I've owned the jeep for almost 6 months now. Besides regular maintenance there were some minor troubles but so far i'm keeping up with it and fixing it by myself.
The reason behind this being a non-build thread are stupid laws regarding vehicle modifications which makes any kind of modding an expensive experience (besides buying stuff for upgrade you also have to have a proof from mechanic that it was done correctly plus you have to take it to inspection to get it road legal, otherwise the cops can take your license plates + give you a fine). I have some minor plans, but i'll take it step by step.
Now, the jeep: i bought it at the end of january this year, traded it with my previous car and added some cash to the previous owner. I spent about two months searching for the right one, but it payed off.
Here's how she looked the night i got her home:
It was a two hour drive from where i bought her, mostly highway, some country roads and a little city driving. Before jeep all my cars had manual transmission so i was looking for the clutch pedal with my left foot every time i had to stop
but i got the hang of it very fast and now i don't do this anymore
About a month after i found i had an oil leak from the tranny's oil pan. Not much, only a few drops every day. But enough to drive me crazy so i checked oil level very often and i also ordered 2 quarts of atf+4 from stealership to top it off if necessary.
Meanwhile i was gathering stuff for the jeeps first maintenance. I did it with my fathers' co-worker (he's a mechanic at a company my father works for). We changed engine oil and filter and tranny oil and filters.
The oil didn't leak any more from the tranny, so i was very happy
A couple of weeks after that i changed tyres. Jeep came with winter Pirelli Scorpion Ice&Snow, they were just a few months old when i bought it. It would be a shame to waste good winter tyres on highway over the summer, so i got me some Yokohama Geolandar H-T/S, 235/65R17.
Meanwhile, tranny started to act funny (hard shifts from 3rd to 2nd, sometimes going in&out of overdrive) and the engine was surging to 2k rpm at startup with a rough idle, especially when it was raining. Didn't take long for the jeep to spit out CEL. It was P0121, TPS.
So i ordered the TPS from stealership and after reading wjjeeps and this forum i decided to change it myself. Fairly easy job, easier than i expected.
[pics coming in later].
Also fixed my clogged AC drain. Didn't even know about it, but i was playing with my son one day and i sat on the floor. I felt my *** getting wet, WTF? I removed the carpet and found a small lake underneath. I vacuumed it out as much as i could and went searching for a solution. It was a pretty easy fix, just drilling a hole and blowing in with compressed air.
And finally today i got to fix another annoyance. My passenger rear view mirror literally fell off, luckily the wires for heating held it on. It happened on the highway, i was doing about 80 at the time. I stopped on the emergency lane, my wife sort of put it back in and i drove slowly with folded mirror to the first gas station (thankfully only a few miles ahead) where i bought some adhesive tape and wrapped it around the mirror, preventing it from falling out.
Earlier this week i bought some silicone adhesive which is supposed to be resistant to heat and cold and it is appropriate for outdoor use. Perfect for my application, or so i thought. I cleaned both surfaces (the mirror itself and the seating for it), applied the silicone and put it in. It ended up looking like this and i decided to let it sit for a few hours before going for a test drive:
A few hours later i just turned the jeep around and it was off again... i got really pissed and decided to **** it all and really went for it. Before i was very careful not to damage the heating element on the mirror, but i decided i can live without it if i damage it. Driver side heating is more important to me.
So i unhooked the wires and started to clean both the mirror and the seating.
Mirror clean:
Instead of silicone i decided to use double-sided adhesive tape from Tesa. I use it quite often and from my experience it's the best. And i've tried many. First a test patch on both surfaces to see if it will actually hold on.
At first i was going to just put two large pieces of adhesive tape, but then i decided it was better to put more small ones, in case one lets go others will still hold on.
Just about ready to put it together:
And the final result:
Not very different from first time when looking at it, but i drove later and the mirror seems rock solid. I do have some concerns though, because of the winter. I have a feeling that the tape might let go because of stretching/shrinking when using heating. If that turns out to be true, i'll just unhook the wires. Like i said driver side is more important to me than passenger.
This is how she (still) sits now:
Well that about covers it for now
Any comments, ideas or whatever are welcome
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My non-build fix-it-when-it-gets-broken thread :)
