Drew Norman: The Jeep Farm - Jeep Builder & Restorer (@thejeepfarm)

On this episode, Chris and Drew discuss some of The Jeep Farm's iconic builds, Drew's Willys, Kaiser and AMC era Jeep obsession and how it all started as a hobby that grew into a thriving business.

The Jeep Farm understands that every Jeep owner has unique needs and preferences, and they take pride in tailoring their services to meet those needs.  One thing that sets The Jeep Farm apart is their eye for detail.  They approach every project with the same level of care and attention to detail, no matter how big or small.  From a lift kit installations to a custom build, they take the time to understand their customers' visions and bring them to life with precision and expertise.

Thank You Josh Card (@american_jeep_7686) for requesting Drew as a guest on the show!

Follow, Like and subscribe to the podcast on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and your podcast listing platform. Check out our website at classic4x4.com and reach out if we can help you sell your classic, vintage or collector truck or 4x4. Thanks for listening!

Transcript

Chris Picconi (00:01.271)
Hello, classic four by four podcast listeners. Today's guest, as you most likely know already at this point in season three, is a listener request and an exciting listener request that I am personally interested in listening to and speaking with and interviewing. And that is the one, the only Drew Norman from the Jeep Farm. What's up, Drew?

The D (00:27.178)
Hey, how's it going?

Chris Picconi (00:28.711)
Rock and roll. Thank you so much for joining us today on the Classic 4x4 Podcast. For all of you listeners out there that are not familiar with the Jeep farm or possibly the paint farm out in Phoenix, Arizona, Drew owns the Jeep farm and the paint farm, which is the premier, one of the most premier and preeminent Jeep restoration companies out in the country. They specialize in AMC, Kaiser and Willys Overland Jeeps.

The D (00:50.435)
Thank you.

Chris Picconi (00:56.055)
So yes, we could say 86 and older, but you do have the Grand Wagoneer SJs, which went to 91. So we'll say 91 and older with the asterisk being anything between 86 and 91 is SJs, SJ Grand Wagoneer. And Drew, you're out there in Phoenix, Arizona right now, and what is the temperature today?

The D (01:06.22)
Right.

The D (01:19.438)
Uh, it's supposed to, I think hit a hundred today, but we actually got rain last night, which was nice, but we had a solid five weeks or something like that. That was like 118 and over. It was one of the worst summers we've had in a while. I mean, they even put up a thing, the sorrows out here. Uh, we had one in our yard that was about 600 years old and it's just dropping branches and supposedly it's happening all over the valley because of the heat. So it's special this summer. It's miserable. Yeah.

Chris Picconi (01:46.179)
That is wild. That's absolutely wild. Hey, as long as your air conditioning's working, you're all good to go. Yeah.

The D (01:50.278)
Yeah, so much not so great the shop, but the guys are doing okay.

Chris Picconi (01:55.683)
So all of our listeners out there, if you don't follow the Jeep Farm and the Paint Farm on all the social channels, check them out at the Jeep Farm at the Paint Farm. Check out their website, www.thejeepfarm.com. They've done some really cool projects that we're actually gonna talk about today. But before we get into that, we have to credit the listener that requested Drew to come on today's show.

And this is actually a listener that is a common friend of Drew and I's. And though we had several people that requested Drew from the Jeep farm. I always credit the first person that requested them and that is Josh card from survivor Jeeps. And Josh actually was, yeah, Josh was actually on the classic four by four podcast. So for all you listeners out there, he, Josh is essentially like the

The D (02:41.102)
Thanks Josh! I'll give you a hug.

The D (02:51.138)
The man.

Chris Picconi (02:56.107)
what's the best way to explain Josh? He is like the wealth of knowledge. Yes, of AMC era Jeeps. Like there is nobody that knows. I think I know a lot about them. Drew, I'm sure you think you know a lot about them, but I catch myself a lot of times saying, you know what? Let me just run this by Josh real quick. Cause he is like the be all end all when it comes to AMC era Jeeps.

The D (02:58.954)
He's an encyclopedia.

The D (03:08.482)
Mm-hmm.

The D (03:17.65)
It's what he retains it. That's what amazes me. Like I see something shiny and I go off in another direction. Dosh, he retains that information and can just spew it back out. Yeah, he's amazing.

