Episode 1048 – Avengers Are Back!
Unlike the prior Avengers, this Advenger 4xe is not sold in America. Maybe we have a bad attitude about what Jeeps are
The Advenger is a British tv series from 1961 to 1969 introduced us to Patrick Macnee and Diana Rigg. A spy versus spy, I’d call it a SciFi show! Much later the Avengers returned, but this time part of the MCU. A group of Super Heros that as far as I know weren’t spies or British.
This Jeep gets four-wheel drive and a lifted suspension.
The Avenger 4xe is a tiny 1.2-liter gasoline engine fitted with mild-hybrid technology. It’s a three-cylinder turbo mill that develops 136 horsepower and routes output to the wheels via a six-speed, dual-clutch automatic transmission. Joining the ICE are two electric motors, one at the front and the other at the rear, with each developing 28 hp.
Top speed of 121 mph. At speeds of up to 19 mph, the Avenger 4xe always works in 4×4 mode with a 50:50 split between the two axles. From 19 to 56 mph, it defaults to front-wheel drive, but the rear motor is always ready to intervene should the need arise. Go faster than 56 mph and the rear motor is disengaged to reduce fuel consumption.
If it’s not sold in America, the majority of our audience, why talk about it on the show? Well, sometimes you can see what’s coming to us from overseas.
Replacing Fender Flares
We all love making our Jeeps custom, most of us just buy someone else “custom” work and bolt it to the Jeep. The fender flares that came on my JT are fine, but never very custom. For those people who are trying to make customizations for functionality, why do they change fender flares?
Metal or plastic
Wide vs narrow
Legal ramifications of narrow flares
Rain or mud (with rocks)
Are you customizing your Jeep into an off-road only, or mostly, vehicle?
Must-Have for Your Jeep!
PRP Seats B040-05 Front Seat Covers for Jeep Wrangler JLU, 4 door $433.46
I think we all, or most, have heard of PRP seats, but did you know they make seat covers? We love customizing our Jeeps, but inside the Jeep is overlooked. Looking from the outside the seats are easily seen. If they are nasty-looking seats that’s bad, but you can just change it from factory to custom, and that screams you love your Jeep.
This episode of the Jeep Talk Show is brought to you by Bowerion. Bavarian-born and German-bred line of specialized Jeep and Ram products engineered by ORZ GMBH in the heart of Munich. Bowerion products bring the strength and intelligence and design you expect from German engineering. Products such as Bowerion’s GeoRise 45 suspension, DTX rack and Bond’s wheels that will keep your Jeep or Ram looking great and performing flawlessly for years. Our European customers find us at MeinJeep.de. Now our US customers can buy directly from ORZUSA at Bowerion.com. That’s B-A-W-A-R-I-O-N.com or contact our Carson City Nevada facility at 1-800-815-1525. Hey, real quick, Josh. So I think it was Bill that looked it up. The GMBH, that is the equivalent of LLC in Germany.
Is that right? Yeah. And I think I was very proud of myself because it took me a while to actually read the MeinJeep.de. And then I was really proud of myself because I came up with MeinJeep. But the way you said it, it sounds more German and that bitch it is MeinJeep. Yeah. That’s great.
Well, this episode is also brought to you by G-Tops. In the beginning, the idea of G-Tops was to simply let the light into your Jeep. Many Jeepers take the top off. Freedom Tops make this easy and easy to store. What if you could let the light in every time you drive your Jeep? Rain, snow, sunny, even the dead of night. It doesn’t matter. That’s G-Tops letting you enjoy the view outside simply and easily.
I’m going back to Twilight Zone. There’s a man on my Jeep. You know, where you’re looking at the porthole. Well, there’s something later in the show that I was going to go that direction anyway. So, kind of deep into it. Wow. We’ve been separated for a long time and I’m still reading your mind.
Hi, I’m Tony and welcome to the Jeep Talk Show where we put the fun in off-road fun. This is the only show where you can hear Jeep owners talk about things like men sucking on your top and giant tires and not getting weird looks. So strap in, grab your favorite beverage and get ready to laugh, learn and have a damn good time. On tonight’s episode in our news stories, the Avengers are back. And maybe not the ones you’re thinking about.
Probably not.
This is one of your opportunities to say timely reference, Tony. And our Jeep Gladiator Update to wash or not to wash?
Gosh.
And our must have stuff for your Jeep PRP seat covers. Josh, were you aware of seat covers? You’re going to say yes. I know you are. I wasn’t aware of it. Yeah, except, you know, the PRP, I’m familiar with this like platelet rich therapy that they got going on right now. And so that’s where my mind went with this. I was like, they’re introducing platelet rich therapy in Jeep seats. How is this going to work? No, it’s not PRT. It’s PRP. I’m sorry. You hear about your health issues. That’s too bad. Radio.
Are you ready? It’s time for the Jeep Talk Show with hosts Tony, Josh, Wendy and Chuck.
Hey Jeepers, it’s your old pal Josh, and I’ve got just enough time between jobs to wipe my ass and do the show. And I’m all out of TP. So I hope you’re ready for this one. Man, you’re lying. You don’t wipe your ass. You don’t have time.
Just makes this makes laundry a little more, a little longer. There’s this guy named Daniel Tosh. He’s got a show on on Comedy Central called Tosh. Oh, I was going to say, yeah, Tosh 2.0. Now, I think. Yeah. Yeah. And he did this one skit called the, you know, because there’s the immaculate conception. Well, he tried to do the immaculate shit or the immaculate dump. And so he had one of his interns, you know, drop the deuce and then go the entire day without wiping.
You’ll have to watch the rest for yourself. And you stand up. I mean, this has happened sometimes. And you stand up out of your chair and you think the chair is stuck to you. And it’s just not a comfortable feeling. It’s kind of like when you had that wreck in your ex, Jay, the cushion was stuck to your ass there for a while. Yeah. Yeah. There were definitely a lot of fucker there going on. All right. The The Avenger is a British TV series from 1961 to 1969. And it introduced us to Patrick McNeigh, McNeigh, McNeigh and Diana Rigg. You know, Diana Rigg, I bet you. Don’t you remember her? Yes. Yes. Yes. You know, I’m a big fan of the movie. I bet you. Don’t you remember her? Yes. Yes. Yes. You know, I’m thinking that the Austin Power stuff, I bet you really came from this. Oh, loosely based on. Yes. 100 percent. There’s definitely a little bit of influence there. You can’t you can’t argue that. Yeah. Because it’s a it was a British spy versus spy. I would even say it was sci-fi because they had a lot of gadgets and gizmos. When you remember the old Mission Impossible, the original Mission Impossible series. I mean, same kind of cut from the same cloth. My dad was a big fan of that show. He would watch that one. And back that was back in the days where you didn’t have a lot to pick from. And in fact, you didn’t have a lot of TVs in the house and you had to watch whatever the hell your dad was watching. If you wanted to do something other than a nap or bitch about something.
