As much as I love my 2011 JK, being vertically challenged (aka shortish) hopping in and out of it wasn't easy. Plus the van was on it's last legs so I figured I might look around for a 4 door (and face teasing from a buddy who says 'real Jeeps' are 2 doors). I came across this AS IS 2013 at a dealer in the area just as everything got locked down for Covid. I think though that worked out to my advantage as they listed it way below the going rate for others of that vintage, about $10,000 to be exact. It did have high milage but then so did my 2011 and the milage doesn't worry me as much as rust. So I put down a deposit and snuck out to the dealer on a sunday when they were closed to look at it on the lot. I actually wasn't able to test drive it for almost 2 weeks because we were completely locked down at that point.

This is really a pretty basic 'build' and more of a what I look at when buying a used Jeep/vehicle. Up here in Canada we use brine solution on the roads and it creeps into a lot of hard to find spots and then starts the rusting process because it sticks. So for me looking at used Jeeps is really looking at the common rust spots. You know, on CJ's, and TJ's the fenders for example as they all tend to rust out. Also floor pans and frames. The JK and JKU are nice in that they use plastic fenders so that reduces one rust prone area although hinges (door and hood) as well as windshields are still rust prone areas.

Today our cell phones have great cameras so that can be really useful when you want to study the frame for rust and other problems so I shot quite a few photos to get an idea of how it looked. I also got the dealer to pop the hood and take a shot of the engine bay. (I know I could have done it but they had security on the lot so didn't want to push my luck). This Jeep had not been detailed which can be a good thing as it's easier to spot things such as fluid leaks.




The undercarriage had rust, which is par for the course for up here as we put a lot of brine solution on the roads here in the winter. Jeep will go in before the winter and get Crown sprayed. The shocks looked marginal so I put that in the list of likely replacement parts.




Yup the shocks were shot, one look at a tire confirmed this as it was cupped. So I ordered in some Bilstein replacement shocks. I decided being vertically challenged to stick with the stock ride height on this Jeep so I just ordered in stock replacements. I can tell you that the advertising hype that Bilstein prints is fairly true. The ride is quite good and I've had the Jeep on ATV trails up north and it soaks the bumps up quite well. Jeep is still due for it's Crown spray....





This Jeep came with BFG KO2 tires which was something I had planned on installing on any used Jeep I found. At first my plan was to keep the tires but I did notice that one tire was badly cupped so decided not to use them as I had a brand new set of General Grabbers that the dealer had installed just before I picked up the used JK in the other build. This also looked like it was the result of a shock that was bad (looked like it was leaking) so I put shocks on my parts list. Oddly the springs looked brand new. Otherwise the underside was pretty much normal for a used Jeep up here that had been driven but not abused in the winter.

One thing I did notice was the hinges were badly corroded as were the hood hinges. I have picked up new bushings for the door hinges and am in the process of deciding which hinges to swap in on the doors. At this point I plan on this Jeep to be my daily winter driver so I plan on waiting until the spring to replace the hinges as I'm leaning toward stainless steel hinges to match the hood. This is a known problem caused by the aluminum used in the hinge and steel pin that the door pivots on.



While we are on the topic of corrosion, something you might not discover until it fails is the vacuum pump located under the plastic cover on the bumper. Mine was disintegrating from years of exposure to salt. It was actually still spinning up however the top cover was actually cracked and the inside was full of dried brine solution. When we took it all apart all the hoses were plugged with brine so the pump was actually not doing anything. Oddly the Jeep was not throwing codes and the brakes seemed to be ok, however when I replaced the pump I noticed that on hard braking (which I try to avoid) the pedal had a much firmer feel. My 11 JK does not have the pump mounted there, and the 12 and up Jeeps can use a relocation kit to move the part to a better spot up higher. Reason for it being way out there is that it makes a whining noise when running and the first time I heard it I wondered if my alternator bearings were going bad.



I decided to order up a second pair of BPS Lighting H13 LED bulbs to install in my factory headlamps. They are $49 Canadian and work well. Maybe not as well as the high buck complete replacements but so far I've been happy with the results driving country roads. Of note you need to orient the bulbs to get the proper beam patterns on low and high. The other good part with these bulbs is they work with your daytime running light setting.



While I was at it I decided to replace the front bumper with a Smittybilt Carbine front bumper. I chose this style over the XRC on the JK because I wasn't planning on installing a winch and this had provision for a front license plate. On the XRC I found a flip up plate holder that bolted to the fairlead. But as mentioned on this Jeep I wasn't thinking about installing a winch. But I do have the option of installing one later. I just didn't install the fairlead plate at the moment.

Instead I installed a vintage set of Hella Ralley 2000 driving lights that I had had in inventory since the mid 90's. These bolted right up to the holes already drilled into the bumper so installation couldn't be easier. All I had to do was run the wiring, I opted to run the wiring through some cable armour as it would not rub against the holes in the bumper I was feeding it through. Up here I bought a roll cheap at Princess Auto.

The stock fog lights will mount to this bumper but you will need to split the insulation off the wiring harness in order to stretch out the wires so they reach out to the new mounting locations.



