Between 705 & 1200 SQ/FT 24x30 First shop for Binders and Crawlers

[bustedcrawler]

Long time lurker and finally have something worth posting about. Last few years I've been living with a friend from college, rented room and getting part of the attached 2 car garage.

I'm a mechanical engineer for a mining equipment company, and after spending most of this year in Africa on a jobsite, finally had enough to jump into Denver's crazy housing market. Found this place while overseas and all the stars aligned with it still being on the market with a reduced price when I got back.

2 bed, 1 bath, 875 sqft, with a detached 24x30 heated and partially finished garage. Perfect for a single guy with an IH problem and a new buggy project.





Started off empty...





Added in 10 4ft led shop lights from Lowes as I cannot stand a dark workspace.





Got the 1953 IH fridge moved in to get the beer cold for the upcoming move



Started hauling stuff over by myself until I was out of easy 1 man stuff to move. Called some of my great friends and finished it off and then started to arrange some of the big pieces.








Brings this up to date. Still working on getting the house interior painted, and the hardwood floors done before I move all the way in. Garage needs a MAJOR clean and organizing weekend but the tools and parts are there. Work bench that came has to go as its not deep enough or strong enough for what I will be doing. This coming weekend I'll have a new 96"x30" bench built and a set of legs for a 4'x4' solid oak counter top that was left in the garage by the previous owners.

 

[PCStang]

lookin good so far! Is that an Ibex chassis?

 

[bustedcrawler]

lookin good so far! Is that an Ibex chassis?

Thanks.

Its the JHF/Goatbilt chassis. Reusing the 5.0 atlas, 60/14b out of my scout and have a 5.3 and TH400 to put in there with 42 BFGs.

 

[spudley]

Nice fridge! I was going to guess 1949 until I read your next post. Looks like you need a little ceiling repair or your heat will be useless.
Good luck!

 

[bustedcrawler]

Nice fridge! I was going to guess 1949 until I read your next post. Looks like you need a little ceiling repair or your heat will be useless.
Good luck!

Close, I also have a matching chest freezer as well. Have some good friends that understand my addiction.

Yeah, that's how the ceiling came when I bought it. Heater works but I am planning on slinging drywall after I finish up the inside of the house and get moved in. Then blow in some insulation this fall.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Been bust getting the interior of the house painted to get ahead of my hardwood floor guy. Took him way many belts to get such a small floor looking good.. but it's nice and will be stained today.

Meantime I've been picking away at the mess trying to get things better organized and ready to use.


Got my welding area somewhat ready. Waiting on the cart I ordered for the AHP to show up and I get it off of the floor. The Swag table and C-Man drill press will go on a small table of their own, just need to build it.




Almost done getting the bench cleared and ready for demo. This one is no where near strong enough for doing any real heavy mechanical work. Get this out and nice homemade metal topped bench will be put in place. Also of key value is having the shop stereo up and going again. Not that my little bluetooth speaker was bad... but this is just better.




Got some shelving up and starting pulling stuff up off of the floor. Not sure how I had all of this in a 20x24 with room for my roommate's car to fit in as well.



Dirty work wall is coming along. Just need to make my list for dimensional lumber for the work bench so I can get that plywood sheet out of the way. It's hiding the Dayton drill press and Dayton Belt/disc sander.




Hard to get good help without a couple easy paths to the beer fridge so moved tires around a bit to make a temporary path.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Well, now that I am finally settled in, it is time to get after a few small projects and get going on the car.

First, a couple from inside the house. Ikea is nice but eats up time assembling everything. Still need to cut some pockets and hide cables but that is low priority right now.










Now that all the house stuff is sorted it was on to getting the shop ready to work.

Added a bluetooth receiver to the old sony receiver to borrow the freebie Bose speakers. They work okay for garage speakers.



But added in a pair of these freebies from a yard sale, and it's much better now...




Got an Eastwood cart for the Alpha Tig.



And got a chair for use at the welding table as its a little too low for standing use. I need to hang the Rapid Air kit this weekend.



Recycled a cabinet top and made a small table for the little drill press and the SWAG table for my porta band.



Got a shelf up above the welding table for all of my dad's old die cast trucks and tractors. Couple of them don't fit and will either go on a different shelf or back into storage.



Was struggling to find a decent vise. Craigslist has been barren or was old beat up vises with gold plated price tags. Murdoch's had this import Wilson for $150 less than anywhere else in town or online so I grabbed it.



