Is it unreasonable for me to expect my new Smittybilt hardtop be leak free?
- Thread starter Rick77
- Start date
Possibly made of better materials/construction since it was older. Companies like smittybilt love to figure out where they can cut corners in quality over the years while not telling consumers. Someone’s 20 year old warn winch that was made in America might last longer than a 1 year old warn that wasn’t. Just depends on if the company decides to get a littttle more profit out.
You might think that, but it is actually rated higher by users in certain models on Quadratec. About equal on Amazon. And overall pretty good reviews on other sites. I am in the market, so I have been looking at these.
I'm not really advocating for either, just objectively looking at the general feedback along with my limited anecdotal experience.
Quadratec Bestop
Quadratec Smittybilt
Amazon Bestop
Amazon Smittybilt
Extreme Terrain Smittybilt
Morris 4x4 Smittybilt
If anyone wants to put their $$ into a Smittybilt top, fire away! I'm not going to stop them. It's their money, not mine..
Well the OP did, and that was his question. Also, objectively judging by the amount and content of the user reviews, so have a lot of other people... and the vast majority of users have been very pleased, even moreso than compared to some more expensive options.
So, objectively speaking, and without the brand loyalty, maybe try a new top if you would like... but I still wouldn't expect your current top to leak based on the brand name.
Although, maybe the soft tops are much different than the hardtops.
I know this doesn't get a lot of love around here. But, just my observation after reading a lot of feedback.
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I tried to leave this with "if people want to spend their money on a SB top, that's their choice", but you seem to want to keep defending the brand. Like I said, people can buy whatever they want. If they're satisfied with SB, I'm happy for them. The 13 Jeeps I've had all had OEM (made by Bestop) or Bestop. To me, a top is too important to skimp on because of price, and every issue I might have had with any of the Bestop soft tops I owned was immediately resolved with replacement parts from Bestop directly. I do know, though, there are a lot of Jeep owners who aren't like me, and want to spend less on a top. There's nothing wrong with that. I get it.
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ZEN357
TJ Enthusiast
Your comments praising Smittybilt are the very rare exception. Looking at user reviews on Quadratec, a website that pushes/sells Smittybilt, is like looking at reviews on Quadratec's website for any product they sell. OF COURSE they're going to be favorable. Quadratec isn't going to publish bad reviews for anything they sell. Reviews on Amazon are similar in quality... some are honest but some are placed by fake buyers to make some products sell better. Amazon has upped their attempts to weed out the fake reviews but they're still there.
I know the entire Smittybilt history from when they had a superb reputation when old man Smitty actually owned and ran the company. His products were 100% manufactured in the U.S. and, again, Smittybilt had a great reputation then. Then Smitty died. The whole thing stopped, his family was not interested in continuing on and the company's sales started falling off without Smitty at the helm. They shut the doors. It wasn't long before a group of investors bought the name "Smittybilt". Nothing more than the name. They didn't buy any of the manufacturing facilities, designs, nothing. Just the name.... because the name Smittybilt was well known and it was worth a lot of $$$ due to that respect and reputation.
But all the investors did was go to China and start importing parts for Jeeps and slapped the Smittybilt name on them. They weren't Smittybilt designs, they were just what they could get the Chinese to build for them. The name alone was enough to bring them instant credibility and sales, buyers had no idea it was a 100% different company who just had the rights to the name. I'm old enough to remember when Smittybilt meant a good product. Those days are over. A few good reviews here and there are easy to find, new buyers are excited about what they buy and post glowing reviews. They are the exception, not the rule.
The overwhelming comments on Smittybilt are negative. A few good reviews here and there are nothing when compared to the vast majority of comments all over the various Jeep forums. Personally? I wouldn't TOUCH anything made by the current owners of the Smittybilt name.
By the way, it's very common for investors to start a brand-new company and buy the rights to use an old well-established name of a company no longer in business. Bell & Howell of late-night infomercial fame is another. Bell & Howell used to make great movie cameras & projectors. Then they went out of business when it all went video. Now you see the Bell & Howell name slapped on all kinds of junk like cheap computers. Buying the names of old defunct companies is a great way to start your sales off strongly. People think they're buying from a long-established company, some eventually catch on but not all. Old man Smitty must be rolling over in his grave.
