Barn Door for JK factory hardtops

[jscherb]

That looks awesome Jeff. Can't wait to see the fold down table added.

I found a nice source for the tabletops - Walmart. These folding tables sell for about 8 bucks and include a nice solid wood butcher block style tabletop that's a very nice size for this application. Picked this one up yesterday to see how it sizes up with the slide, haven't unwrapped it yet.

I'll hinge a couple of them to work like this:

I'll probably also hinge one as a cover/tabletop over the drawer.

Might be a week before I get to it, I want to hinge the panels with flush table leaf hinges like the ones below. Not sure anyone in my small town carries them, might have to order some.

I'll try to have this all done by the next time I get down there, looks like I'll be spending most of July at Mom's.

 

[Comanche Scott]

beautiful hinges. Very classy. :beer:

Would be awesome to have an adjustable leg at the front left corner (near the arrow on the #1 arc). Would provide a lot of stability, and if a clamp was attached to the side of the fridge, it would hold the whole thing closed for travel.

 

[jscherb]

beautiful hinges. Very classy. :beer:

I picked that style hinge because they'll provide the functionality I'm looking for - the rear leaf will be able to swing back over the front leaf as shown with arrow #1, and these hinges will be flush with the table surface so they won't get in the way of things on the table. I'd rather have them in stainless or chrome if I can find them, brass doesn't go with anything .

Would be awesome to have an adjustable leg at the front left corner (near the arrow on the #1 arc). Would provide a lot of stability, and if a clamp was attached to the side of the fridge, it would hold the whole thing closed for travel.

I'll see what's required once I get the leaves hinged. Might be that a removable/adjustable leg in that corner is a good idea but won't know that until I can test it.

 

[TrailBadger]

Scherb the only issues my wife and I would in doing something like this in the back of the jeep is that like our kitchen & bathroom sinks, as these are too low for us. The slightly haunched over posture would cause both our back to go out. plus the back seems to crowded with stuff.. there isn't any room to prep or cook food etc assuming this is where all the prep was to be done. This is why we feel space to store the components would be critical and ease of removal once at the site. Otherwise it would be left in or on the jeep at all times.

 

[Felix the cat]

nice, we have similar setup's. I love the DIY stuff.

my table is a simple cantilever off my steel rear flare.

 

[jscherb]

nice, we have similar setup's. I love the DIY stuff.
View attachment 403785
my table is a simple cantilever off my steel rear flare.
View attachment 403789 View attachment 403790

Very nice!

beautiful hinges. Very classy. :beer:

Would be awesome to have an adjustable leg at the front left corner (near the arrow on the #1 arc). Would provide a lot of stability, and if a clamp was attached to the side of the fridge, it would hold the whole thing closed for travel.

I've ordered hinges in chrome for the table so I probably won't make much more progress on this project until they arrive. I've also got an idea for an inexpensive adjustable table leg if it's needed, stay tuned.

 

[akpostal]

my table is a simple cantilever off my steel rear flare.
View attachment 403789 View attachment 403790

I like that a lot. Do you have a pic of the underside where the table mounts? Something like that would be killer for my rear rack.

 

[Felix the cat]

The steel flares made it easy, I just drilled them out for the 3/8 bolt, large flat washers and wing nut go through the aluminum plate,plywood and the flare I'm going to put all-thread rod from the bottom of the table back to the flare but it's really stiff the way it is now.

 

[vtsoundman]

Two weeks ago I posted about the HD door hinges I designed and said that I'd have preproduction samples in my hands very soon. (http://forum.expeditionportal.com/t...for-JK-factory-hardtops?p=2301110#post2301110). Met with MORryde today and they pulled a preproduction sample off the welding line for me to check out (it was still warm when they handed it to me). This sample hasn't been tumbled yet to prep it for powder coat, it's literally just come from welding.