Then set about building my main bench. 96" long, 32" deep, with a 41" work top height. Top is 1/2" OSB skinned with 3/16" mild steel on top of it. Still need to wrap up some bracing and tie it into the studs.

 

[redheelerdog]

Looks like you've been busy! I'm like you, I need good light to work, a million times better with the LEDs.

How do you like your Alpha TIG? I'm in the market for a machine, mainly to do sheet metal and thin stuff. Does it have a low amp, high freq. start?

Looks good!

 

[bustedcrawler]

Looks like you've been busy! I'm like you, I need good light to work, a million times better with the LEDs.

How do you like your Alpha TIG? I'm in the market for a machine, mainly to do sheet metal and thin stuff. Does it have a low amp, high freq. start?

Looks good!

Helps that I am moved in and not not having to go back and forth. Yeah, it's a huge difference.

So far I really like it. I got it used off of a good friend as he got a new Alpha TIG. He built a rear cab enclosure, bed, and roof for his lexus FJ 40 hybrid. So you'll like that machine for doing sheet metal and thinner metals.

I'd have to double check, but I'm pretty sure it will do low amp, high freq. starts. I haven't used it enough yet to remember off the top of my head.

 

[teamextreme]

Congrats on the new space. You're making serious progress. Mine's been a work in progress for 5 years now and I'm still not done. Another Denver area wheeler shop, I like it! I notice security bars on the windows, the PO must have had concerns. With all the equipment you've got, you might consider putting up blinds to hide things from view and look into beefing up the man-door jam/latch.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Congrats on the new space. You're making serious progress. Mine's been a work in progress for 5 years now and I'm still not done. Another Denver area wheeler shop, I like it! I notice security bars on the windows, the PO must have had concerns. With all the equipment you've got, you might consider putting up blinds to hide things from view and look into beefing up the man-door jam/latch.

Thanks, trying to get things setup so I can get the buggy built and going.

Yeah, just went from where I was renting in Lakewood to up in Wheat Ridge at my own place and gain more garage space and less house to clean. I'm sure we know some of the same people...

The story I got at closing on the bars is a few previous owners a go, it was a gentlemen with an older collectors Mercedes Benz who was paranoid about anything happening to it. I'm planning on blinds or a tint or something in the windows to block the light and limit looking in.

I've got one window covered up with my Advanced Adapters banner and some PBR boxes so I have at least started to address that.

The door is another issue. I want to replace it with a steel door without glass in it and just put in a new frame in it with some reinforcements.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Quick back story on the truck I had (well still have just in pieces) and what I am building.

First car was a 66 IH scout 800 with a 283 chevy in it. Built it up slowly until it was stolen and never recovered when I was in college.

Took a few years away from wheeling, and when I came back to Denver from Pittsburgh sold the F150 I had at the time and grabbed a 76 IH Scout II from a buddy. Way too tall as it was SOA on 4" lift springs, but it had a 44 front and 14bolt rear. I added the winch and some 37s on beadlocks as it came with 36 swampers on aluminum slots and had fun.






Well played too hard, smoked the trans and decided to lower it, go to 35s, add a terralow kit in the tcase and EFI. Randomly entered for Ultimate Adventure on a whim... and well ended up being selected and got to go.






It stayed like that for a couple years. Out at EJS, I thought why not run Helldorado on leafs and 35s... That was a rough day. Bent the windshield frame and popped the glass out. Glass wasn't broken by some miracle. Then little further up ripped a spring hanger off of the frame. Patched it up and limped it out and onto the trailer.







After a lot of debating... I chopped it up and made a scout buggy aka the scuggy. Back halfed the truck, 3 link front and 4 link rear on coil overs, bobbed and dovetailed the rear, dove nosed the front, added a 60 up front, full hydro, atlas 2 case, 5.38s, and 39 reds. Tons of fun like this...







I wanted to change up the cage for more head room. That lead to pulling the tub off and then going full tube. Came home for R&R from working in Africa and found a JHF/Goatbilt chassis for sale dirt cheap with all the trimmings. So drove down to Texas and grabbed that. That is the chassis in the pics that I am building up now.

 

[XJSuperman]

Damn, can wait to see what happens with this thread. Diggin the Scout for sure, but the garage is similar in purpose/setup to mine, so Ill keep an eye out for ideas.

 

[Styx]

Great start to the shop.
Love the scout and the buggy. Can't wait to see it finished...

