Interview Chris JeeTops.com
In this Jeep Talk Show interview, Chris from JeeTops.com talks about their OEM Plus removable clear tops for Jeep JK, JL, and JT models. Transform your Jeep into a luxury vehicle with this incredible Freedom Top modification. Enjoy the open sky while keeping the security of your Jeep hardtop. Easy to store and always on, JeeTops offers the perfect upgrade for your Jeep. Watch, listen, and then explore more at JeeTops.com!
All right, hi, do cheaper we’re back for another interview well, I love these interviews It’s so much fun to talk to folks and I get to talk to what has become a very good friend of mine Chris at G tops Chris and I talk wait, what do you think about at least once every couple weeks?
Yeah
You I I mean
Now that now
if it’s if it’s less than that or you never talked to me that’s fine You can help me I can you can you can tell me where I’m lying.
I don’t mind But you guys have been enthusiastic and actually have my product on your vehicles so that oh,
yeah Yeah, well, you know, I was nervous Initially, I loved the idea behind being able to have the clear top. That wasn’t a a big huge piece of plastic that to me was going to be problematic and This seemed to be a very good
OEM plus is one of the things I like to say about
Various products that I see it’s it’s something you would have expected for the Jeep manufacturer to put in there as an option Expensive option and add-on one of the things that they would do, you know like for a Rubicon or something But they don’t and I was just and and the cool thing is is that I mean I’ve been doing this this thing for 14 years now and I had never heard of your product and that that’s kind of a lot like The Jeep talk show we’ve been doing this for a long time and a lot of people don’t know about it It doesn’t mean it’s not great and I was just blown away about how wonderful this product is and especially now that I got to Experience it. All right, so let’s let’s get on I just told you we were gonna stay on track and I’m going off on a tangent
So that was that was kind of the gist right there that I really wanted to lead into because
OEM plus and Tony you did coin that and and I don’t it’s those simplistic kind of things that are like key and and
Back in in o-10 when we were awarded the first patent that that that was the entertainment back then We were going to do an OE run with Jeep We went through all the all the motions and we never got there and Mike Manley had had already Left and and maybe it will be re-approached soon because one of the things that I didn’t tell you I’m putting my wife in a new JL you and Of course the unit didn’t get in here yet because it was special ordered and She’s got a 23 JL you well, guess what and ironically, it’s a it’s a front a dealership friend principle of mine that I’ve known for forever and It was a loaded 23 and it’s got the folding power fabric Wabasko roof I
Know that roof inside and out because I’m one of the oldest Wabasko agents or I should say partners in the world, right?
and We used to repair tons of them Now now they changed a few things to do the adaptation that they did in the Wrangler But that is well, it is a Wabasko roof. So I know it intimately but what astounded me
Was how bloody loud the thing was? No, it’s windy here yesterday But even even my wife called to say that even when it’s not today, it’s not windy But on the front did come in but I mean I’m talking Obnoxious loud. I’ve been hearing that from people with the what’s the thing that clear
lids or no
Wabasko even made one for a while, but then they
come at the best top where they can run the thing back
Yeah, best ops thing. I mean that’s loud.
