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CavFab_MFG

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First off, we are super excited to be here. Many of you may not have heard about us, perhaps some may have heard about us but to a very little extent so I will use this first post as an "About Us" and give you all some insight as to who we are, what we do, and the direction we are headed. Also, a forum discount for you guys to use :D

**Disclaimer, this is a fairly long winded detailed post about how we started**

We (CavFab) have been around officially now for around 4 years. We started as a couple of guys who were both involved in the "off-road" scene. I (David) have been in the Jeep scene since 08 when I purchased my first XJ right out of high school. I became completely infatuated with window shopping websites for parts, reading forums, and scrolling through other builds for inspiration. Of course as we all have...I went through my newbie stage asking questions that had been previously answered a million times over and buying less than ideal parts that would eventually be replace after lack-luster performance. From 08 to around 2014 I bought, "built", and sold close to a dozen XJs, a couple of TJs, a couple YJs, and WJ. With each new Jeep I would take the "build" a bit further with nicer parts and more purpose behind the end goal. I spent a good bit of time wheeling here locally and continued to build a better understanding of how different parts and combinations of parts effected the overall performance of the vehicle. Sometime early in my time as a Jeep owner I became an admin on a Cherokee related forum and spent ungodly amount of hours researching parts, builds, and administrating the forum. Moving forward to around 2013 I was driving a 98 2 door XJ and wanted some bumpers that were a bit less cookie cutter than what was offered. I found a local guy (Donovan) who had an unbelievable reputation for designing and building unique parts. Long story short, I dropped the Jeep off with Donovan, gave him an idea of what I wanted and he absolutely delivered. Upon meeting Donovan, I found he was building a way over the top Crew Cab OBS 7.3 F250 that he had dove tailed, thrown Coilovers on, boat-sided, and just all around BUILT. After I picked my Jeep up with its new bumpers I kept in contact with Donovan here and there but not to much extent.

Fast forward to around a year and a half later I had bought and sold a few more XJs (I have a problem yes) and I was in a very clean 01 XJ. I had intentions of this being my end all be all Jeep that I never sold and began setting money back to really go all in with the build. At this time alot had changed in my personal life since I first entered the Jeep scene. I had graduated college (IT), gotten married, had a daughter, and had matured a ton. Not to sound narcissistic but I had become someone that a lot of people from the forum and locally that folks came to for advice on their "builds". Somewhere in this time Donovan had noticed I was planning another build and asked if I had interest in him building some new parts for it. Since I had first hand experience with his work I agreed to sit down with him and plan out what we could explore building. Since our last time working together Donovan had sold his F250 build and had begun the build on a 4th Gen 4Runner (Toyota... I know :P ). This 4runner build was also insanely over the top for what we all consider "built". Donovan had built a full subframe, removed all IFS components, built a Steering Dana 80 (yes D80), hybrid cage, mini boat sides, etc etc. Once we sat down and discussed my XJ we decided to begin with a true 3 link long arm system..and while 3 link long arms already existed in the aftermarket world...most left a bit to be desired. Donovan was working full time as a machinist / engineer but neither of us had any real experience with 3d modeling so we essentially drew this 3 link up on a Waffle House napkin (this has since become an inside joke). We finalized our napkin masterpiece and Donovan went to work. A few weeks passed and Donovan let me know he had something ready that we needed to test fit. Upon first seeing this prototype part I was incredibly surprised to see that our napkin rendition had came to life. Laser cut .25" steel that had been press formed into a gorgeous low profile crossmember. It was at this time I realized that we could be onto something. After a few hours of test fitting and more napkin notes for small tweaks we were confident we would have a ready to install piece after these minor modifications. Fast forward a few weeks and sure enough we installed our first 3 link long arm suspension. I spent the next couple of months putting miles on the kit, wheeling it, and essentially trying to find something wrong with it..I couldn't.

Moving into early 2015 and around 2 months on my new suspension system I had become inundated with people asking where it came from after seeing it on social media. It was at this time I approached Donovan with the idea of building / selling these. Things seemed to fall into place very quickly here. There was already a business license in place from a previous venture of Donovan's so there was very little that needed to be done to make this a legitimate business. Over the course of a few weeks I built a website, and had started really pushing exposure to our kit on the forums and social media. I wrapped the website up while Donovan spent his spare time welding parts together in his parents garage and the ball really started to roll. After selling a few of these 3 link kits we began to explore new parts. An upgraded steering system seemed like the easiest thing to tackle with a welder, some DOM, and a nice tube bender. Thus gave way to our HD steering upgrade for the TJ, LJ, XJ, ZJ, etc. This is where the deer in headlights started for us. Within months of our website being live and essentially selling 2 different parts..we became so overwhelmed with orders that we found it very hard to manage our workload..especially working out of a 2 bay garage that was half taken over by the 4Runner build. After several pep talks, beer, and wine (don't judge bro) Donovan made the decision to quit his day job as an engineer and pursue this full time. This move really allowed us to free up time to design new parts keep up with the demand of orders. Sometime in early 2016 we decided it was time to re-design our first ever product...the XJ 3 link. With feedback from customers and the general public we decided to make some key changes in a complete re-design of this kit. What we settled on was a new 3 piece crossmember that would allow the end user to completely drop the center section of their crossmember without having to touch their actual suspension. This became an invaluable feature as previously any time you needed to service your trans or t-case..you had to drop the suspension, our new design fixed this. I essentially marked the heck out of this and it took off.