 

[bustedcrawler]

Finally felt like I had everything in order enough to start using the garage, finally.

Next time, I need to use the cherry picker and not a jack to put wheels on axles ... rear went fine but the front. Well, there is a nice spill from hydraulic fluid coming out of the ram as the axle rotated off of the jack and went upside down. Oh well only harm done is a spill that has kitty litter on it to soak it up.



Got the chassis up off the ground and the dollies. Started moving things around and get everything mocked up to start building. Right now its 110" wb, 20" of belly height, 72" to the top of the cage, all while sitting on 42s.






Got started on a small chassis support table. This will have leveling feet, and an additional front section that will let me rest not just the chassis, but the driveline as well on it. Helps with the chicken and egg issue of laying out a 4link and fitting a driveline in there.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Long time no post. Work offered up an opportunity I couldn’t refuse so ended up in the SLC area for almost two years on a large capex project. Long term this will pay off and well not too many chances to do what we did. Always fun having crane lifts of 750K pounds on the hook, and using crawler transporters to move 3.2 million pounds.

Primary crusher on the move up a 10% grade. Transporter had 4, yes 4, Detroit diesels driving it. Anyways, back to the shop….

Scored a free Lista cabinet. Wished I would have gotten a few more but didn’t want to wear out friendships moving them. While making room for it, added hooks to put wheel Dollie’s up off the floor and some rafter J hooks to hold the bigger Dollie’s, and put up a couple of shelves.


It’s amazing how easy it is to organize in a lista….


Nice to have a place for all the small tabs and gussets



Now that I am home and off the road for work for a bit it was time to get serious on my way too long Project.
Modified the engine table from above by adding some casters to make a mobile table to put tools on while working.


Most importantly brought the buggy back from a friends house and blew it apart to finish weld out so I can start reassembly and get going on all the brain teasers…. Plumping, interior panels, exhaust, and all those fun details.



playing around with layout before it comes apart



Current state as she sits. Did add another 6 lights to the shop to help clear out a few dark areas I had been fighting too.

 

[jbrentd]

Great looking space and love the crawler project. I just missed out on 3 of those Lista cabinets the other day on FB. I think they wanted $500 for them.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Great looking space and love the crawler project. I just missed out on 3 of those Lista cabinets the other day on FB. I think they wanted $500 for them.

Thanks.

$500 isn't a bad deal for that size cabinet. Good luck on the hunt.

 

[bobg03]

Great post, interesting buggy. I love that you kept those old metal trucks from your father.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Let’s see if I can get this back on track….

I got tired of moving the plasma by hand and having it on the floor so built a cart out of scrap material.


Next up was turning the table I built to support the engine during mock up into a grinder and catch table


Table was important as I needed to rework the back half of the chassis. Buying a used chassis meant I had some PO issues. Namely bad welds and in this case it was faster to cut out and make new. Plus I could fix a couple things I never cared for in the design.


No turning back now!

To make the drill press easier to use with the notched I needed to fix a broken handle that moves the table vertically. I got the drill press used from a friend. Drill press, belt disc sander, and a compressor for $200 when I moved in. Rummaged in the scrap bin, found a piece that would work and fits gorilla paws and used it as an excuse to practice tig brazing with silicone bronze filler.


Not great but for my first time, I’ll take it.

I didn’t had a bench grinder and have needed one more and more. So found a cheap Buffalo 1/3 hp for cheap on Craig’s. Dug out some more scrap and a buddy gave me a class 8 brake drum to use as a base.



Starting slinging tube and in a couple evenings a this past weekend I got the back end rebuilt.









Saturday I had a friend drop off my new mailbox. He’s getting into more flake and decorative painting, so I had him do a large mailbox for me.





Flake pops nice in the sunlight.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Really need to be better about keeping this current but life happens and spent most of the last year working out of the country.

Problem, well good thing, is there was plenty of down time and some time killing on Marketplace started a slippery slope.....

Found a good deal on a used 60" Epiq. I've wanted one since I got to work out of a friend's 68" years ago but never wanted to pay the average 8k. So did the deal, grabbed it and realized I desperately needed to reorganize the shop.

Can't say no to candy apple red....

The prior state of WTF is this mess?? Things definitely got out of hand and not in a good way.




So with a loose plan, a big order from the local box store and a great friend/neighbor... I set out

HD is close so I was lucky and was the first stop at 6am for the drop off of shed and fence materials.