I'll throw my two cents in here since @Chris mentioned me in this thread and since I have recent, first hand experience with a Smittybilt soft top product.
I purchased a Smittybilt Premium soft top from 4 Wheel Parts on sale. All in I think I paid around $250 or so for the top and the extended no fault warranty. I had my reasons for not purchasing a Best Top. The major reason is that soft tops get beat on rather hard running through the brush around here. I'd rather chance destroying a $250 top than an $800 top (or whatever the Best Top premium is selling for these days). With that being said, here's my experience with the Smittybilt and 4 Wheel Parts.
The top went on as easily as any other TJ top. It also didn't fit exactly right. Close, but no cigar. There's pictures someplace on here. Part of that may be my almost 20 year old top frame being tweeked. Be that as it may, the fit was off enough to be noticeable. I drove it for a week to ten days and the zipper around the rear window pulled out of the top on the upper right corner. It appears to have come un-sewn. A call to 4 Wheel parts had a new, complete top on its way in about 10 minutes. No charge. The new top arrived at the house promptly, and in good order. I now had two complete tops to play with, discounting the top panel with the sewing issue. Mixing and matching all the parts for both tops including the soft upper doors allowed me to come up with one complete top that doesn't leak and fits reasonably well. I keep fiddling with it trying to get it to fit better, mostly when I get bored and want to do something on the TJ. At this point, it's about as good as it's going to get. It doesn't fit like a Best Top and never will. It does work for my intended purposes. One of these days I'll take the broken top in and get the upholstery people at work to re-sew the zipper in the back on the bad top. I can't really say anything bad about Smittybilt and 4 Wheel Parts and how they've handled this whole thing. They were all over it and tried to make it right with no hassle.
There's no making a silk purse out of a sow's ear though. If you have an expectation of a Smittybilt Premium soft top coming out of the box and going on your TJ with no fiddling around and no hassles, you may be disappointed.
I purchased a Smittybilt Premium soft top from 4 Wheel Parts on sale. All in I think I paid around $250 or so for the top and the extended no fault warranty. I had my reasons for not purchasing a Best Top. The major reason is that soft tops get beat on rather hard running through the brush around here. I'd rather chance destroying a $250 top than an $800 top (or whatever the Best Top premium is selling for these days). With that being said, here's my experience with the Smittybilt and 4 Wheel Parts.
The top went on as easily as any other TJ top. It also didn't fit exactly right. Close, but no cigar. There's pictures someplace on here. Part of that may be my almost 20 year old top frame being tweeked. Be that as it may, the fit was off enough to be noticeable. I drove it for a week to ten days and the zipper around the rear window pulled out of the top on the upper right corner. It appears to have come un-sewn. A call to 4 Wheel parts had a new, complete top on its way in about 10 minutes. No charge. The new top arrived at the house promptly, and in good order. I now had two complete tops to play with, discounting the top panel with the sewing issue. Mixing and matching all the parts for both tops including the soft upper doors allowed me to come up with one complete top that doesn't leak and fits reasonably well. I keep fiddling with it trying to get it to fit better, mostly when I get bored and want to do something on the TJ. At this point, it's about as good as it's going to get. It doesn't fit like a Best Top and never will. It does work for my intended purposes. One of these days I'll take the broken top in and get the upholstery people at work to re-sew the zipper in the back on the bad top. I can't really say anything bad about Smittybilt and 4 Wheel Parts and how they've handled this whole thing. They were all over it and tried to make it right with no hassle.
There's no making a silk purse out of a sow's ear though. If you have an expectation of a Smittybilt Premium soft top coming out of the box and going on your TJ with no fiddling around and no hassles, you may be disappointed.
Artemis
TJ Enthusiast
Lol nah we don't have to have hardtops here. I've always had soft tops on the Jeeps. You just can't be crazy with it in ice and snow.
