Foot Pegs, JUST too late...

I recently had the doors off for about a week, but just put everything back on in anticipation of a lot of rain we're suppose to be getting.  Wouldn't you know, the next delivery day after I put it all back on I got my foot pegs.  :-/  For those who have no idea what I'm talking about, when you take the doors off your Jeep one of the most amazing pleasures in life is to cruise around with your foot hanging out of the car, preferably bare foot at highway speeds.  You can get foot pegs to rest your foot or leg on that hook onto the door hinges.  Like this...

http://www.skidrowoffroad.com

 

 

Just set your foot on it and away you go!  So I'm glad I got them, but now there's rain in the forecast for the rest of the week.  Next week I'll be in Florida (probably won't be posting btw).  After that who knows?  So I'm not sure when I'll be able to use them.  Oh well.

In other news, my wife and I almost ate it.  We were driving home when we passed an unkept dirt road that I've always wanted to explore.  Keep in mind what I said above, it's been raining here quite a bit lately.  But it looked pretty flat and mundane, so we decided to check it out and I didn't bother with 4 wheel drive.  It was all a mistake, and almost a BIG mistake.  The dirt was more like quick sand it turned out with all the rain we'd been having.  I lost nearly all traction after about 20 feet.  I don't exactly have mud tires (far from it) and they got absolutely CAKED with mud.  So we're in 2 wheel drive, and then traction control started kicking in.  It keeps you from giving too much gas and spinning the tires, and it resulted in us traveling at about 1 mph, slipping left and right, steering wheel did no good, we were barely missing trees, almost slid off a little hill slope that probably would have rolled us had we gone over at the wrong angle, it was a mess!  haha  I wanted to pop it into 4WD but didn't want to take my foot off the gas long enough to do it.  We made it to a paved alleyway - FINALLY - and decided we'd either never try mud again (I'm not interested in mud tires) or at least put the thing in 4WD before trying even boring looking dirt roads after 2 weeks of epic, flooding rains.

Jeep Wave Count: Still coming...

SPIDERWEBSHADE

So I've bought a few things for the Jeep so far, but nothing has been as satisfying (yet) as the new SpiderWebShade.  This thing is awesome!  For the uninitiated, it's a mesh cover you elastic-band to the top of your Jeep to give you some shade with the top down.  Behold...

Outside

Inside

The temperature difference in full sun is remarkable.  I mean, don't expect a 20 degree difference, but it really is very nice compared to full sun.  The main complaint I've heard about these things is that it doesn't feel like you still have the top off; the SpiderWebShade still "feels like a roof."  Well, yeah kinda, but not really.  You can see through it (see the trees in the second pic?) and it feels very "open air" (the doors being off probably helps that I guess...).  My wife said it felt like being under a camping pavilion or something.  haha

Anyway, 3 big cheers for this thing.  Easy to install, good lookin, and functional. Don't expect it to keep the rain out though!  It started raining (kind of hard actually) and the water came through like nothing was there.  It was actually kind of nice.

Another story:  The other day I was runnin TDDO (top down doors off) and it started raining H-A-R-D.  I can't recall ever being out in rain this hard, I couldn't see anything through my windshield with the wipers going full blast, the wind was ridiculous whipping me all around, it was nuts!  Thankfully I was on the highway and managed to keep up about 50+ mph and didn't get too wet.  Mostly I had water blow in from the sides.  I didn't get much from the top.  If I'd slowed down another 10mph I'd probably still be swimming though.

Jeep Wave Count: I'm keeping up, really, I just need to review my dumb notes.  I'll post it eventually.

More Stuff - Cab Cover

I told you.  I told you.  I can't save money.  :(

Other side of that coin:  I got some AWESOME STUFF!!!!@#WEFQ#$^WA%H#%

I finally, FINALLY pulled the trigger on a yellow SpiderWebShade.  This guy.  I of course don't have it yet to show you, but this is a pic I totally pirated off their website (not my Jeep):

http://www.spiderwebshade.com

The coolest thing about them in my opinion (aside from the fun colors) is that you don't have to remove it to put the top back up.  So now I'll essentially have a yellow headliner all the time!  Yay yellow!

Before I tell you my next purchase, let me 'splain.  Rain was in the forecast for Wednesday, but it ended up raining (pretty hard actually) on Tuesday.  I currently have the top down and doors off and I didn't feel like scrambling to put them all back on, it's supposed to be pretty clear for the rest of the week.  Anyway, I had another option- get a cab cover.  I'd been wanting one since Go Topless Day anyway (keep sand and possible rain and junk out of the Jeep overnight), but now I wanted one RIGHT AWAY.  So I went to 4 Wheel Parts (I'll probably post on them later) and got one.  But I broke my rule, it's made by Stupidbilt.  I would link to it, but I'm not completely sold on it yet and don't want to lead anyone astray.

