has anyone seen the smittybilt tailgate in person? is it good quality?

 

No experience with it, but just gave it a look. The stock JK sheet metal is ~20-22 gauge, I can only assume the tailgate is the same thickness. The Smittybilt tail gate claims to be 14 gauge. Not a huge improvement, and a heavy 35 or 37 will still be too much (especially if you run beadlocks).

Besides the looks, which I won't even get into, the way the tailgate mounts to the hinge looks questionable; It doesn't really span too much of the tailgate, and looks like the tailgate has a lot of leverage on the mounting points.

For $550 there are plenty of better options that have been tested and proven. Give the Teraflex hinge a look here. Crawler Conceptz makes a good one too. Some people have gone with the Rugged Ridge version of the Teraflex design and had good results, however the pricing is so similar I'd go with the Teraflex if I were you.

After years of knocking on the Teraflex design and calling it crap, EVO sucked up their pride made their version of it which not only looks uglier...but is pricer (surprise surprise!)

 

Which tailgate are you referring to? I have a Springtail solutions tailgate piece as well as a MorRyde tire carrier....frequently referred to as a tailgate of sorts. The MorRyde will take the weight and is greaseable if you're into keeping up on the maintenance.

In addition to the other tire carriers above, Metalcloak also makes one that is designed similarly to the ones above.

 

I had the smittybuilt Rear tirecarrier and bumper and it was of very poor quality on the power coat. It flaked and rusted within 2 years. The handle that locks the swing gate into place was very poor design also. It's not terrible but I spent the few extra $$ on an LOD linked rear instead.

I will say that smittybuilt did acknowledge this issue and gave me a slight refund on it. Great customer service there.

 

I always lol when people complain about powder coat. It's not a permanent finish, and you should expect to re-finish it after 2 years. That's why I bought all my parts in bare steel...

Smittybilt is generally trash though, I agree.

 

Those are for the hinges. I actually have a tire carrier but im in need of a tailgate and with the price of a new one that would have to be primed and painted the smittybilt looked like a better option.

 

https://www.quadratec.com/p/smittybi...ep-wrangler-jk

 

Car-part.com is going to be your best bet. You can filter by condition, price, color, etc.

 

Get the Teraflex and be done with it.

 

If done correctly it should last more than 2 years in So Cal conditions. They even said it was a problem in the factory and they were getting many complaints. I've had the LOD one now for over 6 years and no rust. Conditions and Jeep location all the same.