated with it and they were both good, but I still wasn't getting power at the small red wire on the fender solenoid. so I cut the pink wire on the clutch solenoid and ran my own wire through the firewall to the solenoid and now it starts fine.

now I just need to diagnose a pretty rough misfire, I replaced all the plugs with brand new, all the plug wires with the working plug wires from my last working motor. Didn't change anything. it did set off a check engine light which turns out to be a O2 sensor, any chance a bad O2 connection can cause a misfire. I was thinking of swapping injectors over next to see if those were causing a misfire.
 












I will double check, however im fairly sure they are in the right place, as I replaced them one at a time from my old motor
 






Ok, update

topped it off with coolant sunday, and let it idle in the driveway while I worked on my brothers camry. After about 30 mins of idling in the driveway I hopped in to turn it off and I noticed it was idling around 500rpm (unusual for it) so I stepped on the gas to rev it up a few times and it felt smooth. Took it for a ride down the road, and the misfire was gone. All I can think of is maybe an injector was clogged with old gas, and it worked its way out.

It didn't have reverse lights or a working speedometer, so I did swap over the old engine harness from my manual motor and that fixed both those problems. So I finally have a proper running sploder!
 












It's not uncommon for injectors that haven't operated for a long time to stick. I suggest adding a bottle of Techron fuel injector cleaner to your tank.

+1 on the Chevron Techron FI cleaner. Only thing I use and it's been proven to work.
 






I will throw some injector cleaner in there for good measure, thanks for the help guys!
 






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