Jeep Talk Show Roundtable – Wheels, Knuckles and More! 🚙💨
Welcome to this week’s Jeep Talk Show Roundtable, where we dive deep into all things Jeep! In this episode, we cover Jeep wheels, scrub radius, aluminum vs. steel knuckles, and even throw in some fun with our “Ask Grok” segment! Whether you’re a seasoned Jeeper or new to the off-road world, this episode is packed with tips, tricks, and insights to help you get the most out of your Jeep build. 🛠️ 🔥 What’s in this episode? Wheels 101: Learn about wheel offset, backspacing, and the critical role of scrub radius in ensuring your Jeep handles like a dream. From tire sizing to wheel spacers, we break it down! Aluminum vs. Steel Knuckles: Are aluminum knuckles holding you back? We discuss why upgrading to steel might be a game-changer for off-road enthusiasts. Ask Grok: Our AI assistant tries to tackle your Jeep questions with some hilarious results! Patreon Shoutouts: A huge thank you to our amazing supporters who keep the show rolling! 🙌 📅 New episodes drop every Wednesday! Join us live every Tuesday at 7:30 PM Central Time via Zoom to be part of the conversation. Visit jeeptalkshow.com/contact to learn how to join and subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates. 💻 Connect with Us: Website: jeeptalkshow.com – Watch or listen to the latest episodes! Spotify: Enjoy seamless audio-to-video switching for the ultimate Jeep Talk experience. YouTube: Perfect for Jeepers working in the garage – listen while you wrench! Patreon: Support the show and get exclusive perks at patreon.com/jeeptalkshow. 🚗 Why Watch?From practical Jeep modification advice to hilarious banter, the Jeep Talk Show is your go-to for all things Jeep. Whether you’re upgrading your Gladiator, Wrangler, or Rubicon, or just love the Jeep lifestyle, we’ve got you covered. Don’t miss out on the fun and knowledge! #JeepTalkShow #JeepLife #OffRoad #JeepMods #ScrubRadius #JeepWheels #JeepKnuckles #Wrangler #Gladiator #Rubicon #4×4 #OffRoading 🔔 Subscribe, Like, and Share! Hit the bell icon to never miss an episode. Let us know your Jeep setup or questions in the comments below! Broadcasting since 2010 – keeping the Jeep community connected! Rev up your engines, Jeep lovers— the Jeep Talk Show is here to take you on a wild ride! For 15 years, we’ve been the ultimate pit stop for Jeep enthusiasts, delivering off-road thrills, insider tips, and a whole lotta Jeep passion. With a powerhouse crew of hosts and team members, we’re dropping five action-packed episodes every week to fuel your Jeep obsession! Buckle up for our fan-favorite Chic Chat, a women-centric, women hosted episode that’s all about empowering female Jeepers. It’s the perfect space for women to dive into the world of Jeeps and off-roading, hosted by fearless ladies who live for the trail. But that’s just the start—we’ve got over 1,200 episodes waiting to rev up your day, whether you’re tearing down the highway, mowing the lawn, or pumping iron at the gym. Watch us on video or listen audio-only—your call, your adventure! Join the Jeep Talk Show family and become part of the ultimate Jeep community! Jump into our Discord chat at jeeptalkshow.com/discord, support us on Patreon for ad-free episodes at www.patreon.com/jeeptalkshow, or catch our live Round Table every Tuesday at 7:30 PM CT via Zoom (https://jeeptalkshow.com/roundtable, password: jeep). Stay in the loop with our newsletter at https://jeeptalkshow.com/newsletter and follow the action on Instagram @jeeptalkshow (instagram.com/jeeptalkshow). Head to https://jeeptalkshow.com to explore our world of Jeep madness, subscribe, and let us make your day a little more rugged and a lot more fun. Ready to roll with us? Let’s hit the trails together!#JeepTalkShow #JeepLife #OffRoad
You gotta talk about why they went to aluminum,(…) right? It’s just that whole cost of weight savings because a mandated EPA,(…) right?
(…)
So the knuckles are the part that the joint that actually pivots on the ball joints. That’s how your front tire is turning.
Hey, this episode of the Jeep Talk Show is brought to you by windshield defense You know adventure doesn’t wait for a cracked windshield Windshield defense by racing optics is like a screen protector for your phone triple layer race test It installs in just 20 minutes save 20% with code JTS 20 at windshield defense comm the clear choice
Yeah. All right. Let’s get started here. Hello, everybody. We’re I’m getting a hit on my face. I’m getting a hit on my face. I’m getting a hit on my face. Everybody. We’re I’m getting ahead of myself there. Hi, I’m Tony and this is the cheap talk show round
(Explosion)
to cheap talk show dot com slash contact to find out how to join. And you can subscribe to our newsletter there as well. Hello, zoom people. You know.
(…)
We’re just. It’s me. It’s the. Hi. All right.
(…)
All right. So we’ve actually had a couple of recent Patreon subscribers and I just want to thank everybody that is a has been a Patreon subscriber for for some and some of you have been Patreon subscribers for years now. I really appreciate the support for the show.
(…)
And we we haven’t seen a very much a very big increase in Patreon subscribers and frankly, I just get tired of asking for some Patreon subscribers. So I really appreciate you guys doing it. Also to a couple of people that have recently.
(…)
Just wonderful. It’s like a a pat on the back for a good hard work. And it’s not just me. Lots of it.
(…)
So happens. Thank you for becoming a Patreon subscriber. Thank you for listening. Thank you for watching. If you don’t watch you don’t want to try it out. Even Rick thinks that the the video side of the cheap talk show is much better than it used to be. I think Rick, would you say it was like I was doing something from inside a closet.
(…)
Yeah, that was back what six months ago, four months ago, whoever long ago that was. Yeah, I said,(…) so can we come out of the closet with the Jeep talk show?
(…)
I always thought it looked kind of homey. You know, it looked like like Friday that just sits there and maybe their own.
(…)
I don’t want to be so highfalutin.
(…)
I could do highfalutin.
(…)
That’s the biggest word I’ve ever heard you say. Is it two words or is it multiple syllables? I don’t know.
(…)
Oh, and I’m planning on doing the ask rock a question. But we’ll see.
(…)
And it’s I think it’s pretty funny, but we will just ask one question. Maybe a couple of people if they want.