Really want a skiddy but can't justify it in suburbia... but man was it nice for demo work, moving all the materials out of the driveway, with the auger setting fence posts went quick, as well as scraping for the shed.



First order was tackling the fence and gate:

Roughly 150 linear feet of fencing. Basic 4x4 posts, except for the 2 at the gate, and PT runners and white wood pickets. Nothing fancy but did confirm I was on the property line as I found several balls of concrete from the fence prior to the one I ripped out for replacement.


Gate is 4x4x3/16 posts, and then a 1x3x14ga frame with bullet hinges and same pickets and PT 2x4 runners.




As noted by the dirt, I had already been playing with the skidsteer. Instead of only doing rock where the shed would be, that expanded into roughly a 35ft by 35ft area, 6" deep for 3/4" tricolor to go down. Cleans things up, makes a nice laydown area, good base for shed, and happens to meet city requirements for additional parking.


10 tons sure doesn't look like much:


Was off a bit on my estimate but luckily I am close to the supplier and they were able to make a second trip quickly. Once I had the additional 12 tons dropped off, it went smoothly with the skidsteer and some rake work to let the shed build begin.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Nothing fancy, basic 10x12, single 5ft wide door, with gambrel roof and loft storage. My neighbor and I knocked it out over three weekends. First being rock and then floor of shed, then the next was main structure, and the final weekend was paint and roofing.




Having the gate made things easy, as my neighbor has a killer 2 car wood shop that made making trusses easy. But we didn't want to carry them so into the back of the truck to run them between shops.






Finished with the major work. Now for all the trim work to dress it up. As well as rebuilding one door but we wont talk about that little oopsie.




Opening for loft is roughly 6x6 so there is plenty of storage in the shed loft area.





Shed being done let me turn my attention to inside the shop....
Finished insulating the walls, added OSB where the walls were open, and cleaned/purged/redid everything until I could find my benchtop and not be frustrated when I opened the shop doors.





Much much better... still have some cabinets to build with my neighbors help but it is clean enough to start tearing the buggy down to sell it as my interests have changed. Keeping axles, atlas, and LS for the new project, but the rest of the buggy stuff will be sold off to help fund the new build.

Time for another UA style scout. 66 800, rear quarters are rough since it was a plow truck, rockers arent the best but sliders will go in their place. 42 for fun but end game will be 40s.

 

[XJSuperman]

Your first few pics didn't load for me. The rest look ok. Nice update!

 

[bustedcrawler]

Your first few pics didn't load for me. The rest look ok. Nice update!

Think i got it fixed...

 

[bustedcrawler]

Trying to stay on top of this both to add since I've learned a lot from reading here and to help keep myself motivated with projects.

Now that things are clean, its time to start working on some smaller summer projects to prep for the scout build.

The daytona drill press developed a speed wobble in spindle. So do I sink time and effort into that or go find something else. Not finding anything new i liked and too much scrolling here... I ended up with, what I think is a 1946 Craftsman 100 series floor standing press.



Pretty cool as it had the MSA on it already



Needs some love for sure. Everything is stiff or stuck, feed stop collar is missing, feed return spring is either broke or missing but good bones and runs true as can be... even with a 3500 rpm motor.

Digging around for a motor and parts lead me to picking up a benchtop model. Has the correct 1800 rpm motor, feed stop collar and some good parts, even though overall that one is in really rough shape.



So its time to bust out the electrolysis tank and start the tear downs on those. Make the floor stander into a great press and then the rest of the benchtop will get listed for someone in need of more parts.

Started working on a stand for my swag porta band stand and will post more as I go on that. Between the stand and a few other projects I wanted to step up my fab tools and picked up a few fireball clamps to try. So we'll see how those go.



Hope everyone has a great 4th of July weekend!

 

[bustedcrawler]

When plans fall through and you have a day off of work.... time to keep moving on the reorg of the shop. Trying a new layout to see if I have the feeling of more room and better workflow. It'll be good to have the weld bench between the 220v outlets as one is shared with the compressor and other is only that outlet.



Down to tensioning the belts and wiring in an on/off switch on the craftsman 100 series... Definitely big thanks too 11b aka Jeff's shop. Between the threads here and his youtube channel... that wealth of knowledge made it pretty easy to do the rebuild.


Really impressed with how well Mothers cleaned up the original chrome...




