PEAK PUTTERS

I did a thing. Already swapped the tires I kept from the JK.

Need to fix your tag line

Gregandlina wrote:Need to fix your tag line

Oops. Done!

Atta kid!!!! I was waiting to see pics, you're not-so-subtle hints had me convinced I knew what your plans were, I was just waiting to see what color you ended up with. I fully approve

I take it they were out of orange models?

I seen it...

Yrjan wrote:I seen it...

Yes you did! It has a little bigger tires now....and a matching spare!

Gregandlina wrote:I take it they were out of orange models?

There was an orange one..(pumpkin), but the red Rubicon dash next to the orange door jams was rather disturbing.
White matches the old boat and motorhome.

Nice Dave.

Tri-fold soft tonneau cover, JL Rubi wheels and 35's, old 1993 boat.

How’d it tow?

Gregandlina wrote:How’d it tow?

Awesome! It's no 7.3 diesel, but it did great. Plenty of power, and so much easier to maneuver the boat around to the backyard, and at the boat launch.
#7000 tow capacity on the wide axle Rubicon. The Max Tow optioned Sport S (like the Cunningham's JT) can tow #7650. Max Tows are basically Rubicon axles with no lockers, but 4.10 gears. All other Gladiators have narrower axles and can't tow nearly as much. Something the dealers like to avoid telling people, so they can sell all the Sports and Overlands sitting on their lots. From what I have read, some people see "tow package" on their window sticker and think they are getting the wider HD axles and 4.10 gears. Nope! Read the window sticker. Max Tows are getting harder and harder to find, which is one reason we got this one.

The clarity of the 8.4 screen with the tow mode was pretty nice too for hooking up. Our old 20' boat is a big fat pig with a Ford V8.

Exxellletttt.... wrings hands

Whats your use case?

OldGreen wrote:Exxellletttt.... wrings hands
Whats your use case?

For right now, local daily driver, motorhome pull behind, and boat hauler. Campsite firewood hauling volunteer.
Mild spacer lift, 35's and light duty wheeler. Easy wide stuff.

Maybe later when the 35's wear out, a better lift, and 37's.

Lift #1 done. 1.5" Teraflex front Daystar 3/4" rear. This will get me by until the 35s wear out.

Winch bumper, Maximus 3 towbar mounts done. And a new Warn Jamboree score winch.

The lift is fine. . .when you to to bigger tires, spend your lift money on really good shocks. This looks fantastic.

So I had some rubbing last weekend at the dunes. Figured I would with the 7.5" wide JL wheels and no spacers. Quadratec Rubicon wheels to the rescue. On sale! 17x9". I always loved TJ Rubi wheels, and the wheels that came on my old 1982 pos Z28. These are kind of a cross between the two.





Should be done spending money for awhile.

Cooltech JL/JT flat tow harness installed. This is a very well thought out and complete kit. It comes with an isolation switch, and custom under seat mount for it. Drain plug grommet to route plug wire under seat to front of Jeep. Was a little nerve wracking cutting the new rigs wires, but after the first one, the other three were easy! Mounted the plug and breakaway switch on top of the bumper to avoid certain death.

Nice work!!

I went round and round debating what to do for flat towing our JLU-R... MOPAR, Cool Tech, or the Hopkins diode kit... I finally took the easy (and cheap ) route and went with the Hopkins setup because I stalled long enough to put myself in a schedule bind, and simply didn't have time to dedicate to a more complicated install. So far it's been working perfectly, and I even put a secondary harness on my flatbed trailer so when Oscar is hitching a ride 4-up, both the trailer lights and the Jeep taillights function

tobyw wrote:Nice work!!

I went round and round debating what to do for flat towing our JLU-R... MOPAR, Cool Tech, or the Hopkins diode kit... I finally took the easy (and cheap ) route and went with the Hopkins setup because I stalled long enough to put myself in a schedule bind, and simply didn't have time to dedicate to a more complicated install. So far it's been working perfectly, and I even put a secondary harness on my flatbed trailer so when Oscar is hitching a ride 4-up, both the trailer lights and the Jeep taillights function

That's awesome having Oscar's lights working while on the trailer. More visibility is great with all the flounders on the road playing on their smart phones.

I kept waiting for the Hopkins plug and play kit to come back online for the JL/JT. It was so easy on the JK. I'm not sure why they pulled it. RVupgrades online store returned my email and said the unavailability was due to the Covid shutdown. I'm not sure if that's true. They could of set up a temporary shop in the back of a Walmart or a weed dispensary and kept knocking out wiring kits!
In the end, I am happy with the results. The only wire routing I had to do was from the drain plug under the passenger seat to the front of the Jeep.

Today was off with the Teraflex 1.5" front spacers, and on with an RC 2.5" front spacer kit. The front end dropped almost an inch after adding the winch and bumper. This fixed it. The RC kit also has extended sway bar links and shock extensions for the factory Fox shocks. Thank you Michael for the extra set of hands!
Hmm. Looks like room for 37's now.

Did you adjust the caster and that track arm and draglink thing to account for the lift? If so, how?

SPR wrote:Did you adjust the caster and that track arm and draglink thing to account for the lift? If so, how?

Surprisingly the axle doesn't seem to be too far off center from lifting it a little more, and the steering wheel is still centered.
The Black TJ was off enough to bug me, so it got adjustable trackbars to center the axles. Drag link adjustment centers the steering wheel.

Caster is set by adjusting the control arms. Lower adjustable front control arms on the Silver JK fixed the castor and the squirlyness on the hiway, but it had alot more lift than the Gladiator has now. It also needed drag link adjustment to straighten steering wheel.

After a thousand miles or so after lifting it a little more, and some trips out to work along the heavily rutted river road, there is the slightest bit of squirlyness at hiway speed. The Mopar 2" lift that many install on these truck Jeep things gives about 2.5" lift on Rubicons, and 3" on the other models. The Mopar lift comes with longer fixed lower front control arms to correct the caster. With the 2.5" lift now in the front of my JTR, I thought I would look in to some adjustable lower control arms, like I put on the JK.. Spendy. Then, I saw a thread on one of the Gladiator forums about the AllMoparParts website, and they sell the control arms from the Mopar lift separately.
$30 bucks each! SOLD! Now I just have to find the time to throw them on.

I also been reading about the led lights freezing up in snow and ice. I threw some el cheapo led amber cube fog lights on the bumper that I heard give off enough heat to stay snow and ice free. $34 dollar Amazon find. Wiring stuff is stupid easy with the factory aux switch option.
Yesterday's freezing fog fest was a perfect opportunity to test them out and drive the Jeep truck thing out to work. 40 minutes of freezing fog and the led headlights were halfway covered, and the factory led fogs were completely coated with ice. The cube lights stayed clear. Let it snow!

I've been putting the dune flag on the front bumper through a hole meant for extra lights. PITA getting my fat fingers in there to put the nut on the flag. A trip to Lowes for $2 of Unistrut parts to make a mount on the factory trail rail. Problem solved, and the flag will sit a couple feet taller. Cheapest, most boring modification yet!