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To elaborate, I got a "great deal" on some Smittybilt stuff a couple of months after I bought this XJ. I got their front bumper, rear tire carrier bumper with rear quarter armor, and rock sliders for something like $1200 out the door.
My XJ is now approximately 2 feet longer than stock. That's not an exaggeration, and in fact may be an underestimation. Luckily, I did not need to cut anything but the fender liner to get the front bumper installed, but the moment I got it on I realized how ridiculous it looked without the bull bar, so I had to go buy that for another $100.
The front bumper went on okay, but I had to replace some of the bolts they supplied with longer ones. The ones they sent were about 10mm too short. They only threaded about halfway through the nuts. This was for the bumper-to-frame-tie-ins connections.
The previous owner installed a 3.5" lift, but did not replace the sway bar end links. This ended up being really good for me, because apparently if you run the correct length sway bar end links, then the sway bar will hit the bolt heads for the frame tie-ins on a pretty regular basis, damaging the sway bar and the bolt heads.
The winch plate sits a little too high and with my winch installed, it blocks more of the radiator than I'm entirely comfortable with.
The rear tire carrier bumper was a complete PITA to install and required the use of a grinder to allow the Smittybilt frame tie-ins to actually fit in the Smittybilt bumper. Apparently, they didn't take the powdercoating in to account when designing those parts to fit together.
The marketing photos show that the rear tire carrier has a spot to hold a high-lift vertically:
This, in fact, is a lie. Well, actually its a bad photoshop but the high-lift doesn't go like that. All the marketing photos like that are really just stock XJ pictures with the bumper photoshopped on. According to the instructions, it is supposed to lay across the top of the tire carrier, like this:
Unfortunately for me, my particular rear tire carrier appears to have been welded together incorrectly, rendering those mounts unusable. I ended up having to drill holes in the metal plate.
Then there were the rock sliders. I got the rock sliders "for free" as part of the bundle. That's good, because they retail for $500, and get this--they don't tie in to the frame. You drill in to your rockers and install nutserts that they provide, then the "rock sliders" bolt in to the nutserts. I didn't realize this until I went to go install them almost 2 years after I bought them. I immediately put them on craigslist, because eff that noise.
The worst part of all was that when I ran in to problems installing that rear bumper on a Saturday, I discovered that their customer service installation help line was only open M-F. So in order to get any help, I would have had to drive around with no bumper for a week since I have a day job and can't work on my jeep during the week.
So, what you're saying is, you would do that mod again? Yeah, I don't blame you. What a mess. You would think that a company that has been doing this as long as Smittybilt has could get something right.
getting to extreme on mods for something intended to be a daily. the v8 make the jeep a blast to drive, but its also made it unreliable for a 70 mile round trip to work
To elaborate, I got a "great deal" on some Smittybilt stuff a couple of months after I bought this XJ. I got their front bumper, rear tire carrier bumper with rear quarter armor, and rock sliders for something like $1200 out the door.
My XJ is now approximately 2 feet longer than stock. That's not an exaggeration, and in fact may be an underestimation. Luckily, I did not need to cut anything but the fender liner to get the front bumper installed, but the moment I got it on I realized how ridiculous it looked without the bull bar, so I had to go buy that for another $100.
The front bumper went on okay, but I had to replace some of the bolts they supplied with longer ones. The ones they sent were about 10mm too short. They only threaded about halfway through the nuts. This was for the bumper-to-frame-tie-ins connections.
The previous owner installed a 3.5" lift, but did not replace the sway bar end links. This ended up being really good for me, because apparently if you run the correct length sway bar end links, then the sway bar will hit the bolt heads for the frame tie-ins on a pretty regular basis, damaging the sway bar and the bolt heads.
The winch plate sits a little too high and with my winch installed, it blocks more of the radiator than I'm entirely comfortable with.
The rear tire carrier bumper was a complete PITA to install and required the use of a grinder to allow the Smittybilt frame tie-ins to actually fit in the Smittybilt bumper. Apparently, they didn't take the powdercoating in to account when designing those parts to fit together.
The marketing photos show that the rear tire carrier has a spot to hold a high-lift vertically:
This, in fact, is a lie. Well, actually its a bad photoshop but the high-lift doesn't go like that. All the marketing photos like that are really just stock XJ pictures with the bumper photoshopped on. According to the instructions, it is supposed to lay across the top of the tire carrier, like this:
Unfortunately for me, my particular rear tire carrier appears to have been welded together incorrectly, rendering those mounts unusable. I ended up having to drill holes in the metal plate.
Then there were the rock sliders. I got the rock sliders "for free" as part of the bundle. That's good, because they retail for $500, and get this--they don't tie in to the frame. You drill in to your rockers and install nutserts that they provide, then the "rock sliders" bolt in to the nutserts. I didn't realize this until I went to go install them almost 2 years after I bought them. I immediately put them on craigslist, because eff that noise.
The worst part of all was that when I ran in to problems installing that rear bumper on a Saturday, I discovered that their customer service installation help line was only open M-F. So in order to get any help, I would have had to drive around with no bumper for a week since I have a day job and can't work on my jeep during the week.
Good gawd, what a nightmare!
Originally Posted by cleenrob
getting to extreme on mods for something intended to be a daily. the v8 make the jeep a blast to drive, but its also made it unreliable for a 70 mile round trip to work
Haha, I was waiting for you to chime in. Though I thought it was going to simply say "v8 swap"
I love 'em. Except when you have to change tires. Well, I have 2 out back that are bald, and caught something in the front passenger side last Thursday. Thing that sucks is the tires up front are not that old...oh well. So, I have not located the point of impact on the front yet, but am toying with just getting new wheels and tires all around, as I really don't feel like doing 4 beadlock wheels again...then I can just find a decent set of used tires for offroad, and swap out when I go wheeling, plus lower the unsprung weight for daily duty.
Bitter pill to swallow at $1025 for the wheels and tires shipped, not mounted. Debating.
10-12-2017, 12:38 PM
