Introduction:
Been having some fun building our new to us Jeep Wrangler. First a bit of backstory on how the Jeep came home with us. Those that know us are well aware that we often bring home strays, of both animal and vehicular varieties. We have been searching for a new project to build as a replacement for our very tired Commander and a companion to our trusty WJ Grand Cherokee and Ram 3500. We really wanted a Gladiator and came close to coming home with one a couple of times, but with time (and perhaps an erroneous bit of common sense) we realized that we could not justify dropping over 60k plus for a new rig, and then a bunch more to build it, and then subject it to plenty of potential damage. Second option was a used Wrangler, but with a very long time spent looking at tons of Jeeps only to rule them out due to condition, damage, abuse, crappy modifications etc, and yet still asking (and often getting) super high prices we almost gave up. Finally found a nice looking 2013 Rubicon on Facebook from a private party, we agreed to look at it, expecting the usual issues and disappointment. What we did find was a immaculate 10th anniversary Rubicon that a collector of exotic cars had purchased new for his wife. The JK was completely factory stock and had been out in the mud only once in its life (It was too much for their car collecting OCD to have to clean it afterward, so it never happened again ..lol) This gave us a well maintained unmolested platform to start our build, and It was a fair price. So it was not long before it followed us home just a few days before Christmas. Being as we are not good at Adulting and making smart decisions, we elected to test our new steed out by filling it with gear and heading out on a impromptu 6 day winter trip to Yellowstone in sub-freezing weather. We had a great trip and the Jeep performed perfectly. Now its time to tear it apart and make it ours.

We are starting off with the Jeep completely stock as it came from the factory, albeit 9 years young with full maintenance records and build sheet. First order of business was a trip to the local scale to get a starting weight, which was an already chunky 5,020 lbs. (2,520 front & 2,500 rear) We plan on keeping track of each item added / removed so we will have an accurate idea of just where the weight was added, which may or may not be of interest to anyone doing their own build (learn from our mistakes is the general idea) already know it’s going to be heavier than I would like when we are done. Plan is to balance weight vs usefulness of the various modifications.

Been making some good progress on the JK build, just hard to find enough time to make timely updates. We have had the Jeep long enough that it has developed a personality and is now deserving of a name. As we work on it, little things just don’t seem to go the way they should, mods almost seem to cause more issues than they solve, yet even with a pessimistic attitude from the one with the wrench and even more patients from his wife, we rework it and love the results. Combine this with stubbornness from the three of us, the nice shade of Anvil Grey that is some semblance of a donkey and a name is born. We have not just any donkey, but we have Eeyore the donkey. Now we have a mini me version of his namesake on the dash, and lovingly reference him by his name, UNTIL the attitude comes out on a trail when we ask him to go somewhere he does not want to go and he replies with Ohhh-kayyy, at that point he gets called ‘Donkey’ in the tone of Shrek.