Jeeps. Who uses them as part of your wood scrounging arsenal?

Mine is a major asset for off property scrounging. Load the jeep with saws and fuel, pulling a 5x10 trailer with 33x12.5 tires for rolling over dead fall and through soft ground, mud, deep snow.
Hauls roughly 3/4 a cord.

I don't see many others using a jeep for this. I can't be the only one.
Post your jeep setups if you got them.

 

Nice setup!!

 

I used to always have a winch on my trucks, so my Jeeps were not used for firewood scrounging. My current truck doesn't have a practical way to mount a permanent winch, so I have a Warn multi-mount with a 9.5 winch that goes in the receiver hitch. Kind of a PITA sometimes so what I do a lot now is load gear up in the Jeep (saws and stuff, ropes, chains, and skidding cone) and go scouting in the morning for dead and down. If I find something, I'll cut it into manageable lengths, winch it to the road with the Jeep, and then go back to get the truck to finish the job and haul the timber home. Most of my scrounges are only a few miles from the house so it's not an issue, I just have to hope that no one else scoops my scrounges during the back-and-forth trip. I've been looking for an M416 trailer to tow behind the Jeep but don't want to have too much weight behind it (I scrounge in the mountains and that's a lot of weight for Jeep brakes and GVWR going downhill).

 

I haven’t been wood cutting since I got my Jeep a year ago, my work schedule has been a problem since my dedicated account closed, and I became a pool driver, the money has been Great, but my off time is reduced and unpredictable. We are burning wood now that was cut in 2019 and 2020, but that supply is getting low, but should get us through this winter, but we will be hitting the cutting areas Hard once they open, probably between 5-10 Feet of snow right now.

I got a new 2021 Wrangler a week before Christmas 2020, it has the 3.0 liter Turbo Diesel, 260hp/442 ftlbs of Torque, I Love it.

I have 35x12.50/17R Toyo AT3’s on it, and a Rugged Ridge Front bumper carrying a Warn XD9500i winch. I mounted a DV8 rear bumper with the spare tire carrier, the 35” tires and wheels are heavier than I wanted mounted on the tailgate. I need to readjust the spare tire height, it rides too low to use my rear Reciever mounted winch, but that will usually not be going along wood cutting, unless I carry it in the trailer

The Jeep will mainly be used as a “Support Vehicle “ pulling my 6x10 enclosed trailer loaded with saws, fuel and other gear, eventually the splitter, when I get the “E Track” installed for tying things down, and putting in decking to load above the splitter, and possibly sleeping in.

I still have the “Big Red Truck “ that the Grandogter, Loves so much, Ol’ Red will still be the work horse hauling the 6x12 tandem open trailer for hauling wood.

It will mean that the Wife will have to drive the Jeep, but the saws and gear will be much more secure in the trailer, and Ol’ Red is a 1994 F350, powerstroke with over 250,000 miles on her, the first year of the Powerstroke, and like many first model year vehicles, it has given me more issues than the later model Powerstrokes were known for, so it will be reassuring, to have a second, reliable vehicle when we are miles from cell service, deep in the woods on Forest Circus roads


The Grandogter ready to go wood cutting in her Beloved “Big Red Truck “



The Jeep and trailer are both works in process, the Jeep still really needs a lift, I’m thinking about a Teraflex 4.5” kit, I was originally thinking about an AEV 2.5” kit, but I don’t know that would give me enough clearance for tire chains, and where I, live and the work assignments that I travel to, I need the ability to use chains. There are a few other minor upgrades that I want to do, a half rack, roof rack, I still want to be able to remove the “Freedom Panels” over the cab area, eventually I want to get a Soft top, and axle lockers.

The trailer, I need to install the already mentioned “E Track” and I am seriously considering replacing the 3,500# plain axle, with a Flipped 5,000# axle with brakes. I don’t have the ground clearance that I would like to have, and as much mountain driving as I use the trailer for brakes would be nice to have. When I bought the trailer last April, enclosed trailers were Hard to get, this one, was unassigned, on the production schedule, and was a 2 month wait as it was, it was close to what I wanted, and I didn’t really think about the brakes and ground clearance until after I bought it, an axle swap, should be easy enough, and within reason price wise, I have already run the wheels off it as it is, I use the heck out of it, I would change a few things, but I am Happy with it, and don’t regret buying it. I am really glad that I didn’t wait any longer than I did to buy it, as the prices have gone way up since then, I paid about $4,200, and 2 months ago, I looked out of curiosity, and the same trailer was selling for $6,000



Doug

 

31x10.50x15 tires. Just use it to transfer wood from splitting area to stacking area

 

Better take a look at the right tire on the trailer behind the Jeep, it’s looking a bit low

Good looking fleet for moving wood



Doug

 

No worries. Trailer never leaves the farm or our wooded property.

 

We put a BDS kit on my sons LJ and it went together really well and it rides better than factory. I would highly recommend them. Cost a little more but it’s one of the areas where you get what you pay for. Rig looks good though

 

Think this guy has us all beat...

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Dang, you ain't lying!

I was in the woods skidding logs when I was getting wood from my grandmothers property. My son, who was younger at the time, was spotting me as I crawled through some rough stuff. He pretty much watched a pointy stick, about the size of your wrist, poke a hole in the sidewall of the rear tire. I was so mad at the time as I was going very slow and he could have stopped me. Took a while but I got over it. Had to buy a new tire.

We sold this about 1-1.5yr ago.

8 arm Rustys lift w/ Bilstein shocks, sye, Rubi Dana 44 rear w/ air locker and an electronic locker up front. Regeared, Banks header & cat-back, and the list goes on and on.


Had a lot of fun in that Heep. These were taken at Rousch Creek Offroad Park. Last couple are @ Rock Creek.

 

Nice! Well, other than the tire mishap. My '04 Rubi is getting regeared with 4.88's right now. Lost track of how many money-pit Jeeps I've owned over the years...they're kind of addictive.

 

Forgot about this thread until I got an alert about a new post

I’ve done a few more upgrades, I went with the Teraflex 4.5” lift kit. I added a soft top for the warmer months, and I got the roof rack for the hard top, plus addes four rows of “E Track” in the enclosed trailer, which came in Handy in July. We did a road-trip to Cheyenne, WY to pick up 8 120 gallon propane tanks. We took the “Scenic Route “ and spent 3 days in Moab, UT one of which we spent doing some light wheelin in Arches National Park





The propane tanks had more than Doubled in price in our area, and were out of stock even at that price, with no availability date known.
We were able to order these tanks online through Menards, but their closest store was Cheyenne, and we got them for a bit more than what they used to cost. We have sold 5 already, planned on keeping 2, but are now thinking about keeping the third one, as that will give us two more run days on our whole home back up generator. At this point, what we were able to sell the 5 tanks for, paid for all 8, plus our expenses to go get them

The Jeep is still a work in progress, eventually I plan on adding ARB, air lockers to both axles, and a few other projects, but there are other priorities ahead of those right now

Definitely have to Make time for wood cutting this spring, we are way low on firewood, and mostly saving it for power outages, and together time. Not burning 24/7 like usual, fortunately my excessive hours at work more than offset running the furnace, but the Wife and I both prefer wood heat, it does feel different, we enjoy the fire, and the house is much warmer when heating with wood


Doug

 

With the last few days miserably hot, it was a decent 45 degrees this morning after heavy rains so a good morning to grab a cup of coffee and drive some of the local forest service roads looking for scrounges. Didn't come across any dead and down worth the time and effort but saw one black bear, a bunch of turkeys, and 5,000,000 mosquitoes.