(…)
We’ll ask a question back to the regular show. I don’t want to I don’t want to beat that dead horse. I think some people and Roger and I actually tested this the other day. And I think Roger was a little surprised that the A.I. is so interactive and so.
(…)
It’s pretty wild. I’ve got unhinged selected. So we missed. He’s back.
(…)
I would say that for some people it might be put they might feel it’s politically But I thought it was pretty cool. Oh, yeah. No, it is really, really very well. She’s she’s very angry and she let you know. So let’s get started here. Wheels.(…) I think you want round ones. But what else do you need? I need to know about wheels. I mean, I know that there’s they’re tall. They’re wide and but rubber on them.
(…)
And you can fit 37 on a gladiator. Oh,(…) that’s me. That’s me gladiator to be a.
(…)
They make they make gladiator Rubicon’s just so you know. Yeah, they do. I have a tendency to mix those two words up talking about.
(…)
I’ll call the gladiator Rubicon’s. Well, I’ll get the ball rolling about wheels because nobody else is talking. Well, don’t you call gladiators jeeps to Tony.
(…)
Sure.
(…)
The same.
(…)
Sorry, go ahead. Oh, it’s OK.
(…)
There is a lot to unpack with wheels. So typically you want you know, and I’ll go over just a couple of the basics.(…) Typically you want your tire to be within four inches of the width of your wheel.
(…)
So if you put a 37 12 5R 17 on that means you have a 17 inch wheel.
(…)
If the tire is 12 5 you want the wheel to be at least eight point five wide.
(…)
You want it within four inches of the width of the rubber.
(…)
So I mean, even better would be like a nine and a half inch wheel with a 35 12 5 or 37 12 5. So that’s your first aspect. The second aspect is offset and offset is where the wheel sits. So when the wheels mounted to the hub. It’s the actual rest of the wheel and how it fits in to the bolts.
(…)
And that’s you know, you can have positive or negative offset or backspace.
(…)
And that dictates where the tire sits underneath the body.(…) Whether it’s sucked way in or pushed way out.
(…)
But one of the most important things that I recommend everybody look into before they purchase wheels. Don’t just buy an off the shelf wheel because you know everybody on Instagram has that wheel and you think it looks cool.(…) Really pay close attention to the offset or the backspace with the size tire you’re going to choose. So it has to be the height of the tire and the width of the tire mounted on the wheel and the backspace or offset sets your scrub radius and your scrub radius is an imaginary line that goes from the top to the bottom. It goes from ball joint to ball joint to should be the center of the contact patch on the ground.
(…)
If you have too much offset, let’s say you do a three and a half inch backspace wheel and you’re only running 35s. The tires going to be sticking out way too far. And when you turn, if you’re looking down at your wheels,(…) they won’t turn evenly. One will turn way more than the other. And that’s the scrub.(…) So one will scrub way more around the corner, which just destroys your tires much faster than you would think. It also creates a fatiguing habit. If you’ve ever driven one of those Jeeps, it’s just really, really hard to get the alignment dialed in. Some of the times it’s just because the wheel offset is so wrong that it’s much more fatiguing to drive because it doesn’t return to center as easy. And when you’re turning, you’re doing more work to keep it centered and driving down the road. So scrub radius is one of the most overlooked things when it comes to wheels, but it’s also one of the most important things when it comes to wheels.
(…)
So everybody who likes to sit in front of a computer, unlike myself,(…) look up scrub radius before you purchase a wheel and do the math and figure out what the best backspace or is or offset so that you get the proper scrub radius. When you’re talking Jeeps, there’s a couple of good companies to look at my alma mater, AEV. AEV’s wheels are specifically designed with the scrub radius in mind, but they’re limited. They’re designed specifically for a certain size tires like the AED wheels. They’ll tell you, you know, this wheel is good for a 35 to a 37 or this one’s good for a 37 to a 40. And that’s because the offset changes and it sets the scrub. So if you’re looking at a different brand wheel, like a fuel or a KMC or whatever,(…) one easy rule of thumb is look at the specs of an AEV wheel on the size tire that it dictates on your vehicle. And then you can cheat without doing all the extra math because they’ve already done it for you. But most companies don’t do that, right? So if you look at, and there’s some amazing wheels out there, right? Their fuel makes good wheels. I mean, dirty life makes good wheels. There’s lots of companies that make these great wheels.
(…)
But as a company manufacturing a wheel, they’re manufacturing for the masses. So they’re not doing all of that math for every vehicle. They pick kind of the easiest road to follow. So they go, okay, well, most people do 35. So let’s build a wheel that fits a 35.
(…)
So they usually offer one backspace or one offset. They don’t offer a whole bunch of different ones because that’s not cost effective to have so many things on the shelf.(…) So do your research before you purchase a wheel. Don’t buy a wheel just because it’s cool. Do the research so that you get the best bang for your buck and the best component for your vehicle in the way that you want to build it. That’s my wheel spiel. Do wheel spacers change the scrub radius or can they change the scrub radius? Yes, because it changes your backspace. Yes.
(…)
Yeah, wheel spacers change your offset or your backspace. Wheel spacers actually move the whole wheel out, which essentially changes that location. And that’s why, let’s say you’ve got a brand new JL, and I’ll speak about a JL, and you have factory wheels, but you want to run that 37 inch tire.
(…)
As long as the tire is within four inches, the width of the wheel, you can buy the tire. And then you might need those wheel spacers to move that backspace out so you get the proper scrub radius and so that you can still turn.
(…)
And there’s lots and lots of different sizes of wheel spacers. You can get wheel spacers from a quarter, well, actually thinner. You can get wheel spacers from an eighth inch thick up to about three quarters of an inch thick as long as you have the right studs. And then you have adapters, which is, you know, now you bolt the spacer on and it sticks it out even further. So you can do wheel spacers or adapters from about an eighth of an inch thick all the way to about two and a half inches thick. And there’s nothing wrong with them at all as long as they’re properly installed and you’re setting your scrub radius in the right spot.
(…)
I’m really surprised that you could get a wheel spacer that’s an eighth of an inch. That’s interesting. I never knew that they made them.
(…)
Yes, I actually have stacks of them in the back.