I'm very impressed with it. It's all stainless steel, and they followed my prototype very closely, check the link above to compare mine with this one. It's 1/8" larger all around than the factory hinges so it will hide the typical corrosion that happens under the hinges. This first run is only a small number for their own internal testing; as soon as they do some fit testing they'll do a larger preproduction run for testing by me and others.

They say they can hit the price target I challenged them to hit.



Yes, now that I've seen the preproduction versions I can say they will be compatible with the Tuffy locks.

ETA for market?

 

[rubicon91]

Scherb the only issues my wife and I would in doing something like this in the back of the jeep is that like our kitchen & bathroom sinks, as these are too low for us. The slightly haunched over posture would cause both our back to go out. plus the back seems to crowded with stuff.. there isn't any room to prep or cook food etc assuming this is where all the prep was to be done. This is why we feel space to store the components would be critical and ease of removal once at the site. Otherwise it would be left in or on the jeep at all times.

Plenty of room for food prep with a tail gate table. Your biggest issue is carrying all the cooking gear so I go with a very simple skottle to cook everything on. For 2 people especially a tail gate table fridge and skottle and you are all set. I'm almost 6 feet 2 inches and no issue with utilizing my fridge or table. Jeep is not lifted at all. Mine stays in most of the time however it is all of 5 minutes to remove the fridge and slide and you have the rear of your jeep. One added bonus no ice. You do not have to worry about ice at all or a heavy cooler to pull out of the Jeep. With space being limited all you need is a cargo rack for the rear. Plenty of accessories available to make it where you can carry everything in the jeep if you want. Just look at venture 4wd or theroadchoseme to know it can be done easily. For reference I carried all this to the beach in the rear of my Jeep with 3 of us for the day. Table chairs food skottle etc and still had plenty of room. Just need to pack smart. As you can see that white table is not much higher than the fridge or tail gate table either.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using Tapatalk

 

[vtsoundman]

I've continued to test the wiring for the fridge and I've made a few minor updates to it, but one issue it took me a while to sort out was that in low voltage situations the fridge compressor would sometimes fail to start. When the indicated voltage was low but still above the voltage set for shutdown it would run a while and fail to restart as it cycled off and back on. Turns out is was the Dometic power plug was part of the problem - it made good enough contact in the socket to provide voltage to the fridge but not enough current could pass to start the compressor in low voltage situations. Like many such plugs, only one side is wired, so it only relies on the one contact; that contact being flat and the inside of the socket being curved, the contact area is fairly small. This isn't necessarily a criticism of the Dometic part, most of these plugs are like this, but in this case of the plug I have the contact was marginal.

I added a bit of solder to the contact to improve the size of the contact area. Works fine now. Passing this along in case anyone else needs to solve a similar problem.

I'm very pleased with the way the wiring is working. The fridge is powered by the dedicated battery when the Jeep isn't running and when the Jeep is running the fridge runs off the Jeep power and the battery gets charged.

Haven't had time yet to work on the slide, mounting the fridge to it or the fold-down tables yet. I did review the fridge/slide concepts with MORryde when I ws there the other day (since they supplied me with the slide) and they were very interested in following the project for commercial possibilities. Hopefully I'll get some time at the end of this week to get back to working on the project.

I like the slide concept.

Ditch the cigarette lighter plug...they are completely unreliable no matter who makes them or the mods that are performed. The voltage drop across the connection can be non-negligible especially during a startup of a compressor. My older Domentic CF-018 will sometimes draws 3-4x rated current for a moment while the compressor fires up. I measured ~1.8V with a Blue Sea Receptacle, proper wiring, and the Dometic connector. My newer CFX-65DZ pulls approx 2-2,5x rated current during startup.

I went through your mod cycle already...all it takes is a gentle bump for your food to be spoiled. Use ANY 12V connector of your choice - anything but these. A SAW bullet style, a small anderson (my preferred connector), A Marinco Trolling motor plug/receptacle - 3 wire twistlock style for outdoor applications ...The OEM supplied cord can easily be replaced if you ever have an issue.

After the connector swap, the fridge starts up much faster and 'appears' to be running smoothly -> no more food spoilage and no more LV faults.

WRTO your slide - in my Jeep, I have a bit of a challenge. I need the driver side to be kept clear for the Rusty dog - my large St Bernard Mix. However, I have a tailgate table that I find to be immensely useful. Any thought on how you might engineer a slide that moves the fridge laterally then extends it out? We also have a interior rack that prevents us from opening it while it is inside - so a slide is somewhat mandatory.

 

[jscherb]

I like the slide concept.

Ditch the cigarette lighter plug...they are completely unreliable no matter who makes them or the mods that are performed. The voltage drop across the connection can be non-negligible especially during a startup of a compressor. My older Domentic CF-018 will sometimes draws 3-4x rated current for a moment while the compressor fires up. I measured ~1.8V with a Blue Sea Receptacle, proper wiring, and the Dometic connector. My newer CFX-65DZ pulls approx 2-2,5x rated current during startup.

I went through your mod cycle already...all it takes is a gentle bump for your food to be spoiled. Use ANY 12V connector of your choice - anything but these. A SAW bullet style, a small anderson (my preferred connector), A Marinco Trolling motor plug/receptacle - 3 wire twistlock style for outdoor applications ...The OEM supplied cord can easily be replaced if you ever have an issue.

After the connector swap, the fridge starts up much faster and 'appears' to be running smoothly -> no more food spoilage and no more LV faults.

WRTO your slide - in my Jeep, I have a bit of a challenge. I need the driver side to be kept clear for the Rusty dog - my large St Bernard Mix. However, I have a tailgate table that I find to be immensely useful. Any thought on how you might engineer a slide that moves the fridge laterally then extends it out? We also have a interior rack that prevents us from opening it while it is inside - so a slide is somewhat mandatory.

I agree about the cigarette lighter plug, and I may change it out for a more reliable connector at some point. I almost did it the other day, but I decided to try the mod to the plug first and so far the modified plug hasn't failed, so I'll test it a little longer before getting out the wire cutters and removing it and replacing it with a more reliable connector.

I can imagine several different mechanisms to move your fridge the way you need it to move but the simplest would be another slide mounted crosswise in the Jeep. The main slide would be mounted on it - first you'd move the fridge to the left on this new slide, and then you'd move it out on the current slide. One complication might be height - you'd have to find a slide that didn't increase the height so much that the unit wouldn't fit under your interior rack.

 

[jscherb]

ETA for market?

The next step for the the HD door hinges is (or was, they may have already done it) for the company to test install them on one of their JKs to verify the fit and dimensions. Assuming those are ok they'll be making up a larger preproduction run and finishing them off as if they're production products and then doing some real testing with them. I'd expect they'll be sending me a complete JKU set for testing, they may recruit others to do some testing as well. I'll post progress updates as these move towards production - assuming the ones I saw the other day check out with regarded to fit and dimensions, it shouldn't take very long for them to get to market.

 

[jscherb]

Hard to beleive it's been 2 1/2 months since I finished the front flat fenders; they've been installed ever since and I'm very pleased with how they echo the styling of the original Willys fenders.

I'm now starting the process of making the molds for matching rear flat fenders. The first step is to mold exact-fit mounting flanges for the new fenders; to make the flanges I'm using the Jeep as a mold - I'll lay up fiberglass right on the Jeep body and pop it off when it's cured. In this photo I've got everything masked and prepped with wax and mold release, all ready to shoot gelcoat and lay up fiberglass against the Jeep body.

I shot the gelcoat first thing this morning. Gotta have confidence that the mold release will work .

More to come.

 

[jscherb]

The fiberglass layup is complete; I'll let them cure overnight and tomorrow morning I'll pop them off the Jeep, trim the rough edges off, and the result will be a pair of perfectly fitting mounting flanges to base the new fenders on.