We've been having cooling issues with the girlfriends 95 Cherokee Sport the last year. Nothing serious, or at least nothing easily diagnosed by the tech we go to. Check the levels frequently it its been a good rig.

Going down the highway tonight, at a reasonable speed even, i notice the gauge is in the red, and in the time i was wondering if the gauge was screwing with me or not, the engine started to run worse and worse. Was able to limp it to a highly lit section ov highway to get a look (maybe about 1.5 miles later), but by the time i got there it was barely running, so i shut it off. All fluid gone, engine smoking, and rad cap nowhere to be seen?

I'm thinking whoever had the cap off last (not me) didn't quite get it back on right, and i lost it a couple miles before i saw the gauge tagged.

So i filled the thing to capacity with some handy dandy creek water (luckily everything is flooding here right now), it wouldn't start, battery died (weak in the first place). Looooooooong miserable story later... got to a friends house, we shot down there, jump-started it, got it to a nearby gas station, and it was running BAD. Worse, now the starter sounds different... like theres a dead cylinder... like a : rr-rr-rr-whiiiiirrr-rr-rr-rr-whiiiiirr... Which goes great along with that new BAD exhaust leak (or similar sound).

Filled it up, checked everything out, no leaking. Lucked out and found the cap hanging off the frame. Limped it 30 miles home. When i got to the gas station in town the gauge had not moved from the 100-110 it read the whole way, but the engine was steaming again. By the time i got home it was wanting to die and pretty hot again.

Did i blow the head gasket?

Its gotten warm before (not like this though), and its always had a coolant leak nobody could diagnose. To me... it points to a weak/bad head gasket, that finally went when the cap popped off the rad on the highway tonight.

Sound about right? Other ideas? How many hours to fix for a shop? (i wont be doing it)

I'd say you are correct on your radiator cap "popping off" diag (installed incorrectly). Reason your gauge showed "ok"... coolant temp sensors like to be in coolant. When they become hot air sensors things get extremely hot before you know whats happening. If it's a nice cherokee and worth keeping I'd pull the engine and go through it. Cheap gamble would be to pull the head, resurface it, and throw a gasket on it and hope for the best.....and get a new radiator if you haven't in awile.

BTW....the dealer I work at got in a clean 92 Cherokee 4x4 w/t 67k miles. They advertised it and the phone went crazy. Sold it within an hour for $5500.

The funky cranking sound goes a long way in telling you that it will most likely have to come apart. I would bet the head will have to come off at least. A compression test will pinpoint which cyl (cyls).

My '75Mercedes, inline 6, overheated one night in the middle of nowhere. I was't paying attention to the gauges and only looked when the engine started to sound rough.

I pulled over as soon as I could, looked under the hood, boy did it smell hot. I got it home. The engine had been so hot that it melted the insulation off the plug wires.

Then I got married and the car sat until I could afford to work on it. Letting it sit was a bad mistake. After four years I had enough money to rebuild the engine. I found a mess.
The burnt ethylene glycol ate pits in the cylinder walls, and the pistons were stuck in so tight that on two of them I had to pop the top off the piston and jack them out using a hollow core hydraulic jack and wire rope. The 100 ton jack had to work pretty hard to get those pistons out.

Later I found that there is a chemical called butyl cellusolve that might have made life easier.

Back to the block. I decided it needed "first oversize" pistons which are about 0.020 oversize, so I bought a set at $61 each from a gray marketeer. I was in an auto shop class then, so I bored the cylinders myself. That Mercedes cast iron is the best cast iron I have ever seen. Very hard, made the boring bar work.

I took the block to a local shop with a Sunnen automatic hone for final hone to fit and they did a nice job. However, when I got the block back into the shop I found that I could still see discoloration from the bottoms of the pits. But, I already had the pistons so I put the engine together and actually the pits didn't do any harm to performance.

Oh, yeah, cause of the overheating was a blown head gasket. The head when freed from the block was warped 0.024 on the exhaust side, less on the intake side. That was repaired by Arizona Cylinderhead, and a good job they did of straightening it out using an oven and hydraulic press. It only took a couple of thousandths milling to make it flat.

Moral of the story is, don't let the engine sit like that for any length of time! Or trade it for a good used one. I guarantee that it's going to need more than a head gasket.

R.

Well... its been to the mechanic already, a friend ov mine who isn't gonna let me spend a dime more than i have to. The thing is toast. Though last night it was still clean, today the oil is creamy, and at minimum, the head gasket is done. Likely a cracked head he said by the way it was running/cranking.

[Edited by Moparts - Family Friendly Site - Keep it clean].

Now we dont have a car.

Mustang is out with a blown head gasket and needs an engine. Now the Jeep needs an engine. Closest thing i have to a runner is this bashed Pinto, and IT wont hold coolant either (need a frost plug). What is it with me and keeping coolant in a car...???

You need to get an old VW bug or a Corvair... No need for coolant!

If you were driving distance I'd take that Cherokee off your hands!

Time for a Slant Six.

I've seen 'em run with the oil light on for months. Run without coolant? Not sure, but you sound like the right Guy for the job!

Should be an old Ram with one kicking around near you. $100 to $1000.00 is about right.

If you do happen to get behind the wheel of the Pinto.............I don't know you.

my experience with cherokees tells me its a warped head.

around here a new head is 150 bucks, takes a few hours to swap.

Mine has been thru the coolant merry-go-round.
When i first bought the head gasket went at 110k.
Later on down the road around 150k the rest went.
Radiator, waterpump, hoses, T-stat, metal return tube all replaced at that time. Around 165k heater core finally bit the bullet.
NOW, it's good as new.
and no issues.