Overall it fits pretty good, and honestly if I didn't have doors-off removable side mirrors or running boards it would probably fit perfectly.  As it is though, the mirror brackets prevent the side of the cover from completely covering the doorway, and the rails limit my bottom bracket placement options.  The end result is a gap between the cover and body at the doorway.

So this cover will keep the rain out of the big areas I'm pretty sure.  The fabric itself is rated as "water resistant", not "water proof", but man, it's pretty thick and plasticy.  That said, it probably won't be a bad idea to hit it with some water sealer for tents or something.  Also, without the top on, the middle of the top of the cover sags down quite a bit.  I could totally see water pooling.  I think if it came down to it I would put the top up, put the cover on, and at least have protection over the open windows and the majority of the doorways.

That said, look at that gap!  Again, it's not really the cover's fault, it's the mirror bracket placement and there's not much to do about it.  Perhaps I could move the mirrors to the lower position (the bottom two bolts in the pic), but I played with that when I first put the mirrors on and it didn't work extremely well.  I don't want to just remove them all together, even "temporarily".  It's not a HUGE gap, and it is a Jeep after all...  The cover is really more of an emergency flooding mitigation tool anyway, I didn't expect an airtight seal or anything.  But what about that eyelet hole?  Seriously?  What's that thing all about?

Jeep Wave Count:  Still need to tally.  :-/

Latest Purchases!

Well, I don't have them yet, but I did pay for them and they're on the way!

1)  Foot pegs.  I like running doors off and have been disappointed in the "fun" level of my foot/leg placement options.  So I picked up these guys.

2)  Soft top boot.  I also like putting the soft top down and, mostly just for looks, I got this guy.  Well, not only for looks.  When you put the soft top down, the fabric hangs into the trunk space.  You have about 2 inches of storage space before you have to start messing with the fabric to move it out of the way.  Not too bad, but when you're loading an arm-full of junk at 1am in a dark street (no trunk light) it's kink of a pain.  This boot wraps around the fabric and zips shut, so I'll essentially have more easily-accessible trunk space while the top is down.  This as opposed to what I've read anyway about the Smittybilt boot (this stupid guy), and we all know how I feel about Smittybilt anyway.  So here's the Rugged Ridge awesomeness (fingers crossed) that I picked up:

So there you have it.  So much for my lift savings...  Honestly though, there's a heck of a lot more I want that I could have bought and didn't, so I consider it a victorious savings day!  ...Right?

Jeep Wave Count:  Need to tally, not sure.  :-/

Window Tint

I think I've wiped out on the blog here.  My intent was to update every Mon, Wed, Fri, and I still hold to that as being ideal, but I've had trouble making it happen.  It's kind of been like a New Years resolution.  I think about 1 month of having kept up more or less as planned is actually pretty good.

I will continue to post though, and my new commitment is at least once per week on no particular day.  For this week's installment, I got my windows tinted!  Here's the guy putting it on.

Not my best photographic work ever, but you can see him working on the passenger side window.  The driver side had already been done.  I don't have any good pics of what it actually looks like now but I'll try to get one up.

I generally like it ok.  I do have a couple... not complaints, just mentionings. whatevs.  The total cost for both front windows was under $40, so you kind of get what you pay for and honestly they look just fine.  That said, my "mentionings":

• The color is grey.  Perhaps that's ok, but the tinted window kits for the rear windows I've seen online for Jeeps look like they come in amber.  I do intend to eventually get a tinted window kit for the back windows, and if they ARE in fact amber (and they might not even be) I'll have grey up front and amber in back.  That's dumb.
• There are tiny pieces of dirt that bubble out the tint film.  They're really REALLY small and toward the lower corner of the driver side (that's all I've discovered so far anyway), but still, I want PERFECTION!  haha  Well, I did only pay $40 so I'm not going to complain really.  
• They're not as dark as I'd hoped.  There are laws that govern how dark tint can be, and I believe the law is 35%.  I was told my tint is 31%.  So it COULD be a smidge darker, but oh well.  

 Honestly overall I'm totally fine with it.  I think it looks pretty good and I can perceive a difference now in the temperature and incoming light.

Still saving for the lift...

Jeep Wave Count: 58