Yeah, and what’s like a drum because the air hitting on hitting that surface of that Yeah,
and I know you know the fabric and no construction when I used to convertible tops and all that highline stuff And I know what little engineering tweaks you can do But I was just I was blown away that that that folding fabric roof that everybody’s touting I mean just about every unit that that that Jeep builder that I’ve been talking to lately
Ruby tops is a Ruby Ruby
True me You have included me in the conversation. I don’t know Every bill will every bill they do they’re they’ve got the that OEM Top in there and I’m I’m the same and they’re saying how they’ve got all these plain Jane ones that are sitting out on The back lot and they they don’t know how to get them sold and I said well lunch with G tops in them So even more so now I’m I’m I’m Realizing that here these guys are selling, you know 135 on average $1,000 units all the way up to you know, almost 200 G’s and they’re putting that factory They they’re pushing that factory folding fabric room. I think sucks and I mean I I don’t I mean it’s doesn’t suck relevant to when it opens it is Fabulous, it’s huge. It’s all you the backs open too. So conceptually it’s wonderful, but bloody noisy I mean, I I don’t know how anybody can hear themselves think driving down the freeway
Well, I guess that is the neat thing. There are various options and that’s the wonderful thing about a Jeep There’s various options that you can get you can do it the way you want to do it And what I want to do is encourage you guys to get something that I think Checks all the boxes For being able to see out the top of your Jeep, but having so many conveniences like you’re talking about the noise The the Sun coming in is going to be very hot and very bright. But with you the G tops it is Not because it’s a little to get a little tint to it So it’s not as bright and it is cool It’s actually cool under the the the freedom panels and and that’s what I want to make sure people understand a G top is a modified Freedom panel so you’re not getting something that replaces the freedom panels. You’re getting a modification to the factory created Freedom panels that makes it a lot better
by federal law people need to understand We by federal law cannot Compromise any of the FM VSS, which is the federal motor vehicle safety standards. We cannot change Jeep specs at all What we have done with this is we have made the tops stronger. We have made them considerably Well, the the passenger side is Two ounces the driver’s side is like four ounces lighter They actually made them lighter but they’re in a crush test They’re about three times stronger being because we put more structure into the forming of that acrylic an impact modified acrylic aircraft acrylic piece that we put in So when we’ve computer designed it a lot of people say well, what’s the why is that shaped like that? That’s the perimeter, but why is it shaped like that? Well, it’s it’s for one it’s to bump out and make Optimize the viewing area you can’t you cannot make the viewing area any larger than what we’ve done because There’s the parameters of the latching system and whatnot, but there’s also the parameters of the structure so we had to Integrate ours with the factory to enhance the structure. So we’ve made it structurally more sound but
That and then there’s there’s the balance of the top that the weight has to be equally distributed to it You can’t just like those crazy guys that that are out of business now that panoramic thing that they were throwing household glass on you people don’t understand you can’t just take something and throw glass up on top because then if the Dynamics of it in a crash are entirely different You’ve got the weight to the top of the top top the weight has to be You have to keep the top uniform to the design that it was when Jeep designed it.
Mm-hmm.
So Yeah, you know me I get real wordy, but You’re trying to
convey this you’re concerned about this and you’ve put a lot of time and engineering into it that people don’t That they don’t know because you’re right somebody can come up What was the old thing? My dad’s got a barn Let’s put on a show and they just come up with a way of putting the something on the roof It may look cool, but they don’t but people don’t know the science behind it
Yeah, well and there’s there’s a lot to it that they are encapsulated in a lot of people who I’ve had people over the years kind of bomb grade well They’re there they are we use a bomb grade structural silicone. It’s not only it’s it’s structural Which means that it’s got really high pole and sheer it’s got the highest pole and the highest sheer
specs of any Goop that you’re right putting you but it
We do that because it’s extremely elastomeric so it has all kinds of you know There’s a lot of movement going on.
Oh and you have to have that especially in an off-road vehicle That’s so that’s twisting and stuff. You need that ability to Deflect so getting back to the original question. What is a G top in simple terms? It’s a easy
way It’s an aircraft window. That’s been
Retrofitted into the factory top with without without changing any of the Original factory top and would you say actually moving creating it so that it it’s optimal with a view
Yeah, it actually improving the the freedom panels to a degree Yeah, all right, so cool now This is another one because everybody’s concerned about how long things how long you’ve been in business So are you going out of business? Is this a six month deal that you’ve been doing and of course I know the answer to that But but I want to get you to answer how long has G tops been made?