Also snuck in redoing 3 of the window screens. 1 window is missing a frame but that is behind the toolbox and not a window that will be open often.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Chasing the neverending quest of being organized and having a better workflow in the shop... decided to build some cabinets. I have a great friend/neighbor who is set up for carpentry work and was willing to help out with this project.

So between his scrap sheet goods, and a couple of new sheets, I have 6 cabinets in the shop. French cleat mounted to make life easier and to take them if I were to move.

After a couple days in his shop... AC for mine is fast moving up the priority list. That is nice. 3 of the 6 cabinets are Red Oak as that is what he had a sheet of as "scrap", and then 3 are sanded Baltic Birch.






Don't mind the mess... pulling out the shelves I had to get things mounted wrecked the bench... but couldn't say no to hanging the cleat and the cabinets














As my neighbor wants to redo his sheet goods cart and the cabinets kick started his shop purge... he ended up building a pair of spray can holders to help get rid of his leftovers. Super handy and freed up about 4 linear feet of shelf space in my shop doing this.






I've been wanting to get back in 3D printing more. I've had a couple Ender 3s, and the current 3 S1 had the hot bed **** out I was at a juncture. Keep pouring money in a project, both of the Enders for me have been projects needing constant attention and parts. Or step up to a newer one that is more of a tool to be used and less of a project to tinker with.

Sipped the Bambu kool-aid... picked up a X1C and couldn't be happier. Night and day difference to the Ender lines and have been cranking out small organization items for my shop and helping to repay my neighbor for his help with a few small prints for his shop. Once the trail filaments are gone, I have PETG and some ASA for car/shop parts where I need some high temp resistance.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Got the drill press project wrapped up and put it to use. Wired in a duplex outlet with an appliance cord so the drill press and its magnetic light plug in on the machine. Motor was missing the toggle switch it came with so put in a nice machine switch.



Whipped up a quick cad model and put the Bambu to use making a holder for the Blair wax and Lubricut fluid and wax.

3d printed holder and the TMR drill press organizer.



Final design




Knocked out a quick F clamp holder print too that I found on Makerworld. Mounts via french cleat.



Finally got my holders mounted up and printed a couple M12 holders I found too. Nice to have stuff back where it belongs in easy reach.



Started making handles for the cabinets.... not in love with the mounting plate but 3/16" rod and a 5/32" hole in the wrench is tight enough i cant push in by hand but is a very light press fit in the vise.



And part of the new tools.... Cornwell was doing a pretty good sale, buy a M12 Stubby 3/8 or 1/2 impact and get 2 xc3.0 batteries for free. So bought both.... 1/2 and batteries came in and waiting on the 3/8 now

 

[XJSuperman]

I know this isn't what your shop is about, but since I'm in the thick of tractor show season, this is what came to mind seeing your thread this morning:

(crawler and binder)



I like the drawer handle idea. Can you hide the mounting plate inside the drawer? Just leaving the rods coming through and the wrench hanging out.

 

[bustedcrawler]

I know this isn't what your shop is about, but since I'm in the thick of tractor show season, this is what came to mind seeing your thread this morning:

(crawler and binder)



I like the drawer handle idea. Can you hide the mounting plate inside the drawer? Just leaving the rods coming through and the wrench hanging out.

I'd love to find one of the small IH Crawlers, for yard art. Same with a binder or other farm equipment. Currently on the hunt for an ore cart and ore bucket, as they will go well with my tram scoop and cover the 3 main ways they moved ore in the old mines out here.


There is room on the inside of the door for the plate. Will need to look into that idea a bit more.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Fallen behind on this as work has been crazy busy again, not as much as last year but close.

Need to grab photos but found a nice simple, clean solution for door pulls... Drill and tap wrenches at 10-24, and use a small standoff to get the wrench away from the door. Let the 3d printer knock out the stand offs and drill guides. Still need to install so I will be able to catch things up.


Went to Sand Hollow with some friends so that meant the MiniVan needed some love. It's good motivation to get things sold and plan for a 2nd vehicle when the scout goes in, as it gets old wrenching on the apron when I have a nice shop.




Meet up with a friend in Durango who was taking his new 4dr build out on it's maiden voyage. It flat worked and has a ton of slick little details. Not much taller for being on fresh 40s vs my wore out 35s.


Fun times with a good mix of rigs. 2 V6s and 2 LS re-powers. Lots of fun was had by all.





Took the scenic way home through Zion NP....


One of the tunnel "windows"







Stopped by a good friends house in Grand Junction on the way home from Sand Hollow for some motivation on my project.