For you young guys, here's a rough chronology of Smittybilt:
Basil "Smitty" Smith lived in Southern California's San Gabriel Valley and had been an avid jeeper since the early 1950's. In 1956, at the urging of Brian Chuchua of Brian Chuchua Jeep in Fullerton, Smitty founded the Chuckawalla Jeep Club. He had been fabricating roll bars and steel bumpers in his garage for friends. Sometime after the Chuckawallas were formed he began selling products to the general public. The company was called Rock-ett Products and if I remember correctly the address was in El Monte. My family lived about 20 miles away and our '54 CJ-3B was equipped with one of Smitty's roll bars which my father had purchased from Hick's Muffler in Pomona CA. Our local jeep club was the Drifters, and although my father was not a member of either the Drifters or the Chuckawallas, we did participate in runs by both clubs. (The '46 Bantam trailer I have now was purchased by my father from a member of the Drifters and had been previously owned by one of the Chuckawallas.) I can't say that I knew Smitty, I was just a kid and he was referred to by all but the adults as "Mr. Smith," but I do remember him from jeep runs in the early 1960's and in particular from my first encounter with the Chuckawallas near Split Mountain in the Anza Borrego Desert State Park. I can vaguely remember Smitty's son, Tom, from those years as well.
I cannot remember when the company was turned over to Tom Smith, or whether Smitty was still alive, but it was after the company incorporated as Smittybilt in 1973. It was Tom who came out with the tubular nerf bars and tubular bumpers that remained popular with CJ owners until the late 1980's. Another popular product was the "Sure Step."
Tom Smith ran Smittybilt for quite some time. Various company profiles suggest that it was his only job during his entire working career. He and Dick Cepek's son, Tom Cepek, were contemporaries. Both were smart enough to recognize the changing international economy and that the real money wasn't going to be made selling products but by selling off the entire company to eager investors in the hot-at-the-time mergers and acquisitions climate. In 1999 the Smith Family Trust sold Smittybilt to Lund Industries for $18 million, a sum that allowed Tom and Smitty's other heirs to retire comfortably. In 2000, Tom Cepek sold his inherited company to Mickey Thompson Tires (which in turn was acquired by Cooper).
By 2001 Smittybilt was being run by former management from Steel Horse Automotive and Trailmaster Products (Lund had acquired controlling interest in Trailmaster Products in 1994, five years prior to its acquisition of Smittybilt, and moved Trailmaster operations from Michigan to a joint facility with Smittybilt shortly after it acquired Smittybilt from the Smith family.) Steel Horse had a reputation for for selling imported accessories of marginal quality; Trailmaster had a reputation for average quality. Smittybilt became unprofitable under the former Steel Horse leadership, as did Trailmaster, and as a result Lund reported to its shareholders almost $34 million in losses through the 3rd Quarter, 2001, and a week later announced its intention to discontinue operations of both subsidiaries and divest both brands.
In September 2002, Lund Industries sold the Smittybilt and Trailmaster product lines to an investment group incorporated as Smittybilt Automotive Group, Inc. and run by the same former executives of Steel Horse Automotive and Trailmaster.
In 2006, Transamerican Auto Parts acquired all stock in Smittybilt Automotive Group, Inc.
In 2016, Transamerican Auto Parts was acquired by the Polaris Corporation for $665 million.
So there you have it, a rough chronology of how over a period of 60 years a one-man operation started in a residential garage grew to a multi-million dollar family-owned corporation that was acquired by Lund, a billion dollar publicly traded corporation, which hired the wrong people to run the subsidiary who ran the brand into the ground thus forcing Lund to sell off the remaining assets to an investment group who in turn sold the company to Transamerican, another family-owned corporation, which was subsequently acquired by Polaris.
Whatever soul Smittybilt had when it was owned by Basil Smith and later by Tom Smith and the Smith Family Trust is long gone. The company is now run by soulless bean counters who wouldn't know a jeep from jello.
The fact that Smittybilt was run for a period of time by former Steel Horse executives should tell you all you need to know about how Smittybilt became known as S*ittybilt. It had nothing to do with anyone named Smith; it had everything to do with the Steel Horse guys importing cheap Chinese junk and slapping Smittybilt decals on it.
As I said before, "friends don't let friends buy S*ittybilt."
Basil "Smitty" Smith lived in Southern California's San Gabriel Valley and had been an avid jeeper since the early 1950's. In 1956, at the urging of Brian Chuchua of Brian Chuchua Jeep in Fullerton, Smitty founded the Chuckawalla Jeep Club. He had been fabricating roll bars and steel bumpers in his garage for friends. Sometime after the Chuckawallas were formed he began selling products to the general public. The company was called Rock-ett Products and if I remember correctly the address was in El Monte. My family lived about 20 miles away and our '54 CJ-3B was equipped with one of Smitty's roll bars which my father had purchased from Hick's Muffler in Pomona CA. Our local jeep club was the Drifters, and although my father was not a member of either the Drifters or the Chuckawallas, we did participate in runs by both clubs. (The '46 Bantam trailer I have now was purchased by my father from a member of the Drifters and had been previously owned by one of the Chuckawallas.) I can't say that I knew Smitty, I was just a kid and he was referred to by all but the adults as "Mr. Smith," but I do remember him from jeep runs in the early 1960's and in particular from my first encounter with the Chuckawallas near Split Mountain in the Anza Borrego Desert State Park. I can vaguely remember Smitty's son, Tom, from those years as well.
I cannot remember when the company was turned over to Tom Smith, or whether Smitty was still alive, but it was after the company incorporated as Smittybilt in 1973. It was Tom who came out with the tubular nerf bars and tubular bumpers that remained popular with CJ owners until the late 1980's. Another popular product was the "Sure Step."
Tom Smith ran Smittybilt for quite some time. Various company profiles suggest that it was his only job during his entire working career. He and Dick Cepek's son, Tom Cepek, were contemporaries. Both were smart enough to recognize the changing international economy and that the real money wasn't going to be made selling products but by selling off the entire company to eager investors in the hot-at-the-time mergers and acquisitions climate. In 1999 the Smith Family Trust sold Smittybilt to Lund Industries for $18 million, a sum that allowed Tom and Smitty's other heirs to retire comfortably. In 2000, Tom Cepek sold his inherited company to Mickey Thompson Tires (which in turn was acquired by Cooper).
By 2001 Smittybilt was being run by former management from Steel Horse Automotive and Trailmaster Products (Lund had acquired controlling interest in Trailmaster Products in 1994, five years prior to its acquisition of Smittybilt, and moved Trailmaster operations from Michigan to a joint facility with Smittybilt shortly after it acquired Smittybilt from the Smith family.) Steel Horse had a reputation for for selling imported accessories of marginal quality; Trailmaster had a reputation for average quality. Smittybilt became unprofitable under the former Steel Horse leadership, as did Trailmaster, and as a result Lund reported to its shareholders almost $34 million in losses through the 3rd Quarter, 2001, and a week later announced its intention to discontinue operations of both subsidiaries and divest both brands.
In September 2002, Lund Industries sold the Smittybilt and Trailmaster product lines to an investment group incorporated as Smittybilt Automotive Group, Inc. and run by the same former executives of Steel Horse Automotive and Trailmaster.
In 2006, Transamerican Auto Parts acquired all stock in Smittybilt Automotive Group, Inc.
In 2016, Transamerican Auto Parts was acquired by the Polaris Corporation for $665 million.
So there you have it, a rough chronology of how over a period of 60 years a one-man operation started in a residential garage grew to a multi-million dollar family-owned corporation that was acquired by Lund, a billion dollar publicly traded corporation, which hired the wrong people to run the subsidiary who ran the brand into the ground thus forcing Lund to sell off the remaining assets to an investment group who in turn sold the company to Transamerican, another family-owned corporation, which was subsequently acquired by Polaris.
Whatever soul Smittybilt had when it was owned by Basil Smith and later by Tom Smith and the Smith Family Trust is long gone. The company is now run by soulless bean counters who wouldn't know a jeep from jello.
The fact that Smittybilt was run for a period of time by former Steel Horse executives should tell you all you need to know about how Smittybilt became known as S*ittybilt. It had nothing to do with anyone named Smith; it had everything to do with the Steel Horse guys importing cheap Chinese junk and slapping Smittybilt decals on it.
As I said before, "friends don't let friends buy S*ittybilt."
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