Well G tops is a registered a
registered trademark We have a red R and and it is the real unlike the actually I just ran into a company the other day that
Yeah, you have to have a trademark for a specific amount of time before then you can go approach the patent office and then get A registered trade we and we are a registered trade That in itself we if anybody understands any of that you got to be around for a while to have but no I have been in the sunroof industry all my life. I put my first pop-top sunroof in when I was old 21
and Then became I I was a American sunroof cars and concepts
American sunroof Corporation if anybody remembers American sunroof, you know, that was oh yet Ford
GM Chrysler American sunroofs. I also was a Cars and concepts dealer cars and concepts teatops those came OEM factory back in the day and I’m dating myself It’s a long time ago and Hearst hatches If anybody is out at these car shows and they see these these cool the Hearst shifter and then then oh, yeah some Hearst hatches on a Camaro or a F body which is your Monte Carlos and your those but yeah, we used to put it on cars and concepts Hearst hatches and so way back then you had to be structurally
The the the fix during in the jigging
you you wouldn’t have been it you would have been in business this long if you weren’t doing It the right way because by now somebody would have died from a bad design So and you would have been out of business, but simply because of the lawsuit
the corporation Well, no, but but we carry a ton of you know, we kind of care carry a ton of Well, that’s another good question for a lot of you know, our product liability we got we’re proud of liability insured up the yin yang, but the Automation has been around since 1989 Wow It’s a Delaware C Corp, we’re not an S Corp. We’re not an LLC. We are a Delaware C Corp. You can look it up
September of 89
We All the way up until when GTOP started we were wholesale to new car dealers We did we service to service to all the dealers in Milwaukee Madison and upper Chicago We usually did about a million dollars a year in highline inbuilt power sunroof sales at big inbuilt and big panoramic roof, you know And I usually ran about six to eight guys and and our claim to fame was one of the things was the fact that we Were mobile but we you know, but we were wholesale. I mean and in that in in itself
You know, I’ve said this to you before you don’t brag enough but being wholesale you got a member that that Those vehicles were setting those up and getting them ready for delivery for and these dealerships used to live by us And and we used to never have any warranty because we were so anal and had these excellent systems in place but It was around 0 8 when I had a bunch of customers coming to me saying, you know you used to do teatops in the day and and I’ve got this new Wrangler, you know I can remember the first oh seven Wrangler came in and look at these darn things and can you do anything? and I’ve got a manufacturing background engineering background whatnot and started futzing with it and and and then Filed for patent after I came up with the first prototypes, but we showed at SEMA in 2010 was the first time that I Free it was either 9 or 10 But I but I you know saw everybody, you know walked around and it was old home week as usual when I go to SEMA Because I always know all these I kind of know I know all the old guard and anyway the first patent came and then the then it was about a half a year about a year later another patent came and You know at that point you’re kind of in it. I mean you’re vested. I mean we built prototype, you know I started buying tops up like, you know the our local mopar dealer, you know, just They used to shit when we’d order, you know, we get 20 20 front sets at a time They’d come in and
so let me read between the lines It sounds like you’re saying and correct me on this that the G tops have been around since 2008. Is that correct?