So much later, the Avengers returned. But this time it was part of the MCU, you know, a group of superheroes that, as far as we know, weren’t spies or British.
So unlike the prior Avengers, this adventure four by E is not sold in America. You can’t get it in America.
Let’s call it. Maybe we have a bad attitude or something. I don’t know. Maybe we complain about what you really are. It’s not our fault, but you can blame us. I mean, I’ll take that. So have you heard anything about the adventure prior? I don’t know how much time you have to even look at Jeep information anymore. You used to do it. What I so what I had heard about this one was correct me if I’m wrong, that this is actually on. This is the cuter you. This is the smallest you that Jeep is possibly offering. I believe this is smaller than the Renegade. If this is the Jeep that I’m thinking of, it’s hard to tell by the picture that we have in the show notes so that you guys can see. They teased this a couple of years ago. She knew that they were going to be doing this, whether or not it was or was not going to be sold in the U.S. I don’t know if that had been established yet, but there was going to be a sub compact addition to Jeep’s lineup. They were going to have something in that market where it’s going to be smaller than the Renegade. It’s going to be a sub compact as if the Renegade wasn’t small enough. And it’s going to apply to that niche.
I think this is that. Why it’s not being sold in the U.S. right now, I think is well, because of the market, frankly, nobody wants to buy electric vehicles. Europe has small streets. Yeah, and make you small as cute as you want. I don’t care if you add four wheel drive. Nobody wants an all electric vehicle. Not selling. And so I think that FCA or Stellantis rather kind of saw the writing on the wall here in the States and they said, yeah, this isn’t going to be a winner there. So let’s try this in Europe. Let’s see how it does. If we if it just gets stellar sales, maybe we’ll go ahead and add it to the U.S. lineup. I don’t think we’re going to see it here. So check this out. Yeah. So check this out. The Jeep gets four wheel drive and a lifted suspension. But, you know, they don’t say what the lift is. I’m guessing about three quarters of an inch. If you’re looking at the picture that we’re looking at, it’s it. It looks like it has a similar stance to like a Renegade track trailhawk. You know, you get exactly a bit of a boost and maybe one size bigger tires. If that you got my get some traction. Yeah, it looks a lot like a Grand Cherokee to me, but you’re right. It probably is really small. Oh, by the way, I don’t know if you’re aware of this or not, but the Renegade was very popular in on the circuses. The clowns really liked it. This looks like a clown car. I was going to say to your grand, your grand Cherokee. If you were to take a grand Cherokee, drop it into dry ice and chop it in half. That’s kind of what you get here. It’s a shrunken down smaller version of a grand.
So probably without half the bells and whistles. So the Avenger four by E. Yes, it’s a four by E. It has a tiny one point two liter gasoline engine fitted with a with a mild hybrid technology. It’s a three cylinder turbo. Who could God this sounds like a great motor, not a motorcycle on a lawnmower that develops one hundred and thirty six horsepower, which isn’t bad. I mean, that’s that’s Jeep four point. Oh, no, it’s bad.
I mean, the last three cylinder car that we had here in the States, I think, was the Geo Metro. And that was one of the cylinders was dead, right? That’s you had to pay extra for that third cylinder. Yeah, I know only sometimes it worked. And I think that thing had like forty six horsepower. So I mean, it was just gutless. I actually owned one of the first wedding I ever DJed. I DJed out of a Geo Metro.
Well, once you get in there, it’s hard to get out. I understand.
Look out all the seats except for the driver’s seat. I’m a gear in the hard enough time, but not the stuff in the XJ. Yeah.
Anyway, the this.
It’s one hundred and thirty six horsepower and routes the output of the wheels via six P’d dual clutch automatic transmission. What dual clutch automatic. OK, whatever. Joining the ice are two electric motors, one at the front of the vehicle and one at the rear, each developing 28 horsepower. Well, you don’t need much to drive a milk crate down the road. I mean, top speed, one hundred and twenty one miles an hour. Yeah, yeah. OK, right. It speeds up to 19 miles an hour. The adventure four by always works in four by four mode with a 50 50 split between the two axles.
Up to 19 miles an hour.
OK. Yeah. From 19 to 56, it defaults to front wheel drive. Oh, yeah, because, you know, front wheel drive is wonderful. But the rear motor is always ready to intervene. Should the need arise faster than 56 miles an hour and the rear motor is disengaged to reduce fuel consumption.
Wait, I thought.
I thought the rear motor is electric. Yeah, it is. I guess it’s a parasitic drag or.
That’s what I’m like. I’m like, wait a minute here.
Where does the fuel consumption come in into an electric engine? Electric motor, especially one that is detached from the rest of the drive train up front and is in the back.
Maybe it ejects it figuring if you’re going 56 miles an hour, we’re going to dump some of some of the weight of the vehicle, improve miles per gallon. You just have to circle back and pick it up. You get all wheel drive up to 19 miles per hour because reasons. Yeah, I guess there’s, you know, too many burnouts. They don’t want you spinning the tires. You get a better acceleration, better launch. It’s actually it’s going to feel like the car is actually quicker than it really is. More traction and rain and snow, too, I’m sure.
I suppose for, you know, because, yeah, you’re not going to be doing a whole lot more than 19 miles per hour when you’re driving in ice or taking off in the rain.
Yeah, I don’t know. It’s I don’t know how they come up with this stuff. But yeah, I just found the whole thing interesting, especially the the 1.2 liter engine.
So the again, it’s not going to be sold in America, which is the majority of our audience. And you might say, why would you even talk about it on the show?
Well, sometimes you can see what’s coming from us from overseas. Think of it as a radar right before Pearl Harbor. So that’s that’s what we’re doing. And like I say, and Jeep was teasing this car at least two years ago, if not, if not more. They they’ve been talking about a subcompact segment for a while now. It’s something that they they’ve never really been in. And so this is this is sort of their entrance into that into that segment, into that market. And again, with with most of this thing being mostly electric, obviously, it has an internal combustion engine, a very, very small one. About the size of a motorcycle engine.
