The plate was lost while on a trail in Moab Utah in 2004.  He’s been traveling the world since then.

Facebook page with all the pictures

The NAXJA Forum that started the whole thing

Direct link to pictures

UPDATE: Link to the Story

Current Jeep: 2008 Jeep Wrangler JK

• MOPAR: Red Rock, Unlimited, Rubicon, Hard Top, Soft Top
• TeraFlex 2.5” Standard Kit
• TeraFlex 1” Spacer
• Fabtech PreRunner Bumper
• SmittyBuilt 8000lb Winch
• SmittyBuilt Synthetic Winch Cable
• (5) BFG MT KM2 35×12.50R17
• AEV ProCal Module
• ForMatt Fab CO2 Tank
• Warn Winch Plate
• BullDog Tow Strap
• PowerTank Roll Tube Mounts
• (2) Riddler Dif Covers
• Best Top Hard Top Cart
• AEM Silver Air Intake System
• DayStar JK Dash Panel
• Entry Handles
• Fire Extinguisher Holder

[Link]

For owners of any 4 wheel Drive the secret is to get as big of a tire as possible with the amount of lift you can afford. For XJ owners it can be a pain to figure out how to get the big tires under your vehicle as most lift kit makers state for XJ’s 4.5″ of lift you can run 32″ tires. Problem I find that not so accurate. I have 4.5″ of lift with 31′s and still rub in the front and rear.  The front of an XJ you can cut to yours hearts content to give yourself room. The rear of an XJ is a little more complicated being it is a Unibody and the pinch seam and lower quarter panel gets in the way. Even with minor to major cutting most still do some form of Bump stop extensions, this is also to stop from damaging your rear shocks compressing farther than your shocks can. Some refer to bump stops as “axle snubbers”, but for this article I will refer to them as bump stops.

On the market there are several options that are cheap to the expensive. First you can get extended bump stops $20-$30, but you still need to extend out your ubolt plates to catch them. As with the way a XJ rear leaf spring suspension is designed, when you lift it the bump stop originally would hit the axle, but with a lifted XJ flexing one wheel upwards the spring/ubolt plate comes up and side swipes the bump stop not making it very effective. So ubolt plates that you can buy that are extended out are usually designed to be the extension themselves with adding plates or spacers to adjust. These I see run from various manufactures $55 to $100. If you spend that much money just to extend the ubolt plate out to catch the bump stop, why buy longer bump stops?

I wanted to keep this project as inexpensive as possible and figure out the amount of extension needed built in as I really do not need to have all the adjustment ability at this time. (I am keeping this XJ where it is at for awhile.)

So here is what I started with, $20 for a set of used XJ ubolt plates from “Cherokee Parts Source” a local Denver metro guy that finds, buys, and parts out XJ’s and sells the parts to us lazy guys not wanting to go to the pick and pull places. (If you want his contact info give me your email addy and I can send it to you.) Some Scrap steel from the local metal supply house that charges .50 cents a pound. I figured I needed about 2″ of extension to stop before my shocks bottomed out and the tires would catch the inner fender. I cut the vertical pieces 2″ and the extended out 3″ with corners cut to avoid the shocks. After cutting the peices for all of this , I started to assemble and weld them up.

Didn’t take long to put them all together, clean up the welds, and paint them. Once dry I installed them and took measurements to make sure I had everything where I wanted it. If I need further adjustment I can either buy those extended bump stops or cut off the stock ones.

For the future I might take my old ubolt plates that I took off to put these on and do this project again, but not build in the extension and instead use hockey pucks for 1″ adjustments, but that is another time. Overall this project cost me about $25 and about 2 hours of time with installation, not including cooling or painting time. For those naysayers I might still have to add a top side gusset for strength, but I did beat the crap out of them before cleaning and painting with a 3lb sledge while they were clamped down and they seemed pretty strong………time will tell.

Here is what they look like all cleaned up, painted, and installed;

I am a long time BFG fan. In 10 years I ran two different vehicles and four different sets of BFG’s on them. (1) Set of BFG A/T’s which are great on everything besides mud. (3) Sets of BFG M/Ts which are an all around great tire which I managed to abuse quite regularly and still got 60,000+ miles on each set. They only sucked on the street on snow and ice until I had them siped which kind of helped, but there is no perfect tire for all terrains.

Last year I had an epiphany; “How do I know if there is anything better if I have never tried them?” So I decided to try Interco’s Trxus M/T’s. I read plenty of reviews of satisfied customers who ran them and I thought I will give them a try. I bought a set May ‘07 and it is now September ‘08. They have taken plenty of abuse as I have put 30,000+ miles on my XJ in almost a year and a half and they have also been on eight off-road trails in Colorado since putting them on.

The good; I have beat them, bashed them, ground them against rocks, trees, curbs…….and they still have integrity to the sidewall and never punctured them. They were great in the snow and ice last winter and other than frozen icy streets, they still got me traction. They look cool; I get lots of compliments on their design. Plus the first 6 months they were quieter than my BFG M/T’s

The Bad; Referencing above; eight wheeling trips since mounting them and I have slashed and missing chucks of tread. The rubber they use is really soft; I believe that is what has led to this chewed up effect as I never had this bad of a problem with my BFG’s. The Trxus M/T’s only come in 31×10.50×15’s and then jump to 33×12.50×15, I would like to run a 32×11.50×15 next……….

The Ugly; I repeat only 15 months of being on the Jeep and they only have 25% tread left, I think that I will have to replace them by end of the year, so no where near the mileage I got out of my BFG’s. Oh and now, they are LOUD, louder than my BFG M/T’s, sounds like I am running paddle tires on the street!

Overall I enjoyed these tires; they have done me more good than bad. However even being one of the cheapest aggressive M/T’s out there, the price to purchase them every 1 ½ years will cost me more in the long run than getting some good high mileage set of BFG M/T’s again……………… although I heard Cooper STT’s are a great tire and they have a 32×11.50×15’s?

Vilnus, Lithuania

Here are a few more photos form that visit.

Mount Gerlach, Slovakia

Looks like the plate is in Slovakia.  To bring some of you up to speed, my plate was “lost” and has been traveling around the world for the past four years.  On it’s journey it has seen international places of interests like the Leaning Tower of Piza, Chitsunitza in Peru, skied the Alps in Austria, Norway, China, Australia, South Korea, even supported the troops in Afghanistan.  As for it’s American locations…it’s been almost everywhere.  The plate has traveled on the famous Route 66 highway, visited historic Boston.

The infamous XJ group NAXJA is responsible for this little trek.  Enjoy the full set up pictures here.

Last night I picked up my 9th Jeep.  Let’s recap.

1. 1997 TJ Red
2. 1999 XJ White
3. 1988 XJ Red
4. 1998 XJ Green
5. 2001 TJ Rubicon Silver
6. 1971 Comando
7. 1989 XJ Tan
8. 2006 Jeep Commander
9. 2008 JK 4dr Rubicon

Red Rock Chrystal Pearl, Black Hard & Soft Top, Tan interior, 4dr, Auto, Rubicon, 3.8L V6, PW, PL, Tow Package, Cruise Control, Air Conditioning, 6 Disc, Remote Start, Clear Bra, Tire Cover, Deep Tint Windows

NAXJA Link to get the whole story

New Mexico is my guess.

Who knows were it will stop next. Check out the NAXJA thread.