jeepdreamer
Expedition Leader
Good catch on the headlight switch... those have been known to cause more than a few Car-B-Ques... :O Stupid design but looks like you got it all fixed up. 
1973 Wagoneer - Full Size Camping Goodness
- Thread starter Dr. Marneaus
- Start date
jeep-N-montero
Expedition Leader
I'm loving this thread, I had a buddy swap to the electronic ignition on his old 360 and picked up a lot of power and a few mpg. If you can't find the axles locally let me know, 80's model FSJ's are pretty common in the salvage yards here in Utah.
gixxerphil
Observer
:wavey: Marn
problem is I need a front that is the correct width and a d44 or 60 with a drivers side drop for the new transfer case. much harder to find. axles out of the ford and dodge 3/4 and 1 tons are about 10 inches too wide. custom is stupid expensive but i may have to go that way.
Dr. Marneaus
Station Wagoneer
What he said :ylsmoke:
The trick is on these rigs (unless you are trying to build something bigger or whatever) to find something that's a direct swap, so that limits a lot. As mentioned other manufactures will require mods, moving spring perches, etc which is great if you plants go SOA or something but I'm not planning on any more lift at this point, well, not really.
So that narrows it down to FSJ's for donors. Welllllll....post 78 or 79 they ditched the d20 and went driver drop. Okay plenty of fsj's from before 1980 right? well obviously anything pre-74 is going to have the same craptastic d30 in the front. So....74-79 it is!
Well, a j truck and a Cherokee are going to be wide track and thus not the correct width. Okay.....so....we need a wagoneer or NT chero from 74-79....getting a lot more difficult to find! Not hard by any means, but factor in that baby jeep people buy these axles up like candy and that makes them more rare and more expensive.
I had a set all lined up, but the owner mistakenly told me they were 3.54's which I wanted....but turned out they were 3.07's. Say whAt you want but I'm not regearing a set of free to $200 axles, and. I'm not willing to step down to non-tow package gearing. Especially because of my eventual towing plan....and the d20 while being a great t-case is notorious for not having a very low low.
Anyway....I'm on the search, I have a few more sources I am friendly with that I will check into before buying them from a stranger.when I get them I will be going through and redoing all seals and bearings and joints and new everything for the brakes, and will more than likely toss a lunchbox in the back.
I'm at dunkin donuts right now but will try to get back to the updates if I have some spare office time today!
Thanks for all the comments too guys! There will be trip pics and more interesting mods coming up in the next post.
jeepdreamer
Expedition Leader
How hard can it be?
It can't be that hard to locate a pre 80s NT 44 for a Waggy, can it? IFSJA is where I would start. Then hit Craigslist and be willing to travel a bit. God knows there are hundreds (if not thousands) of rusted heeps laying around to be had for a song. You could buy the whole thing maybe cheaper than just the one axle? Custom is nice but I would be personally very hard pressed to justify the cost for something you don't really need to have "specially built".?. I'll keep my peepers open for ya though..
It can't be that hard to locate a pre 80s NT 44 for a Waggy, can it? IFSJA is where I would start. Then hit Craigslist and be willing to travel a bit. God knows there are hundreds (if not thousands) of rusted heeps laying around to be had for a song. You could buy the whole thing maybe cheaper than just the one axle? Custom is nice but I would be personally very hard pressed to justify the cost for something you don't really need to have "specially built".?. I'll keep my peepers open for ya though..
jeep-N-montero
Expedition Leader
Keep an eye out on ksl classifieds, these pop up quite often, for example here is a pair of front and rear in St George although the wrong gear ratio http://www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=218&ad=14301912&cat=&lpid=1&search=dana 44
Warn Industries
Supporting Vendor
So awesome—love it. I've always loved the full-sized Jeeps, such as your Wagonneer. There was one at the SEMA Show last year that was awesome, full wood-grain and all. Someday I'd love to have one as a wheeler/ExPo vehicle.
- Andy
- Andy
Dr. Marneaus
Station Wagoneer
No, its not difficult to find them, its literally just a matter of cost for me. If I wanted to I could go buy a set this weekend, here in vegas, or in phoenix, or in LA. However, I'm not going to pay $400 for a set of axles I can get for free or $100 or $200, but thats just me. Its all because the thing that I want is a factory option, so i'm waiting for the ideal situation you know?
