After the that claimed my fiber camshaft timing gear, I had to tow the little CJ-2A the final 500 miles of . But now, I’ve swapped in a new timing gear, and oh my, she runs perfectly.

Just after diagnosing that strange camshaft gear failure, I called up Autozone in Grand Junction, Colorado and overnighted a new part. The following afternoon, my coworker Freddy and I—with careful use of a tiny rubber mallet we like to call “baby’s first hammer”—coerced that timing gear into place after lining up the timing marks.

Speaking of timing marks, have a look at how far off my old, broken gear was; my thumb shows the timing mark on the old gear. Compare that to the black dot at three o’clock on the new gear:

She fired right up!

That night at about 1 A.M., Freddy and I took the little Jeep out for some light off-roading on Fins ‘N Things:

And yesterday, I spent eight hours off-roading with heavily modified JK Wranglers on 7 Mile Rim. The Willys Kicked major butt. You can expect more off-road footage in the coming days, but here are two little clips:

I’m off to do some more off-roading.