But I could just see that there’s there’s no there’s no need for this car here. There’s there’s no there’s not a lot of people that are looking for this kind of vehicle that don’t already have another half a dozen to choose from from four or five other manufacturers.
It would be like it’d be like putting another hooker out on the corner when there’s 17 of them already there.
You know, you already have plenty of choice. You don’t want any of it.
And so you’re probably just going to keep driving. You know what the question is, though, whenever you go up to a group of hookers.
Who do tell the answer is or not. If you Bob knows what I’m talking about. So, yeah, I don’t know if this is it’s interesting. It’s and the cool thing that I just thought about was you were talking about the Jeep wanting to get into this market. They really have expanded at least their coverage of the market because they have really small electric or hybrid electric vehicles. And then they have like the Wagoneer and the Grand Wagoneer, which are just huge. They’re like Suburbans used to be way back when you take the whole family off a cliff. If you want to. Yeah. So it’s interesting from that standpoint that they’re getting a very wide array of Jeeps. Of course, I’m and I think you are only interested in two and this the primarily off road models. And when I say off road models, I mean the real off road ones, the Wranglers and the gladiators. And but as long as they keep making those, I’m happy with it. And as long as they don’t add IFS to either one of them.
Yeah, unfortunately, I think that that is just going to be a matter of time with the EPA restrictions getting more and more ridiculous every year. I mean, the kind of stuff they’re talking about needing by 2030.
I honestly don’t see how the Wrangler is going to or the Gladiator. I don’t see how any I don’t see how any manufacturer is going to be able to survive if they’re having to do EV vehicles. The technology isn’t there yet. I don’t think it’s going to be there by 2030 either.
Yeah, no, we and we beat that horse dead into the dirt. And we’re going to continue beating that horse because it definitely deserves it.
All right. So I don’t remember if you did this with your ex J or not. Did you ever replace the Fender flares on your ex J or were they the stock ones? So I deleted mine. I’ve got a and then I did the the Fender flare or the Fender cut. So my my Fender flares are gone. My Fenders have been cut. I was at the cut and fold.
I did do the cut and fold in the rear. Yep.
And and all that. So but no, I’ve got a set of fake bushwhackers for but it’s really not bushwhackers. Wow. I didn’t think that was a thing. No, they are and they fit like crap. So they’re not on the Jeep currently.
The front ones. The front ones are okay. The rear is just they the way that it is. The way that is with the door seam and everything and you’ve got part of the Fender that stays on the on the vehicle and then part of the Fender that comes out with the door. It just doesn’t line up. Right. It looks like crap. So that’s what you get for trying to be cheap. So what did you pay for? What was your motivation for the Fender flares? Two words, Tony state patrol.
See here in Oregon and I think Washington has it as well. And of course your state may vary you listening to this. And of course you as well, Tony. But up here we have a rule that is very strictly enforced that says at least 50 percent of the tire must be covered. Oh, that’s nice. I thought it was 100 percent. I think they give you some leeway at least. But I’ve got like less than 25 percent probably with no flares and things being cut and back spacing and all that kind of good stuff. Right. So we all love making our jeeps look custom. And most of us just buy someone else’s custom work and then bolt it to our Jeep.
But the the Fender flares that came on my Jeep JT I was going to say Jeep dog show on my JT are fine. But never I wouldn’t say they were very custom for those people that are trying to make customizations for functionality. Why do they change the Fender flares? And you did Fender flares because of the local laws. Was there a reason why you removed your Fender flares or did this nature take care of that while you were off road?
Part of it was the the arc of the build. Once you get up to a certain size of tires, I don’t care what Jeep you’re driving, you’re going to start having to cut.
At a certain point, Jeeps can only manage a certain diameter of tire without modifying the body, especially without especially if you if you don’t massively bump stop the suspension and reduce your your up travel. Right. I’ve seen, you know, 40 inch tires on on stock fenders, more or less, but they have maybe an inch and a half of up travel and suspension. It’s all about the flags.
I don’t believe in sacrificing suspension travel for for for the sake of fitting a tire, tire cutting or body damage. Right. If you want to run a certain size of tire, well, then you need to do what you need to do to run that tire and without sacrificing the capabilities of your suspension. And that generally, 99 percent of the time means modifying the body of the vehicle. And most aftermarket fender flares sort of have this in mind and they’re going to hide that cut that you’re going to do. You’re going to be doing some bodywork, going to be shaving some metal. That arc may not have the shape that the wheel opening used to have. Your cuts may not be straight. You may have to fold some metal and stuff like that. The fender flares hide all of that. And so not only that, but also gives you a larger opening. And generally, in some cases, they actually provide a little bit of armor as well, especially for you to get into like the metal aspect of size. But generally, those they also come with some quarter panel protection and stuff like that as well. You’re not getting just a fender flare. You’re getting a piece of armor. Well, I’m glad you mentioned that because that’s the one of the questions I want to ask. If we all agree that we do want to change the fender flares on our jeeps, and it could be any model Jeep other than an Avenger or a Renegade, do you get metal or plastic? I’ve heard some detrimental things about getting metal fender flares.
Well, it depends on how you wheel. If you get into very off-camber situations, you’re wheeling around a lot of trees, you’re in deep rocks, things like that. Well, there’s a very strong likelihood that those fenders are going to come in contact with an object that doesn’t move as easy as the metal on your Jeep does. And what happens if you have a big metal fender flare that is more or less bolted to the quarter panel and you bump into something with that fender flare, it very well could transfer that energy into the body as well.