Chris Picconi (03:29.471)
It's amazing. And he absolutely, he never ceases to amaze me. So all you out there, you may not know who Josh Card actually is, but you probably follow him on all his social channels. That is, and you gotta follow him. It's Survivor Jeeps. He does a great job posting really cool, all original AMC Jeeps, but is also a great guy in general. So he gets the credit for today's episode and requesting Drew at the Jeep farm.

The D (03:46.153)
Mm-hmm.

The D (03:49.656)
Yes.

The D (03:54.359)
My check's in the mail, Josh.

Chris Picconi (03:57.939)
Yeah, too funny. So Drew, let's start with you. Let's get to know you a little bit, man. Like, you know, you just don't start this like premier Jeep restoration business out of nowhere. There any successful business and you know, any business that has seen the success that you have, you know, it all is rooted in passion. So as a young buck, like where did this passion come from?

The D (04:00.442)
Hmm. Uh-oh.

The D (04:21.926)
Oh man, my dad came home. My dad's a car guy, you know, he collects Jaguars and he's always when we were young, we didn't have much money and you know, he had this old anyway, uh, just a car dude and he came home in 1979. He bought a renegade off the showroom floor and I still remember going to the dealer and growing up in North Carolina, you know, there was the blue one and I wanted it UNC Chapel Hill blue. And so he brought home a red Russet red 79 renegade and

something about the colors and you know, we used to go fishing in it and my dad would go four wheeling, you know, no cell phones, no nothing, get stuck and my mom would be pissed cause we'd walk to a pay phone, it'd be like midnight. He'd call, you know, we got the Jeep stuck and just growing up in a Jeep, like family trips in a Jeep and they're just, I don't know, just warped my personality. I mean, I still own that Jeep now and it just totally screwed me up. Like I've just been infatuated with Jeeps.

Ever since well all cars in general, but jeeps definitely like were my thing like a hundred percent infatuated so Yeah

Chris Picconi (05:23.887)
cool. That is definitely cool. I mean, for a lot of people, it goes back to that nostalgia as a young child. I mean, for me, it does too. You know, that's movies when I was a young kid, man, and seeing, you know, the Goonies with the XJ. You know, that's the first time I ever saw an XJ. And it was like, you know, bullet holes, ORV, you know. So it's fun that it's cool that it goes back to stuff like that.

The D (05:29.986)
Childhood. Yeah. Mm hmm. Yep.

The D (05:37.516)
Oh yeah.

The D (05:41.914)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Yeah.

The D (05:51.76)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (05:52.383)
You know, and I ask this question of every single guest, and it's always a fun question because the answers are amazing. What was your first car or truck? Like when you got your driver's license or the first one you bought with your own money or your parents gave you.

The D (05:58.806)
Mm-hmm.

The D (06:05.338)
Oh Yeah, this thing ran girls so far away from me So, you know I grew up around jeeps and my dad, you know, he drove the Jeep every day It was our family car We go the beach had a little trailer that would pull the luggage and he knew not to give a 16 year old CJ You know So we went to a junkyard when I was about 15 and bought a 51 Willy's wagon And it was like an old North Carolina mud truck. So it was on a commando frame Dana 44s

had a 360, had a roll cage, had a bullet hole in the windshield. I mean, so he said, whatever money you make, I'll double. And I made $400 mowing grass. I mean, in a kid is as a kid in North Carolina, that's what you did. You mowed all your neighbor's grass. And so 800 bucks, I brought home a Willie's wagon and it was a mess. I mean, had Casey's like straight bolted into the roof and it was nasty.

I spent the next year or so getting it running and putting side pipes on it. And I worked at Tar Heel full wheel drive in Charlotte, North Carolina. And so I would go work and basically hand them my paycheck right back and pick up parts and you know, all this shit. And I was so proud of myself when I had this thing running and, uh, no girl in high school wanted to ride in a 51 Willy's wagon, you know, with it, it had a, like I said, a bullet hole in the windshield had been filled with plexiglass.

And God knows why my dad wasn't like, dude, let me put a windshield in it. He was like, oh, that's fine. No worries, you know? And I would drive this thing and it had a tilt wheel and my grandfather helped me make a wood dashboard with auto meters and had the, remember the equalizer with the little red lights that would go up and down and shit. I thought I was bad ass. And you know, you go through an intersection, the steering column dropped out one day and I couldn't steer it because the whole column was rotating. And so I skidded up in the front lawn of a church.

