Barn Door for JK factory hardtops

[jscherb]

Mr. jscherb

I am so excited to see this drop down storage. I've wanted something to put there, but didn't want to pay the absurd prices for similar products. When I saw you taking a stab at this, I became ecstatic.

I'll be closely following this and when it hits the market this will be on my "short list" of things to buy.

Thank you for all the time and effort you put into these sort of things.

Thank you. And please, I'm Jeff. Mr. Scherb was my father .

If there's enough interest I'll work to get this in production; there are two companies I've worked with on other products that I think would be interested in manufacturing/marketing this.

I'm working on the LJ version today, hopefully I'll have it done and installed by tomorrow. It uses the same Molle panel but different mounting hardware due to the different roll bars.

I hear you about the cost of other options that use the same space, one I looked at costs $699, requires a hardtop, and requires drilling into the hardtop for installation. I've designed this to be affordable and easy to install - it works with a hardtop or with the soft top or with no top, and it requires no drilling for installation. The prototype cost me less than $35 at retail prices for materials, so I think this could be very affordable if it gets to market, depending of course on whatever company's cost structure and distribution.

 

[devlooper]

Thank you. And please, I'm Jeff. Mr. Scherb was my father .

If there's enough interest I'll work to get this in production; there are two companies I've worked with on other products that I think would be interested in manufacturing/marketing this.

I'm working on the LJ version today, hopefully I'll have it done and installed by tomorrow. It uses the same Molle panel but different mounting hardware due to the different roll bars.

I hear you about the cost of other options that use the same space, one I looked at costs $699, requires a hardtop, and requires drilling into the hardtop for installation. I've designed this to be affordable and easy to install - it works with a hardtop or with the soft top or with no top, and it requires no drilling for installation. The prototype cost me less than $35 at retail prices for materials, so I think this could be very affordable if it gets to market, depending of course on whatever company's cost structure and distribution.

Haha, to be honest, MORryde or any other company you work with would be silly not to pick this up especially if you can bring it to market at a reasonable price. For too long Jeep mods have been 2 of 3 things.

Affordable, and low quality, or expensive and high quality.

Then you and your designs have come along with the magic combination of: Affordable and high quality.

I've already planned on picking up your JKU door hinge kit, HD Tailgate reinforcement kit, and if this comes to market I'll be picking this up.

Keep up the awesome work!

 

[jscherb]

Haha, to be honest, MORryde or any other company you work with would be silly not to pick this up especially if you can bring it to market at a reasonable price. For too long Jeep mods have been 2 of 3 things.

Affordable, and low quality, or expensive and high quality.

Then you and your designs have come along with the magic combination of: Affordable and high quality.

I've already planned on picking up your JKU door hinge kit, HD Tailgate reinforcement kit, and if this comes to market I'll be picking this up.

Keep up the awesome work!

Thank you very much for the kind words.

I just try to design things that I think will be useful, and I try to design them in an economical way that will also stand up to abuse on the trail. And I don't do "copycat" ideas, if I can't do something unique and creative then I'm not interested. If I achieve all that it doesn't matter to me if they become commercial products, although I do enjoy seeing other people use and enjoy my designs.

 

[akpostal]

Count me in as interested for the overhead storage.

I look forward to getting the HD door hinges when they are available.

 

[jscherb]

Count me in as interested for the overhead storage.

I look forward to getting the HD door hinges when they are available.

Yesterday I asked MORryde when the hinges would be available for sale. This was the reply:

We are just waiting on the initial order to get through production. They are scheduled to be done later this week.

So that probably means they could be bought direct from MORryde the beginning of next week. It'll take a little bit longer for them to get to other outlets like Retrofit Offroad.

I'll get my production set when I stop by MORryde on the way to Easter Jeep Safari in two weeks, I've had a preproduction set on my JKU for several months.


I'll talk to MORryde about the overhead storage design.

 

[jscherb]

Back to the JL Grille for the JK project, I've got five slots molded, two more to go. Once I mold the final two I'll assemble a complete grille to make the full grille mold from.

All of the JL grilles I've seen have inserts and mesh in the slots. I'm heading in the same direction with this grille - I've molded the slots with inserts, mesh will be installed after the complete grille is molded. In this photo I've colored some inserts light gray (can't really do silver with my drawing program so my coloring job doesn't really do it justice).

The photo below is of the grille on FCA's Safari Concept Jeep, it's got the inserts and mesh and this is where I'm heading with this project.

 

[jscherb]

I finished the LJ overhead/swing-down Molle panel, I posted a video of it in my LJ thread: http://forum.expeditionportal.com/t...u-outfit-this-custom-LJ?p=2445800#post2445800

It works exactly like the JK version; the panels are identical, only the mounting hardware is different.

 

[jscherb]

Finished molding the last two slots. Today I'll start assembling a complete JL-style grille. The outer two slots need to be modified so they intersect the headlights and I'll do that in the process of assembling the complete grille.