And what you end up with is a bent quarter panel, a pushed inside, something like that. Whereas if you had a plastic, that’s why they call them bushcrackers. If you have a plastic fender flare, like a bushwhacker, for instance, and you bump up against the edge of the trail on that rock or that tree, well, the plastic is going to give before the metal does, and it’s going to crack. It’s going to break. It’s going to do something. And it’s not going to, you know, as much. Right. Less likely or not as much. The dent the fender is if you had a metal one. Now, have you seen these ones where they take that into account for the metal flares and they actually, they don’t initially, they do mount to the fender, but they have a structure that mounts it in further so that it’s up against like using the frame or something that’s more substantial. You get a little bit of a little pogo there, a little stick that kind of goes out and gives you some a little bit of reinforcement and stuff. That’s when you get into again, you get what you pay for. And when you if you’re going to be into some serious wheeling, you know that you’re going to be dragging your body against the side of the trail or a tree or rock or something like that, because those are the trails that you wheel in. Well, you need to make sure that the armor and the accessories that you’re modifying your Jeep with can accommodate the kind of wheeling and the terrain that you find yourself in more. So that’s that’s a really good point. And you in this makes sense. You have to consider how you’re going to use the tool. I mean, that’s really what we’re talking about here because you need the right tool for the right job. And of course, you can do you can look at it in a general way, too, is like, well, what is this flare going to do for me in this situation and in this situation and in this situation? So I personally like the idea of metal flares.
And as long as they have the proper support that you’re not going to be using the the flexible, thin metal that makes up the body of the Jeep.
So let me let’s move on to this next question I have or the next thing I want to talk about, which is wide versus narrow. Now, you’ve already mentioned some legal reasons about wide versus narrow.
So wide makes sense. It gives you more tire coverage.
I think it’s better in rain. I’m sure you’ve experienced the roost the front rooster tails. Oh, yeah. Lots, lots.
Honestly, it’s kind of cool. You kind of come to the stop sign and and and as the the the rotation slows down, the rooster tail kind of dies down a little bit. There’s this point in time where where it looks really cool for for about 50 feet. And then, of course, you come to a stop and the water kind of all drops and everything like that. But so there is a there is a bonus to not having flares, but there’s also a lot of negatives to it. You know, you get a lot of a lot of splash on the body. You get rocks, mud, of course. And that’s the worst, honestly, especially this time of year. You know, the beginning of the season, you know, it’s it’s May. You still have a lot of the April showers that have happened. The trails are probably a little a little moist still. And in some cases, it may be 75 outside, but the trail is still three quarters halfway mud. And so as you’re going through hard and dry spots and soft and wet spots and suddenly the tires load up and you got some mud that’s on your face, on your cheek, on the back of your seat. It’s on the inside of the roost. How the hell did that happen? It sounds like it’s hailing. No, it’s just the rocks that are in the mud. And so, yeah, fender flares, mud flaps, you know, all those kinds of things when done properly, when in the right position and everything, they can protect you from all of that stuff. And of course, the width of the fender flares comes into play with that. Is there is there any offroad negative to having too wide of a fender flare other than not being able to fit down the trail, obviously?
Well, yeah, you could get into a situation where, you know, you’re at full stuff. And that means when when that corner of the suspension cannot go up anymore, the body can’t come down anymore. That wheel is shoved up into the wheel well. Maybe you even have the wheel turned. And when you’re at full stuff and at a turn, you definitely don’t want to be dragging lugs of your tire on your on your on your fender flare. Oh, that is. And so with can come into a situation here, you can come into a negative here if your suspension isn’t set up properly, if you haven’t clearanced your, you know, if you don’t have the right clearance and stuff, then you can start going into self clearance when the tires are just going to rip those fender flares right off for you because they’re in the way. Yeah, self-clearancing. So let me ask you this. We’ve covered the other things I was going to talk about already. So let me ask you this, just your opinion.
Can you customize your Jeep and going along and saying, oh, this is I need this because I was taken off road and this is going to fix this and blah, blah, blah. And sometimes it’s just fun to make the modifications.
So are you customizing your Jeep into an off-road only or mostly off-road vehicle?
I think a lot of people don’t think about this when they get carried away at Amazon or Moto built or Genrite and they’re buying parts. They’re just really excited about getting these parts and thinking about doing the off-road this weekend or EJS. It’s going to be so cool to have this at EJS type thing. And then all of a sudden it’s like, oh, well, I can’t I really can’t take this to go do this, like on road someplace or maybe a legal ramification. Now I’ve got to put mud flaps on there before I can drive it on the road. So is there a danger in doing too much customization and turning your your Jeep into an off-road only rig? Well, you raise an interesting point because that that brings to mind a company called Metalcloak. And Metalcloak is really making a name for themselves over the last five or 10 years in the off-road industry, especially in the Jeep world.
And they have very, very unique fender designs. And these aren’t flares, actually. They pretty much replace your entire fender. And it’s a triangulated style of fender flare, which goes very, very high and is very, very narrow. Now they have, I think, like four, six, eight inch varieties. You can get you can get them fatter in order to accommodate maybe state laws and offsets and backspacing things like that. Or you don’t like rooster tails.
But generally speaking, these are you’re going to find these fender flares on more off-road only rigs generally because of their design and how little they cover the tire. And it’s meant for for the sake of stuffing that wheel, that tire up into that corner as much as you possibly can next to zero bump stop. I mean, maybe just a little bit just to prevent the shock from bottoming out on itself. And that’s it. It’s meant for maximum stuff and maximum articulation. And there’s other manufacturers out there that design their stuff for that purpose. And you may end up inadvertently because you’re buying for looks, you’re buying for performance, end up modifying your Jeep into an illegal status or a non-roadworthy status. And you could end up not passing your next inspection, you’re not being able to get tags. You could end up getting a ticket on the road because, you know, a gung-ho state patrol or a sheriff just doesn’t like the look of your Jeep because, well, you got too much tire sticking out and he’s going to get you a ticket. Yeah. So you got to take all these aspects into account and check with your local laws because honestly, twenty five minutes up the road, just 20 minutes up the road is Washington state for me. And Washington state requires off-road vehicles to have mud flaps. That is not a requirement here in Oregon where I live. Oh, nice. But if I go 25 minutes up the road, suddenly my vehicle is no longer street legal. So just keep that in mind, those of you who live near borders. And you need to. And actually, I’m glad you mentioned that because you need to check these things out before you make these decisions. You don’t want to make a six, $1,200, $1,500 purchase and then it looks really good in your garage. And then you have to spend a 20% restocking fee because you got to send it back. Or be like Chuck and make a desk out of a Jeep for you. Oh, hey, there you go.
I want to use it, damn it. So anyway, take these same same considerations. I doubt that we’ve made it easier for you, but we hopefully we’ve informed you so you can make the right decision for you.
And speaking about Washington and mudflaps and stuff, are you in the area of Oregon that you’re soon going to be in Idaho?
No.
I wish. I wish really though for everything that’s going on. No, because downtown Portland is just a hop, skipping a jump for me. So I’m in the thick of it all. So no, no, I knew you weren’t, but I figured you’d love that.