And in North Carolina, there's a church on every corner. And I'll never forget, it was Sunday morning and they all came out and I'm out there, you know, looking at it. My dad had to come get me and he was like, ah, you know, it's one of my proud son moments. You know, here's my son in the front lawn of the church on a Sunday morning, you know, and I got my toe strap out and I'm dragging my kid back home. And yeah, he was, he was proud, dad. So I did some dumb shit in that, excuse my French, in that Jeep. I mean, you know, I got a lot of trouble in that thing. Yeah.

Chris Picconi (08:24.279)
That's fun though. That's awesome that your first car or truck was a Jeep. And of course a 51, you know, wagon, Willy's wagon, which is super cool. And that is, that is neat.

The D (08:27.059)
It was fun. Oh yeah.

The D (08:34.084)
Uh huh. Oh yeah. And it had this cheap plastic bucket seats with the like half inch thin foam and you'd sweat and you know, side pipes and the neighbors would call because it had a automatic which of course I would manually shift in the hilly North Carolina neighborhood and my dad, I'd come home and be like, oh the neighbors called, they heard you coming.

Chris Picconi (08:52.221)
Nyeh!

Chris Picconi (08:56.023)
So you grew up in North Carolina and you went to, so it's not like, you know, you were, you started out like, you know, in a Jeep shop or storing or anything like that, or as a mechanic. You went to art school, right? And you were at first, the first part of your career is you were a graphic designer. So how did you go from being a graphic designer to ending up in Phoenix, Arizona and building, you know, one of the most preeminent

The D (08:58.153)
Uh huh.

The D (09:05.784)
Hmm.

Yeah.

The D (09:14.542)
Correct.

The D (09:19.878)
Ugh.

Chris Picconi (09:26.187)
Jeep restoration business is out there.

The D (09:26.294)
Right. Well, I'll try and keep it, you know, short and sweet, which is hard with me. I can make any long story longer. So, um, you know, I had always, as a kid, I was obsessed with cars. And I, it's all I do is just draw, like draw hours on in and in and in. And, you know, everybody knew that was the one thing the kid was good at was cars and drawing. So, you know, in my family, you go to college, there's no, there was no option there. And I actually went with an art degree, uh,

Chris Picconi (09:32.134)
Hahaha

The D (09:55.318)
got kicked out of school, got sent to boarding school in Rhode Island, got my stuff together, got into college with an art degree. You know, and I'm a very, you know, my professors in college struggled because I wasn't free. I liked the color inside the lines. I was very particular. I liked to draw trains and landscapes, cars, mechanical objects.

And they're like, Oh, you need to go to like architect school or landscape design school or something like that. And at that time, computer graphics was kind of a newbie thing. Um, like our whole art had one computer that could actually do computer graphics. So you had to sign up and you got all night with it and did that graduated college. And then, yeah, first job out of college was a graphic designer, uh, worked for a company in Charlotte that did NASCAR wraps.

So we did the side of 18 wheelers and did that. They had this, you know, like 30 foot long printer or whatever. And, and I quickly realized that, you know, all the there was probably about five or six designers and it was a dark room. They kept the room dark. You had your cubicle, you know, you'd open the door and go outside and you're like, oh shit, it's raining. Or, oh wow, it's daylight. It just, you know, it didn't work for me. I'm kind of more of a hands-on guy. I mean, I initially went into what I thought I was good at.

Chris Picconi (10:51.939)
That's cool.

The D (11:21.31)
And it just couldn't be behind a computer all day long. I needed to, you know, touch things and tinker with them and stuff like that. And got into basically outside sales and I'm a talker. So, you know, as my wife makes fun of me, cause I could talk to a tree, you know, and, um, started in construction material sales and did that till like we were talking about earlier, uh, 2008 is when I got out, but quit, you know, so.

Chris Picconi (11:36.545)
Hahaha!

The D (11:48.618)
Lived in North Carolina, met my wife in undergrad. We were just buddies, ran in the same circles. She went to NC State Vet School and she graduated college and then vet school. And we actually lived together as friends. We weren't dating. We had other girlfriends and boyfriends and we started dating and she got her residency in New Mexico.

