Well, I did it again.  I've been trying to get the Jeepster ready for the Easter Jeep Safari in Moab, UT. 

Yeah, it did great in Truckhaven and Ocotillo, but that's close to home andonly a 2-day run.  If it dies in Moab, I'd be way more tweaked... its about 750 miles away and its a week long of wheeling... so, some more wrenching was in order.

I'm not going to get into all the time spent on what was supposed to be 3-days max and became a week, but here's some of the highlights of things I found wrong under the Jeep.

There was a lot of work done to this Jeepster in the past.... but most of it is crap, and was crap when it was inflicted on this Jeep.  Maybe the DSPOs meant well, but there were crap welds holding leaf springs on, bondo where bondo didn't need to be, and just weird crap not meant to add to the Jeeps's longevity.

Here are some of the problems I found waiting for me under my new-to-me Jeep.

Here we have a rotted floor thanks to a cowl vent tube delete and a missing antenna.  Every time it rained for at least 5 years, more likely at least 7, the water all accumulated on the floor and in the carpet of the Jeep.  Missy told me she felt like something was moving under her *** and it turns out it was the floor!!!

Like many Jeeps, the Jeepster had drain plugs when it left the factory... but some rocket scientist glued (!) vinyl patches down over the holes.  So, once the water got in through the cowl vent and antenna hole, there was no where for it to go.  All my rustbelt buds know water will always find a way out, and this Jeep was no exception.

Not only were the shocks leaking horribly thanks to the rust they got from being near the beach, the rear ones were bent, courtesy of the leaf springs.  One of them was actually leaking from the bend in the shock body.

This is a close up of the wonderful weld job someone who failed the NASA entrance exam thought was good.  Why this rear leaf spring perch was off the frame in the first place is a mystery, but at least the crappy weld-job had it relocated an inch too far forward and an inch too high on the frame.  So not only was the rear axle not square in the frame, but the passenger side sat low as well.  Oh, and did I mention that weld!?!?!?!?  I'm just happy it stayed on the frame through TDS.

Another wonderful legacy was the rear crossmember... I thought I'd torn it off trying to pull out a guy in a truck sunk in the sand.  But, after looking at the rust pattern, it wasn't attached that well to begin with.  So, I cut it the rest of the way out, and replaced the 1/8-inch c-channel with some 3/16 square tube.  Oh, and pulled the frame in an inch to get it back to factory specs too.

About 4 or 5 days in I found this, and oh what the memories it brought back.  I've not had a CJ that hadn't had a worn clutch pin in the linkage somewhere... finally something to fix that was just time-related and not some PO hand me down.

Picture a "U" in your head.... now hit the bottom of the "U" until it looks like a "W"... see how the sides spread out, and the middle of the bottom collapses?  Yeah, the same thing happens to the rear body mounts on a Jeepster... that is, the metal that is welded to the actual body.  Well, it was collapsed, and tore off parts of the body... so welding in new ones wasn't happening... some 1/8 tube later and the rear of the Jeep was actually attached to the frame again.