I've located several sets both on CL, and on IFSJA, i'm not in a big rush to get them, so i'm kinda just waiting for the right deal to come along, if that makes sense? I have a set lined up for sometime in the near future from an acquaintance
The set I had lined up were in tucson, and were $100 including rims. It would have been a total cost of $235 bucks with gas, and a day of my time. If i see the ideal set locally, I'll pay around $300 if I have to. However, the only set I see right now has random spring perches and have clearly been monkeyed with.
But anyway. If any of all come come across a set within several hours of Vegas, lemmie know!
Dr. Marneaus
Station Wagoneer
as said...wrong ratio, wrong axles (no want AMC20), and wrong side for the pumpkin....but thanks! (that was a sincere thanks).
Anyway, lets not focus on the axles too much at this point, if I exhaust my sources I'll post up haha.
Thanks! It's been a blast thus far, and there is just something about a classic wood grain family wagon!
Dr. Marneaus
Station Wagoneer
Well after the engine swap all went well until emissions testing time, and I couldnt get the thing dialed in to pass the sniffer. I tried to rebuild my carb but the shop that tuned it for me the previous year stripped one of the jets and over tightened it. I tried my darndest to get it out but it was messed up and jammed in there too tight, i trashed my carb in the process. It was an Edelbrock 1403 (500 CFM performer).
I picked up a new unit on CL still in the box for $200 (musta fallen off the back of a truck, I didnt ask). Put it on the truck, and it just missed the sniffer by a hair. I dropped it off at my new mechanic and paid them for an hour of labor to get it to slide by the sniffer, which it did with zero issue. They probably just bumped up the idle.
Well, truck was running well, but I still had a few known issues. I had what i assumed to be fuel percolation problems, as in the extreme heat the truck would surge a bit on the highway, but it never vapor locked. I installed a 1" phenolic spacer to try and isolate the carb from the heat. I also have had issues with my fuel system venting. I never mentioned it but one of the PO's used the truck for towing, and had installed an auxiliary fuel tank, with a valve switch and a small electric pump to prime the mechanical pump when the tanks were switched over. Sweet bonus right? Thats expeditiony!
Well turns out the most recent previous owner had vapor locking issues but before moving the dang fuel line away from the exhaust manifolds, he went and chopped out the OEM tank, and removed all the lines for the vapor canister, removed the lines to the e-pump, and welded shut the filler tube so it ended after the aux tank. son of a b! So this whole time i'm running off of an AUX tank that was like 19 gallons (great range at 10-12mpg haha). But.....it worked. It wouldnt vent correctly, and i had already done a bunch of work because the dang filler neck was a bunch of pipe and 90* fittings so it was a major PITA to fill at the pump, and not to mention there was no breather tube attached so the damn tank was venting into the interior of my truck. you about got choked out just sitting in it. I fixed all that crap in the first few weeks of owning it though. All that crap is covered in my build thread.
So, as I said, things were running well enough that I decided it was time to see what the old girl could do. Camping time! :REOutCampFire03:
I loaded her up, fueled up on a 98* day in September of last year, and hit the highway headed north. The Destination was Ely, NV, about 250 miles north of vegas, at about 7,600' elevation. I didnt really know what I was in for. Driving down the highway with a full tank of gas the truck started to stink. I discovered I was pouring fuel out the filler cap. The tank would heat up because the exhaust was dumped right before it, and the road was probably 115*. It was pouring out as I drove down the road. I pulled over, removed my gas cap to let the pressure out, put it back on, and carried on. Truck was surging like crazy so I pulled over again. I removed the cap and it literally shot gas out like a hose. Crap.
Well, easy remedy here. drove without the gas cap for the next 100 miles until we gained elevation and got to cooler climes. After relieving the pressure it drove fine, except for the random corners where i would slosh like a gallon of gas out the side.
Comforting sight with a 19 gallon tank, 10mpg, and a broken fuel gauge haha. I had some jerry cans though.
So, in my true (dumb) fashion, even though I was having LARGE problems withing the first 20 miles, I pressed on, and we made it up to Ely, through the mountains, without further issue. However, had i known the rest of the things that would happen, I'd have stayed home.
I coasted into town on what I assume was my last gallon of gas, and filled up with 85 octane mountain gas. (bad bad bad idea...but little did i know) then headed off to our campground at Ward Charcoal Ovens (15 miles outside of town). it was well into the night at this point, so we set up camp and crashed.
View of the charcoal ovens:
View of the surrounding area:
Well, our friends from Vegas spent the first night in Rachel checking out Area 51, so my girl and I headed off into the wilderness to check out some local ghost towns we knew about.