 

[jscherb]

Here are some photos of the work in progress on the JL Grille for the JK. This first photo shows the new grille face; the slots I've been molding are clamped behind the face. The slots will be bonded to the back of the face and then the assembly will be smoothed/bodyworked. The outer slots will be modified to intersect the light buckets properly. The grille is curved the wrong way in these photos because the slots aren't fully trimmed yet and are overlapping in the back causing it to curve a bit when they're clamped to the face.

In this photo the new face, minus the slots, is clamped to a factory grille. The face and the grille will be bonded together after the slots are in place to make the complete grille assembly. I've got black cardboard hiding the old slots behind the new slots; the old slots will be cut out of the factory grille when the new face is installed.

So far everything is going according to the design and plan. Next I'll get the slots bonded to the face and the face installed on the factory grille.

The end result of this process will be a mold master grille that I'll make a mold from.

 

[jscherb]

The JL Grille for the JK is going together very nicely. I've got the slots bonded to the face and in these photos the face assembly is clamped onto a factory grille.

Compared to a factory grille. The backs of the slots of the new grille get cut out, they're solid in these photos for the moldmaking process.

These photos show the bend forward, which matches the bend forward of the JL grille. Also you can see I haven't finished the intersection between the outer slots and the headlight buckets yet.

Next I've got to finish the intersection of the outer slots and headlight buckets, and do some bodywork on the entire panel. Once I do that and put a nice finish on everything I'll be ready to make the mold.

 

[en480c4]

Looks great Jeff. The proportions look perfect. Can't wait to see the finished product.

My personal choice for my JK would be to keep the directionals in the stock location, which is a change from the preference I had a few months back. I've since added an AEV front bumper, and they made a great choice for the JK to align the fogs outboard of the directionals, so they're on a line with the headlights and fogs. But it appears you've created a blank canvas where the directional placement is limited only by the structure behind the grill.

 

[jscherb]

Looks great Jeff. The proportions look perfect. Can't wait to see the finished product.

Thank you. My design goal was to replicate the look of the JL grille as closely as possible. I'm very happy with the results so far.

My personal choice for my JK would be to keep the directionals in the stock location, which is a change from the preference I had a few months back. I've since added an AEV front bumper, and they made a great choice for the JK to align the fogs outboard of the directionals, so they're on a line with the headlights and fogs. But it appears you've created a blank canvas where the directional placement is limited only by the structure behind the grill.

Yes, a blank canvas. I'm not putting recesses for the turn signals in the grille, for two reasons. First, the turn signals on the JL are on the fenders, so if this grille were to be installed it would be possible to do fender-mounted turn signals just like the JL. Second, many people (including me) think the turn signals should be moved inboard a bit to be more like a CJ grilles, so by not putting fixed locations in the mold the turn signals can be located wherever a person wants them, within the limits of interfering with the core support brackets behind the grille. And even so if flush-mount lights or lights that protrude behind the grille a minimal amount are used, the lights can be pretty far inboard.

I've got a bunch of different lights I'm playing with and I haven't decided what I'm going to do on my Jeep yet. I'll post a bunch of photos soon and people can weigh in on what lights they like.

 

[jscherb]

As I said in an earlier post I'm not putting recesses for the turn signals in the grille, I'm doing that for two reasons.

First, the turn signals on the JL are on the fenders, so if this grille were to be installed it would be possible to do fender-mounted turn signals just like the JL.

Second, some people (including me) think the turn signals should be moved inboard a bit to be more like a CJ grille, but there are core support brackets in the way behind the grille that prevent the factory turn signals from being mounted more inboard. By using surface mount lights or lights that minimally protrude behind the grille those brackets can be avoided and the turn signals can be placed anywhere. Here are some examples of lights than could be used. These are just a few options, there are others.

The factory JK turn signals can be installed using a hole saw. There are lots of writeups on this, it's a fairly common mod for TJ's and it would work perfectly in this fiberglass grille. Some photos of JK signals in a TJ grille:

CJ-7 lights might be a bit too large:

CJ2/CJ3 turn signals could be used. In the left photo I've posed just the lens on the grille, on the right it's on a CJ3 grille and you can see it's got a chrome base:

These next examples snap into a hole in the grille, with minimal protrusion through the back side. In the right photos they're just sitting on the surface, when mounted they'd be in a hole and a bit closer to the surface.

A 2.5" light with a rounded chrome bezel:

A 2.5" light with an angled chrome bezel:

A 2" light with a rubber mounting grommet (the 2.5" lights above can be installed with just a grommet as well):

There are others, for example this 3" surface mount light: http://truck.uapac.com/product/cont?pid=11425 :

I haven't decided what I'll do on my Jeep yet, what do you guys like?

 

[en480c4]

My favorite is the clear lens ones off the earthly CJ-5's. Having trouble finding an example I can hot link to, but they're similar the to the CJ-2/3 but with a clear lens and orange bulb.

 

[jscherb]

My favorite is the clear lens ones off the earthly CJ-5's. Having trouble finding an example I can hot link to, but they're similar the to the CJ-2/3 but with a clear lens and orange bulb.

This one? With the clear lens it was used on some CJ3B's and carried over to the early CJ5. https://www.kaiserwillys.com/catego...-lamp-assembly-clear-lens-fits-53-71-cj-3b-5:

This one with a clear lens/amber bulb: