Jack it UP! - Orlando Jeep Club

Monthly Newsletter
Volume 16 Issue 3
March 2014
Upcoming Events:
4/6 Wekiva picnic &
Club meeting
4/10 Sonic Social—
University Blvd
4/12 Citrus County
Jeepers Show n
Shine
4/13 Trail Ride
4/17 Sonic Social—
University Blvd
4/18 Easter Jeep
Safari—MOAB
What’s Inside….
Jack it up: 1
March Social: 2
Spend $: 3
Jeepaholic: 4
Citrus Ride: 5
Show N Shine: 6
Charity 5k: 8
Jack it UP!
If you didn’t gander at our modified trailer, strategically parked in front of Orlando
Chrysler Jeep Dodge during the 2014
TOJC Show-n-Shine, here’s your chance.
Club members have noticed certain trailers that weren’t “stock”, so the idea was
presented to give ours much needed offroad upgrades that are fitting to TOJC
image.
When the idea was presented to the club,
Eric Applequist took charge and applied
his experience and knowledge towards
completing the project.
Before the transformation, our trailer had
p205/70/14 tires and white steel wheels.
Eric then removed the axle from trailer to
perform a spring under to a spring over
setup to give trailer roughly 4-5" lift. He
did this by cutting the spring perches off
from beneath the beam and then welded
them to on top of beam.
Once he installed the axle beam and the
suspension was back as it should be, the
new P235/75/15 tires and aluminum
wheels were from one of our sponsors,
Evan at Discount Tire. Including a matching spare.
Eric also added a front tongue jack extension from Northern Tool to help raise jack
base to match new trailer height.
Cindy has commented on how easy it
pulls and is easier to connect to her lifted
JK. She did say it's harder to get into
though. Mission accomplished, Eric!
Club Social at Hooters
On March 8th we had a club
social at Hooters b y the airport. There was a great turn
out from our members and
we got to meet some new
faces.
Be sure to visit http://orlandojeepclub.com/merch.asp and buy a lare
quantity of items with TOJC logo. The selection of shirt styles, logo’s,
and amazing price points will surely keep you coming back for more.
Don’t be that person at the trail rides or meetings not wearing a t-shirt!
Support our cause and look really snazzy too.
My name is Ashley and I’m a Jeepaholic….
2007 Jeep JKU with a Ford F350 SuperDuty One Ton axle swap, 5.38 gears, Manual locking hubs front
end, ARB air locker rear, 40" Toyo MT's, 14" FOA Coilovers in the front, ORI Struts to come in the rear,
roughly a combined 3" stretch to fit the axles, custom stainless steel braided break lines from Tera Big
Boar Brake Master, NO ABS Computer or wiring, tone ring machined into the rear for speedo and odo
reading, other custom fabrications to make it all happen, and last but not least, TJ gas tank swap to the
rear of the tub.
“Having been raised for the younger years of my childhood in Ohio on quads and in muddy trucks, I knew
when I was old enough I would buy my own vehicle to modify and wheel. When I first met Dyllon roughly
3 years ago, he picked me up in Mawnster. Mawnster was our once gorgeous JKU ( modified as well ).
From that moment I knew that the vehicle I wanted to wheel was a Jeep JK. I wanted to take a jeep built
to be a classy version of the old school CJ, YJ, TJ's etc, and build it to rock crawl. After two years of lingering mods slowly from a 3" kit, to 4", 35's to 37's and finally to 40's. We decided after our wedding in August of 2013 that it was time to crack the whip on building my daily drivable rock crawler. So here we are.
Thanks to all the help of my great friends at Jeepers Den, we've made it happen.”
Citrus Trail Ride and Campout
After a night full of hard rain the group that braved camping for the weekend got up and ready
and headed out on a trail ride. We had about 7 Jeeps at camp. We had a nice ride Sat morning
and we returned to camp around 11:30 just in time to get hit with another complete down pour of
rain. With the meeting time for the ride at 1pm it was not looking good. I made plans to head to
our meeting location about 12:45 to see how many showed up. There was already several members at the Racetrac when I got there. Luckily the rain was starting to let up some. We ended up
with 24 Jeeps for the ride and broke up into 2 groups. We had
planned to ride and meet back at camp at 4pm. The forest was a
little wetter than you usually expect for Citrus but nothing too bad.
