Well, I never did start a build thread, been so busy I guess. No time like the present!
During the biggest part of the covid "stay at home and spend money" time last year, the wife and I picked up a 2005 Jeep Wrangler X, shoved it in the garage and started overhauling it in every way we had the tools and space to do. It was a blast.
Our plan was start doing some major overlanding this year (2021) as well as driving all the back roads near our new large forested property in SW Washington, lots and lots of great roads out there. I've been using EarthMate to start mapping them all.
Thank you so much to so many people in this Forum for all the excellent help and write-ups and information. We learned so much, and continue to do so!
The wife decided this Patriot Blue Wrangler should be named Jeep Inky. I immediately thought of Pacman Ghosts and she was thinking of the famous New Zealand escape artist octopus! HA. So we created a logo for Jeep Inky that's a cross between the two. See it and a description on the web site!
With the exception of the transmission rebuild (which I don't have the tools or skills to do, we had a friend do it at his transmission shop) we did all the work on this thing, hiding in our garage from the world.
As we worked on it I built a web page for Inky just to document all the work we were doing, so that all of our interested friends and family could see what we were up to, as we go along. So the build information and pictures of each project we did is all documented there, including how I jammed a dual battery system into this thing using the existing stock mounting plate.
http://jeepinky.com
If you are interested, there's lots of details on the web site, including mod pictures and diagrams. I'll put any new modifications we do on this thread moving forward. Next project will be overhauling the cooling system since it has so many miles on it, and there's an excellent write-up here from @Chris I'll be using.
Anyway, here's a summary list of the things we did, and a few pictures, the rest is on the web site:
During the biggest part of the covid "stay at home and spend money" time last year, the wife and I picked up a 2005 Jeep Wrangler X, shoved it in the garage and started overhauling it in every way we had the tools and space to do. It was a blast.
Our plan was start doing some major overlanding this year (2021) as well as driving all the back roads near our new large forested property in SW Washington, lots and lots of great roads out there. I've been using EarthMate to start mapping them all.
Thank you so much to so many people in this Forum for all the excellent help and write-ups and information. We learned so much, and continue to do so!
The wife decided this Patriot Blue Wrangler should be named Jeep Inky. I immediately thought of Pacman Ghosts and she was thinking of the famous New Zealand escape artist octopus! HA. So we created a logo for Jeep Inky that's a cross between the two. See it and a description on the web site!
With the exception of the transmission rebuild (which I don't have the tools or skills to do, we had a friend do it at his transmission shop) we did all the work on this thing, hiding in our garage from the world.
As we worked on it I built a web page for Inky just to document all the work we were doing, so that all of our interested friends and family could see what we were up to, as we go along. So the build information and pictures of each project we did is all documented there, including how I jammed a dual battery system into this thing using the existing stock mounting plate.
http://jeepinky.com
If you are interested, there's lots of details on the web site, including mod pictures and diagrams. I'll put any new modifications we do on this thread moving forward. Next project will be overhauling the cooling system since it has so many miles on it, and there's an excellent write-up here from @Chris I'll be using.
Anyway, here's a summary list of the things we did, and a few pictures, the rest is on the web site:
- 4" suspension Lift
- BFG ATKO2 33x12.5" Tires
- Bilstein 5100S Shocks
- Terraflex Stabilizer Shock
- Pioneer DM-C2550NEX
- Garmin inReach Explorer+
- Yaesu 8900 HAM Radio
- Uniden CMX760 CB Radio (to monitor logging truck traffic on forestry roads)
- Custom shelving/drawer buildout in the rear
- On-Board Dometic Fridge
- VIAIR On-board air system
- Custom Transfer/Transmission/Steering box skid plates
- Side Rock guards
- Warn Platinum 10S Winch
- Rough Country Front Bumper
- Smittybilt Rear Bumper
- Smittybilt Tire Carrier rack
- 160A High output alternator
- Odyssey Dual battery system
- Steinjager Limb Risers
- Smittybilt JK Tailgate Rack (modified to fit the TJ)
- JKS Front Sway bar disconnects
- BestTop Soft Top
- Black-Vue Dash Camera
- Dash Mounted Hero 9 Camera
- Body Mounted Hero 8 Camera
- MaxTow Transmission Temperature Gauge
- AUTOOL Slope/Incline Gauge
- Custom Lighting Controller
- Rough County Front Bumper LED Light Bar
- Under-Carriage Rock Lighting
- Custom WranglerFix PCM Computer
- On-board battery charging system
- Portable Solar Panel System
- Doorless Side Mirrors
- Completely re-built 42RLE Transmission