Been on a bit of a Marketplace hunt for a few goodies...

Found an early GM NV4500 for a good price, will be nice to have the 6.34 granny 1st



Changed directions and sold the 5.0 Atlas 2, and will be going Magnum/205 combo, so found a chevy 205 and some mock up K5 blazer springs

 

[bustedcrawler]

Got back home from SH and put the nose to the grindstone while I have time at home....


Stripped the buggy down to get some of the parts and the full chassis listed for sale.


Only got a little sketchy bringing it off the pipe stands onto the home made "cart". Some casters, leftover 1x3x14ga from the fence gate and buddy had some scrap angle iron. Rolls free and will be easy to load for whoever buys it.




Cleaned a bit more and moved around some of the bigger items to get things ready. Took a moment to realize how big the shop looks when it's "empty"




Didn't bask too long in the void of an empty shop. Got the new scout pushed in, as it has no brakes and hadn't run in who knows how long. Best I have found was it was last registered in 1997, so at least since then but could have been more recently as it was a plow truck in the mountains. Bribed some buddies with beer and pizza to lend a hand pushing it in, starting the clean up, and see if it would fire.

Pulled the plow, started the process of pulling the nasty carpet and jute, plywood, and wallpaper interior so it can get a good clean and I can have a good idea of just how rusty the ole rusty bucket it.

While that was going on, I pulled the dipstick and seeing black oil with no gas smell or signs or water... I moved on to turning the engine over and found it was indeed free. So a can of ether was brought up and battery hooked up.... took a couple tries but fired up and sounds relatively smooth. Fuel pump didn't want to pull from a gas can, as I didnt trust the gas in the tank. I'll get a cheap electric pump and see if it will run long enough to make CHP happy to see wipers working at the vin verification. Vacuum operated wipers, so it helps if the engine runs.




After enjoying it run and picking up a bit from the mess made, I wheeled the kingpin 60 and lined the pass side perch up with the springs for fun. WMS to WMS on that 60 is almost the same as the scout is wide at the fenders.




A few weekends ago I got some free mock up 40s from a buddy, and using the 6" cribbing blocks I made for the buggy so it sat at full bump, I figured I'd see what the scout would look. 6" works out the height difference if the only thing that changed was tire size on the scout.

I will remake the cribbing for 8" tall, as I have a feeling I will need about 2" more to make the 40s fit and have room for everything.




Compared to the JK on 35s with a 2.5" lift.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Got a bunch more cleaning done and figured out what the random cut out and bump out at the rear pass side was... Someone scabbed in a rear heater....






Started checking on where to mount the spare tire. Worth noting since I will run beadlocks, I am only going to mount the tire, no wheel. Lets you use the interior volume of the tire for storage.



Mocked up on 9" tall cribbing blocks. Works out to 3" lift and 40s. Don't hate it at all.... top of cab is 6'5" so nice and low.







Sunday sent the last of the buggy parts down the line as the chassis, seats, and some misc parts got picked up. Lots of room now in the shop. Dont mind my home depot bucket as I had done an oil change on the JK earlier and hadn't fully picked up before the guy showed up to get the chassis.

 

[tworley]

Following along! Great motivation to my own garage organized.

 

[zmotorsports]

Started checking on where to mount the spare tire. Worth noting since I will run beadlocks, I am only going to mount the tire, no wheel. Lets you use the interior volume of the tire for storage.

Just curious if you've every changed a tire on a beadlock wheel on the side of the road or trail? It's not as easy nor convenient as one would think and if you're running with a group, some people may resent the time spent doing the trailside repair and possibly even blocking the trail due to not having a tire mounted up and ready to swap and go. Just throwing that out there from someone who has spent quite a bit of time helping fellow off-roaders in the back country and seen way too many Karens on the trail pissed off because someone is holding them up or blocking the trail.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Just curious if you've every changed a tire on a beadlock wheel on the side of the road or trail? It's not as easy nor convenient as one would think and if you're running with a group, some people may resent the time spent doing the trailside repair and possibly even blocking the trail due to not having a tire mounted up and ready to swap and go. Just throwing that out there from someone who has spent quite a bit of time helping fellow off-roaders in the back country and seen way too many Karens on the trail pissed off because someone is holding them up or blocking the trail.

Yessir, been there and done that with spoons and tools on hand in the truck. It's not ideal but the space gained and weight lost from not having a complete beadlock wheel is a worthy trade off, for me. 17" beadlock is a 45-50# of dead weight, on top of a ~100# 40" tire.