Yeah, yeah and and and on on dealer showroom floors Since so
it wasn’t a hard sell I can imagine that people seeing this for the first time. It’s like, oh absolutely
Wasn’t it wasn’t it was a no-brainer and it was and and more so for me
Some of the irony in there was that it wasn’t a hard sell for me Person, you know as as Automation at the dealers on a wholesale level because we had we had the stellar Reputation with with you know anybody in the Milwaukee Madison or or upper Chicago area let alone when you start going out because I know I I’ve trained everybody around the country and and I’ve I’ve been in this for so long. Thanks. Thanks and Chris Prechter with American Center of Corporation. They’re out in, California Hanks is dead now, but Chris is still alive and and They have their aftermarket shops and whatnot and I used to train people out there. I trained people on the East Coast I
I’ve had a few other operations Through the years. I mean we used to do I Had close to 300 people when carvolettes was a was a a company that my partner was from South Africa It was the only manual glass sliding sunroof in the world. It was it was made in but I had Christ I had close to 200 installers we it was all in house up and down the East Coast all the way out to the Mississippi in every major city and So I guess what the point is those people also calling on deeply but all that organization was wholesale to new We sold direct to the dealers. So So what you’re saying, you know here I get these apprehensions from all these retail people when they call up Mm-hmm. Yeah, you know me I get a little short fuse kind of when you’re trying to know I’m talking to you like you’re some kind of a backyard hack and I’m going like well I mean there’s so many of them out there. I understand why they would be concerned. No, you’re right There are but we we and I’m and I cried on your shoulder I’ve run into so many on the hell there’s this crazy guy panoramic guy up in Canada now people I mean, I’ve got I’ve got a counterpart up there who’s who sold all his stores to four-wheel parts
Who actually used to work for four-wheel parts after he sold his seven stores to four-wheel parts But now right now we’re working with the Canadian DOT to get this this backyard hack He’s got a nice website But it what he’s doing is completely illegal
And that’s one of the reasons why we’re doing this interview because yeah, I have I know you have a great product And it needs that people need to understand this and you shouldn’t be buying these I
mean, but the these these plastic units I designed one of them for for quadratec way back when and I said it’s not gonna work I said from a marketing standpoint But what’s interesting is now after a year of clear lids being out in the marketplace I get calls weekly now about all these disgruntled people there They go I keep scuba over 50 miles an hour and and it’s if this is you’ve stretched a drum over your thing But then they talk about the heat and they talk about the acid trip view Yeah, and in the irony is is why I just want to go. Why are you how can people be so?
And he had had it for like, I don’t know, two or three months and of course couldn’t send it back. And he said, “Well, the goddamnest thing is what I didn’t think about, there’s no drip rails.” So in a torrential rain, he says, “You get out of the vehicle, whether it’s that or the other.” And there’s the gusset up on top on the edge, but there’s no drip rail. So even if it’s pouring rain, the water is dumping off like crazy. So if you got to get out of the vehicle, you get out and of course, how do you get out of a vehicle? Especially a woman, you swing your legs out so your thighs get drenched immediately getting out and whatnot.
I didn’t realize that.
The irony…
And also too, I want to mention really quick, there’s nothing wrong if you like clear lids and if you want to have the clear lids and maybe those things that we’re talking about aren’t deal killers for you. I just want to make sure you guys understand there’s alternatives, an alternative where you don’t have to take it off. You don’t have to put it on. You don’t have to worry about anything other than just placing it.
You want to be chasing wind leaks and water leaks.
Oh, I agree. I agree. But there’s people that don’t understand Jeeps, how anybody would own a Jeep. So everybody has their own kind of craziness. So I’m just saying this is, in my opinion, this is a much better product and the only one that I’ve ever had on my Jeep. So now this is the thing, the critical thing. People go, “Oh, this sounds wonderful. Love the engineering, but I don’t want to pay $5,000 for G-tops.” And this was the important thing to me when I found out, and we talked about this in the past, the pricing on the G-tops, modifying your freedom panels, which you don’t have to modify them. Buy whole G-tops with freedom panels and everything, but it costs more money. But if you just have your freedom panels modified to G-tops, in other words, the clear piece put into it, how much does that cost? Ballpark, Chris.
Oh, no, it’s not ballpark. It’s written in stone.
And matter of fact,
I will also mention, we haven’t changed prices.
We’ve been eating it ever since COVID, just to be nice.
A lot of people, I don’t think, realize, because everybody else has been hiking prices about this. Oh, yeah. Well, a lot of people have been looking at center. We’ve been racing prices. Yeah, everything’s going up.
The site will charge you $11.65 to process a JK front set.
That includes one turn of shipping. And we did this because, of course, there’s no shipping platform that can do… Some people want loners. Some people want a box. Some people are really anal and they want to pack them themselves. So then we email them a return tag.
Oh, really? That’s dumb.
But $11.65 includes the first turn of shipping. We have a lot of people that say, “I want loner tops.” We ship out loner tops for free and free to use, which sometimes I really wonder if people… I mean, we’ve run into a lot of people that I really appreciate, and there’s other people kind of expected, and I’m going like…
That’s interesting to do.
