[Lousypirate]

Here ya go Jim, I'll post up something I slapped together this year.

I wanted a gator, but didn't want to pay for one. I had a 46 willys drivetrain and frame lying around that I picked up for $250. so queue the home depot theme song.

Picked up a set of 35s on 15" rims for $50, one needed a tube (eventually a 2nd needed a tube also).

Picked up an 18hp Duromax engine, electric start for $429 to my door from eBay. Comet CVT clutch, and welded up a sprocket to get the chain drive into the stock t90 case. Added a cutting brake for the rear because I had it lying around, and installed 4 corner disc brakes from Brennan Metcalf using Geo Tracker parts. Welded up a new bench seat, added a front and rear rack, and some headlights.

Added some front and rear reciever tubes to help navigate larger trailers around my new property in the UP.

Here's the cabin, still a lot of work to do. Couple buddies and I ripped the junk front half of the building off and got to work on the rear half. 12x14 lofted building, built with 4x4 timbers in all the wrong ways, but it has been standing the test of time uninhabited for a guessed 25 years. It was 7" out of level, which was fun in it's own right using a transit and a bunch of bottle jacks to get it all sorted out. Added some bunks and put a steel roof on it after replacing a bunch of rotten roof pieces. Eventually going to rebuild the front half to have a separation between sleeping and cooking/liesure quarters.

Dropped it off at the hunting cabin near Lakeview for the fall hunting season, and put it to work. We figured out that it can do 23mph in current configuration, 3rd gear high range, on hardpack dirt roads with ~500lbs in people and gear.

Need to make some tweaks for next year, and some further tweaks for hunting season. Been a super fun thing to have in the sub $1500 range.

 

[Lousypirate]

We all have those friends that drop 30+ K on SBS's and then expect others to do the same, just so we can ride with them, I am more like no thanks, I will catch the next trip. Sorry for the rant stopped at a buddies house last night with the family only to catch a ton of shit on this topic, along with buddy just got his kids a new puppy, in hind sight I should have just slammed my hand in the truck door, it would have made for a more enjoyable evening at the ER. I might need to build something like this with a little more top end.


love the build could see a HF "deer picker upper 2000" attached somewhere.

View attachment 283040

I hear ya. Buddy just dropped $13k on a polaris ranger to do the same thing that what I built does. We're still young enough to hoist and not need a crane though

Future plans are to pull the governor and do a few mods to the 18hp, mostly to just get more RPM and a little more torque (maybe through some different gearing through the chain drive from the CVT to transmission. 23hp feels like enough though too. There's a bucket list goal with it to drive it from my cabin the 8 or so miles through sxs trails to get to the goatlocker saloon in paradise

 

[Lousypirate]

Awesome build. Curious how you connected the torque converter to the transmission? Looks like there might be a chain drive in there from what I can see in one of the pictures?

Still up at the hunting cabin, will get it when my new rifle I haven't ordered yet is ready for pickup nearby, otherwise I'd take some more pics.

I took the center out of a clutch and welded a sprocket to it, then just ran the chain drive down to that, added a pillow block to help support the input shaft. Once I do a little to the engine, mainly remove the governor, I'll probably increase the tooth count on the input side to get a little more torque out of it once the RPM threshold is raised to get more useable torque. I need more power, not more speed. I'd find it a little scary at anything over 30mph on flat ground...

 

[Lousypirate]

How does it ride since it lost a lot of weight? Any idea what it weighs? I now want to build one like this. lol Thinking of other engine options hmmmmm

pretty stiff. should pull a couple leaves out in the front at least.

Been meaning to borrow my buddy's scales and check it, my bet is unloaded with 1 full tank of fuel around 1250. I want to know if it is bouyant so if I managed to drive it into a puddle that is deeper than I thought I could just bail and it would be able to float across

 

[Lousypirate]

Looked like it flexed pretty well in your picture.

My 2 big goals would be reverse and a bit more hp in order to get more top speed. Thinking maybe transaxle is the way to go. Just need a stupid simple one to buy, modify and install? lol

Jr is right. It has reverse since I'm still using the t90 from the cj2a. I just have the 18hp engine gearing differential from the CVT, and a 2.4:1 reduction with the chain drive.

I think if I just do a basic couple of upgrades along with governor removal, I should get everything I want, then just increase the sprocket on the input shaft of th t90 to get the top speed and low end where I want it. Granted, with the CVT giving a 2.7:1 on the low range, and a .9:1 on the high range, by the time you do the 2.4:1 in the sprocket, 2.79:1 for 1st gear in the t90, that gives me an effective 191:1 crawl ratio on the low range at CVT engagement, up to 64:1 on the overdrive portion of the CVT.

Punching the numbers in on the grimmjeeper website, and using my low and high ratios on my CVT/Chain drive, the numbers don't seem to exactly work out though, unless I'm actually getting more RPM than I thought originally... which I've never verified.