2014 is when I started going without a wheel, and in some cases a spare. It's not for everyone as you need a totally different set-up to be able to handle tire related issues as you loose the easy/simple spare swap, as well as a different mentality about how to approach things.

For me, the most common issues I see and have had, plugs or a glue tread patch can resolve them, even if it is to limp to a town for a new tire.

You are spot on with the Karens and the Credit Card builders who get pissed when they are mildly inconvenienced. I understand where you are coming from and I am still confident in my choice as it is not a choice I've made without a good bit of thought put into it.

I'm very picky about who I go wheeling with and the main group I run with are all like minded. Most of us only have a tire. Other groups, we've been going together long enough they know I am prepared and more often than not I'm the one helping the broken rig and not the broken rig. But yes, others on the trail may and most likely wont understand the choice and will be upset by the inconvenience.

 

[zmotorsports]

Just thought I'd bring it up, but it sounds like this is your normal setup.

For the vast majority of the time I wheel alone, just the wife and I, so I do carry a full spare as well as a full assortment of tools and some spare parts, however, I've come across people in the past with little to no off-road experience as well as no spare so it's a little frustrating when I'm inconvenienced because of someone else's poor planning coupled with lack of knowledge or skill to self-recover.

 

[bustedcrawler]

Just thought I'd bring it up, but it sounds like this is your normal setup.

For the vast majority of the time I wheel alone, just the wife and I, so I do carry a full spare as well as a full assortment of tools and some spare parts, however, I've come across people in the past with little to no off-road experience as well as no spare so it's a little frustrating when I'm inconvenienced because of someone else's poor planning coupled with lack of knowledge or skill to self-recover.

It's a good point to bring up. It has become my normal over the years and I have adjusted what I carry based on those choices.

I also know you can't make it any more broke, to a degree, and will make sure I limp to an area where I am out of the way so others can get by me. I don't like the pressure of knowing I'm blocking the trail so I'll do what I have to so that I'm out of the way.

All of my wheeling rigs have tool kits set-up specifically for them and only shop tools I take are power tools and a few speciality items like crimpers or the Fluke DMM. Some typical spares are in the rigs as well. I also have a pretty large recovery gear set-up to make sure I am able to self recover. When I go on bigger trips, I usually tear things down and do a lot of pre-work prior to the trip. Wheeling rigs tend to have parts replaced well before end of service life to stack the cards in my favor.

I'm the same way, as most of my wheeling is done solo. I do much more solo than I do with a group and that drives a lot of what I carry and how I am set up. You're spot on, there are a lot of folks out there without a lot of experience or common sense to bring basic equipment or have the knowledge to either self rescue or self repair. I see it a lot and those attitudes are a big part of why I backed out being involved with clubs in my area. Coddling those who weren't prepared and the constant spotting over every little thing.

 

[bustedcrawler]

With the good conversation going on regarding tools and prep for wheeling trips.... this might be a good time to talk about how I carry stuff.

Under driver's seat, from the back is a 30ft strap, and from the front is my winch controller. Passenger seat covers my ARB twin compressor.

Factory cubbies in the back hold spill kit, glue tread, tire plug kit, breaker bar, and other misc items I don't use often. Don't mind the custom art work on the cover panels... price you pay when your friend does the Cerakote paint job for free. Remember kids, nothing is truly free, haha.




Red bag is first aid kit, brown back on back of passenger seat is pneumatic accessories, and the hose can be seen on back of passenger seat. The two yellow bags are full, one of recover gear including 2x tree savers, 4x soft shackles, 2x pin shackles, a SARA device, 2x recovery ring setups, and a couple 1" rachet straps. Other yellow bag is tools, wrenches, sockets, rachets, drivers, etc that are jeep specific sizes. I can't help too many others but I can tear the jeep down with that kit. Black bag has all my fluids, tapes, etc. Not shown is the bag with a 100ft winchline extension on it. Hatchet and shovel can be seen on the C-pillar of the factory roll bar.







This past weekend, I got had by a market place deal I couldn't refuse.... only catch was needed to run Denver to outside of Milwaukee and back. So with a friend as crazy as I am to make a 15.5hr each way run, we took off around 530pm Friday and got back about 930pm on Sunday.