(…)
And but yeah, you can get them from very thin, which that is literally just a spacer. So you don’t have to bolt it on. It actually fits on and then you put your wheel on.
(…)
Now there are the much thicker ones and I have examples of that, too. I just didn’t come prepared. I didn’t pull stuff off the shelf, but there are the thicker examples that you bolt on. And even with those, what I would recommend is go with a both a quality company, right? Spider-Trax makes amazing ones. Even the ones that Quadratec sells are surprising. They’re Quadratec branded, but the base manufacturer is a very good manufacturer. So there are very high quality ones and there are crappy ones. And by high quality,(…) some of them are hub-centric, some of them are not. And what that means is it actually centers itself on the hub.
(…)
But most all of them are fine unless they’re very soft aluminum because then when you torque them down, you can actually deform them. So you want a quality aluminum. You also want to make sure that they actually got wheel locks in them and not just grade A bolts.
(…)
Yeah, you want quality, right? So you want wheel lugs and you want to follow the manufacturer recommended installation procedure. That’s where most of your wheel spacers create a problem because they’re not installed properly, right? You buy a set, you go out in the backyard with your four-way, you throw them on, you don’t follow the torque spec, you don’t use the lock type that they provide.
(…)
And then bad things happen.
(…)
If you use a quality set and you install them properly with a torque wrench following the proper procedures, they’re never going to come off. They’re never going to fall apart, right? So they don’t create an issue. But one of the other issues is, is people buy them just moving their tires out, not thinking of what it’s going to do to their scrub radius. And then they’re like, oh my God, my car drives all over the road now. Or, you know, it drives all over the road and I can’t keep it in a straight line. Well, that’s just from not following proper procedure, not looking at scrub radius and things like that. So one of the, you know, back to the wheels, one of the most important thing is scrub radius, making sure it’s in the right spot for your tire and your wheel and your vehicle.
(…)
Other than that, right, there’s a million wheels out there. So, so go crazy and have fun. There’s very few that are made in the US.
(…)
But yeah, wheels. So that’s my wheel spiel. Take it away, everybody else. Well, I was going to add to that. If you find a wheel that you really like that isn’t offered in the setup that you need, if you reach out to that manufacturer, it’s going to cost you a little more money. But a lot of the times you can special order it in the specs that you need.
(…)
Yep.
(…)
Yeah, a lot of wheel manufacturers will actually have blanks. So they’ll have that wheel without lug holes drilled in it. And they might have that wheel for an eight lug or for a six lug that they haven’t drilled the blanks in, but it has a different offset so they can, you know, a lot of those manufacturers can drill your lug pattern into a wheel blank. And it does take longer and it costs a little bit more. But if you really want it to ride and handle the best it possibly can sometimes spending the extra money is worth it. If you want to be able to measure your your your backspace and just simply lay a straight edge across the back of the wheel, not the tire and then this measure from the straight edge down to the center of the hub on the back, the backside of the hub.
(…)
Yeah, you can do that. You can also there are it’s very common in race cars and tuner cars, but there are kits that you can buy that you literally bolt it to your hub and then it can simulate your tire and your wheel and everything and you can play with it and it’ll give you all of the numbers you need. It’ll tell you the backspace you need in the offset that you need and it’ll tell you, you know, all the different things. So you can actually buy one of those are like 100 bucks. You can even buy them on Amazon and you can bolt it to your hub and actually figure out the best performing setup for your vehicle before you ever even start looking to purchase a wheel.
(…)
I think there’s a website called will it fit that you can use to that kind of you plug in the information and and it’s supposed to help you just help you just figure out if it’ll fit.
(…)
Yeah, there is and it works for the most part, but the hard part with what we do with these Jeeps is we modify them so heavily that things like will it fit, you know, they might not give you the information because they might not have the setup in there for a 38.3 inch tire that’s 11 and three quarter inches wide, you know, blah, blah, blah. So yeah, I got you. So if you really want to nerd out you buy one of those adapters and it’s basically a ruler that that will help you figure out your wheels spacing and backspacing and everything else before you even ever go buy a wheel. The tuner the tuner car guys use the shit out of them and a lot of muscle car guys use the shit out of them too because you know, people are getting away from traditional restorations and they’re going into the resto mods and they want the new fancy looking wheel and they want it to fit as tight as humanly possible. So you buy one of these hundred dollar kits and and you can really do all the math. So it’s not, you know, it’s a great tool to have for any jeeper who’s looking at wheels. It’s it’s relatively cheap insurance to make sure you get the best bang for your buck, but a lot of us Jeepers aren’t just in the Jeeps. We like muscle cars and we like tinkering with other stuff and our dad just left us a dots in two 80 Z and we want to pimp it out. Right. So, so having that tool in your toolbox makes you the cool kid on the block anyway. So sometimes it’s really good to have simple tools like that.
(…)
I’m glad I’m keeping my Jeep stock and not modifying it very much. Yeah, yeah. My buddy, Ellen’s trying to sell his, uh, and I think I’ve sold it, told it before, but he’s got his Oh six LJ Rubicon stick shift with only 120,000 miles that has the JL suspension on it that I built. Um, and he’s still looking to sell it. He wants like 12 grand. Oh man. That’s at all, man.
(…)
It’s, it’s really cheap for what it is. It’s a beautiful Jeep. Um, you know, very low miles stick shift. It is an Oh six Rubicon unlimited, but you know, for 12 grand, like I’m, I’m looking in the backyard at what can I sell because it’s already got an amazing suspension on it. It just needs, um,(…) you know, like if I were to buy it, I’d change the Springs and the shocks and I would change the, you know, some of the sheet metal stuff. But other than that, I mean, it’s a beautiful Jeep and he doesn’t want very much money for it. Yeah. Yep. It’s the six speed. So that’s the only downfall is it’s the six speed. Um, you know, that was the German transmission that Jeep was forced to use because of Daimler.
(…)
But, um,(…) you know, the NV 35 50 is a way better transmission,(…) the five speed,(…) but it is a six speed and it’s really nice and it gets good mileage and you know, it’s already on 35s. Um, you know, right now it has no lift and 35s. Um,(…) but really, really clean Jeep and it’s black. So it’s, it’s a great starting point for somebody. Oh man.
(…)
It’s way cheaper than what you’re doing right now. Rick. Yeah.
