Wicked Lobstah

Alright, I'm brand new to Jeeps and have never really been an "automotive guy," but my buddy sold me on them and now I have the bug. Gonna try to keep all my work in one thread so as not to clutter the board.

Bought a brand new 2013 JK 2dr Sport in Mid-November and haven't stopped working on it yet.

First mod was to of course ditch the back seat. Really pointless in a 2dr. I don't think it lasted a week.

Same day as the seat removal I flipped up the rearview mirror for better viability. Seemed like a common sense move.


Next mod was to install a set of Spidertrax 1.5" spacers.


I didn't want to do this originally but I have a wrecked '05 Nissan Frontier that I need to get rid of. On the Nismo I have a brand new set of 31" Pirelli Scorpion ATR's which I wanted to salvage for the Jeep. I tried putting them on already but they rubbed a bit when cut all the way over. So the spacers seemed like a cheap option which will help me to unload the truck and free up some capitol for a lift. Have a buddy who's gonna throw a bill at me for the 29" Wranglers and just give me whatever he has on his ZJ for the truck. Pretty much a 3-way swap.


Another quick mod completed was to shrink wrap the antenna in black. Just trying to get rid of all the metallic/chrome components.

Wicked Lobstah

Decided I wanted to do a spray in liner. My boss at work has it done to his YJ, and it looks pretty wicked, so I'm gonna go ahead and get it done.

So I looked at a bunch of threads on here and saw the nightmare that was in store for me. This is some kind of spray on, sound dampening / heat absorption compound that was applied at the factory. It would make the spray-on liner look like crap so it needs to come out.


I attacked it with a hammer and chisel. It sucked pretty hard. Not looking forward to the patches on the floor in front of the front seats.


After getting it all up I sanded down the area smooth and hit it with a thin layer of white primer to protect the metal until I can get it sprayed.


Closer view of the work site.

Wicked Lobstah

Continued ripping the interior apart. The front passenger seat is out and I went to work on the patch of crap on the passenger side floor board.

I did learn something from my struggles in the back. A heat gun works wonders. Throwing some direct heat at it caused it to peel up in long sheets with some constant applied pressure on the chisel. Wish I had done this in the back. Took about 15 minutes as opposed to the 3+ hours in the back.

Wicked Lobstah

Time to do the grill! I saw a lot of people on here plasti-dipping their grills and adding in grating to the backside. Looked pretty good so I decided to take a whack at it. I took the week off of work so I spent yesterday and today working on it.

Here's the prep work:

Removed the grill.


Gave it a bath.


Dried it thoroughly.


Taped off the hood buffer so as not to hit it with the plasti-dip

Wicked Lobstah

Forgot to take pics while spraying down the coats of plasti-dip. Doesn't matter, you'll see the finished product. Used 3 cans to do 5 coats. Went light - heavy - heavy - heavy - light. Came out pretty good considering I had never used the stuff before. Regardless on to the grating.

Bought some expanded aluminum grating and cut it down with a good set of shears. I went with 14" x 4 3/4" although if I were to do this again I'd go with maybe 12 1/2" x 4"


Spray painted them black with paint that had a high temperature tolerance.


Got set up to attach the panels to the rear of the grill.


Prepped the back by attaching some adhesive tie downs and then threading through the zip ties.


Finished product. This was actually a painful nightmare. My fingers were constantly getting stabbed by the points on the cut ends.

I started by installing slots 2, 4, and 6 first. ( ) (X) ( ) (X) ( ) (X) ( ) ***BE SURE NOT TO TIGHTEN THE ZIP TIES!
I then installed 1, 3, 5, 7 next. (X) ( ) (X) ( ) (X) ( ) (X) Once all 7 are in place then go through and tighten all the zip ties down. I found it was best to do the tops and bottoms first before doing all the sides.

Wicked Lobstah

Here's some pics of the finished product.

Finished prior to install.


Installed

Wicked Lobstah

I do a lot of driving up and down the east coast and have noticed the hood fluttering when I get up around 75+ mph. Looked around on here and found that it was do to the spring on the front end of the hood. So that's gone...


Also found a cheap mod to convert the side marker lights into blinkers. Seriously don't know why they don't build them like this at the factory.

Went down to HD and picked up a pack of connectors. Biggest thing to note is the wire gauge. There were Yellow, Blue, and Red connectors. The Blue ones were the correct size.


Here is a pic of it installed. There are plenty of "how to" guides on here to show you what to do. So definitely reference them if you need any help.

Wicked Lobstah

Alright the sun came out after a short winter, so I took off the top and doors. Realized that with the doors off I needed to get some type of side mirrors in order for it to be legal.

Picked up a couple Rugged Ridge Quick Release Relocation Mirrors ($40 each). Don't know how I'll like them yet, but at least I'm legal to drive.


Outside look.


Inside look.


Profile

VETTETHRET

Very, very nice. Wish I had the knowledge and patience for this kind of stuff, I would save a ton of money on labor! Great job, I love these threads

MT10JK

Nice clean build! Good job!