Where you see the jeep in those two pictures was where it died, by the way :Mechanic:
Truck would not start back up. Mind you i've swapped an engine at this point, but have almost no experience troubleshooting, especially with carbs. I've never had a car that had ever broken down before.
I rolled it back down the hill to level ground and was getting kinda panicky. My girl didnt care, she would reather break down in the middle of nowhere than on a road.
For some reason my carb was bone dry. Not a drop of gas getting to it. I cranked and cranked but could not get it primed. Eventually I got the smart idea of feeding gas into the carb by hand, and it fired. I then used a hose and a bottle to fill the bowls, removed my standard fuel filter and put in a glass one with a servicable filter element (bad bad bad idea, btw....all this foreshadowing!) and had my girl fire the truck up. Started right up and as it was running i connected the fuel line and had her bring up the RPM's and the mechanical pump got enough suction going finally to prime the lines, and it ran fine all the way back to the campsite....
Finished our evening and the last day we were headed out of town, but decided to stop off and go for a trail ride beforehand, now that there were two jeeps. I pulled up a hill into a parking lot, and yup...it shut off all on its own. had to roll it flat to get fuel into it again. I decided 'screw it, i've got 250 miles between me and home, i'm hitting the road'
Rolled into town, it died at the pump again, filled her up with that lovely 85 octane again, and couldnt barely get it started. It was acting flooded. Had to hold the throttle open, it would fire, dump a crap load of black smoke out the pipe, then run mostly okay. I figured now or never, and started bombing up the road with our friends behind us. I almost made it up to the 7600' peak of the mountain headed out of town, pouring smoke everywhere, truck sounded like crap, stunk to the high heavens, and as we were starting to descende the mountain headed south, it killed out on the highway doing 65mph. . Stopping a 5000 lb truck on 4 drums with now power brakes or steering at this point, headed downhill, was not a fun experience. I pulled over, popped the hood, and let her sit. I went off and took a bathroom break in the woods, hung out for 20 or 30 minutes, and fired it up like it was flooded. Got started, and boy if I didn't keep that pedal to the floor for the next 150 miles to Alamo, NV.
It killed out at the gas station there as I was coasting in. Filled up, got it fired, and bombed the last 100 miles back into vegas. Ran 100% fine as soon as we got home. I let it sit and a few days late couldnt get it more than 100 yards down the road without it flooding and bucking and surging. I ended up breaking down the carb and found out that my dang servicable fuel filter had worked loose and was just letting all kinds of crap through into the carb. Great. Ya big dummy!
Brand new carb was full of rust and the needles were all grimed up.
Cleaned it out, but a real filter back on it, put a filter back by the tank too, and hoped that would do it.
nope. still acting up. It turns out it REALLY didnt like that crap tastic 85 octane. I drained the tank, put in a bunch of 91, and never had that issue again. Live and learn I guess. But on the bright side, i can break down and rebuild an edelbrock in about 30 minutes now, and i know my way around the adjustments, and get how they work!
So, as you can guess, all of these issues lead to some further modifications a little bit down the road.
All in all, it was a successful first trip. The jeep and I made it back just fine, despite it's best efforts to ensure otherwise, literally from the first leg of the trip.
More to come.
I picked up a new unit on CL still in the box for $200 (musta fallen off the back of a truck, I didnt ask). Put it on the truck, and it just missed the sniffer by a hair. I dropped it off at my new mechanic and paid them for an hour of labor to get it to slide by the sniffer, which it did with zero issue. They probably just bumped up the idle.
Well, truck was running well, but I still had a few known issues. I had what i assumed to be fuel percolation problems, as in the extreme heat the truck would surge a bit on the highway, but it never vapor locked. I installed a 1" phenolic spacer to try and isolate the carb from the heat. I also have had issues with my fuel system venting. I never mentioned it but one of the PO's used the truck for towing, and had installed an auxiliary fuel tank, with a valve switch and a small electric pump to prime the mechanical pump when the tanks were switched over. Sweet bonus right? Thats expeditiony!
Well turns out the most recent previous owner had vapor locking issues but before moving the dang fuel line away from the exhaust manifolds, he went and chopped out the OEM tank, and removed all the lines for the vapor canister, removed the lines to the e-pump, and welded shut the filler tube so it ended after the aux tank. son of a b! So this whole time i'm running off of an AUX tank that was like 19 gallons (great range at 10-12mpg haha). But.....it worked. It wouldnt vent correctly, and i had already done a bunch of work because the dang filler neck was a bunch of pipe and 90* fittings so it was a major PITA to fill at the pump, and not to mention there was no breather tube attached so the damn tank was venting into the interior of my truck. you about got choked out just sitting in it. I fixed all that crap in the first few weeks of owning it though. All that crap is covered in my build thread.