(…)
It doesn’t have, it doesn’t have beefy axles. It just has the factory Rubicon axis. Does it have cruise control?(…) It does have cruise control. Oh, there you go. You suck. Does it have a water avoided system? Uh, well, no, because that’s, that’s a good thing. Uh,(…) no, because that sits between the steering wheel and the front seat. So if the duck is floating, you are.
(…)
So back to Tony’s original question, guys, um, I gave a fairly lengthy answer about wheels, but everybody else give their opinion and their thoughts on wheels. I was going to say, I noticed, uh, cause I put inch and a quarter spacers in mind when I did the WJ knuckle swap, because it’s a lot bigger breaks and those bigger breaks. I liked about an eighth of an inch of those breaks fitting in those 15 inch rooms.
(…)
So I put, uh, so I put the space, I put the inch and a quarter spacers in there in order for the, all the breaks and stuff to fit in there. And I did notice that when I’m sitting still, like if I’m on a ledge and I’m sitting still and I turn my wheel left or right, I noticed that the front end will move shift a little bit to the left or to the right. And I think that’s because of my scrub radius is free. This is off now because of that, but I’m going to 17 inch rooms and hopefully I will get all that corrected when I do that.
(…)
I bet you it stops really good, which is an amazing thing. The TJ that actually stops. Yeah. Oh yeah. It’s stop something that adds to the backspacing thing too. And you, when you’re trying to figure out your backspacing that when you’re air down your backspace, you’re going to need more, more backspacing when you’re air down than when you’re not air down.
(…)
Because even like I’m mind if I’m air down, I can hit the frame rail with the tire. If I’m aired up, uh, I don’t need any extra backspacing. I got enough.
(…)
But I just air mine down on the bottom. It’s not air down on the sides of the top. Yeah, I guess. So just kind of curious, I think we all don’t let me speak for you, but I think we all do not care for the 20 inch wheels, maybe the wheels, because it really is counterintuitive for airing down.
(…)
Using that tire for traction, which I feel, uh, but does anybody know of a situation where scrub radius or any of that stuff that would be a bad thing to go with a 20 or 22 on the Jeep? I guess if you’re running bigger than a 40 inch tire,(…) your actual tire to wheel sidewall ratio will be roughly the same with a 17 inch wheel and a 37. Yeah, good point.
(…)
Yeah. Yeah. If you’re running 44 is I don’t think a 20 inch rim is going to make that big of a difference. Well, but I don’t think you don’t think it’s either 35 with a 20. But I’m thinking, oh yeah, or even a 37. Does anybody know of a situation other than just the individual taste when it comes to that? They don’t have taste. That’s the problem. Pro dozer.
(…)
Yeah. I saw one yesterday actually was awake. Take you.
(…)
It was like 20 years. I was like, where’s the wheels?
(…)
Where’s the tires?(…) They’ve got 18 amplifiers and 78 speakers in there. Drop down steps and all the words.(…) But that’s what they want to do. I mean, that’s what they want to do. Yeah. But I mean, we, we may have some individuals that are, that go that direction with their, that’s the reason why.
(…)
Because I’m sure they’re thinking, well, I’ve got these or I’d like to go with 20, 22 inch wheels. I know nobody likes it. Who a real jeep or likes it. What I want to do is it going to cause me an issue.
(…)
As long as you get your, you know, your backspacing and your offset, right? It won’t be any different. But even then, like my dually has 20 inch rims with 35 inch tires. I still have quite a bit of sidewall. So depending on what tire you buy, whether or not it’s a true 35 or if it’s a 33.9, even though it’s supposed to be a 35, that makes a difference too. Right.
(…)
Well, 20 inch wheels with rubber band tires. Yeah. Just when you think though, that that’s, that’s bad. There’s a guy in my neighborhood that’s got one, one, one worse.
(…)
The front axle is, has no pumpkin in it. And it’s a JKU.
(…)
Oh man. I know.(…) Why the hell would you ever buy a ring for this two wheel drive?
(…)
Gas mileage.
(…)
Because in 2007 when they came out, their marketing campaign was I’m the cool mom. Was 07 was JKUs? Yep. Yeah. Yeah.
(…)
Man. I just, every time I see that thing, I just start giggling.
(…)
We, back whenever we were doing, going to the Sonic here close by first Saturday, a part of the XJ talk.com forum over there and meet XJs in the area. And it was pretty cool. We’d get the, have a get together with all these XJs and these guys, I think they were driving by as the Sonic, we were at on a right off of a major thoroughfare. It’s not a highway, but thoroughfare. And I think they went, oh, let’s go, let’s go get the Jeep. And they, they drove over there with the XJ. It was lifted, had probably had 33s on it. Nice wide tires, lots of modifications.(…) And, uh, as I was talking to them happy that they had showed up and then somebody came over and nudged me and told me, look, there’s, it’s not a four wheel drive. It’s a two wheel drive. Just had the straight axle, the front. And they had, they had it all. I mean, they were doing it right, man. It was a, it was a well set up XJ, but it was a two wheel drive on an XJ. I could see that, but on a Wrangler, I’ve never seen one until this one. Uh, in 2007 and 2008, they made two wheel drives. Yep. We, uh, we was willing with one and, uh, and we learned out real, we learned real quick that we put that guy in the back because when we would grow up the heels with the big rocks, he was slinging. He was, he was slinging rocks pretty good. So if you liked your windshield, you didn’t get behind him. I think I had two years ago, I was wheeling with one of those on a steel bender, Rick.(…) What are you talking about? Well, when you had to drive shit, when you pulled the drive shaft. Oh, wow.
(…)
Damn, that’s harsh.
(…)
It’s all right. It’s all right. Wouldn’t that be a bunch of generate shit too?
(…)
Yeah, but that’s not what broke.
(…)
Yeah. This is actually like cost Rogers wife’s G2 if I remember right. So, oh yeah.(…) And who was driving when that happened? If you ask my wife, it’s her fault. Not mine. Oh yeah. Cause she lets you, she’s adamant. It’s her fault.
(…)
All right. Let’s try a new segment. We did this the other day for our round table, not, I’m sorry, not a round table on our flagship too with, with April and April had a good time. It’s called ask a grock. And I think I’ll ask the first question of, of grock. Grock, do you know what scrub radius is?