We started the ride in a slow rain and it continued to let up as we
went along. We made a couple stops along the way to hang out
and chat and take a few group pics. We had several guests that had
never been out before and were amazed at how you could work
your way around the forest and not be lost. I told them as many
years as I have been riding in Citrus and the fact of how the trails
are laid out makes it very easy to get around. We covered 20.08
miles in 3hrs 6min. That is an average speed of
6.5mph.......hahahaha. But remember that also includes our
stopped time too. We met up with Chris's group on our way back to camp along trail 13. We had
no issues and everyone did a great job staying together and helping our guest if needed. I think
the only Jeep that really got stuck and had to be recovered was Garrett.......maybe he needs larger
tires.....I'm not sure but those 40's were not tall enough for that hole. Sorry Garrett had to call you
out on that one. Good try tho. We had a great ride and looking forward to seeing everyone in
Ocala in April.
Rich Hardway
Thank you all for coming out to our 16th Annual Jeep Show & Shine that occurred on
March 15, 2014! This year's attendance just broke the 300 mark. We have a special thanks
to extend to the HUGE staff of TOJC volunteers for all of their hard work and planning that
made this possible, Orlando Dodge Chrysler Jeep for hosting and supporting the club, and
our amazing vendors American Outlaw, SpiderWebShade, Discount Tire, JeepersDen &
Truck Accessories, Lynn At Outkast Gear, 4 Wheel Parts - Orlando, Forever Wave, Black
Label Shooting Sports, Graves RC Hobbies, Defcon1 LED's.
2014 It’s for the Kids 5k Run/Walk
On March 22nd our club participated in the Central Florida Children’s Home fund raiser.
We both hosted the water stop and had several club members run in the race.
As a club, we raised $1200 for the Central Florida Children’s home, placing 3rd this year
for fund raising.
Before the race, we were visited by a resident bald eagle. It has been tradition, during
races past, to douse the present with water. It was much warmer weather during this
race compared to last year, I’m Chris welcomed it.
2014 Board of Directors
President: Chris Casey
Vice President: Janet Kraft
Secretary: Bo Fisher
Treasurer: Rob Maldonado
Director: Jim Day
Director: Kory Bowman
Director: Eric Applequist
Social Director: Eric Graves
Quartermaster: Cindy Lock
Bylaws Director: Steve Dowman
Public Relations: Stacey Daigle
Newsletter: James Luke
Trail Ride Director: Rich Hardway
Membership: Justin Kreinbrink
The first week of March we attended 4 Wheel
Parts ‘March Madness Sale’ and had a blast!
They had many great giveaways, a bounce
house, car crush, free food, and a bikini car
wash.
It wasn’t even a couple hours into the day
before we had the first Jeep carnage— a
broken drive shaft. Fortunately, it was easily
remedied…. How convenient we were already at a parts supplier :)
New Member Spotlight
We would like to welcome Chuck Nordone as a new member to TOJC!
Jeep: 2013 2dr Wrangler Rubicon
Specs: 2.5” TeraFlex coils spring lift with Bilstein 5100 shocks. Metalcloak adjustable
front tracbar. 295/70/17 Nitto TrailGrappler M/T on 17x8.5 Black Level 8 Tracker
wheels. Full width Rampage Recovery front bumber with a Smittybilt 10k winch. Multiple sets of LED trail lights from Black Box Logistics by a SPOD and a few other goodies.
Why did you join TOJC? We’ve been looking for a good group to go on rides with, socialize with and learn from. TOJC seems to fit the bill perfectly. We’ve been to a couple meetings and a ride to Hardrock as non-members and have really enjoyed ourselves.

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