Oregon Tony.
With standard OE low fenders and can clear an outstanding 39 inch tall tire when the Baguarian extenders or Mopar high fenders are installed. Get your Gio rise 45 at Baguarian.com or at 800-815-1525 right away. Baguarian premium performance parts.
It’s funny. I was talking to Bill voiceover guy for them. I need his processing. Right. So I made a voice. I made the comment to Bill last episode about last flagship and I said, isn’t that a great voice? He goes, it sounds like AI to me.
It’s like it’s not real. He’s down. He’s he’s lower Sam Elliott register down there. I can’t even get that low. It is all kinds of gravel down there. I can only sound like that when I have a head cold. Yeah.
Great base. Yeah. Speaking about sounding, you’re going to scream whenever you get a G top with a not with horror, but with the with cheer and happiness and glee. Thank you. G tops is a patented system that has been around since 2008. It’s not a sheet of plastic that stretches across the width of your Jeep. You know who I’m talking about. It’s a Freedom top plus it’s OEM plus G tops blocks 99% of the UVA and UVB rays made of impact resistant acrylic like aircraft canopies. G tops comes with a snap in sunshade that will stay in place even with the most aggressive off-roading. Somebody’s going to say, hold my beer. That’s fine. Challenge accepted. Just give me to send the do it video and send it to us. So G tops comes with a five year or 50,000 mile limited warranty. How much does it cost to have G tops installed in your factory? Freedom panels is about $1,200 and it’s available for JK’s JL’s and JT’s. Let’s go to G tops.com today for more information. Oh, and Josh, great news. You, not you, the female Jeep, you can win a set of G tops for your Jeep exclusively here on the Jeep talk show. Listen to the end of this episode for more details on the G top giveaway. You know, I did that the last, the last flagship we did, and I forgot I didn’t talk about how to win the G tops at the end of that flagship. So we’ll have to make sure we do it this time.
Gladiator. My name is gladiator.
Gladiator’s. Are you not entertained?
Are you not entertained?
Is this not why you’re here?
Gladiator. Oh, it stopped too soon. So, uh, to wash or not to wash. How dare you. Larry’s going, you son of a bitch.
Last time I checked, there’s no R in the spelling of wash. Yeah. I like it. He doesn’t say wash too much, but he says washer. So he’s consistent though. So, uh, love you, Larry. But anyway, for your, for your Jeep, do you wash it or not? That’s a, that’s kind of a question because you can kind of lose a jeeper points if you wash your vehicle, especially if you wash it too often. Yeah, I don’t know. It really depends on the Jeep. Um, you know, I think the newer that your Jeep is, the more likely that you’re probably going to wash it more often. The older your Jeep is, the less roadworthy or legal it is. Chances are the less likely washing your Jeep more often. So I think that that kind of comes with the territory of, of the Jeep that you drive. So this is probably going to set the women off. But so you’re saying, you’re saying like, if you’re in a long-term relationship, you’re less likely to pay attention to it.
Well, I’ve, I’ve had, I’ve had my Jeep for God, it’s been, uh, 15, 17 years, something like that. Um, now I understand over the last eight years, the Jeep has sat more than it’s driven, but even when I was, um,
when I was wheeling it and driving it all the time, I would go a year without washing it. I was probably the last, the last few years, the Jeep was on the road, um, on a regular basis. I was probably about a once a year wash, maybe twice.
And generally it’s, and honestly, it probably wouldn’t even be that much, but we’ve got this Oregon and clay described in the past as snotty peanut butter and it will stain paint.
So if you’ve got clay in your neck of the woods, you might be a jeeper who might opt to wash their Jeep a little bit more often just for the sake of the stains in the paint. Right. Right. Um, which may vary. So, uh, it’s, it was time for the 2021 Jeep talks. You’re glad eater to, uh, have its inspection sticker updated. Actually April, uh, was, uh, what it was do. And, um, uh, my, uh, my oldest daughter, actually both daughters, uh, work in a Mercedes Mercedes dealership nearby and they have a huge, huge, absolutely huge shop and they do state inspections there. So, uh, all I have to do is ask her if she doesn’t mind, uh, taking the gladiator to work and get it inspected and then driving home. So it’s, it’s, it’s great. And also to, uh, they’re top notch. I mean, the, the technician stuff over there. They’re top notch and, uh, uh, regular beatings, make sure that they, they pay close attention to things. Oh, sure. Yeah. So anyway, I, uh, uh, she, uh, I was, it didn’t happen around the end of April because she says they get really busy, as you can well imagine, uh, with inspections, uh, during towards the end of the month. So, so I forgot about it. And, uh, except my wife was driving the, the gladiator, uh, yesterday and I went, oh my God, if she looks at the sticker, she’s going to freak out. She hates driving, drive any vehicle with the inspection sticker out. I’ve gone a year and a half before a cop gave me a ticket on the, on the XJ. He literally walked into my garage and was so he could look at the sticker because I don’t think he could believe what he saw. Really? Yeah.
Yeah. But he just, was he doing a patrol in the neighborhood and saw your Jeep in the driveway and it was just like, no, no, he was in there. He was around someplace and I drove by him and he, I guess he spun around and came up and then parked out in front of the driveway. You were in the garage. I was in the garage and he literally had to walk in the garage and he was just like dumbfounded looking at it because I had to double check. So I probably got it probably could have got him for a warrantless service. Oh yeah.
But you mean the, you know, y’all used to do is get an inspection sticker and then it goes away. Fix it ticket is what we call them up here. Exactly. So, but I found that I thought it was really funny because I never had a, had a police officer in my house before our garage. We don’t have inspections up here like that. And so I’m completely unfamiliar with that whole aspect of it. So do they, if you, if you, if you’re a police officer, you know, you’re a police officer. So I think that’s just a good aspect of it. So do they, if you can, they tow your vehicle, if you don’t have a current inspection or something like that, I mean, how far does it go? They, they probably could, but that’s not anything that they don’t even pay attention to it much around here. We also have a front license plate law and they don’t really pay attention to that either. We got those here too.
2025 the inspections are going away. We will no longer have to have inspections.