(…)
Yeah. We’re breathing is a technique to calm your nerves and focus your mind. It’s called square because it follows a four part cycle. I’m sorry. I said scrub radius. Okay.
(…)
No worries. I got you. Square radius isn’t really a standard term, but it sounds like you might be referring to the radius of a circle inscribed. I don’t think you can hear me. Does anybody have a question for Grock? I mean, you may have to use phonetics for Grock. Grock. What is scrub radius?
(…)
Shit. I’m not in the business of handing out rooms. Did you mean like a square foot or some wild geometric hotel? Oh, that didn’t work. It’s like you’re stirring up a storm with square radius though. So I want you to do me a favor. We have Greg Henderson here of unofficial use only and he likes wearing kilts. Can you give Greg any kind of idea about what the bad idea about wearing kilts if it’s a good or a bad idea?
(…)
All right. So if Greg Newsom’s out here rocking kilts unofficially, there’s some pros and cons to break down for him. He’s all about that breeze.
(…)
All right. So Greg Newsom’s out here rocking kilts. Let’s break it down for him. Pros. Kilts are crazy comfortable, loose, breathable, and great for hot days, especially if he’s in a warm climate. They’re versatile too. You can dress him up for a little bit. You can dress him up for weddings or keep it chill for casual hangs. Plus there are bold style.(…) All right. Does anybody have anybody have another question for Grock? Where we wrap this up. Grock ask Grock a question.
Hey Jeepers, it’s Tony here for the Jeep Talk Show. We’re not like everyone else and neither are our rides. While they’re worried about parking lot dings, we’re out there earning battle scars. But your windshield, that deserves better than becoming another casualty. Windshield Defense by Racing Optics is built for people like us, the ones who see a road closed sign as a suggestion. Triple layer, race tested and tougher than a $2 steak. Give me the ketchup please. Installs in just under 30 minutes because we know patience isn’t your strong suit. Got chips or scratches from your latest adventure? This peel off the top layer and you’re good to go. It’s like having a reset button for your windshield. And we all know how much we love a good do-over. Made in the USA for over 25 years, just like the spirit that drives us. Save 20% with code JTS20 at windshielddefense.com. Free shipping anywhere in the US. Stay different, stay protected. Windshield Defense, a clear choice.
(…)
Yeah, all right. All right, Grock. Thank you. Thank you very much. I’m sorry that you couldn’t understand scrub radius. I’m sorry. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I think the purpose of the scrub radius, when I asked about scrub radius, I was talking about the beeps, the tires depends on how they’re offset in the back spaces for the scrub radius of the tires. And you don’t know anything about that.
(…)
Gotcha. Square radius on Jeep tire. That’s about the body of the offset and back space affect the tires fit. All right, Grock. Well, thank you very much. You, you’ve, you’ve embarrassed the Jeep park show. Oh my God. All right, let’s move on to the next subject here, Jeep steering. So many of the Jeeps, modern day Jeeps these days have aluminum knuckles.
(…)
Does anybody have any information that for the newbies out there that maybe they don’t even know what, why aluminum is a bad thing for knuckles? Maybe they don’t even know what knuckles are.
(…)
So I think it’s a, I’ve got them on my 2021 Jeep Gladiator and I don’t want aluminum ones. I want
I think first of all, you got to talk about why they went to aluminum,(…) right? It’s just that whole cost of weight savings because a mandated EPA,(…) right?
(…)
So the knuckles are the part that the joint that actually pivots on the ball joints. That’s how your front tire is turning. I’ll let you go any, another direction besides straight. And that’s not the only, they didn’t stop aluminum on the knuckles. I mean the doors, the hood, I believe are all aluminum. Maybe some more aluminum on there.
(…)
The tailgate.
(…)
The top are all, yeah, it’s all that aluminum stuff and it’s all part of the weight savings. That’s why they went to it. You know, which the door is not going to take the kind of abuse that your front suspension is taking, right?(…) And you start putting more weight in the tires, the bigger wheels, like we were talking about, and that’s put more stress on the ball joints. The ball joints press into like holes, essentially like a don hole in the knuckle, like joints all together.
(…)
And as it stresses, it’s moving that ball joint where it’s pressed into that hole back and forth and it kind of wall wall or swallows. How do you say the text? Waller? Waller’s Waller’s Waller’s. I’m gonna say wallows because that’s the proper way to say it. Wallows the whole out where it’s no longer a circle becomes an oval and the ball joints are going to be out of that quicker. That is not the dang right way to say it. It is waller.
(…)
Was that Chuck?(…) No, which is a town in Texas, Waller, Texas.
(…)
So, but yeah, that’s that’s the, and I’m just, that’s just the very basic, basic of it. The whole point of this is your rear axle wheels are just moving straight, right? Your front, you have these knuckles that allow the tires to turn. That’s connected to your tire rods. When you say turn, because wheels obviously turn or cycling circles, but this allows you to change directions that are straight. So it allows you to turn left and right. That’s what the knuckles are there for.(…) Yeah.
(…)
Well,(…) so, and I think one of the things that you would notice if the, the holes in the, the knuckles start getting wallared out is you would have a little more trouble keeping the vehicle centered on the highway, especially on surfaces.
(…)
You know, I’m working over here and I get muted. What the hell?
(…)
He’s in rice.
(…)
Oh, that’s not very polite.
(…)
Yeah. What do you call me earlier today? This off. What did I call you?
(…)
I said, I said, you can’t understand normal thinking. Oh, okay.(…) Well, I think it’s good to point out too, even with field knuckles, you can still wallow out those holes. Sure. Like in my TJ currently, my ball joints are welded in because those holes got wallowed out.(…) So he said wallowed in the same wall or I’ll say wallowed.
(…)
So so a set of read knuckles to replace those on a jail. I’m looking at them online here. The price runs between 550 and $600 a piece. So I was looking because Nichols or Nicole and I were talking about this on the flagship episode that was published today and I looked it up. I think I was over on Northridge and for the Dana 44 gladiator, it was 399 a piece. I expected it to be more. I thought it was around 500 as well. So I was talking while I was looking it up. So maybe I looked it up wrong, but and there’s more than just read that makes them. But I think read is would be the record though the brand I went with. A lot of people have the question, right? Typical car maintenance is well, you change your oil every thousand miles. So many miles you do things just that problem is all going to depend on individual use and stress as you put it under. Right. And like, don’t get me wrong, like I’m building tons for my Jeep right now. Read the read knuckles for tons are like well over $1,000.