We continued to pour orders out and essentially sold 2 products for nearly a year. I made it my main priority to market these parts and really connect with potential customers to inform them on how these parts worked and how they could be beneficial to their builds. In my opinion this was something that I felt was a void in the aftermarket world (at least for the XJ world). The XJ had been around so long the market had become stagnant with parts that had been out for years and while they may have been quality parts from reputable companies...there was something missing when it came to information on how these parts would benefit the end user. This became my mission...to inform people on how our parts worked and what benefit they could bring. Moving into mid 2017 we had become so busy with order fulfillment and some changes in my personal life I decided it was time to sell the XJ. Over the couple of years I had owned it it had become fully equipped with quality parts and had really been used as a marketing tool for us to showcase our parts (all 2 of them lol). I sold the XJ and bought a JKU. Of course all of my XJ fans wanted to crucify me...but this was an opportunity for us to jump into the Wrangler market. Around this time we began to realize that the 2 bay shop behind Donovan's parents house was just no longer sufficient and was creating a bottleneck. After a bit of browsing around we found a decent 5 thousand square foot shop in North West Georgia and moved into our first real shop. With new expenses we realized we needed to expand our product lineup and take the next step in growing CavFab.

The remainder of 2017 involved us developing new parts (mostly XJ / TJ parts) and figuring out how to streamline our manufacturing process in our new space. As I began my JK build we developed an HD steering system and some JK control arms as well as our first Wrangler bumper. As 2017 came to a close we sat down with a plan to really attack 2018 with new products and determined that it would at least be worth while to try and jump in the JL market ASAP as talk of the JL began in the Jeep world. Somewhat out of the blue in early 2018 (February / March) Donovan opens the bay door to the shop and sure enough...there sat a 2018 JLUR. We essentially had no idea what we were going to do with it..aside from trying to jump head first into a new to us market. Around this time we also began to devote time to learning how to 3d model parts. This allowed us to design parts on the computer and get more exacting fitment without near as much trial / error. We became SEMA members and began the process of designing JL parts. At this time we were also fighting some less than ideal situations in our shop and ended up moving to our current facility rather quickly. We made the move into our 12k sq foot facility that we currently operate out of now in hopes of this being our home for many years to come. The new facility has a full show room, and a manufacturing floor well over twice the size of our former location. Throughout the course of 2018 we focused almost solely on the JL market. With the development of our spare tire delete plate, bumpers, and control arms all while continuing to manufacture and fulfill orders for our existing product line for other models.

If you've stuck with me for this long I will try and wrap this up fairly quick. Moving into 2019 we continued our JL / JT product design bringing us to current day. Our JL / JT product line now includes an array of different bumpers (front / rear), an HD tire carrier, our tire delete plate, diff covers, fender deletes, sliders, rocker guards, trusses, among other things. We recently acquired a 2020 JT Rubicon that is being used as our shop test rig (photos below). Being that it is now Q4 and we are wrapping up 2021 we have sat down and planned for even more new products in 2021 for the JT. Our mission continues to be that we design, develop, test, and sell absolutely top notch components that we make right here in the USA. On top of this, we are always more than happy (and actually enjoy) talking with you to help plan your build to best fit your needs and align with your desire to have your vehicle perform and look the way you want it to. As everyone should, we back all of our products by a NO BS lifetime warranty. If you break a part we manufacture, we will replace that part...without question.

So, albeit this long winded history of who we are, where we came from, what we do, and what we plan to do...we thank you for having us here. We are also happy to offer a JT Wrangler Forum Discount code that will work on any CavFab branded part on our website (CavFab.com) for not only the JT but any model.

Coupon Code: JTForum

Some quick teasers featuring some of our prototype JT Parts:

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HjStrater

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Welcome! Love the clean look of the predator front bumper. Got any more photos, specifically of the different hoop options? Interested in the winch guard.
 

Gladiator832

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MAN, David, I'm gonna let you tell my wife this time. Last time I had to tell her where the $ was going - she was mad!
WELCOME!
 

Dlish

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Look like your FB page had step/sliders for the JT pictured back in July. Dont see them on the website though, they available? the picture looks like solid frame mount. More info please.
 

93civej1

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welcome aboard. Im not far at all from you guys.
 

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JohnQ

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Welcome. I got some quality parts from you in the past for my Comanche.
 

James H

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More info on the rock sliders pictured above please.
 

Imbuere

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I'm a fan of the cosmetic look of your stuff. Well done. Any chance you could add the installed weight and installed weight vs. stock component it replaces on your website.

Like the calorie labels on our food, this should be on everything!
 

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GRAN1TE JT

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I’ve been running your vantage front bumper on my jt for a while and I love it! Very well built. You can tell it’s quality. Definitely would buy from you guys again in the future :like:
Jeep Gladiator CavFab Introduction and JT Forum Discount! E0FA4E54-1608-4294-8D95-28095DF9588F
 

Free2roam

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Aluminum front bumper for the diesel JT? Skid plate and lower mount so as not to interfere with diesel cooling issues? Rear bumper in aluminum too with a spare tire carrier that would mount on either side? Also love the full wrap around on the rear bumper. Is it tied into the frame like the Rubi sliders? Any chance on cube light holes in the back bumper? Factory fogs fit in the front?
 
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CavFab_MFG

CavFab_MFG

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Welcome! Love the clean look of the predator front bumper. Got any more photos, specifically of the different hoop options? Interested in the winch guard.
On a JT, but you get the idea (same part number actually). Thanks for the warm welcome, let me know what other questions you have :)

--Dave

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