Cargo access sucks because there is no cargo area! but if thats what you want it really isnt that expensive when you take off the sale price of your original hard top, they look nice with the half doors and hard uppers.
Removed the back seat and console the minute I got it home from seller a couple years ago. The area is suitable including a medium fridge. Old men like me don't need any stinking back seats! It's just the access.....getting to the stuff. If one needs a back seat, Wrangler solved that 14 years ago. Been out days on trails. Nothing wrong with cargo area sans seat.
That’s the least of your worries. The 03-06 hardtop does not have vents. They put vents in the tailgate those years. The 97-02 tops had vents. You need vents. You won’t have them on your tailgate. Short story; an 03-06 can use a 97-02 top, but not vice versa
Nice! Now stick a factory hard top over that and you have a factory engineered rear side access problem. The really comical aspect: spend 60 grand on a 2 door JL; unlike an old TJ, there is no after market product available to resolve the $60,000 JL rear side access issue. Result: saving the cost of the optional JL hardtop to add the right top is not an option. Even more interesting is not one competing manufacturer has offered that solution on their products. Amazing that manufacturers are the followers of the after market rather than the opposite. The after market throughout the '90s invented the Rubicon, not Daimler Chrysler. Just imagine if the rear seat in a 2 door Wrangler was welded to the frame.