But she gave me Monday and she said, hey, I got a residency in New Mexico. I've got to move. And I was like, oh shit. You know, in my mind, I'm like, well, crap, we're going to break up. And she looks at me, she goes, do you want to move with me, stupid? I was like, oh yeah, that's a good idea. I'll do that. So we moved to New Mexico, which was great because I'd never really, you know, seen much of anything. I mean, you know, my family were travelers when I was growing up. We didn't have the money.

And so we moved to Albuquerque for a bunch of years and she was a regular vet. Uh, I worked as, I actually had gotten into AutoCAD and I was a drafter in New Mexico. Um, I drafted a little bit in North Carolina and going from graphic design to AutoCAD before 3D CAD was in, I was in architecture companies and other things where, um, I was the only employee that could take a

two dimensional CAD drawing and convert it into a three dimensional drawing. So like when you would go by construction sites, there was always the drawings on the corner of the lot. So I was paid to do those. Cause I could, in my mind, I could convert 2d into 3d and my art background allowed me to draw them. Um, so kind of did that, uh, worked with an architectural water fountain company that did like the Bellagio in Vegas, um, as a CAD drafter in New Mexico.

Chris Picconi (13:17.895)
Mm-hmm. Cool.

The D (13:38.914)
Then at that point, that's when I really got into construction sales, um, and moved to, uh, Phoenix, her career took us to Phoenix for a residency and was, I covered one company, covered everything less of the Mississippi river, which kind of sucked, I was gone all the time and then worked for a couple of local construction suppliers and manufacturers until like I said, Oh eight. And then I joked that I was in construction, mere material collections.

Chris Picconi (14:08.152)
Mm.

The D (14:08.39)
And at that point, um, my wife's career had gotten to the point that she had her own clinic and was bringing in money. And I wasn't supporting us while she was in education. And she's like, stop, this is stupid. She's like, you hate it. And, um, literally went from a really good paying sales job and took a job on the counter desert rat off road here in town for 13 and a half bucks an hour, you know, basically a control, delete. And that's what I wanted. I wanted to get into cars.

Chris Picconi (14:30.613)
Mm-hmm.

The D (14:37.662)
or jeeps and while I was a desert rat, made a lot of good connections, people in the industry and this, that and the other. And basically I always bought and sold jeeps. I love, I can't get enough of them. And back then we didn't have any money. So I had the, you know, the renegade I grew up in that, you know, it's probably, if shit goes upside down, that's going to be the last car I ever get rid of. And I probably won't ever get rid of it, but

The D (15:05.586)
I would buy them and fix them up and put them on eBay. And of course the eBay sellers would wait till after the auction was over. And then they would reach out and be like, oh, did it sell? And I was like, yeah, it sold. Well, can you build me one? Sure, why the hell not? And that's what did it. So I was working at Desert Rat and I started building Jeeps on the side and selling them on eBay. And when I say build, I mean like I'd pick up an $800 Wagoneer back then was actually a nice Wagoneer. You know, you buff it, fix the wood grain.

Chris Picconi (15:32.67)
Those were the days.

The D (15:33.866)
Yeah, I mean, you buff it, fix the wood grain, tune it, polish the wheels, you know, make it look good, get it tuned up, running right. And you know, you turn around flipping on eBay for 13 grand and I was like, holy shit, this is amazing. You know, you can't even buy that wagon here, like what I was starting with for 13 grand anymore. Right. Yeah, and the same thing with CJs. I'd find a really nice CJ that was like jacked up on 35s, brush guard, light bar, blah, all this crap bolted to it.

Chris Picconi (15:50.495)
You can't buy a Roach GW for 13 grand now.

The D (16:02.878)
And I would buy it and buff it and lower it, put stock tires and wheels on it, get rid of the brush guard, the light bar, get rid of all the stuff, you know, and somebody would remove the renegade stripes. So I put those back on and I'd sell those and, and it was, it was crazy. And I left a desert rat and started working for a friend of mine at Bulldog winch here in town. And, um, you know, I would work. So basically I worked Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday at Bulldog.

And then I would restore Jeeps Friday, Saturday and Sunday. And I worked every freaking day until the point I told him I was, I was making more money turning three or four Jeeps a month, you know, than I was all year working with him. And my wife's like, dude, you can do this full time. And I was like, no, I need a paycheck. I can't I got, I got to get a paycheck. She's like, you're getting a paycheck. Figure it out. You know, it just didn't make sense to me. Like I never thought it would actually work. I always thought it was just an extra money thing. You know what I'm saying? Like.

