Novak Conversions Jeep Wrangler JK engine mounts

Project Detonator - My 2016 JKUR Hard Rock Edition

Unfortunately, I have the stock radio, so I don't know (or it didn't register with me as a concern) about those claims. But I'll take a stab at it. It mounts in 2 locations close to the window. Those obviously won't be any issues with an aftermarket stereo. If you look in my pictures, in the dead center there is a small plate that says "Vector" on it. That plate goes down in to the storage area. You have to remove the liner from the storage area. Once removed, it exposes a screw. That screw is removed and then reinserted once the docking station is installed. It's another fastening point. I never payed attention to what that screw actually goes into. It is directly above the radio. I can't imagine the screw actually mounts into the top of the radio, but if it does, that could be why an aftermarket stereo couldn't be used. Now one of the Alpine stereo's I have seen actually has its own plastic bezel that sticks out further than the stock dash and I believe might use up part of that top storage tray. I definitely could see the docking station that I installed not working with that aftermarket stereo option.
Thanks! I appreciate it. If it reuses that same screw in the storage area, I think it will work fine.
 
I took 10 minutes to install some DV8 Offroad Aluminum Door Handle Inserts yesterday. I must have been mad at my money! Zero function, but they went with the aluminum accessory color. I'm almost wishing I went with black. Oh well. They are on.

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I took 10 minutes to install some DV8 Offroad Aluminum Door Handle Inserts yesterday. I must have been mad at my money! Zero function, but they went with the aluminum accessory color. I'm almost wishing I went with black. Oh well. They are on.

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I have a set of these as well. I cant decide if I want to install them or not... 🤨. Yours look good. Mine are just black. Did you drill or just screw them in? I have seen where they can get thrown off really easily and look like trash.
 
I have a set of these as well. I cant decide if I want to install them or not... 🤨. Yours look good. Mine are just black. Did you drill or just screw them in? I have seen where they can get thrown off really easily and look like trash.

I pre-drilled. I held them in place and pre-drilled 1 hole. Then tightened the screw down and repeated the process on the opposite side.

Be careful when drilling. Obviously you don't want to go through and hit sheet metal. I was being careful and somehow broke the drill bit off halfway through. Luckily there was enough of the broken bit sticking out I was able to grab it and spin it out with a needle nose vice grips. I was also lucky enough I had a second drill bit to finish the job. Like I said, I was being careful and still broke the bit.
 
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I picked up these brackets today from a local body shop. I dropped them off a few days ago to be color matched. They look good in the back of the Jeep. We'll see how they look on it. Still crazy busy with work. Hope to get some time to install soon. These brackets will be supporting one of my "Black Friday" purchases!

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Brrrrrrrr......It's cold outside. I had some free time this weekend so I couldn't let the cold weather get in the way of progress. I was able to get those brackets installed along with a Baja Designs Linkable light bar. It has 8 of the XL Sport lights linked together. Looking forward to seeing how well they light up the night.

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As promised, here are a few pictures with the lights on. The back story goes like this: Jeep's stock headlights are horrible. These are the lights that I replaced them with.

JW Speaker 8700 Evolution J3 Heated Series Headlight Kit, Graphite
JW Speaker Trail 6 Pro Kit
Baja Designs XL 80, LED - Driving Combo - Front Bumper
Baja Designs Jeep JK, XL Linkable Roof Bar Kit

The first picture below shows the JW Speaker headlights only on low beam. These are considerably better than the stock Jeep lights. I still need to do some slight adjusting on the passenger light to bring it up slightly. However, I am happy with these lights.

The second picture shows the JW Speaker headlights only on high beam. These give great light down road. It's more focused straight ahead. The peripheral light doesn't increase, but you can see quite a ways straight ahead. Again, I am happy with these.

The third pictures shows the JW Speaker lights still on high, but with the JW Speaker Trail 6 Pro Kit on as well. I have these set to amber. You can see the amber coloring down low in front. To be honest, these lights were just a bonus. I wasn't really expecting much from them. I wanted to add some sort of fog light and I wanted to add some amber lights to the front for visibility. With the turn signal built into the headlights it allowed me to go with this option. My opinion, I got what I was wanting. Although, I haven't had a chance to try them in the fog yet. These lights are just ok. I got my amber light that I was wanting. I like the fact you can switch between white and amber. The JW Speaker app is pitiful in my experience. I have a difficult time getting the blue tooth to connect. FYI: These don't put out a lot of light in my opinion.

