'22 JLR 2.0T build progress/wheeling thread

[Remorseless]

My dude... your wife has hairy legs.

Sponsored

 

[grandsrus]

AND A PENIS!

 

[Remorseless]

AND A PENIS!

 

[Remorseless]

Had a good wheeling trip on Saturday with @Sean L and @yokramer. We ran Daniel > Rocky Mountain Loop > Slab Pile > Dutch John. Super, super impressed we managed to get Sean's JLU Sahara sitting on stock Rubicon suspension and wheels through Daniel. It's our toughest trail at Uwharrie, and while some of the harder spots have bypasses he availed himself of, the v-notch on Daniel is unskippable and pretty sketchy for a stock Jeep. His run through here is below:



Just little love on the fender to show for it:

The below cover my run up Daniel:





And my damage:

Missed the body thankfully, but the flare's gonna take some TLC to get the inner and outer flares back together right. Clips on order.

@yokramer came out with the least issue out of the 3 of us, only having his tires down low enough that - when stuffed into the wall in the v-notch - even the beadgrips farted out the air. But, impressively, they held the bead well enough that he just aired back up and was on his way, no jacking or bead seating necessary.

Ended up being a dang good day. Sean missed out a poser photo op:

 

[Remorseless]

Man, been a hot minute since I updated this. Well let's dig back into the time machine and get this caught up...

After I got the flares from that incident sorted last June, in July '24 I ended up moving from steel skids to aluminum skids (nothing special, the MORE 5052 aluminum version of the same skids) and had to swap trans crossmembers due to a weld nut in the crossmember that broke off. What a fun project that was.

Weld nut just didn't have much weld penetration I guess:

Had to cut the bolt off at the skid to get it out due to the slide washer

OEM replacement crossmember was a stamped steel part though, which is nice I guess, vs the aluminum crossmember it replaced.

Anyhow, aluminum skids went on and have been working fine. Did have to hog out one or two of the holes on it though.

 

[Remorseless]

Then in August 2024, had a wheeling trip with @yokramer and a buddy of his, along with a couple buddies of mine. That turned out to be more of an adventure than we thought. One of my buddies had never wheeled before and we spent the day building up his experience and confidence. Then we took him to Dickey Bell and he damn near flipped his Jeep after he panicked and got into the clutch when he shouldn't have. He'd done fine all day with no nerves or issues, so took us by surprise. Oh, and right before that his spring popped out under compression. That one was wild. Enjoy the craziness:





Oh, @yokromer and I also managed to help his buddy get a Ford Explorer up Dickey Bell too. That was pretty impressive given the limitations he was working with:



The sway bar links in the Explorer were brand new before that trip, and after, "gently used":

And my buddy in the JK showing the buddy in the TJ how it was supposed to go...

 

[Remorseless]

In Sep '24 we had a much more chill ride out at Uwharrie. Got a stock JKU on street tires up Dickey Bell too. Didn't get much in the way of pics or footage though. Just the below.

 

[Remorseless]

Let's see what else I can dig up... hmmm.... also Sep '24.

Not my Jeep, but my buddy's JKU. He'd been having horrible death wobble and his whole front end was pretty knackered. Ball joints were shot. Trackbar bushing was shot. Steering linkages were shot. Replaced the whole kit and kaboodle. Steer Smarts tie rod, Teraflex trackbar, and Dynatrac ball joints put in.

 

[Remorseless]

Let's see - then in Dec '24 Santa came early and dropped off a whole bunch of parts that I've only partially even installed because toddlers are insane and the wife (now pregnant with our second and ready to pop any day) and I are struggling to keep up.

8 adjustable arms for the JL (JKS, Clevite bushing version) and lower adjustable arms for the JT (also Clevite bushing version). Longer shocks for the JL and no-lift 2.5's for the JT.

 

[Remorseless]

Fast forward to April '25 and I managed to get enough time to install the longer 2.5's in the JL:

And somewhere in there also in the JT:

 

[Remorseless]

Then May '25 rolled around and, first wheeling trip of the year, and I go and do something stupid. The rock that I tagged my fender with in June '24, well, I managed to hit it with my quarter panel this time.

All squared away by the end of the month though thanks to a local body shop:

 

[Remorseless]

At this point (June '25) I was tired of the rubbing on the stock rear inner liners and I'd chewed up the rear passenger flare pretty good the couple times I ripped it off. So, I decided to replace my flares altogether. Took a gamble on the Rough Country WF1 flares ( WF1 Fender Flares | Jeep Wrangler JL (18-25)/Wrangler Unlimited (18-25) | Rough Country) and they actually don't suck. Time will tell how they hold up, but man, went on easy and look good. Also installed the Grimm front inner liners ( Grimm OffRoad Front Inner Fender Liners Bare - Jeep Rubicon 2018-2025 | 10147|Northridge4x4) and Metalcloak rear inner liners ( JL Wrangler Replacement Aluminum Inner Fender Set, Rear).

All told, project came out pretty well. Been updated a couple times since it first went on, but here's the first iteration:

Metalcloak rear liners went in nice, and the RC flares matched up well

The Grimm liners required some modification of one panel to clear the Fox resi hoses (feet pic for ya @J.Ferreira, any more costs extra)

Flares reuse the stock DRL/turn signal and so I just routed the wiring in a loom with some sticky zip tie bases:

All told, the flares look stockish but a little higher clearance

 

[Remorseless]

This one's not really a wheeling or wrenching thing, but more a time that the Jeep came in very handy. During tropical storm Chantal in July, the storm sat over central NC and dumped somewhere between 9" and 12" of rain in an afternoon. It also spawned like 3 tornadoes in the NC piedmont. Guess which lucky bastard had a tornado zip right over his house? That's right, this fucker! Lots of downed trees and stuff, but no real damage.

It bent my flag pole:

Dropped 3 big oaks, a maple or two, and a couple sourwoods across my driveway. You can see how splintered the oak trunks are:

And this used to be the neighbor's driveway, they lost like 6 or 7 tall pines and a load of understory hardwoods here:

We were glad to have the Jeep because we could put it to work moving big logs so we could spend less time cutting and much less manpower on moving logs:

This is the "after" picture for the road up to the neighbors' place

Anyway, winches are nice, but I beat the absolute shit out of my winch rope dragging it across logs and through the mud. Seems alright for now, but keeping an eye on it.

 

[J.Ferreira]

Good man with the flip flops

 

[Remorseless]

Alright, August '25 - got back out for a relaxing wheeling trip. No wild trails, just a good time with the top and doors off.

Slapped together a few time lapses:

Sponsored