So, as I said, things were running well enough that I decided it was time to see what the old girl could do. Camping time! :REOutCampFire03:
I loaded her up, fueled up on a 98* day in September of last year, and hit the highway headed north. The Destination was Ely, NV, about 250 miles north of vegas, at about 7,600' elevation. I didnt really know what I was in for. Driving down the highway with a full tank of gas the truck started to stink. I discovered I was pouring fuel out the filler cap. The tank would heat up because the exhaust was dumped right before it, and the road was probably 115*. It was pouring out as I drove down the road. I pulled over, removed my gas cap to let the pressure out, put it back on, and carried on. Truck was surging like crazy so I pulled over again. I removed the cap and it literally shot gas out like a hose. Crap.
Well, easy remedy here. drove without the gas cap for the next 100 miles until we gained elevation and got to cooler climes. After relieving the pressure it drove fine, except for the random corners where i would slosh like a gallon of gas out the side.
Comforting sight with a 19 gallon tank, 10mpg, and a broken fuel gauge haha. I had some jerry cans though.
So, in my true (dumb) fashion, even though I was having LARGE problems withing the first 20 miles, I pressed on, and we made it up to Ely, through the mountains, without further issue. However, had i known the rest of the things that would happen, I'd have stayed home.
I coasted into town on what I assume was my last gallon of gas, and filled up with 85 octane mountain gas. (bad bad bad idea...but little did i know) then headed off to our campground at Ward Charcoal Ovens (15 miles outside of town). it was well into the night at this point, so we set up camp and crashed.
View of the charcoal ovens:
View of the surrounding area:
Well, our friends from Vegas spent the first night in Rachel checking out Area 51, so my girl and I headed off into the wilderness to check out some local ghost towns we knew about.
Where you see the jeep in those two pictures was where it died, by the way :Mechanic:
Truck would not start back up. Mind you i've swapped an engine at this point, but have almost no experience troubleshooting, especially with carbs. I've never had a car that had ever broken down before.
I rolled it back down the hill to level ground and was getting kinda panicky. My girl didnt care, she would reather break down in the middle of nowhere than on a road.
For some reason my carb was bone dry. Not a drop of gas getting to it. I cranked and cranked but could not get it primed. Eventually I got the smart idea of feeding gas into the carb by hand, and it fired. I then used a hose and a bottle to fill the bowls, removed my standard fuel filter and put in a glass one with a servicable filter element (bad bad bad idea, btw....all this foreshadowing!) and had my girl fire the truck up. Started right up and as it was running i connected the fuel line and had her bring up the RPM's and the mechanical pump got enough suction going finally to prime the lines, and it ran fine all the way back to the campsite....
Finished our evening and the last day we were headed out of town, but decided to stop off and go for a trail ride beforehand, now that there were two jeeps. I pulled up a hill into a parking lot, and yup...it shut off all on its own. had to roll it flat to get fuel into it again. I decided 'screw it, i've got 250 miles between me and home, i'm hitting the road'
Rolled into town, it died at the pump again, filled her up with that lovely 85 octane again, and couldnt barely get it started. It was acting flooded. Had to hold the throttle open, it would fire, dump a crap load of black smoke out the pipe, then run mostly okay. I figured now or never, and started bombing up the road with our friends behind us. I almost made it up to the 7600' peak of the mountain headed out of town, pouring smoke everywhere, truck sounded like crap, stunk to the high heavens, and as we were starting to descende the mountain headed south, it killed out on the highway doing 65mph. . Stopping a 5000 lb truck on 4 drums with now power brakes or steering at this point, headed downhill, was not a fun experience. I pulled over, popped the hood, and let her sit. I went off and took a bathroom break in the woods, hung out for 20 or 30 minutes, and fired it up like it was flooded. Got started, and boy if I didn't keep that pedal to the floor for the next 150 miles to Alamo, NV.
It killed out at the gas station there as I was coasting in. Filled up, got it fired, and bombed the last 100 miles back into vegas. Ran 100% fine as soon as we got home. I let it sit and a few days late couldnt get it more than 100 yards down the road without it flooding and bucking and surging. I ended up breaking down the carb and found out that my dang servicable fuel filter had worked loose and was just letting all kinds of crap through into the carb. Great. Ya big dummy!