I tried to explain this to a guy the other day because he somehow wasn’t tracking and it’s very clear on the site. I said, “We lose,” because this guy happened to be way out in Southern California. I said, “Between the shipping and everything in the packing, the repacking and eating up boxes and all the labeling and all this stuff.” So we don’t charge for any of that. We probably, if you want to really amateurize the labor out in the whole bit, we’re probably losing with you in particular, probably close to $300 by the time that the tops went out, they come back, and all the wear and tear on our loner tops that we got us. On the site, it specifically says, and I can’t remember the last time we have, we don’t charge a deposit on the loner tops.
I think it’s a pretty nice consideration that we do, and when you get the loner tops, the return tag’s going to be right in there. You pull them out, put them on, your rig, and put yours in there as they came.
The panels are encapsulated at the bottom, which is the inner under that you see the perimeter when you’re looking out, but they’re encapsulated around the top. And if people don’t know what the term encapsulation means,
the goop is filled and then the trim seal goes on and everything’s squishing out of the top and it’s squishing out of the bottom. It’s like way overkill, encapsulating something. That’s the way we do it. There’s about four times the material. I mean, if you want to compare it to, let’s say a front windshield,
we’re using about four times the material per the area that we’re putting it in.
There’s about an inch and a half of material versus in a windshield bead, when you put a windshield in a car,
it’s about a quarter inch is what’s sealing it. So we’re three times that.
So leaks are not an issue. What about the scratching of the…
Matter of fact, a gentleman by the name of Mike Crenshaw just called me today and he’s on his fourth G-tops.
You may have seen him on Facebook, Tony.
He’s with Shasta County emergency guy. He up in Shasta Mountains and all of their Northern California.
He’s one of a crew of like eight volunteers that are the rescue team that go and I mean, they get… I mean, this is the real deal. They are out in the wintertime. They’re navigating four feet of snow and lost people that were in one of the parks or outback skiing and whatever. Cool, cool guy. He wanted the G-tops because he’s got all his radios and all his stuff in there. A lot of expensive stuff.
He knows they’re unbreakable. You can’t break in. And he had called me because he had… They couldn’t get the ATVs in quick enough and it was a critical situation with somebody that they were found, but they were like an hour and a half up and out in the middle of nowhere. And Mike’s got some pretty extreme… Well, his Wranglers, his rescue Wranglers are really extreme. So he went bashing through trees and the whole bit.
And I said to him, I said, “Can you polish them off for me?” I said, “Yeah, you know I can do that.” So actually they’re being sent back probably tomorrow because he had also told me some good news. He said that there’s some lighting company that he has on this thing because they’re out rescuing at night and he’s got all this wild spotlights set up in the works. Sure.
His vehicles, we got to the SEMA show this year. So he said, “Yeah, it’s going to go out to SEMA and whatever.” And I said, “Mike, that’s cool because it’s not a pretty baby, but SEMA’s becoming where they kind of like the stuff that’s really used and that it doesn’t look so fake-ish and renditious.”
So anyway, I said, “Well, the trees shouldn’t really scratch.” He said, “Well, I really bangs.” Where’s the drill?
It wasn’t his relamp.
Well, no, I mean, he has the guide things. He said, “I even broke some pretty damn big branches that I thought would not break.” And they were banging up and over. So he says, “Yeah.” He says he’s got some light scratches. But yeah, all we’ll do is this material. It’s like a car paint to his ring. We’ll just wet sand them out and buff them out. And they will look new, tell… This material does not oxidize. And oxidation is from UV rays, from being on the sun. This stuff was invented in 1933, Roman Haas, a German company, but in New Jersey.
And it’s designed to be out in the weather. That’s the great thing about this material. It’s not like a headlight lens that once it starts degradating, oxidizes.
I think that’s an important thing to mention.