The fourth picture has the headlights still on high beam, the amber trail 6 pro lights on, and the Baja Designs XL-80's on. Wow, I love these lights. For what its worth, I bought all of these lights mentioned in this post at the same time. I just never installed them all at the same time. To be honest, after having these XL-80's hooked up, I'm not sure if I would have bought the linkable light bar. These lights are incredible. Possibly my favorite out of all of them. I love the light these put out.

The last picture shows the headlights on high beam, the amber trail pro 6 lights on, the XL-80's on, and the linkable roof lights on as well. This picture gets some glare. I have not had a chance to aim any of the lights on the linkable roof bar. Between the snow flakes and the glare off the roof this picture doesn't do any justice. Together, they put out a lot of light as well. I'm happy with the lights, but I think I can make them better with some proper aiming. I love the look as well.

Hope this helps! Oh, and for reference, those trees are about 120-130 yards away.

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Well, its been a few weeks since I have made any upgrades. Kind of been waiting for the cold weather to move out too. Jumped in the rig Easter morning only to be greeted with a dead battery. Woohoo! I've been waiting for this moment. I purchased the Genesis dual battery kit months ago. It's just been sitting there waiting for me to install it. This finally gave me the opportunity I was looking for. I finished it up last night and to my surprise, the darn thing started right up and everything else seems to work as well. It's a miracle! I have a few more accessories I need to wire up now. I'll post those as I go. Unfortunately, I never took any before, or during pictures. This is all you get...

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I'm growing quite fond of those fenders. The more I look at them, the more I like them.

Yeah, I like the more narrow ones even better. Since the build was supposed to be more geared towards overlanding, I opted for a little more tire coverage. Maybe if I ever get those fender inner liners installed they will look even better. Hopefully coming soon.
 
Yeah, I like the more narrow ones even better. Since the build was supposed to be more geared towards overlanding, I opted for a little more tire coverage. Maybe if I ever get those fender inner liners installed they will look even better. Hopefully coming soon.

I'm with you on that too. On my TJ I have the GenRight 0" fenders so they don't even have a fender flare at all. I'm a fan of the smaller flare for sure.
 
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I was waiting to wire in the ARB dual air compressor until after I completed the dual battery project. Well, that is now complete. Everything on the air compressor is wired and working. I used the sPod to switch the power on and off. While I was wiring, I went ahead and also installed the Genesis Offroad G Screen Dual Battery Monitoring System. I wasn't exactly sure where to install it, but ended up cutting part of the dash on the passenger side just above the speaker. It didn't turn out too bad.

Also addressed the rear inner fender wells. I installed some Artec Industries Rear Inner Fenders. I had always planned on painting them black, but went ahead and installed them in the bare aluminum color just to see what they would look like. Yuck.... I didn't even get a picture to compare they looked so bad! lol I masked off parts and sprayed them black. Its probably just me, but I prefer the toned down look. Hopefully I will get some time to get the fronts installed this week.

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Made some mechanical upgrades last week. For some added strength, I had Yukon chromoly front and rear axles installed. I knew running the stock 3.73 gears was only a temporary nuisance. Yukon 4.88 gears were swapped in as well. The stock diff covers were also replaced with the Yukon hardcore iron diff covers. Lastly, I wanted to address the stock brakes. I had the Black Magic JK Big Brake Kit installed.

The family is heading West this summer. I believe this is the last of the mechanical upgrades that I'm going to make at this point. The rig should be capable of some overlanding adventures and hopefully some light to mid level trail duty as well. I attached a few pictures to show the progress.

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Finished up a few creature comfort mods last night. Preparing for our trip out West, I purchased a few storage bags. I added two of the Bartact bags that hang off of the roll bar in the back seat. I also added a Warn bag which hangs off of the front grab bar.

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I also installed the Goose Gear side cubbies and Base Plate. It's hard to see in the pictures, but off to either side of the back seat I also added some USB outlets so my daughter and other passengers have plenty of places to charge their electronics. That is also where I installed the Dometic wiring outlets for the fridge. My next project is to get the slide and fridge mounted.

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Lastly, I mounted a 1" ram ball mount to the passenger grab bar. I'll be using this to hold a tablet running Gaia.

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I mounted a Dometic slide and CFX3 55IM refrigerator to the back this weekend. Not too many more things I want to get done before we take a few trips this summer.

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Novak Conversions Jeep Wrangler JK engine mounts