After installing the Hella's I discovered a couple of things, the bumper doesn't have a decent ground so I had to run a ground wire to the frame which was no big deal and that the stock halogen H1 bulbs looked too yellow compared to the rest of the LED lighting. So on to a fresh adventure, I sourced out a pair of LED H1 bulbs that were inexpensive and ordered them in.

They work, however they required a modification to the Hella housings. The problem was that the bulbs have a round collar that won't fit through the hole in the bulb socket on the Hellas. So I had two options, I didn't really want to cut up the Hellas so I decided to try and grind down the collars on the bulbs. Well that didn't work but it was a cheap bulb so no big deal. Instead I wound up using my Dremel to open up the collar in the Hellas so the bulbs would slide in. That worked. One thing to note about these bulbs, they are long and on the pair of Hella 500's I have on the CJ they will not fit. Well that and the fact I would have to grind out the housings.....




Success! I now have lighting colour temperatures that match. Yeah I'm a bit funny about this kind of thing. But something else to know, because these LED replacement lamps are so long they basically render the reflectors of the Hella housing useless. This means that I basically just have a beam pattern that shoots off to the sides but is not directed forwards.




Since then I found some shorter H1 LED bulbs and have ordered them in. I'm still waiting on them to arrive. The problem I may run into with these is that they protrude to far out on the back and will hit the back of the housing so that I can't screw the lights back together. Will update when I find out. But they might solve the beam pattern issue....



End of part 1

 

Part 2

While we are on the topic of LED bulbs, I also decided to upgrade the interior lights to LEDs. Now on the 2013 there are also reading lights built into the mirror that I don't think can be replaced. But more on this later.

So I changed out the front bulbs and they work fine. I looked around for a replacement for the rear bulb and that is a lot harder to find. I eventually found something that was supposed to fit. It didn't at least without a lot of modification. But I eventually got it installed and working. Great!

Well that night I stroll out and notice the mirror reading lights are on. Hmm ok I must have left them turned on when I was doing the interior bulbs. So I try turning them off, nope no luck they are stuck on! WTH, this is weird. Key on, key off, doors open, doors closed, motor on, motor off, even plugged in the JScan to see if there is a setting I overlooked. Nope they are still on!

Then I remembered something I read about cheap LED bulbs, they are lower in capacitance or was it resistance then incandescent bulbs and this can cause problems. Yup removed the rear LED and the mirror reading lights go out! FYI, they are actually located on the bottom of the mirror along with their respective switches. So for now my interior lighting upgrade is on hold for the rear.





Only other interior upgrades is the radio installation. I basically am mirroring the installation that I did in my JK. Ordered in another Jeepuniq handheld and mic grab bar mount and another Rugged Ridge dash tray GPS mount. I may at some point make another attempt at installing the Mopar GPS radio though for now I'm happy with the setup the way it is. Another thrift store Garmin LMT GPS with hands free although on this Jeep there is a lot more interior wind noise so the hands free does not work well. I do have other devices I may install or get that RHB radio working. For now though I'm ok with what is in it.

The Jeepuniq mount is angled a bit differently vs the one I bought for my JK. Not sure why but this mount is angled more flat vs the previous which was angled more towards the driver. It works fine just wonder why. I also installed a Midland CB radio, of note, these radios do not have a Mic mount stud on the back but I happened to have some surplus Body Glove cell phone belt clip parts and one piece of this was as stud that mated to their belt clip and dash clip. Works ok for the radio. I put a UHF rubber duckie antenna on the Midland to cover the open antenna connector which is disconnected when the radio is attached to the in car base. The base is handy as it has a cigarette lighter plug as well as a socket for a standard PL259 antenna connector allowing you to hook it up to an external CB antenna. At some point I might upgrade to a Quad band system but for now what is in there is ok.



I don't recommend these tire mount CB antenna mounts because the antennas tend to touch the tires. Also if you do not open the tailgate fully you will smack the tailgate glass on the antenna when you open the window up! Because this Jeep has the MORryde hinge kit I will be making a proper mount that will move the antenna off to the side like my JK.




This Jeep has the base radio with the Alpine premium sound system. There are many comments about the quality of the sound being not great with this system and I would have to agree. Compared to the Infinity system in my JK this one just isn't as good. Lacks the crisp highs and volume of the Infinity system. Perhaps just swapping out the speakers to the Infinities would help not sure whether they used the same amp which might also be part of the puzzle.



At some point I'm going to upgrade the wheels and tires, I had debated going with Gladiator Rubicon take offs and still might as I like the look of the stock Rubicon wheels but they aren't dished enough for my old school taste.... I do think I will go to a 285/70 17 tire to go with 17" wheels. It's interesting that the 315's and 2" lift don't make the JK look that much taller than the stock JKU with 265s. For now the take offs from my JK work fine, the General Grabber tires are quiet on the highway, have good grip in the wet, and even work ok off road plus they are supposed to be good as winter tires so we will see shortly. And the price was right and the tires were brand new and just collecting dust in the shed.

 

New H1 bulbs came in and they work a lot better. Now the reflectors actually work with the bulbs, first pair of H1's were a lot longer than the stock halogen bulbs and as a result they only shot light out the sides but did not take advantage of the reflector which focused light forward.