No, it goes to hell. You can buff your headlight lenses back out, but then you get more UV rays in about four months. They’ll look like shit.
And it gets more UV rays because it’s flat up against the sun. So it gets more UV rays.
Correct. I mean, you have a big enough issue with headlight lenses that are at about…
Most break 30 degree angle, but most… So the UV rays aren’t whacking them. So just think now how bad and quickly you see them get. Now they say, “Oh, let’s stick it right up on the top up here.” Anyway,
but our material, someone made that comment. Polycarbonates are pretty cheap compared to what ours is. This impact…
It’s aircraft window material. I mean, it’s not like something you can go to Home Depot or even go online and find it. It’s at a 65% mix.
It’s designed. You know, all in all, this sounds like it’s really… You’re selling just this fantastic product that’s installed very well. OEM Plus.
It’s infinitely refreshable.
It’s cheap compared to what all the stuff that you’re done to it. I mean, that’s the other… So you’re kind of doing the Elon Musk thing. You’re improving the process and keeping the cost down.
It’s pretty expensive. And I’m going, “Well, you get what you pay for,” which with us is probably… That’s a snarky thing to say to people. But honestly,
having been in the sunroof industry all my life, all these costs are completely optimized. I get these snarky asshole… Excuse me. That get on the Facebook and they go, “Well, I went on your site and I see these prices.” Well, you idiot. Do you know what a factory top costs? If you look at some of the prices and really shop the prices, quite honestly, we don’t make anything at all on the JLs and the Gladiators and the JTs. We pretty much sell those tops at cost. And a few of the savvy people have said, “You’re way below list if I take the price that you charge just to process mine versus getting this plus.” And I go, “Well, yeah, we technically really shouldn’t be doing that, but then you could… The Chrysler doesn’t get mad at us because then it’s kind of like that we’ve… They look at it like we didn’t stick to a map price, but we’re discounting our straight price.” It’s all kind of how you look at it. Yeah, I’ve actually entertained marking up the tops themselves, but
I optimize this all out to be the fairest as you can be, but these days, everybody thinks that somebody’s doing smoke and mirrors to try to tear your eyes out and go on like, “Well, if you know how long these things took to make and you know that we’ve got a five-year 50, you will not find anybody.” And quite honestly, we put a five-year 50 on it because
they will last the life of the top, as I started saying before, if you take the time to maintain them and just don’t put any funky… The funny part is these days, someone takes the time to call. I mean, you look for our warranty information and if you look for our maintenance information, it’s out there, it’s on the site and whatnot. But I’ve had people over the years, “Rainix.” I love Rainix. I’m an old racer from way back when. Guess what? Rainix, if you’ll read a bottle of Rainix, it says it destroys rubbers and plastics. They tell you that if you put it on your car, if you’ve got moldings, don’t get the Rainix on there because you get it on there more than once. Well, guess what Rainix did? They now make Rainix that’s meant for plastic.
But I started saying this, I had a gal out in Vermont who’s, oh my God, she’s an old, old customer now.
And Anne, what was interesting is she had a stained glass shop in that region up there in the Hoytee-Toyney, Vermont, in the mountains.
Everybody knows her in that region because her stained glass windows are these. Artisan sought after, she’s been doing it that long and she called me up and she said, “Hey, is it all right if my husband keeps putting the Rainix on these?” And we couldn’t figure out why they got funky. And I said, I still remember this day, I said, “Vicki, no, no, no, tell your husband, don’t put.” And then it was about four or five years later, now they make a Rainix for plastic. But yeah, it’s like anything, just use some common sense.
Well, I think a lot of people don’t know the difference between the polymers and glass. And that’s one of the reasons why a lot of TVs get destroyed is because it’s not a glass panel on your flat screen TV, it’s plastic. Different from the G-tops obviously. All right, so now I’m going to feel bad about this and you just tell me, no, we’re not going to do this. But we discussed it about getting a 10% discount. Oh, sure, let’s do it. Let’s pump. All right, all right. So if you’re losing money, now you’re going to lose 10% more. So for a limited time and thank you for watching all the way to the end to get to this point, you’ll get 10% discount. Was it 10, Chris? Did you say 10 or was it two?