Brand new carb was full of rust and the needles were all grimed up.
Cleaned it out, but a real filter back on it, put a filter back by the tank too, and hoped that would do it.
nope. still acting up. It turns out it REALLY didnt like that crap tastic 85 octane. I drained the tank, put in a bunch of 91, and never had that issue again. Live and learn I guess. But on the bright side, i can break down and rebuild an edelbrock in about 30 minutes now, and i know my way around the adjustments, and get how they work!
So, as you can guess, all of these issues lead to some further modifications a little bit down the road.
All in all, it was a successful first trip. The jeep and I made it back just fine, despite it's best efforts to ensure otherwise, literally from the first leg of the trip.
More to come.
Dr. Marneaus
Station Wagoneer
So, needless to say the truck had some reliability issues there, specifically with the fuel system.
I kept up the wheeling as it was running fine with the carb freshly cleaned, new fuel filters, and the correct gas. I went through the winter without any major issues, but I started spending more money on guns and less money on the jeep, I let it sit for a while without driving it because I had gotten bored/fed up with the results of the aforementioned trip.
Had it out at christmas to putt around in, took the girl's family on a lil trip up rocky gap road, behind Red Rock park. This picture right here sums up why I bought this vehicle. 7 of us, up a road where a standard car could not go, having a blast together. Thats what it's all about!
Everybody wave!
Me and the truck:
Come spring time I decided I was bored, and had some money sitting around, so it was time to have some fun and make some progress.
I decided to do a round of 'winter time boredom' mods. Some would increase reliability, some would be fun others would be practical, others were just straight up necessary. The list was as follows:
Cleanup the rear cargo space
Install some AUX lights.
H4 Conversion (already covered, the wiring had been done since Ely, just still running the sealed beams)
Brake system refurb (the booster had gone out and already been replaced)
Get a full-er size spare tire (had a old ******** 29" in the back floating around)
Redo the trailer harness to a 4 pin (including removing the old defunct trailer brake)
clean up all the under hood wiring i had done
new tail lenses/reverse light lenses
install my 700w inverter
So, lets get started!
Rear cargo space:
The old rubber matt was long since ruined, and the vunly side panels were in tact...but rough. Bottom of the fold and tumble seat was surface rusty. Just needed to be cleaned up.
Before:
I held my breath and pulled the matt, bracing for what I'd find. Luckily it wasnt bad, a few small holes through the floor and only a lil surface rust.
Ground it all down, painted it with rust converter, welded shut the bolt holes in the floor, and prepped it for a new finish
I then picked up some ulan to make new side panels. cut them to shape and tested the fit:
ran the wires and mounted my inverter before i applied the finish. Its just a harbor freight unit, 700w 1400w max. I have had it for years, in my old wrangler, and in the back of the magnum. works great for making margaritas when camping!
Fat 150A fuse and fuse holder for it, running through 4AWG wire. This all got cleaned up later, FYI, so dont crucify me based on my wiring!
Went out and got a gallon of Al's Liner and went to town.
ADVISORY
If you are going to do Al's liner, and are not going to spray it in, mix it 1/2 of the kit at a time, i was dump. The pot life is only about 20-25 minutes on this stuff, i only got 2 coats done before it was impossible to roll anymore. I still need to get another kit and redo the whole area about 2x as thick.
Anyway, the product was great other than the short potlife, the color matched my interior almost perfectly, and the texture was great (i didnt add any crumb rubber or sand)
CLEAN!
With that, i wanted some way to secure my tool box, and spare tire. Decided to build a cargo deck. Picked up some 3/4" plywood and a 2x4 and some carpet. The edge closest to the seat rests on the wheel well humps, and i built some "legs" for the opposite end that stay attached to the side panels.
the rear is held in by the angle of the tailgate, and the front is held in with 2 bolts and wing nuts that come up from inside the wheel wells.
I ended up picking up a brand new 32" bighorn on a jeep rim for $75 bucks, so, i figured for the time being a 32" spare would suffice. Yes, i did cut a corner there, but I couldn't find any used or cheap 33x10.50 tires, and sorry but I wasnt about to spend 225+ on a tire that will never be mounted on the truck.
anyway, everything fits nicely, the tire, my little box of fluids, a cheapo took kit for the trail, and my trail box. plus, its all out of sight and securely held in place under the cover. future plans for this area include some form of a cargo net to keep any heavy objects from killing me in an emergency stop or accident (lol, emergency braking in this thing still wouldn't cause any items to fly forward...even with the refreshed brakes haha).