Really need to add a winch to the trailer but we got the 1963 Scout 80 loaded the hardway with a come along in the sub-zero temps. She's not much to look at... but there is a reason the rear quarters aren't on the rig on the trailer. Typical Wisconsin truck, rusted and hurting, but has a 345/ 4spd/ dana 20, scout 2 dana 44s, and 33s on Jackman Wheels.












Because they are NOS quarters. These don't come up very often, and the last time I had seen a set come up, they sold for what I am into the truck for. Pure unicorn gold, in metal.

 

[zmotorsports]

It's a good point to bring up. It has become my normal over the years and I have adjusted what I carry based on those choices.

I also know you can't make it any more broke, to a degree, and will make sure I limp to an area where I am out of the way so others can get by me. I don't like the pressure of knowing I'm blocking the trail so I'll do what I have to so that I'm out of the way.

All of my wheeling rigs have tool kits set-up specifically for them and only shop tools I take are power tools and a few speciality items like crimpers or the Fluke DMM. Some typical spares are in the rigs as well. I also have a pretty large recovery gear set-up to make sure I am able to self recover. When I go on bigger trips, I usually tear things down and do a lot of pre-work prior to the trip. Wheeling rigs tend to have parts replaced well before end of service life to stack the cards in my favor.

I'm the same way, as most of my wheeling is done solo. I do much more solo than I do with a group and that drives a lot of what I carry and how I am set up. You're spot on, there are a lot of folks out there without a lot of experience or common sense to bring basic equipment or have the knowledge to either self rescue or self repair. I see it a lot and those attitudes are a big part of why I backed out being involved with clubs in my area. Coddling those who weren't prepared and the constant spotting over every little thing.

The wife and I still wheel with our national club that is an RV and Jeep related club where we travel across the country wheeling various areas. It is a national RV club (FMCA) with a secondary chapter specific to off-roading. However, seeing as how my wife and I are still working full-time and most of the members in that club are retired and full-time RV'ers, we only hit one or two events a year as time and our schedules allow. We hope to be able to attend more once we retire.

As for local clubs, we joined a local Jeep club in the Ogden, UT area back in 2017 and quite enjoyed wheeling with them for the first couple of years. They have a monthly run, plus some of us would meet up for a non-club related run once in a while in between the monthly runs. However, in 2020 when every idiot with a checkbook or could sign their name on the dotted line bought a Jeep and joined our local club, I got fed up and dropped out at the end of 2022. Our club had monthly meetings and, in those meetings, held information type seminars and I had actually conducted a few covering very basic maintenance and repair issues that I have seen on the trail and how to prevent them. I also communicated what kinds of very basic tools to carry that could get most people even with minimal skills out of a variety of situations.

Unfortunately, what I found was no one was listening nor cared to even try to be self-reliant. They flogged on their vehicles and then when something broke, they stood back while myself or others jumped in to address the issue. I had even tried to get them to spread their wings and enjoy places that aren't local. My wife and I hosted a trip to Ouray, CO in 2022 during one of our annual trips and all the group wanted to do were short couple hour trails so they could go back to camp or town and drink and be idiots. That was the beginning of the end for me as we went there to wheel and not party. The wife and I went off by ourselves on a couple of the days because the group wanted to do other things than wheel. The final straw for me was during one of our last local trips in 2022 when one of the members insisted on trying an obstacle that his Jeep was neither built for nor did he possess the driving skills to tackle. Unfortunately, he was being encouraged by some of the other idiots in the club and he ended up hopping his Jeep around until he snapped a front U-joint despite my telling him he should back off the obstacle and give it a break.

I backed my Jeep down the canyon to get closer as I carry way more tools than usually necessary in my Jeep and commenced tearing down the front end to remove the axle shaft and get it back together where he could drive out. Partway through the teardown I turned around and the owner of the Jeep was over sitting in his lawn chair bullshitting with others while eating his lunch. Me and one other guy were working on his Jeep and that was the last straw. I was done after that and I figured I didn't need them any longer nor want to be associated with them.


As for tools, I know I carry way more than necessary for most situations, but my Jeep is not only my off-road vehicle, it is my daily driver and my toad that we tow behind our coach so the tools cover both the Jeep and the coach, plus we don't always solely travel dirt, many times it is 50+ miles of pavement before we even get to the trail, so preparation is paramount. Fortunately, most of the trail side repairs thus far have been on other people's vehicles we come across on the trail, but I try to be prepared as much as possible. I won't clutter up your thread with my toolbox or tools as I have posted quite detailed pictures and descriptions on my thread.