Scratchbuilding a mini-me JKU

[jeffro]

I may as well build a little one from leftover and robbed parts from my other little trucks and stuff. I was starting this in another old thread, but it kinda got lost.

My cash flow has changed direction, to a real Jeep but its still not enough yet, so I will tinker around with a little one and hope you guys enjoy something the same, but different. If not, oh well It keeps me busy.

This is what I want to copy, sort of... My Jeep

1st, the body, I used to have friends keep there eyes open for these bodies. I ended up with 4. They usually show up around Christmas in some of the department stores.

I have already chopped the hell out of it, I did the cut fender mod

Cut the solid part of the roof out, not sure why just yet, that we will figure out later.

I also chopped off the stock mopar lookin running boards

I have to find the other pictures... :thinking: be back with more..

 

[07silverjk]

I am interested in seeing how this turns out. :beer:

 

[jeffro]

I am interested in seeing how this turns out. :beer:

Great, come on along


I'll get back to the body later. It needs axles, suspension and a chassis.


front axle

rear axle

laying it out

linked it up, and dug up some shocks with helper coils and home made shock towers

robbed a transfer case from another clunker

That's it for now.

 

[07JKSahara]

This is cool! Id love to have a project like that. Keep sharing!

 

[jeffro]

This is cool! Id love to have a project like that. Keep sharing!

I will do that, Thank you for the comment !

 

[USMC Wrangler]

Subscribed! Looks like fun!

 

[jeffro]

Thank you gentlemen !

As I said, its something to do, its a small town, and about all there is too do is go to a bar, but I had my fun years ago, now its time for the younger guys.

The body had the fender flares like the old bushwhacker's, except its a fake bolt hole. They needed ground down and smoothed out.

On these types of bodies, I use small pieces of styrene plastic, left over from larger sheets of styrene (that's another story) to strengthen areas of the body or whatever I need to do, in this case, make the fenders look a little more modern.

This piece is a hair less then 1\8 th in. thick and about 6 inches long, maybe 3\4 th's wide

Then I use PVC pipe cleaner fluid as a plastic cement type welding, melting agent and some kind of clamp that works in the area.

Then I use auto body bondo, and it seems to bond nicely to styrene and other plastics.

That just about catches up to where I am right now, just staring at the damn thing wishing it would put itself together.


.

 

[jeffro]

I couldn't sleep, so I was in the garage about 4 AM, so I did some sanding and a little primer so I can find the bad spots, mold lines, wavy bondo, etc... It needs more sanding..

Plus a pic or 2 of the interior, and I'm trying to decide if I want to chop up the interior and cut the doors out, or leave them in, and don't really mess with it...







Even though my money is being saved for my 1:1 Jeep, I still have to buy dogfood for these 3 nuts, so its off to go shopping,,,Oh joy :crazyeyes:

 

[jeffro]

I spent a few hours on the interior.

I took a Dremel and a few different cutting bits to it.

Then it was time to build it back. Had to build a false floor, to hide the transfer case, not sure how else to explain it.

Installed the electric motor (may change it) and transmission and connected a driveshaft to the t-case.

Also attached a steering servo.

I've got left over electronic speed control and radio system on the shelf

I'm trying some different shoes for it..little too tall, but for now, they work.

A mock up to look at

Is it looking ok ? I also chopped the bumpers off..



.

 

[USMC Wrangler]

Nope. Looks terrible. Start over. J/K of course! Looks good...keep going!

 

[jeffro]

Nope. Looks terrible. Start over. J/K of course! Looks good...keep going!

Thank you ! I know you were, I need a jab to keep me awake.

I will say one thing, now that I have been here reading and looking at other people's real rock crawler jeeps, I'm learning a little better what a real "rock crawler" looks like, so I can make it look. hopefully close to the real thing, plus it will crawl and there will be a video, if my legs can deal with bounding on the loose rocky terrain I have available for my mini's. I have close to 30 different ones.

 

[USMC Wrangler]

Cool! Can't wait to see it done and out smashing rocks!

 

[jeffro]

Cool! Can't wait to see it done and out smashing rocks!

Great, that gives me a reason to do it.


Now, tomorrow is Monday, this thing will probably sit for a few days while I acclimate to work once more... :crazyeyes:

 

[DMF]

This is too cool!

 

[07JKSahara]

Looks awesome, I kinda like the flat gray primer. I've always liked flat painted cars but they got a bad rap so I've always steered clear.

 

[jeffro]

Looks awesome, I kinda like the flat gray primer. I've always liked flat painted cars but they got a bad rap so I've always steered clear.

Thank you. I know what you mean, I always think about doing one flat black actually, but the closest I got was a satin black, sorta close.

Its Monday night, no building tonight, so a video of that satin black blazer, its no longer mine, it moved to Idaho a year ago.

 

[jeffro]

@ 07JKSahara,

I was digging around on my Flickr page this morning looking for a picture for something else and I found this, I forgot, I did do one in 2011 that I primered flat black before I painted it Rescue green.

 

[OJK12]

Looks amazing!!

 

[jeffro]

Looks amazing!!

Thank you !!

 

[07JKSahara]

@ 07JKSahara,

I was digging around on my Flickr page this morning looking for a picture for something else and I found this, I forgot, I did do one in 2011 that I primered flat black before I painted it Rescue green.

Both colors look cool. There's just something so sinister about flat black to me... But it's been kind of overused now. I still love it on classic muscle cars no matter what.

Keep this thread going, it's cool to see all this.