P.J., the custom Wrangler Rubicon expedition motorhome

[TonyD]

What I've been working on...
I used up my zebrawood scraps...



...and had friends paint the topsides...

I dont even have the words for how great these are. Well done!!!

[Overland Hadley]

I dont even have the words for how great these are. Well done!!!

x2!

[blupaddler]

I would love to surf those scraps any day!!!
I am hoping to attempt shaping my own board this summer.





Mike, curious how you like the Dura Tracs? I have been contemplating them for my SMB.

[mhiscox]

Mike, curious how you like the Dura Tracs? I have been contemplating them for my SMB.

Sadly, it's tough to say how great a specific tire is since you only get to compared different sets every many thousand miles. Still, based on my experience, supported by a lot of research before I got them, I think the Duratracs are tough to beat.

They seem an excellent tread design. Plenty of capacity for a porky truck. Not silent, but far from intrusive. Great in snow, decent in mud and not totally lame at anything. But I think the best thing is that they are perfectly workable on pavement, even wet pavement . . . good even. They go, stop, turn and handle bumps fine. As you drive around, you don't feel like you've had to compromise in routine pavement use, and, face it, that's where more of the miles are going to come from.

The Jeep previously had Goodyear Mud-Terrains and I can tell you that the decision to give away a little bit of ultimate off-road tire ability for something safe and secure in routine use was one of my better decisions.

Short answer is, I think you'd be satisfied, and it might be tough to find anything better for overall use.

[mhiscox]

It's probably worthwhile to let everyone know that all's well with the Jeep and it's acquitting itself even better than hoped. I've been getting it out to assorted campgrounds and it has, fortunately for me, been living up to expectations. As has been my view from the start, having a fully self-contained motorhome in a fifteen-foot long, go-anywhere package is a first-rate idea. But if you've been following along in the truck's build threads, you know there have been a lot of design changes and modifications over the years, and it's only now that I'm getting the chance to verify that most all of what's been done has worked out well.

A couple big elements of the new design, the pull-out upper bed and the underbench locations for fridge and toilet, turned out to have been the right things to do. And all of the systems work well, except that there's no hot water for a while, since the leaky original system is being redone and the new "boiler" (to use the European term) will be a while getting here.

I've also been deploying the Foxwing awning and can say that while it might not be ideally sized for every vehicle, it's outstanding for the XV-JP. Quickly pulled out or stored, it's a heck of a lot of coverage for little effort. It is, however, pretty much just a lucky break that the mounting height worked out right to clear the rear door and windows.

A couple of pictures of the rig with everything deployed . . .

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After all the time and effort that's been put into this truck, it's a very good thing to learn that it's all turned out great. Special thanks to Paul Jensen, James Lombardo, John Bendit and his staff, and especially the people at EarthRoamer who came up with the rather interesting idea that the world needed a tiny all-terrain motorhome.

[Tucson T4R]

Yes, I would say it is worthwhile.

Thanks for the update and keep us posted on your future travels with this awesome back country nest.

[mhiscox]

The truck got a couple nights of use at the Northwest Mogfest last weekend in Sheridan, Oregon. There's lot's of reasons to attend, but one of my favorites is that you get a great place to camp with water, hygiene and food available, and it all costs you hardly any money. Even if the event didn't provide cool trucks, cool activities and cool people, it'd be worth going just for the camping.

Anyway, there's not too much to write about these days as all is going well and the Jeep is proving out to be a fine little motorhome. I took the microwave along for the first time and it worked correctly off the inverter, so each time I go out, I can decide whether it's better to have the microwave or the additional counter space (which will, in turn, depend mostly on how best to cook the food being taken). And I'm quite impressed with the 35-liter Dometic fridge we have. So far, it seems every bit as good as the Engles and ARB I've had. Seems a little quieter, and the temperature readout is nice. In any event, it's not a step down from the others, and I was worried it might be. (It got picked because of its size.)

Oztent might owe me some commission money, as a half-dozen people who came by were completely taken by the Foxwing awning, And I did, in fact, look brilliant when we got a bit of rain (first in a month) and I had the awning out and usable about 90 seconds. If the wind is calm enough that you don't have to worry about guying down the awning, the Foxwing is about as quick to get up as one of the roof rack awnings while having way more coverage. It's one of the things I like best on the truck.

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A while back, someone had a sale on the "awning extensions" for the Foxwing and I bought two. I took one of them with me to Mogfest and put it up Saturday just to see what I had. It worked great, as it just zips to the main awning with a hefty nylon zipper.

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The extension kit also includes two poles and guy ropes so you could add another six feet of width to your already-wide awning rather than using it as a sun/wind break.

It got a little cool Saturday night, so I fired up the petrol furnace. I'm bonding quite well with it now, after disliking it the first few times I used it. It still is ridiculously noisy for the first couple of minutes while it sorts itself out (sounds like a jet spooling up) and it remains intrusive when working at full capacity. But once you get things up to temperature, it's quiet and pleasant at maintaining a temperature. I still think that I'd prefer a thermostatically-controlled catalytic heater running off my propane supply IF there was the perfect place to put it, but there wasn't and I'm now happy with this setup.

Not too much else to report beyond that. All in all, a really trouble-free couple of nights of camping with all systems working as hoped.

[Every Miles A Memory]

You know you have money well spent when you can go camping multiple times and not find anything wrong with your decisions or equipment you chose! Congrats and to many more days of happy camping!

[Tucson T4R]

Hi Mike, What a sweet set up. I don't remember what kind of batteries you put in this puppy. How do they handle the amp draw when running your microwave? My original 200AH AGM bank would drop the voltage from 13.1V down to 11.4 even when fully charged when I ran my microwave off my inverter. It pulls around 118 amps when on full power. I just upgraded to a 200AH LiFePo4 Lithium battery pack and the difference is ridiculous. Running the same 118 amp draw, the new pack only drops from 13.1V to 12.8V and then holds that steady for as long as you want to run the microwave.

Pics here if your interested: http://www.expeditionportal.com/foru...Karavan/page31

Smaller, lighter and mega power...Gotta love technology.

[mhiscox]

Pics here if your interested: http://www.expeditionportal.com/foru...Karavan/page31. Smaller, lighter and mega power...Gotta love technology.

Your thread was, interestingly, the first thing on the Portal I read after getting back from MogFest. I'm very pleased to have someone I trust tell me how well the LiFePO4 units work. Congratulations on the upgrade.

I have a 700 watt microwave and ran it twice for 90 seconds at a time (heating sausage links), so while it was clearly an inappropriately-fast current draw (with the voltage dropping to the high 11s), the overall effect on my two 105 AH Lifeline AGMs wasn't too dreadful. But there's no question that a microwave is a horrible thing for a couple of modest AGMs and I'm glad to hear that you can run it so much better off the new-tech batteries.

Shame about the current cost of those batteries, though. I think my best plan will be to run the microwave irresponsibly, hoping the the LiFePO4's cost will come down a bit while I'm destroying my VRLAs so that I'll have to get the new ones.