First of all, the thread title is a bit misleading. I'm not looking to make the Jeep completely waterproof. Here's the scenario: 2015 Unlimited Freedom Edition hard top that we bought used and it came with the basic mopar head unit. This is my wife's daily driver and she needs/wants more features, so I replaced it with a head unit that gives her Apple Car Play, backup camera, and a microphone for calls. All is well. Until I broke it about 18 months after installing it.
We sometimes have to remove the hard top on the weekends in order to go fishing or boating. If we have people with us when we go fishing we can't lay down the back seat, so we take the top off and stand the rods up and secure them to the roll cage. If we are just boating, we have to take the top off to fit the inflated tube and all the other boating stuff, regardless of riders in the backseat or not. This was the case yesterday... top off and.... RAIN. Lots of it... and we were on the boat, so there was nothing I could do. Welcome to Florida in the summer. It's not the first time we we've been caught in the rain, but it's the first time that it happened while the Jeep was sitting still.
So now the head unit is shot. I'm not looking to spend $2k on a water-resistant replacement. Frankly, I could buy 3 or 4 more $350 head units and still would have spent less than the $2k Alpine. Having said that... I'm wondering about a couple things....
1. Can i take the top off, and then put the "Freedom Panels" back on? That would at least allow me the space needed in the back and provide cover for the front. Any issues with this at freeway speeds?
2. I've looked into bikini tops, but they seem to be mostly mesh and not very effective at keeping the rain off the dash... any suggestions for this approach?
Any other thoughts on preventing this in the future?
We sometimes have to remove the hard top on the weekends in order to go fishing or boating. If we have people with us when we go fishing we can't lay down the back seat, so we take the top off and stand the rods up and secure them to the roll cage. If we are just boating, we have to take the top off to fit the inflated tube and all the other boating stuff, regardless of riders in the backseat or not. This was the case yesterday... top off and.... RAIN. Lots of it... and we were on the boat, so there was nothing I could do. Welcome to Florida in the summer. It's not the first time we we've been caught in the rain, but it's the first time that it happened while the Jeep was sitting still.
So now the head unit is shot. I'm not looking to spend $2k on a water-resistant replacement. Frankly, I could buy 3 or 4 more $350 head units and still would have spent less than the $2k Alpine. Having said that... I'm wondering about a couple things....
1. Can i take the top off, and then put the "Freedom Panels" back on? That would at least allow me the space needed in the back and provide cover for the front. Any issues with this at freeway speeds?
2. I've looked into bikini tops, but they seem to be mostly mesh and not very effective at keeping the rain off the dash... any suggestions for this approach?
Any other thoughts on preventing this in the future?