It allowed me to create a little bit of income to go buy another Jeep. And that's really what it was, was I would do my jam to it. And all these Jeeps that I was doing, I didn't just build them and sell them. Like I registered, I insured them, I drove them. And then like a lot of ADD car guys like me, you kind of get bored with it. And then the next one pops up on Craigslist because Facebook Marketplace didn't exist and you were like, who I want that Jeep. So I'm going to sell that Jeep because my wife's like, you can only have to, you know.

Chris Picconi (17:24.78)
Yep.

The D (17:28.97)
And then it became, you can only have three and then became you can only have four. And now she's just giving up. She's like, she walks out, she's like, I don't even know what, yeah. So, yeah, I've got a lot of Jeeps now, but that's how it all started. So I started it in a two car garage, just, you know, either somebody would want it, I would post it for sell and sell it or, and then it got to the point people were like, hey, I want you to build for me. And I was like, oh, that's weird, but I'll do that. You know?

Chris Picconi (17:33.775)
This is a very familiar story. I can relate to this very well.

The D (17:57.602)
Back then it was anything for a buck, just to keep the money rolling, to eat and pay bills. And that was pretty much it. That's the start of it.

Chris Picconi (18:07.939)
That's awesome. And hey, and you're celebrating 13 years this year because you founded in 2010, celebrating 13 years and you've worked on some pretty wild projects that have gotten some serious press. And one of those projects, which I wanna talk about, which I've actually talked about on the podcast before, and that is Paulo de Massa's, his yellow, what's the name of that colors? Sunburst Yellow?

The D (18:11.54)
Yeah, it's...

Mm-hmm.

The D (18:26.71)
Mm-hmm.

Hmm, the yellow one.

The D (18:35.046)
It's a sunshine yell sunshine. I think. Yeah. And I had built other jeeps for him also.

Chris Picconi (18:37.573)
Yeah, Sunshine Yellow.

but he, that specific one has a really cool story. That sunshine yellow, a Wagoneer that you did a wide body conversion on. Everybody knows, hey, it's got, it was a wide body conversion. You put a supercharged LS in there, but I want to go a little bit deeper because I did talk about it with Paolo and we kind of scratched the surface, but I want to go a little bit deeper into that. But before we do that, I think it'd be cool to tell our listeners about the story behind that Jeep. Like how that like,

The D (18:45.555)
Mm-hmm.

The D (18:53.405)
Mm.

Mm-hmm.

The D (19:00.046)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (19:12.311)
the idea how Palo actually conceived the idea to not only build that Jeep and then how you actually went and executed. And actually everything comes full circle. We talk about the Jeep community and the classic truck and four by four community being so big. And the fact of the matter, it's not. It's actually a very small, right? Yes, right? And if we don't know each other, we know of each other, we can get a hold of each other. It's just a great.

The D (19:20.129)
Okay.

The D (19:25.439)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

It's a very small community in reality. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (19:39.671)
community to be a part of, classic trucks in general, right? So, how that started was several years back for our listeners that don't know, Jeep itself, Jeep, the company, the manufacturer, every single year builds these things called Moab Special Projects, right? And they're these unique, they're concept Jeeps, they take...

The D (19:42.474)
Yes, 100%.

Chris Picconi (20:05.687)
classic Jeeps and they do a different spin on them, they restore them, they do all these crazy modifications to them and every year they create these Moab special projects that they bring out and they bring to EJS, which is Easter Jeep Safari, right? And they, I don't wanna say they premiere them, but they debut them at Easter Jeep Safari every year. And at the time, the Jeep design manager,

The D (20:16.908)
Mm-hmm.

The D (20:30.99)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (20:35.467)
that was still actually to this day, even though he's not the Jeep design manager anymore, he's the Dodge and SRT design manager, he still does do the Moab special projects. The Jeep design manager at the time who was building them or who was designing them was a Jeep designer by the name of Chris Biscitelli, which actually we've also had on the podcast and I encourage all of our listeners to.

The D (20:58.964)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (21:02.963)
to listen to his episode along with Palo de Masa's episode where we talk about this jeep. But Chris Piscitelli I grew up with, which is an even smaller world. So Chris and his design team created this really cool Wagoneer. It had like a...