So, thats the inverter/cargo area.
Had a little boo-boo somewhere along the line. just did a trail repair and kept working. If only I knew the booboo that would result from this round of mods... (i REALLY like foreshadowing...but does it still count as foreshadowing if I say its foreshadowing?)
I kept up the wheeling as it was running fine with the carb freshly cleaned, new fuel filters, and the correct gas. I went through the winter without any major issues, but I started spending more money on guns and less money on the jeep, I let it sit for a while without driving it because I had gotten bored/fed up with the results of the aforementioned trip.
Had it out at christmas to putt around in, took the girl's family on a lil trip up rocky gap road, behind Red Rock park. This picture right here sums up why I bought this vehicle. 7 of us, up a road where a standard car could not go, having a blast together. Thats what it's all about!
Everybody wave!
Me and the truck:
Come spring time I decided I was bored, and had some money sitting around, so it was time to have some fun and make some progress.
I decided to do a round of 'winter time boredom' mods. Some would increase reliability, some would be fun others would be practical, others were just straight up necessary. The list was as follows:
Cleanup the rear cargo space
Install some AUX lights.
H4 Conversion (already covered, the wiring had been done since Ely, just still running the sealed beams)
Brake system refurb (the booster had gone out and already been replaced)
Get a full-er size spare tire (had a old ******** 29" in the back floating around)
Redo the trailer harness to a 4 pin (including removing the old defunct trailer brake)
clean up all the under hood wiring i had done
new tail lenses/reverse light lenses
install my 700w inverter
So, lets get started!
Rear cargo space:
The old rubber matt was long since ruined, and the vunly side panels were in tact...but rough. Bottom of the fold and tumble seat was surface rusty. Just needed to be cleaned up.
Before:
I held my breath and pulled the matt, bracing for what I'd find. Luckily it wasnt bad, a few small holes through the floor and only a lil surface rust.
Ground it all down, painted it with rust converter, welded shut the bolt holes in the floor, and prepped it for a new finish
I then picked up some ulan to make new side panels. cut them to shape and tested the fit:
ran the wires and mounted my inverter before i applied the finish. Its just a harbor freight unit, 700w 1400w max. I have had it for years, in my old wrangler, and in the back of the magnum. works great for making margaritas when camping!
Fat 150A fuse and fuse holder for it, running through 4AWG wire. This all got cleaned up later, FYI, so dont crucify me based on my wiring!
Went out and got a gallon of Al's Liner and went to town.
ADVISORY
If you are going to do Al's liner, and are not going to spray it in, mix it 1/2 of the kit at a time, i was dump. The pot life is only about 20-25 minutes on this stuff, i only got 2 coats done before it was impossible to roll anymore. I still need to get another kit and redo the whole area about 2x as thick.
Anyway, the product was great other than the short potlife, the color matched my interior almost perfectly, and the texture was great (i didnt add any crumb rubber or sand)
CLEAN!
With that, i wanted some way to secure my tool box, and spare tire. Decided to build a cargo deck. Picked up some 3/4" plywood and a 2x4 and some carpet. The edge closest to the seat rests on the wheel well humps, and i built some "legs" for the opposite end that stay attached to the side panels.
the rear is held in by the angle of the tailgate, and the front is held in with 2 bolts and wing nuts that come up from inside the wheel wells.
I ended up picking up a brand new 32" bighorn on a jeep rim for $75 bucks, so, i figured for the time being a 32" spare would suffice. Yes, i did cut a corner there, but I couldn't find any used or cheap 33x10.50 tires, and sorry but I wasnt about to spend 225+ on a tire that will never be mounted on the truck.
anyway, everything fits nicely, the tire, my little box of fluids, a cheapo took kit for the trail, and my trail box. plus, its all out of sight and securely held in place under the cover. future plans for this area include some form of a cargo net to keep any heavy objects from killing me in an emergency stop or accident (lol, emergency braking in this thing still wouldn't cause any items to fly forward...even with the refreshed brakes haha).
So, thats the inverter/cargo area.
Had a little boo-boo somewhere along the line. just did a trail repair and kept working. If only I knew the booboo that would result from this round of mods... (i REALLY like foreshadowing...but does it still count as foreshadowing if I say its foreshadowing?)
Hill Bill E.
Oath Keeper
Great read! And awesome FSJ!
:coffeedrink:
:coffeedrink: