Sara's Jeep

shawn

shawn

running dog lackey of the oppressor class
Administrator
Joined
Mar 13, 2005
Location
Raleigh, NC
It's long past time I started a thread for this.

I'll get around to telling the back story eventually, but here's the Jeep the night we brought it home in October 2011:

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We'd been looking for a cheap rig that would fit in our trailer. Cherokees were too long, Razrs were too expensive, and Broncos were too pretty (or too rusty). It just so happens that our buddy Brad specializes in selling crappy used cars, so we picked this gem up from him for cheap.

219,000 miles
4 cylinder, AX5, D30/35, etc
Sitting on four oversized highway terrains with a mismatched spare
 
We wheeled the Jeep pretty much as-is through the winter. I added a pair of tow hooks up front, but aside from replacing the power steering hoses, steering box, and the multifunction switch, we didn't do much to it.

At the Uwharrie Jamboree in the Spring of 2012, the highway terrains finally gave out. I was riding RML by myself, with no cell phone, no radio, no spare tire, a jack, but no tire iron, when all of a sudden, I heard the familiar FEEESH of a tire letting go. I briefly hoped that maybe I'd just burped the bead, but as I rolled forward a bit more, the tire answered back FEEESH FEEESH. By the time I got out to inspect the damage, the tire was already flat.

The 3" gash in the sidewall wasn't getting any better any time soon, so I decided just to drive it out like it was. I made it back to the gravel road without any trouble, and happened to chance upon a friend who lent me his 33" spare to get back to the Outpost.

A few weeks later I checked Craigslist on a whim, and found a guy nearby that was selling a set of five JK Mud Terrains with Spidertrax adapters included. He drove around with bad ball joints for a while and cupped two of the tires badly, so he was looking to get rid of them cheap. Score.

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At around the same time, I picked up a used 8274 and TJ mount from a guy in Charlotte. This particular winch was built in 1985 and has the 2.5hp Bosch motor. It was in decent shape, but I tore it down, cleaned it up, replaced all the bottom end seals, and painted the spool. Alex at Carolina Truggies sent me 100ft of 3/8" Master Pull rope to replace the cable, and I picked up a Superwinch contactor to replace the stock solenoid pack. After replacing a couple of power cables and insulating boots, we had a great winch for a great price. When the 2.5hp motor kicks the bucket, we'll replace it with the 4.6hp motor from the 8274-50.
 
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