Sgt. GLaDOS: Brass' JT

[Brass]

Finally getting around to starting this thread. Got my JTR September of last year and in the excitement of finally having it I kind of disappeared from the forum.

I decided to name her Sgt GLaDOS. I know there's thousands of JTs named Gladys, though mine's named after the antagonist from the Portal games, so maybe just hundreds named GLaDOS. And of course she gets to be a Sergeant due to her color.
Here she is fresh on the lot on delivery day:

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[Brass]

I switched her top, added a Warn Mid-Height Grille Guard, and took her up into the mountains to get a feel for how she handled:

 

[Brass]

The upgrade that did me in:
I'd picked up Harbor Freight's Badland winch on a recommendation before I even got the Jeep. Chose the Warn winch mount.
A year later I can say neither of those was a bad choice, however the install quickly killed my motivation to work on the Jeep.

I don't know if it was red loctite or cross threading from the factory, but the bolts that held the Skid plate brackets to the frame horns were stripped, and I would later find the nutserts aren't in great shape either. I was fairly disgruntled about it because the Jeep was barely a month old and the dealer kinda blew me off when I asked them to replace the nutserts. I was told it would be weeks before they could even look at it. Then, some of the bolts that Warn included to hold their brackets to the mount plate straight up snapped while being torqued (TO the instructed torque, with a new torque wrench I later tested to make sure it wasn't the problem). To top it all off, getting that bumper back on was REALLY difficult - it did NOT want to go back on the bolts on the frame horns, as if some of them were ever so slightly out of alignment. After a couple hours of fighting with it and holding my tongue just right it finally slid on.
I wound up with a mostly finished physical install, with only a few known bad bolts and I just tied the electrical to the bumper guard in case everything had to come back off to replace the nutserts. Between the exhaustion from the situation, disappointment with the build quality, anxiety over the thought of potentially having to replace the nutserts, and just life happening - it stayed like that for over a solid year before I had the time and motivation to fix it.

 

[Brass]

Can you even see the trail with the windshield down? Looks like it blocks the view.

Yeah, it's awesome - if you're cruising slowly off road, the wind coming through and overall open air feeling is amazing.

 

[Brass]

Window Deflectors - because I like having the windows cracked even when it's raining:

 

[Brass]

Swapped fob to Threedom's mainly because I found it ridiculous that there was no way to give your fob to someone without handing over the key to all your locked storage ?‍

 

[Brass]

I wound up buying high quality stainless replacement bolts and got the winch fully secured and wired up just in time for an offroad training course I signed up for. Shackles are Rhino USA:

 

[KoBear]

Looking good! Picked up the badlands winch myself on Black Friday.

finishing my finals today. Then I’m off from school for a month, so I might actually install my winch/new bumper.

hope you stay motivated and can’t wait to see what you have in mind for Sarge!

 

[Brass]

Looking good! Picked up the badlands winch myself on Black Friday.

finishing my finals today. Then I’m off from school for a month, so I might actually install my winch/new bumper.

hope you stay motivated and can’t wait to see what you have in mind for Sarge!

I was able to use mine at the course and it worked well, but it was a simple demonstration so hardly a test of it.
Good luck on your install! If you're installing on the factory steel bumper, be careful when removing the 2 bolts on each side that connect that front Skid Plate to the frame horns. I hope yours come out clean and go back in easy.

As for me, there's more to come - I just got tired last night and called it a day. I'll catch up today when I get some more time.

 

[Brass]

The install that restored my faith in DIY:
Rock Slide Engineering Step Sliders

Installing these took a decent amount of work, and involved loosening body bolts that apparently like to break. And from what I read if I was concerned about stripped nutserts in the frame horns, broken body bolts would be an absolute nightmare. I almost didn't try but in the end I took my time, hit the body bolts with my heat gun on and off for a bit, and used the quarter-turn out, eighth-turn back in method and successfully got them mounted up with no casualties. For me the rear bolts were the hardest to get moving. 3 days of lunch breaks and evenings to get it done and now I enjoy working on GLaDOS again!

 

[Brass]

Tuffy security center console safe:

 

[Brass]

Rugged Ridge Dashboard Accessory bar:

Seen on it are:
Olight Perun Mini with bicycle bar mount - highly recommend Olight flashlights I have several, and they're all excellent. This one is mounted to conveniently light up my mailbox when I check it at night ?.
The wireless control for the Badland winch.
My wife's Pop Socket mount for her devices.

 

[Brass]

A little led billboard for my windshield - so I can show a light up Jeep wave at night:

It can do pretty much any 32x32 image/animation and comes with some canned options like waves, thumbs up and middle finger. It's designed to be used in the rear window. The little controller mounted on my dash bar allows you to quickly select whatever you want it to show.

 

[Brass]

Found this on Etsy and thought it was a fun idea for anyone looking to Duck my Jeep:

 

[Brass]

ARB Dual Compressor with Grimm Offroad inside fender mount:

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