– I don’t know, we’ll see. I know that the businesses that do the inspections, I think they’re like 25 bucks. And they’re not making a living. – Revenue stream, yeah, they’re gonna be losing on now. – Yeah, but it’s not much. I mean, I guess it depends on what all you do at your shop. But anyway, so she took it, actually she arranged with my wife coming home to say, “Hey, can you meet me? Can you bring the gladiator by here?” Because it’s on the way home. She was over at her mom’s house yesterday. And so she goes,
when Cassie tells her that the inspection sticker is out, then that’s when she looks and notices that it’s been out since April.
And literally gasps.
And I was trying to keep it down on the down low. Because I like telling her when it’s taken care of, instead of you’re driving it, you’re potentially a target right now. And she knows I go a long time without it. And the way she tells me is, “Yeah, you’re white, but they’ll pull me over because I’m Mexican.” Yeah, I know.
But irrational fears are irrational fears.
So anyway, she takes it over there to Mercedes dealership and drives my daughter’s new vehicle home. And Cassie gets it all taken care of and stuff. But they literally, and I don’t know, maybe a lot of new vehicle manufacturers do this. They literally take a video of the technician that is going to be inspecting your vehicle. They do a walk around because they’re checking tread depth, the brake, if your brakes need to be replaced, all kinds of stuff. – Well, it’s probably a little bit of CYA. Because if a week after that, you get in an accident and the brakes were determined that they had failed or something like that, it’s probably gonna come back on the inspector or something. I would imagine it’s a bit of a liability issue. – Right, but I mean, they literally do a video where the technician is talking about the video where they’re showing your vehicle.
And I told, and Cassie got the link for that and showed it to me. And I said, “What’s the deal? “You work there. “Couldn’t there have been any, “couldn’t you have told him to do something like?” Because you see the big sticker on the side of the gladiator. It’d be like, “I’m inspecting the cheap talk show gladiator. “Am I not?” And now I’m a new listener. Something is to spice it up a little bit. – Get me the video. I’ll do a voiceover. Don’t you worry. – I have the video. I actually put it up on our Discord server earlier today. But anyway, once they did, I mean, the video’s not that big a deal. After Cassie got home, I went out to make sure there were certain items put back in a certain way so that if I needed to grab them and point them at somebody, I could do so very quickly.
And I went ahead and moved the Jeep up a little bit because she was parked a little too far down the driveway. And I was getting out, closing the door.
And I noticed this glare coming off of the Jeep, specifically the tire.
They armoureled the tires. – Did they detail the truck? – They did.
Not only did they armoureled the tires, which I’m sure they cleaned them up because I had rock rash on it for them. – That means they washed the body too. – They washed the body. I mean, when I told- – Washed the windows, they vacuumed it out of here. – They cleaned the inside. So two years of Easter Jeep Safari dust have been removed. (laughing) – The guy’s in there back giving for a half hour. God, it just keeps coming out of the carpet. – I started to ask Cassie if they saved the fries, but I love the zombie fries. They just have a special taste to them. But anyway, this was just really cool. I was really surprised by this. And I don’t, oh, and by the way, it wasn’t a, because they have an actual car wash at the dealership.
I guess it’s for the customers they can drive them through and also too for the loan cars that they give to people. But this was hand washed. They hand, yeah, I said, that’s good because, you know, you don’t put a customized vehicle through one of those car washes. – No, not with that kind of wrap. – They were hand washed. And then she told me that they vacuumed the inside. I didn’t even notice that. But they went through all the inside. They armored all the tires. – I’m like, “Is Steve squirming down the driveway? Who the hell cleaned my Jeep?” – And that’s the question, to wash or not to wash? I mean, I didn’t wash it. I had, you know, I have that best top and you always have to pronounce this for me, toner cover.
– Tonno. – Tonno, the tonneau cover for the back bed in that Utah dust was really embedded in that. So I was planning on running the sponge and the water over the Jeep and really mainly to get all that dust out of the top of the bed cover. Because sometimes that stuff will get in there and stay if you don’t get it out of there. So don’t have to, it’s all taken care of. It’s all nice and shiny. – And like a new Jeep then, like it rolled off the showroom floor. – Yeah, I didn’t notice any kind of smell. I wonder what kind of smell, spearmint.
There’s all kinds of little, you know, did you ever work at a car wash type thing or go to a car wash just a bunch? Where you put the, they buy the spray for $2. – Right, right. – Do you want it sprayed in there? – Where? – Spray the Jeep and then spray it in front of me. I want to walk through it for my dates.
(both laughing) – You smell just like a new car. – I’ve got that new car smell.
So yeah, so that’s kind of the way I’ve been doing it. I hadn’t been washing the Gladiator very often. I do it occasionally. And I’ve kind of learned not to wash it. Like when I was this last EJS run, I purposely didn’t wash it. I didn’t want to get out there and be all shiny and stuff. And I mentioned this on the show before. So I had a bunch of ducks. I’ve been collecting ducks from people ducking the Gladiator at various events. And we were coming up on Moab and I told my wife, I said, “Do you have something you can put these ducks in? “Because I want to clear them off the dash. “I don’t want to be judged.” – Right.
(both laughing) – Because you do, you get judged. You get judged about what you’re driving, which Jeep you have. You get judged about whether you’re washing it or not. And it’s not the positive. You think that if you wash your Jeep, that’s a positive. No, that’s a negative. Real Jeepers don’t wash their Jeeps. And real Jeepers don’t have ducks on their dash. I don’t mind the ducks. I think the ducks are fun. And they stay there whenever I’m going off-road. So what do I care? But I took them off because I didn’t want to be judged. – I’m kind of glad that you brought up the ducks because I’ve got to climb up on a soap box for just 20, 30 seconds. – No, no, climb up on a little rubber duck. – There’s something happening here in the Pacific Northwest. And I’ve told you people before that I’m surrounded by nothing but Birkenstocks and blue hair.
And so I live in an area, thankfully, that has a lot of Jeep owners. I mean a lot from all eras. But that also comes a plethora of Subaru drivers. We probably have more Subarus out here per capita than any other town in the nation. And I would almost put that up for a bet.
Now, that being said, Subaru owners out here kind of go a little bit extreme. There’s a lot of lifted Subarus out here. There’s a lot of Subarus, mud terrain tires. There’s zombie Subarus where it looks like, okay, there, Captain Overland, you are prepared for everything. I see it. I get it in your Subaru with the exhaust snorkel. – Wow. – Awesome. – So yeah, and along with that, over the last couple of few months, I’ve been seeing Subarus with ducks.