And what will probably end up happening depending on how they do their shipping or whatnot, they’ll end up getting free shipping or they’ll end up getting some consideration. Right. All right. You know, the one thing we didn’t talk, how much time we got yet?
Oh, we got plenty of time. But let me finish this one. You get a 10% discount when you call in, because you have to call in and order a set of G-tops for your Jeep. And this is for JKs, JTs,
and JLs that enclose the JLU of course, and use the code JTS for Jeep Talk Show. G-tops is just really simple. JTS G-tops. All right, Chris, go ahead and say what you’re going to say.
Well, you talked about the tinting and we sell the shades a la carte. And the reason we sell the shades a la carte is we get, I’ve had some people in some of the hottest places in the world say that, you know, they get under them and they go, my God, the tinting is fantastic. And well, it is 99% of the UEB and the UVA is filtered.
So that the heat gain and whatnot, it’s not there like people think. Now, I don’t know. It really isn’t. Yeah, it’s not out.
Yeah, I mean, the efficiency of that, you know, or I should say the properties of that material, you try to get people to understand because right away they’re associating with some tempered sundress glass that they had in their Cadillac or their Lexus.
Yeah, they think it’s going to be just a horrible.
Which is a fairly different thing with any glass or even these idiots that are doing the these big plastic drums.
The coating is on the underside with this material, the UV inhibitors and the tinting is within the material. It’s inside of the material. So what’s happening is it’s filtering. So the ambient light coming in is much softer. It doesn’t have that squinty feeling, right, is the best way to describe it. But in some cases we get some people that,
and sometimes I think it’s kind of their perception more than more than anything, but we have the Tesla shades. And when I say Tesla,
if you get in a new Tesla, it is the identical fabric because it comes from the exact same manufacturer that makes them for Tesla.
And it mutes the light out
because it’s a fabric matrix shade. You can still see through them.
Right.
But it knocks down the light. So it kind of, it doesn’t block the light. It just makes it less. My wife, we went to meet her parents.
We can make them so they block complete. We have a template that we can take another piece of material and it’s a felt and it doesn’t make it any heavier.
I wouldn’t go that direction because they’re like feather light.
Yeah. The mesh, the mesh, it was really nice. You maintain the vision out the top, which is why you got them. And it does knock it down quite a bit, but we were going to meet my wife’s parents yesterday to eat. And she says, I’m going to put my panel in because the light has bothered me. And it really has to do with where the sun is. If it’s up above you and that light’s coming in, the sun can be very bright.
Yeah. Yeah.
And she pops it out.
On Tony, she popped hers in and you could still not pop your, you use.
Yeah, absolutely. And I figured why she got them. I’d put them in. Now I will mention this. When you get these tops, if you do get these tops, the panels, the Tesla panels, you need to mark them passenger
and driver because it’s a weird shape and they both look like they’ll fit either one, but they’ll only fit one way.
No, they will fit either one will fit either one. It’s just a matter of remembering to take the pop out the pop down tab, the little tab that you grab,
whether you fold it around this way that if you look Tony, they’re both identical.
Oh no, I understand. But I mean, yeah, if you want the tab, yeah, if you want the tab hanging down without folding it around anything, there’s a left and a right. That’s the way we do it. She actually marked it, but she put left and right. I told her it should have been passenger and driver.
Yeah. See, we made them only, see, you got the tab here. And so if you pop it in
passenger side, the tabs hanging down, right?
Now, if you go to put it on the driver’s side, because you just pull the tab around to this side when you pop it in. Because we didn’t bother to tell the solar to so one on one side and one on the other, because they’re, you know, they’re, they’re identical and people want to know how these things are there. There’s a, there’s a spring steel in here and that’s what keeps the shape.
