Posted by Desoto61 [138.162.0.44] on Friday, February 21, 2014 at 08:54:00 :
In Reply to: Dodge Related-4bt in Grand Cherokee posted by Caleb in Manhattan KS [70.184.232.53] on Thursday, February 20, 2014 at 14:20:00 :
Not to rain on your parade, but just going down the 4BT path is violating one of your criteria (really two).
Parts for the 4BT are NOT off the shelf, unless you mean off the shelf at your local Cummins dealer. Some common 6 BT parts that are shared with the 4BT are easy since the RAM stuff is stocked but that's a minority of it.
Second, you will honestly probably have almost new car cost in the thing by the time you are done without some really lucky finds, and assuming you don't include the cost of your time. After all that, in the end it is still a 10+ year old Jeep with a 5-speed manual.
Now I'll fully admit I'm the pot calling the kettle black here, but you have to admit that you are building it because that's what you want. Most people do this thinking they are going to spend $5000 and a few weekends and end up with a modern Jeep experience with 30 mpg. The reality will probably be you will have $15K into a build for a vehicle that will never get that back, all to save 4 MPG assuming you don't start hopping up the power. That's a nice down payment on a better vehicle or a lot of gas you could have put in something else.