A whole bunch of ducks on the dashboard just like the Jeepers because the Subarus, they wanna be Jeepers so effing bad, but they just can’t. And so somebody out there is starting to duck Subarus and they need to be shot, okay? Take them out back, beat them with a rubber hose, teach them a lesson, blow the kneecap off. I don’t care what it takes, it has to stop, okay? I wasn’t a big fan of the ducking thing to begin with. You know, it was all about our toe tags and our rats with bad attitudes and shit like that.
This whole duck thing has gone to another level. And I’m finding if you’re all about the ducks, that’s cool, each their own. But now that it’s entered into the world of Subarus,
I’m sorry. – It cheapens it. Bridge too far.
(laughing) – Now the Subarus start doing it, it cheapens it. So it’s been a while now, maybe two or three months ago. We did a story, and I think I’ve told you about this, we did a story about Subarus and they’re actually doing their own thing that isn’t ducks. You know what I’m talking about? – No, I actually don’t because they’re not doing it up here apparently. – Well, maybe you need to look around, maybe you’re assuming it’s ducks because there’s this thing that’s going on that’s called Moo Moo Subaru.
It’s little plastic cows
that they’re cowing the Subarus. So Moo Moo Subaru. – I’m pretty sure these were ducks. – You’re probably right. – It was across the intersection, so. – Yeah, so now that you know this and in our list. – Okay, I put an asterisk next to everything I just said. I may be entirely off base and have identified a duck as a cow, but up here in Portland where everybody identifies everything is everything else, then it’s probably par for the court. – Well, we’ve all been to a bar at 2 a.m. So it’s understandable.
So the thing that you have to keep in mind is, I would think this is true. – You keep duck-caving Adam’s apple.
(laughing) – He wants me to blow his horn. So the thing is that I would expect in Oregon, especially with these overzealous Subaru, Birkenstock people, that a lot of them are vegetarians. – Oh yeah. – And I wouldn’t think a cow would go very well on one of these Subarus. – Well, vegetarians and cows, they’re kind of the same thing. They eat a bunch of plants and fart all day long. I mean, they’re one of the same, so I get it. (laughing) Anyway, do you to wash or not to wash? Yeah, I love the rabbit trails that we go down.
– From the mind of Nicky G.
– Hey, this is Nicky G and Tony talked about your G-tops and your G-top giveaway.
And I think they’re great.
But I’m kind of sad that they’re only for the newer jails, maybe even JKs and the gladiators.
Once again, us XJ people are left out in the cold.
So I developed my own company called C-tops. Yeah, for $4.99 or a 10% off Burger King coupon,
I will come to your house, with a sawzall and cut a hole in the top of your Jeep so you too can enjoy the sunlight.
And I know what you’re saying, Nicky G.
What do I do when it rains? Let’s all the water in. Don’t worry, all the water that enters through the hole in the roof will quickly exit through the rust hole in the floor block. – Absolutely. – Problem solved. Well, that’s not why I’m calling them. Calling to tell you that the blue whale is so large that if you laid it end to end in a basketball court, it’ll probably cancel the game.
All right, boys and girls, I’ll chat you later and have a good one, bye.
(upbeat music) – You’re mine and I will call you Squishy.
So that’s a very interesting idea there, Nicky G.
– Have sawzall will modify. – Have you subscribed to the DVD, audio only DVD that we’re sending out to people that do not get enough Nicky G.? 47 hours of Nicky G. call-ins. – On one DVD. – On one DVD. DVD. – Good Lord. Somebody needs to record themselves watching that.
Do like a Facebook Live pay-per-view type thing or something like that. I don’t know. – So you actually, you are one of the rare individuals with an XJ that has a clear top. Not the whole top, but you have, was it the sunroof or moon roof? – I have a sunroof, whatever. It has the glass that you can see through. And the thing that slides, it closes it and all that. – So is that something that you really liked having on your XJ? Did it give you a different dimension? – I was actually having this conversation with somebody just a couple of few days ago. And I was telling them, if it wasn’t for that one feature, I probably would have gotten rid of this 99 and got another 97 to 2001 XJ and just moved everything over. But the fact that that sunroof is there, it’s in excellent condition, that I had to make my own relay and switch pack for it to get it functioning again. I got a little sentimental value into it and stuff like that. You cannot find another Cherokee, a 97 to 01 with a functioning sunroof in it right now, especially here in Oregon.
I think there was maybe less than 500 of these things made. I know it wasn’t a factory option for all of you XJ guys out there who were screaming, it never came from the factory with a sunroof. No, I know, I know. But nonetheless, I have never seen in Oregon another XJ with a sunroof. And I’ve been to a lot of Jeep shows, hit the trails a lot, seen a lot of other Cherokees, was president of North American XJ associations, Northwest chapter for a number for a while.
I’ve seen them all. There aren’t any other XJs out there with sunroofs. Now you may have one sitting in the garage somewhere, you know, it’s like, you know your buddy, he’s got one, but maybe it’s the pop out panel kind or something like that. Now, see the side of that coin is there’s not too many that have a functioning sliding sunroof where the sunroof slides back. – Okay, so this doesn’t pop open. It literally slides back like a glass door. – It does two things. It vents in the back or it drops down and slides open, just like a regular moon roof would on every other car ever made. – See, that’s really cool. And the reason why I was asking about this is, is because I was wondering how that changed things for you in the enjoyment of your Jeep, you off road or on road, because now you get to see up and out of your Jeep, which you, the XJ, you can’t take the top off. – No, you do have a little bit of an aspect of the open air, the open airness that you get with like a Wrangler. It’s a close second. I understand. – It’s not the same, but it’s there. – But there’s nothing you have to take on or put off or any of that stuff. It’s not open air, but you get to enjoy it every time you drive the XJ. – Now I will say this, because of the design, it moves into the Cherokee. Sunroof doesn’t open up and go over the top of the Cherokee. It actually moves into the roof. – Right. – So with that, the entire headliner and everything is dropped down about two and a half, three inches. – Oh, I didn’t know this. – I’m six foot three. – Oh God, there’s not much headroom in a Cherokee to start with. – There’s not a lot of room in a Cherokee as it is. So that is the only downside that I have is like if I’m wearing a hat
or I’m sitting really proud in the seat, my hair is touching. I don’t have a whole lot of clearance there. So there is that aspect to it. So that’s the only thing that I don’t really like is that I don’t have any headroom in the Jeep. – Very cool. – But again, I’m a big guy. – So you guys can do the same thing Josh has been doing for years just by having G-tops.