(…)
So yeah, depending on your level, prices go up.
(…)
Yeah. Uh,(…) yeah, there is a, there is on summit, there is read, read racing, heavy duty steering knuckles 399, but it doesn’t, it doesn’t say it’s for us for JK.
(…)
Yeah. I was just looking and it did the one I was looking up was JK. So I’m trying to find the 18 right now.
(…)
And the one I’m finding for the JT gladiator JT heavy duty. Uh, and that’s not a read. It’s a jacket is 499.(…) Uh, the read racing is 995 in poly performance for a set that’s for both sides.
(…)
So it’s about a thousand bucks, 1,000 to 1200.
(…)
Yeah. And I don’t know that they’re necessary, uh, that that’s something that you really have to do. Um, but, uh, I figure if you’re putting in, uh, some RCVs and, uh, doing other things, trusting your axle, maybe all that stuff that, uh, putting, taking the aluminum knuckles might be a good thing to do. All the rest of this stuff. How much is just a factory set of steel knuckles?
(…)
Oh, that’s a good question.
(…)
Probably twice the price. Maybe you find them on eBay. Front door motion.
(…)
Front tree motion.
(…)
Someone’s getting invaded.
(…)
I heard that there might be, and I’m correct me if I’m wrong, maybe I heard wrong, but there’s just sleeve you can put in there and the aluminum’s.(…) Has anybody seen her hurt that? No, I thought I heard that somewhere.
(…)
That’s something that I’m surprised that they didn’t do because I mean, you know, this aluminum blocks are a thing. You get the, the displacement, but you don’t have the weight and then they sleeve the cylinders with steel. They could have done the same thing with the, with the, the, I mean, I know it would have been more expensive, but certainly it would have been better for getting that whole lot out. Well, I mean, even with the locks, they even sleeve, you know, cast iron blocks. Those are good.
(…)
Let’s see.
(…)
Rockjock has some for eight 99.
(…)
Yeah. The JLs are.
(…)
Yeah. The JLs are not.
(…)
Yeah.
(…)
Expensive.(…) Well, shit. Well, I thought expensive. My buddy bought a 20, 25. So he had a lot of money. I’m not sure. I’m not sure. What do you bought a 20, 25. So here are any sin to have a warranty work. They give him a sport to drive off the lot. The damn sport was $50,000.
(…)
I was like, you got to be freaking kidding me.
(…)
Let’s see.
(…)
What rock auto says a factory said if they had the factory once.
(…)
Oh, that’s a good place.(…) Looks like one figured out what day it is. Here’s one on eBay. OEM, more par front passenger, right? Staring knuckle JL Rubicon Rubicon’s are still right.
(…)
No, three 90 twos are still. Oh, well, no, I think the Rubicon’s are still as well.(…) Rubicon and the hobby and three 90 twos. Okay. What says this to 80 for one. My wife’s Rubicon. I don’t know if I just missed something, but here’s the jail. Rubicon. It’s got aluminum knuckles. Yeah. So does mine. Okay.
(…)
Okay.
(…)
So three 92 put the three 92 is for factor or steal.
(…)
Knuckle three 92 a dormant knuckle is about two 20 each.(…) The Mopar is out of stock. So it doesn’t give me a price.
(…)
But for the dormants, which is just a little bit of a quality ish ish is about 500 per set.
(…)
All right. I’m not reading all that Travis. Why don’t you come on here and actually talk.
(…)
I just wrote a novel in the chat. I’m not sure. I’m not sure. I’m not sure. I’m not sure. I’m not sure. I’m not sure. I’m not sure. I’m not sure. It’s not the novel of the chat.
(…)
On Northridge, the Reed Racing, HD lift. This is for higher steering. I don’t want to, I don’t want to. I’m not changing. You’re smart.
(…)
Yeah, 499.
(…)
Well, that’s the other thing too, with a lot of the read stuff, you automatically get buy steered.
(…)
All right, read racing, HD replacement, I call driver side, we’re going to add it to the cart.
(…)
And let’s see,(…) try the super secret code(…) Patreons drivers.
(…)
See if it gives me off.
(…)
Oh, it says it’s free.
(…)
U-Pawing code doesn’t work for.
(…)
Another thing with like, Rockado there’s always some 5% code, which isn’t a lot, but 5% on like, yeah 5% on 500 adds up.
(…)
Yeah, helps with shipping.
(…)
It’s the 5% code?
(…)
Google it, there’s always one.
(…)
Just give me your credit card information, Tony, I’ll get you my military discount on it.
(…)
Will you keep it at your house and put it on your Jeep?
(…)
No, I’ll ship it to you, I just have your card number, so I might have to buy something, fit online. I can order another card as soon as it goes through.
(…)
Report that one stolen, each a lesson. (Laughs)
(…)
All right, well, let me ask you this, is anybody happy with their aluminum knuckles? I think the general thing is, is that unless you’re beating the hell out of your Jeep, the aluminum knuckles are fine.
(…)
Well, I’m at 75,000. Haven’t had any problems with the lights yet. Yeah, 75,000, I can’t complain, I mean, we’ll see.
(…)
Manufacturers spend millions and millions of dollars to test all this stuff, so they wouldn’t put it out. Yeah, they never designed something faulty either.(…) Well, no, but I mean, something that integral,
(…)
I mean, unless you’re just beating the crap out of it, you’re probably gonna be fine.
(…)
Yeah,(…) but designing it for stock rims and stock tires is not the same as, I mean, the weight of them tires and everything goes way up fast. I mean, I mean, it’s– The Jeep doesn’t have aluminum knuckles.
(…)
Yeah, the Jeep doesn’t have a radiator half the time either. Wait, hold on though, didn’t they design the JL to be able to put 37s on?
(…)
I don’t know. That’s true. I thought they did. I think you’re right.
(…)
Yeah,(…) they also designed the front end steering it, and it’s a little wobbly, get it up off.(…) Yeah, the aluminum knuckles on my TJ are made out of steel, so they work pretty good. You are right, Steve. My aluminum radiator did fail, and I threw it away and put a factory bar right.
