OEM motor mount holes damaged, 01 wrangler TJ, will a bracket like bom

My buddy just bought a nice low mile 01 TJ, and upon inspection after hearing some noise, he notice the fan shroud was busted, and upon further inspection, notice that the motor mounts didnt seem right, and had a "wedge" piece of diamond steel between the OEM bracket and the 3 OEM mount holes on the engine.

Come to find out, someone had busted all of the OEM mount holes from the cast iron, and created a plate with drilled holes to reach to the "new" mount holes, which they screw onto the OEM bracket.




as you can see in the pics above (which is a stock pic, how it should look like), all 3 of those OEM holes are unusable or broken on his jeep engine...

there is a official bracket he can use that will allow him to use the new holes as listed in the picture, but it uses the OEM holes as well... the M.O.R.E. bomb proof bracket.

you can see it here:

http://www.mountainoffroad.com/Catalog/Instructions/Block%20Brackets/BBTJ0006-is.pdf


He doesnt think he can weld or reform any of the damage OEM holes as its cast iron...

is there anything he can do to securely mount his engine, or did he just waste $10,000 on what seems to be a otherwise outstanding looking TJ?

any suggestions would be appreciate  

If the OEM mount holes are only stripped, you can use a heli-coil repair.  I've found this to be very effective.  If the boss is actually cracked, have a look at the product described on this site, it looks promising:

http://www.locknstitch.com/inserts.htm

If you want it repaired with welding, it can certainly be done.  Those holes aren't located over anything "important" (that could be damaged by heat), so if you took the whole jeep into a place that has some experience with welding cast (people have been welding cast for decades)and had them remove the pan to get the oil away from the heat of the welding, they could easily repair the stripped or cracked areas on each boss & if the boss is actually broken off, they can build one back up and grind it flat to fit the mounting bracket.  I'm sure they could even drill & tap the holes after welding, and if not, you could do that yourself.  You would need a transfer punch to get the exact center of each mount hole transferred to the welded-up boss' then drill and tap the holes - use a blind hole tap if you want to minimize the hole depth.  This would be the most expensive option, but probably the most robust.  

i work in a body shop and if the mounts are "busted" and not stripped i would bet that the jeep has been wrecked and the frame/engine movement during the collision broke the motor mounts loose and thats the way some someone or some shop halfassed it back together, i'm going to bet if you look you will see either some repair on the frame or that it is been replaced all together

vehicle could also be a rebuilt total  
My Junk:
98 TJ
86 XJ
83 J20
61 CJ6

That's a very good point, I wondered how you could break that part of the casting with the mount bolted to it, but if that's the case, the jeep would have been wrecked enough to be a write-off and probably would have been "parted" to bypass the declaration requirement for vehicles that are "written off" by insurance.  

there are many ways it could have been repaired... and not a total

1. no insurance / liability only and the owner paid out of pocket to have it "repaired" , this way wouldn't even show up on a carfax either

2. a crooked shop repaired it to get the job when it should have been a total

3. the owner repaired it

4. the owner cashed out on some of the repairs instead of fixing them correctly (ie he told the shop "just get it running so i can trade it and give me what is left over")


there are many many other ways... it doesn't take much to cause that much damage and say if it was new it would take $12-15K in damages to total it...i see this crap all the time.. i am a estimator at the bodyshop, you would be amazed at some of the previous "repairs" i have seen by some backwoods/crooked shops and people that have no business working on stuff  
My Junk:
98 TJ
86 XJ
83 J20
61 CJ6