Yep. They’re very light, very easy to install. I was sitting at a red light. Yeah. I was sitting at a red light yesterday when I, she popped hers in and I went ahead and popped the one mind in as well while I was sitting still. So this is a good time to talk about other products. We were kind of talking about it because one of the other products are the Tesla shades and they are not made for Teslas. They are, if you’re familiar with the Tesla shades, they’re the, the, the basically exact same thing, but made to fit your, your G-top inserts. So one of the things that I’m very interested in, and we haven’t talked about it all is you can get a, a G-top for the main top, which is a panoramic insert, which is just amazing to me. And if you’ve got kids and in some cases, one of your customers wanted it for their, for their dogs. Can you see it, Tony? Oh, absolutely. That is huge. That is a huge thing that you can see out of.
How does, I’m just trying to, I’m actually, this first time that you’re interviewing me in the shop, I’m in the, I’m in the office or I’m actually in the waiting room, but yeah. Okay. Well that worked good. Then you, yeah.
Yeah.
Oh, and those things, it’s just amazing. And to have the complete treatment for your Jeep, I think would just be amazing. Just think about how it would look for people that were in the back seat. And I’m thinking about the, the days of drive-ins, that would be an easy way to get the, your date in the back seat. Wouldn’t it, Chris? Oh, you got to see the, the panoramic from the back seat.
Oh, and then, and then she’s going to have something to look at. She’s going to have something to do. Yeah. If her legs are in the air, she’s actually going to not be looking scary.
Yeah. And you tell them, just keep your feet off the, keep your feet off the Jeep tops, please.
See the stars. And if they’re, and if they’re that, if, you know, if you still happen to be at the drive-in and there’s some neon over there, maybe you can look out and see some neon up.
All right, Chris, I think we covered it all. We, we talked about what a Jeep top is. People should know what that is. We know how long they’ve been made since 2008, but you’ve been doing tops for a lot longer than that.
And we, we talked bad, we talked bad about other manufacturers. So we checked that box off.
We’re approaching, Tony, we’re approaching 6,000 units out in the world. Oh, interesting. And, and if people thought that they leaked, I’ll bet, you know, they, they, they, they would see people complaining online by now, I would think. Yeah.
Oh yeah, absolutely.
6,000 units out in the world.
Although we have been mixed up with a couple of these other snarky fly-by-night things.
Oh yeah. There was one actually using this, the similar shape too. So I, I know that was, that was a bit irritating, but I’ll just mention, I’ll just mention really quick. I have a set of G tops in the freedom panels and the 2021 Jeep talk show gladiator. I don’t make modifications lightly. I was lucky enough that Chris sent me a set of G tops to drive to EJS this year and just thoroughly enjoyed them. It made it very easy for me to decide to send my freedom panels to him.
And it was, and Chris has advertised with us here on the show a couple of times. So we do do, he has had paid for motion here on the show.
And, but I, I’m not number one. I mean, yeah, we’ll do ads. But if I don’t like something, I don’t care what it is. I’m going to tell you exactly what I think. And I am about these G tops. They’re wonderful. They’re OEM plus. And we’re not certainly not being paid for this interview, Chris, unless you want to send me a little, send me a little money or something.
And not, and not only is, is, is this in the Jeep talk show gladiator, Chris, the Jeep talk show, Chris has a set in his new gladiator and he is loving the hell out of them. I don’t know. I know Chris calls you occasionally, Chris, but I don’t know if he told you that he was showing them off to several people at Toledo Jeep Fest. And here recently in the wood, was it wood way park run or something? It’s up there in your area. The thing that Jay Leno and stuff goes to. But, but he was showing that off to several people and they were amazed. I mean, a lot of people aren’t aware of this product or if they are, they may be getting confused with the, with these other ones they’ve heard bad things about. And that’s one of the reasons why we’re doing the interview today is to make sure you as a Jeep talk show listener is getting the inside scoop as to why these things are really good. In fact, and I love dropping a Greg Henderson.
You’re my friend, you’re my new friend.