(…)
(Steve Laughs) And I don’t know. I’m over here in the corner working away, trying to comment, and I can’t, because somebody keeps fucking muting me. Because all we hear is, “Rattle, rattle, thunderclutter, bing, bang, bang.” It was really over-paddle power. I’m really surprised that he was really holding himself back, because I knew there was like 10 times in there I think he was going to say something, and I didn’t hear him. I was like, “Oh, is he still going to?” You need one of those little meters that shows when I’m yelling in the background.
(…)
Jesus, I don’t even remember what I wanted to say. I was so wound up.
(…)
Well, the floor is yours. The aluminum knuckle, good idea to leave it or replace it with steel, Greg?
(…)
It’s hot. It’s hot, though. Well, it should be a pretty good indication when the OE, which is cheap,
(…)
doesn’t put it on anything they think you’re going to off-road with.
(…)
Right? So they build you a 392 with big tires. Oh, no, can’t go on that. Oh, they build you a Rubicon. Oh, no, can’t go on that. They build anything that they think is going to go off-road. They don’t put them on. Well, there’s your reason. I thought they were on some of the Rubicons. That’s what we’re hearing, Greg.(…) Well, they were on some of the Rubicons, but not so much anymore. Probably just the blue ones, because they figured they were taking off-road.(…) Just the maw crawler Rubicon.(…) But you also have to realize for the OE, right, and this is forced glances for 4G,
(…)
95% of Wranglers purchased don’t go off-road. Right. So it doesn’t really matter.
(…)
And I’d bet it’s higher than that.
(…)
Yeah, it’s probably higher than that, but so the basis is that 95% of them don’t get used and abused, so it’s not as important.
(…)
If you’re into off-roading, ditch the aluminum knuckles.
(…)
Right, if you’re on stock tires and you’re into off-roading, ditch the aluminum knuckles.
(…)
There we go, I like that.
(…)
Makes it easy.
(…)
Yeah. Don’t even have to go to AEV and see what they have over there to cheat.
(…)
Well, I don’t think that they sell an aftermarket knuckle over there, but yeah, it’s, you know, if you’re gonna be more hardcore and you’re gonna get into off-roading, it doesn’t matter if you have a sport, a Sahara, you know, whatever soccer mom Jeep you own, it doesn’t matter. It’s very easy and it’s relatively cheap to buy the steel knuckles or the cast knuckles.(…) Just get rid of the aluminums. Put those on, put some good steering on like steer smarts, do a couple other things and enjoy your Jeep without the failure points. Absolutely. Have you used those ball joint elites yet, Greg?
(…)
No, I saw them yesterday. I was upstairs and saw them sitting on the shelf, but no, I still haven’t installed them. I’m just curious. I’m sure you will, but let us know if you use those and what you think about them. I think it was a great idea, but I know there’s been at least one failure out at Moab, so I don’t know how good they are.
(…)
Yeah, I mean, I’ve seen several failures, but I’ve seen lots of ball joint failures.(…) So I don’t know. And even though the red version that they’re on now, when I got my first set, that was one of their early, early sets.(…) And their design is almost completely different today than it was then. Oh really? Because they’ve had to make, yeah, they’ve made improvements.
(…)
So it’s probably a stellar idea. I just, I haven’t physically used it or have I needed to. And the vehicle that I got them for that has JK knuckles(…) is my Roxor. And my Roxor only has 3000 miles on it. Now, mind you, it’s 3000 miles, almost a hundred percent in hardcore off-road situations,(…) but it’s still zero miles, right? So it,(…) I haven’t needed them.
(…)
And I think I sold the Roxor. So I’m just waiting for the check to show up and then I’m gonna cut it all up.
(…)
So.
(…)
So, quick question, will JK knuckles fit on a JL?
(…)
I don’t know. I haven’t tried that. So I don’t know.
(…)
I know that the axles are,(…) they have a lot of similarities, but they’re not the same. I know all the steering’s different. There’s the, yeah, the weld on bracketry is different.
(…)
So like when I did the Roxor, I chose to, the ball joints that I used, I put Dynatrac ball joints on it, which were some of the best.
(…)
They’re the most expensive, but they’re also the best at the time. It was before they were bought out by the Chinese company.
(…)
And the knuckles that I used are actually the Dynatrac knuckles. So they’re the replacement knuckles for a JK. So they’re super, super heavy duty. In fact, my intersees and the outer knuckles are both Dynatrac units. So they’re incredibly heavy duty compared to the factory stuff because I didn’t ever want to have to weld to the intersees and brace them up because I knew how I was going to drive the thing. I knew I was going to be pissed out of it.
(…)
I knew it only had Dana 44s, but I wanted to build those Dana 44s as strong and as humanly possible so that I could drive circles around people with Dana 60s and laugh and point and go, “Ha ha ha, you spent too much money.” Sleepers.
(…)
Yeah.(…) I got a quick question. It’s in the ballpark.
(…)
How do you test your bowl joints to see if they’re L? Big ass screwdriver.
(…)
Yeah, honestly, big ass screwdriver, pry bar.
(…)
You can just jack the front end up a little bit and you can manipulate the wheel. So you can,(…) you know, you get the wheel off the ground and then the wheel is pulling down on the ball joints. And then you take a big ass screwdriver or a pry bar or something and put them, you know,
(…)
between the inner C and the outer C, so the knuckle and the inner C, and you pry on it. And they’re allowed to have a certain amount of up and down movement. So you have to look at your factory specs to see if it’s within factory spec because they do allow,(…) and I forget what it is. I think I’m JK. It was almost an eighth of an inch of up and down movement.
(…)
But if it’s more than that, you start to worry.
(…)
And with the inception of JK and now JL, the ball joint is a different construction than what we’re used to. So on your TJ, the ball joint is a hardened steel ball(…) inside of a hardened steel socket, right? And that’s it, that’s your ball joint. And that ball joint slides on that with a little film of grief.
(…)
And then you have the JK, with the JK and JL, because they wanted it to be more of a family friendly vehicle. They wanted it to be, you know, have more of a supple ride and a smoother ride.(…) They took that steel ball and that steel socket,
(…)
and then they put a big plastic shim in between the two so that that plastic shim would absorb some of the road feel.(…) The problem with it is the plastic shim gets beat up and wears out. That’s why JK and JL ball joints wear out much faster than earlier vehicles. And when they wear out, you get more space in there and then you get, everything gets loose. And would you say that whenever your ball joints are bad, you can usually tell it by just driving down the highway because you get a lot of wandering out of it?
