Decrease in TJ Products
- Thread starter JMT
- Start date
From what I've seen, Crown and Omix-Ada are making castings and easily stamped and formed steel parts. Sand casting and using a break press is relatively low tech, and non specific. A 20k press, 100 k cnc laser and a couple welders, you're in business. Casting is a little more difficult, but not much.
You start taking about the plastic parts, you get into very specific tooling for each part. Think about the dash...I bet there are at least 10 different plastic pieces to make that assembly, and each one needs a mold that costs 50, 75, 100 thousand dollars, depending on complexity and cavitation. Then you need a machine to run it in, and those start at 100k... but anything big enough to run a dash panel is going to be 500k minimum. You can see that the cost adds up in a hurry when you start talking about injection molding (how a lot of plastic parts are made)
Sorry...I'm a manufacturing guy, I have a passion for it. I can talk about this stuff endlessly.
I find this very interesting actually. Crown and OMIX-ADA do mostly replacement engine parts. They do a few smaller trim pieces such as fender flares, fuel filler trim, and other small trim pieces, but nothing like door panels or dashboards, which as you said would cost a ton of money and ultimately wouldn't make them any money unless there was a huge demand.
I had no idea injection molding was so costly!
I know ur talking body parts but when I ordered a 2.5L cylinder head gasket from a Jeep dealer - not 1 in stock, not any Jeep dealer in/around Dallas had one. Jeep dealer had to order it from North Carolina, took 2 weeks. Wasn't gonna use non oem no way- 2 weeks?
I broke the gear selector bezel trying to remove it to loosen up the console for a Bedrug install. $300 for a replacement! I may have to bite the bullet as the old one was so brittle I could barely touch it without plastic bits breaking off. I was hoping I could just do some gluing back together.
I thought about just using the shift boot from a manual and forgoing the gear readout, but my OCD probably won't allow for that.
I thought about just using the shift boot from a manual and forgoing the gear readout, but my OCD probably won't allow for that.
Same way EVO and AEV went... looks like Rokmen is following..
Can’t blame them, make money where you can make money. Who can afford to make 5 bumpers a year?
Can’t blame them, make money where you can make money. Who can afford to make 5 bumpers a year?
I get that, but if you are going to quit doing it, Take it of your damn website! Just sayin...
Omix is odd to me. They make a few parts but nothing consistent which I just dont understand. Im sure someone there could explain in detail. They make the inner glove box for the YJ but no door. They make the rpm and speedo for the YJ but not for the 93-95. I hope in the future they will make more parts as the junk yard parts dry up.
OP
Here’s the deal though, from their point of view. What if there are people who are still interested in their product? How will they ever know that if the product was removed from their website? So, as was explained to me, if there were a spike in demand for them, they would like to know that so they could put them back into production.
Of course, in my opinion, what they should do is put a note on the website stating that they are not currently in production, but could possibly bring them back if demand increases. That might motivate people to join together and make group buys.
But why do the work, these businesses are making all the money they want going after the JK/JL market. Its 10 to 1 in sales. The only thing that would motivate production is money, plain and simple. It doesn’t matter if there is interest in the product or not, if it doesn’t pay the bills why waste time on it? Think about it, if we organized a group buy for the rokmen front bumper, we could probably get 5-7 people interested, cash forward expecting the bumper within 30 days. If this was a JK forum you could get 10x the amount of interest in a group buy without even trying. The TJ market is shrinking and we are fortunate to have MIA companies hanging around.
It sucks, but think about it.. some companies have products popular enough hang around, some companies drop products and move forward, and some companies fail entirely.
I’ve wondered about this too. It’s similar with the TJ parts.
Based on this thread, I think I should sell my TJ and buy a slightly used JKU. Just so I can still buy parts for my vehicle! 
Might as well by the JL the JK parts are on their way out hahahaBased on this thread, I think I should sell my TJ and buy a slightly used JKU. Just so I can still buy parts for my vehicle!
OP
Maybe I’ll call Rokmen, just to see what it would take. Can’t hurt anything.
We just gotta wait for 3D printing to take hold. Then we’ll get whatever we want on demand.
Jeeptrash
Member
I’d like to see what it would take for a front bumper run, wish they had a matching rear bumper
Good luck, I’ve had a mercenery bumper on order since November. Called after a month of not hearing anything and Jeff said it would be done in January. Well, it’s February now and not a word on it. It’s the best looking TJ bumper out there IMHO, didn’t think it would be such a big deal to get one. I’m starting to think I’ll never get it...
Anyone have any suggestions for honest part resellers that occasionally have full doors? Been looking a while. Have not yet found that almost extinct unicorn. Sad that TJs are slowly disappearing.