– There you go. There you go. Well, something else you guys wanna get in on much like hearing about G-tops and other things. Well, we do interviews here on the Jeep Talk Show every Friday is an interview. That means every week Friday, you’re gonna hear an interview done by Tony, done by somebody else, done by somebody here at the Jeep Talk Show with an industry expert or somebody who’s in the Jeep world in some way or another. Now this Friday’s interview is unique. It’s for any jeeper or a person out there who loves getting out or on the water and doing some fishing, casting out a line and feeling that hit. Oh man, there’s nothing like that. Our next guest is Dave Stewart of the podcast Wet Fly Swing. And if you like fishing, especially fly fishing, then you’re gonna love this interview.
– I’ll tell you a little something that he told me. I think it is in the main part of the podcast, but it may have been us talking before or after. He has had Henry Winkler as a guest on his podcast because Henry Winkler is a big fly fishing, not expert. He loves doing it. – A fishin’ auto. – A fishin’ auto. I don’t know the pronunciation or meaning of that word. (laughing) So I didn’t want to use it. But I thought it was really cool. – Fons himself is a fly fishing man. I’ll be darned, learn something new every day. – Yeah, exactly. So I asked him to find out if Fonsie ever had a Jeep. So we’ll see. I now have a connection to the Fons. So I could always get him on. – Get him on the show, right? – Get some Bobby Boucher inside information.
– Forgot all about him being on that movie. – Yeah. All right, in our must have stuff for your Jeep, PRP seats. This is a front seat covers for the Jeep Rungar JLU four-door. It is $433.46. Does that seem high to you for seat covers? – They’re be front and rear. – Nope, these are only fronts. They’re only fronts. But they are PRP seats. And PRP seats are very well known for their full seats. But now you can just get the covers and get that same quality that you would expect from what is actually on the PRP seats. I recently saw this. Do you remember Stacey David from Gears? – Oh yeah. – I think I told you when we interviewed him that I found out that Gears is still on and it’s available on YouTube. So I was watching a Jeep Gladiator build that Stacey David did a couple of months ago. And I thought it was interesting. They went with these PRP seat covers for the build. And the cool thing was, and this is something that makes it really easy for you to do, not only can you upgrade the way your Jeep looks on the inside, and maybe you just wanna upgrade it, make it look different than everybody else’s because we love doing that as Jeepers. But you also can do customizations like what Stacey David did. He actually had the Gears logo embroidered into the seat cover. So that makes it your own. So you may not have a logo. You could always put something else on there. But since they’re covers, if you don’t do embroidery, you could always take it down and give them the image and have it embroidered on there. Stick it on your cover and now you have a customized seat for your Jeep. And they do come in front and backs, but this is only for the fronts.
So you can check out this on our show notes for this episode of the Jeep Talk Show. Just go to JeepTalkShow.com and search for episode 1048 for the Amazon link to these PRP seat covers. And if you get them, I’d like for you to send us a picture. I’m sorry, Josh, go ahead. – So I’ve got some direct experience with PRP seats, in fact. In one of our race cars, we are running PRP seats. And well, it’s a single seater race car. So we’re running a seat from PRP seat in that car. This race car hit a large boulder about the size of a 33 inch spare tire, let’s say. Maybe two of them laying on the ground. – So you needed the seat cover because of the stain in the seat is where I see this is going. – Not the seat cover. It was actually a PRP race seat. So not only does this company make seat covers, but they’ve been making seats for the race industry and side-by-sides, the UTVs and stuff like that for many, many years. So this is a company who knows what they’re doing when it comes to seats. So this PRP seat, racing seat with a five point harness incorporated into it in this UTV race car hit this rock doing around 90 miles an hour. He was airborne for about 120 feet and went end over end and side over side about eight times each.
He was lucky to walk away, Hans device, helmet, whole nine yards. The PRP seat held him in place along with restraints and doesn’t have a scratch on it. Neither did the driver. Had a little bit of a bump, a little bit of a bruise here and there from when his knee hit the side and when the roll cage was mangled a little bit from the wreck.
But the PRP seat held in place and held the driver where he was supposed to be. So I would actually bet my life on PRP seats. So if they know anything about seats and seat technology and they’ve applied even a fraction of that to their covers,
I can kind of understand now why they’re so expensive. – Yeah.
– Still, that’s a steep price for a seat cover, man. – Yeah, everything’s getting more expensive these days. Let’s go Brandon.
– Well, who doesn’t like a good sale and getting some discounts and we all need some price office stuff. I mean, heck, look at those seat covers for that kind of a price. – Hang on just a second. I gave you a great entry into this as far as everything costs more and you didn’t take it. This isn’t the Josh I know, you’re out of practice because I said not everything goes up in price. For example. – For example.
The Jeep Talk Show is actually having a sale right now and you can get 30% off the Patreon subscriptions for a limited time and actually for a limited number. So don’t delay on this one. If you like the Jeep Talk Show, if you’ve enjoyed us, you’ve gotten something out of it, you wanna give back, well consider our Patreon and now is the time. Now couldn’t be a better time because we’re having a 30% off of subscriptions right now. For a limited time and a limited number of subscribers, you can become a subscriber for only $3.50 a month. That is a huge discount. Locking the rate now by paying for an annual subscription. Head over to jeeptalkshow.com slash contact. Hit that link and click and subscribe to the Jeep Talk Show right now. Trust me, you won’t have any buyer’s remorse.
And a big shout out to Travis. Travis, this one’s for you buddy.
– Hey, it’s always a little sad when we hit the end of the trail, but there’s always another trail ride just down the road. Jeep Talk Show has five episodes a week, Monday through Friday. Subscribe and never miss an episode. And speaking of subscribing, and I know you haven’t heard this recently, consider keeping the Jeep Talk Show on the air by subscribing to the show via Patreon. The place to go for all the information on how to subscribe and how to contact us is at jeeptalkshow.com slash contact.
– And yes, we all have an Adam’s apple over here.
(laughing) – Oh jeez. – Broadcasting since 2010.
– We’re doing video now, Josh. We have to, yeah, salute, moon, wave, whatever. – All right, y’all, we’re killing the drop trousers. Here we go.
(laughing)
You’re my friend, you’re my new friend. (laughing)