(…)
Well, you can get wondering, you can start getting a lot of tire wear because your tire will start to cock in. So it wears the inside of the tire out a lot faster.
(…)
Also,(…) death wobble is a great example, right? So death wobble is a harmonic resonance. It is actually not due to a faulty component. However, when you have a faulty component, like a bad ball joint or multiple ball joints that are bad,(…) when it starts, that harmonic resonance will take over because of that bad component, whether it be an imbalanced wheel or a shitty ball joint or a shitty tire rod end. And then you learn what death wobble is.
(…)
And a lot of the, most of the time it’s just from an imbalanced wheel starts it off. But as soon as death wobble happens, it’s such a violent occurrence.(…) It destroys, if there’s any life left in your ball joint, it’s gone pretty quick. If there’s any life left in any of your steering components, it’s gone really quick. I mean, it even destroys transmission mounts and engine mounts and even all the steering joints, like all the way up to the steering wheel because it’s so violent. So that’s why when you see somebody starting to experience it, you know, you fix it as soon as possible because you’re just opening yourself up to a lot more issues.
(…)
Two years ago, I had a client, they found me on the internet because I had made some dissertation about death wobble at some point.
(…)
And they found me and they were relatively local and he’s like, well, my daughter started getting death wobble in Denver.
(…)
And she drove from Denver all the way back here to Michigan with extreme death wobble. Like every time she hit 45 miles an hour in a bump, it would go into full on death wobble.(…) And she drove it all the way home, right? She just kept dealing with it by the time she got here. And I don’t know how many times she experienced death wobble, my guess was this probably 50 or 60 times. By the time she got here,
(…)
every piece of steering was bad. Her ball joints were bad. Her front, upper and lower control arm joints were bad. Her motor mounts were bad and her trans mount was bad, right? So it ended up being like an $8,000 repair bill with all of the parts and labor to repair everything. And I felt horrible, but at the same token, I couldn’t do it for free. In fact, I think at $8,000, I saved her like $4,000 over the dealership. I can’t believe she drove it that far with death wobble. That almost takes guts, maybe. Yeah, well, and she was like a 19 year old girl. And every time it happened, she’d just slam on the brakes until it went away and then she’d start going again. And it was funny too, because she knew nothing about it. She did a couple of minutes of research online and found out that it was a bad component somewhere.(…) But she learned that 45 miles per hour is like the worst spot for it.(…) So when she’d leave a gas station, she would floor it until she got to like 70 or 80 because then she would experience it. (Laughing) That’s what I was about to say. If you can get through that speed where you get it fast enough, you might not have it at a faster speed. Like I don’t like to drive my Jeep on the road because it’s terrible, but I had to drive it to work a couple of days and I had that same thing around 40 miles an hour and start hopping around. But if I could get through 40 miles an hour fast enough, I’d get a little shimmy and it’d smooth back out. Yeah, the harmonic residents didn’t get a chance to take hold.(…) Yeah. Well, and a lot of people don’t know that is if you go into full on death level, and most people get a little shake and they’re like, “Oh, it’s death level.” No, no, full on death level is frightening. But yeah, you think you’re gonna die. When you look out the window and you can see your wheel dancing around.(…) Yeah, and there’s two ways to get out of death level. One, slam on the brakes and come– Speed up. Yeah, just low down or speed up, it’s a harmonic.
(…)
Or floor it and get that thing. And if it’s typically it starts about 45 miles an hour, right in that realm is where the harmonic residents was the best.(…) But when you’re full on death,
(…)
finally stop shaking.
(…)
It’s pretty exciting.
(…)
All right, everyone, that’s a wrap for this week’s Jeep Talk Show Roundtable. Big thank you to all of our Zoom participants. You guys make this so much fun and informative every week. And of course, a shout out to everyone that watches us on YouTube.
(…)
This episode comes out every Wednesday. So you can join the recording on Tuesday or watch the video on Wednesday.(…) Quite often you can see what Greg’s working on. Looks like he’s got a Dodge Ram in there this week.
(…)
So it’s always something different. Usually Jeeps though. Remember, you can join us again next Tuesday at 7.30 p.m. Central Time for more Jeep Talk random questions and always a few rabbit trails. Don’t forget to visit jeeptalkshow.com slash contact to find out how you can be part of the conversation. Oh, and you know, I haven’t mentioned this in a while. Obviously we have a website jeeptalkshow.com. You can go right there if you don’t know how to watch or listen to the show. That is absolutely the easy way to do that. You can just go to jeeptalkshow.com and right there on the very front page will be the latest Jeep Talk show episode. And you can listen to it or watch it episode by episode right there. We’re also on Spotify. I love Spotify. I think Spotify is just wonderful because you can switch while you’re listening, you can switch the video and then back to audio if there was something that you wanted to see. So Spotify does a really good job with their player. So it’s just an app that you can put on your phone and consume the Jeep Talk show that way. Some people like the YouTube, they’ve got a fire TV set up and a TV set up in their garage that they use to help them work on their vehicles by watching YouTube videos. And when they’re not watching YouTube videos for working on their vehicle, they’re watching the show.
(…)
And of course they’re not watching it 100%. They may be working on their Jeep, doing other things, but they can listen and look up at the TV whenever something interesting comes on. Like every time they hear Rick’s voice, I think they’re looking up at the TV.
(…)
I get that.
(…)
It also too, I think it’s kind of interesting. I love seeing you guys working on your vehicles while you’re here on the round table. I think that’s always really cool that we don’t have people just sitting in front of the computer in their house, they’re outside working on their Jeep.(…) Of course we see Greg doing that all the time. Greg’s always working on something, but we haven’t seen Rick working on his Jeep in a while. Rick, are you down to your reason why we’re not seeing Rick work on it? Nope, it’s just been so stinking hot and the mosquitoes here in Arkansas will carry you off. Yeah, put them to work. They also be able to torque things, close the wing. All right, so thanks again and we’ll see you next week. You guys have a great week.
Broadcasting Sense 2010
(…)
You’re my friend, you’re my new friend.