1990 Cherokee hard to crank

A good buddy recently bought a 1990 Cherokee Limited with the inline 6.
Every time he tries to start it after it's sat for awhile it takes a looong
time to finally fire. Time is 8-10 seconds. With winter coming, he's
concerned with keeping enough battery capacity available on cold Canadian
winter mornings.

Any quick things we should check out over a couple of Canadian beers? The
truck has just over 50K miles and is otherwise in fantastic shape.

Jeff Falkiner
Ontario, Canada

 

Check to see that the fuel system remains pressurised after a long
shutdown.

 

Makes a lot of sense to me. Now, I've never owned a Jeep 4.0 litre, so can
anyone elighten me as to how the fuel system on that engine is set up? What
are the main areas I need to troubleshoot? I'm assuming that there is a
potentially faulty fuel pressure regulator/fuel pump/return valve I should
be looking for?

Thanks for any help.

Jeff Falkiner

 

It should make sense by now, you have been told all that from the jeep news
group. . Have your buddy go out and buy a manual for the J**P. A full
factory service manual is best but the Haynes or Chilton manuals will give a
pretty overview of most systems.

Snow...

 

Just for the record, I posted this note BEFORE my request for assistance
from the Jeep group. I thought that the fine folks there might also be a
good source of knowledge on the problem, just didn't think of them first
because I didn't subsrcibe to that group until yesterday . Not trying to
be a cross-posting PITA, just using usenet for what it is intended for:
exchange of information!

Jeff Falkiner

 

No problem Jeff. 8-10 sec. crank time seems pretty close to normal my 93
takes from 6-7 sec. on a good day. Check the check valve and rail pressure
like others have said and suggest getting a manual factory is the best but
expensive.

Snow...

 

Another resource for you -- rec.autos.makers.jeep+willys -- newsgroup.
Good luck.
Bob