Quote:
Originally Posted by slowmover
If you aren’t making an income BECAUSE of 4WD (unlikely, we built the entire country without it) its a mistake.
I get it about wanting “both” drab commuter and exciting weekend toy.
Go back to basics.
1). How long will you keep it?
2). How many miles will it accumulate?
3). As it will eventually be the same out-of-pocket as a three year old vehicle (accepting unreliable transportation is a non-starter. Entire vehicle must be COMPLETELY re-Wired. This is not optional. This is before the complications of a drivetrain swap), what is the annual cost of the latter per AAA or Edmunds “True Cost of Ownership” expressed as cents-per-mile over X period.
4). What will be the additional costs? Offroad is especially high maintenance.
5). The cost of fuel is half or less of a brand-new vehicle at 5-years and 60k miles. Purchase, depreciation, finance, etc, all add up hard.
Go find the three year old nice JK and run TRUE NUMBERS.
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It's not just about the money, but I get your point. Those are all good things to consider before undertaking such a project. It is also about the thrill about creating something unique. A vehicle that is not only capable but economic too.
Off road vehicles cost about the same to maintain as a regular car, with the exception of much faster tire wear. If it is a budget build then it will be more expensive as stuff will break all the time.
At 60k miles the fuel costs in a JK would be about 9k or so. Depreciation really hits hard.
The cost of my build would not be that much in relative terms. It would vary a lot based on where I would source parts from. A crate engine is as cheap as 3k. I could get the truck itself for as cheap as $500. Other mods would likely be around 4k-6k. So I would need to drive around 120k miles to recoup the cost of the build in fuel savings, which is probably unlikely to happen. But it isn't just about that
That video is pretty great, haha.
edit: Now that I think about it, the cost of other mods would probably be closer to 6k to 8k.