The D (21:09.172)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (21:23.799)
really unique interior. It was a throwback. It was classic and Palo happened to be at EJS that year, saw this Wagoneer. And for those of you out there, you've probably seen it before. It's like a lime or like a mint green. Yeah, sage green. It's just, it's got a 5.7 hemi in it. It's got like a wicker headliner. There's wicker accents on the dash. Like it just did such cool stuff with this. But it

The D (21:37.358)
sage green kinda yeah.

The D (21:42.838)
Cool Jeep, yeah.

Mm-hmm.

The D (21:51.701)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (21:53.015)
got a lot of press, it was in a lot of magazines, it was on Jay Leno's show, but Paolo saw this Jeep and that was the inspiration for him to build his Sunshine Yellow Wagoneer wide body conversion, right? So he had this idea and who else does he go to, but other than you, Drew, to build this. Yes, exactly. So, exactly. So.

The D (21:54.602)
Yeah, tons.

The D (22:09.921)
Mm-hmm.

The D (22:14.71)
Drew, let's talk about the Wagadeer. I love you, Palo. Drew, in the Jeep.

Chris Picconi (22:21.951)
So take over, so we talked about the story about where the figment of the idea came from, like, you know, the inspiration. So take us from there. Paolo comes to you and says, I want to build a wide body conversion, Wagoneer with a supercharged LS. And oh, by the way, here's a $1,500 shell, which isn't gonna do much for you, but we're gonna do a ground up build. So take me from there.

The D (22:26.23)
Mm-hmm.

The D (22:35.639)
Right.

The D (22:46.206)
It was rough. Yeah, so it kind of snowballed. It didn't always start as a supercharged Wagoneer. The more we got into the build, the more it literally just continued to snowball, whether it was me saying, oh, shit, we did this, cool, we should do this, or a palo going, oh, you know. Anyway, I'll get into it. But yeah, so there were a couple things. There was the Wagoneer that Jeep did that you talked about. So my personal Wagoneer, I also converted to a Wide Track. It's in the front of all my YouTube videos.

And, and Palo knew of it and he'd seen it in person. And I did it just simply because when I bought my Wagoneer, some dude had cut the fenders out with a Sawzall and I was like, well, and so Brian Chachua out of California used to build a super Wagoneer, which was a wide track Wagoneer. There was I think five or seven, somebody probably knows better than I do, but there were a few built and there's a couple of them still floating around out there.

legit wide track wagoneers, all built by Brian Chachua. He was a Jeep dealer in California. And so I grafted mine on simply to fill the holes because it would fill up with dust when I go down the road. Anyway, let me focus here. So Paolo sent me this wagoneer and it was a total pile of poo. Like some kid had owned it and he'd painted the interior black with rattle can and.

It was a typical Jeep build, which cracked me up. One of the things that we found out during the build is the B pillar on the passenger side between the front and rear doors had been welded in a half inch off at the top. Total Friday or Monday Jeep build. Like we were like, what the hell? And we thought it had been wrecked, but it was the original color, which was sunshine yellow. And I'm like, no, this is definitely somebody's bad day on the assembly. Why? Like you're like, screw it. I hate this job. It's hung over. I played, you know, bowling last night. I really don't care.

that's crooked, but fucking go down the line. You know, I've got another Jeep here that it's the hilarious story about pissed off Jeep assembly line workers. Anyway, so we kind of made a plan. Apollo, I'd built a couple of Jeeps for him in the past, not quite to this level. And he'll laugh when I say this, Palin knows me. And, you know, he was like, we would talk about a budget and he would chuckle and just add like 30,000 on top of whatever we talked about because he knew.

The D (25:06.922)
the way the build would go and where my brain works. I'm like, oh, well, let's do this. So we knew we wanted to keep it yellow. Yeah, it is.

Chris Picconi (25:12.611)
I think that's true for every build out there, every custom build out there. Just add 30% onto whatever it is. Doesn't matter what that number is. And that's where you're gonna get it or somewhere around the final.

The D (25:18.078)
100% yes.

Yeah. And I, I mean, I struggle with customers that are like, you know, I need that like line by line itemized thing. And I'm like, look, it's going to be 80 grand. That's, you know, give or take 40 on either side. You just never know when you get into a Jeep and Palo knew like he knew he wanted something just bad-ass like wanted something to like stop the show, like outside the dorm, you know, typical LS swap.

Chris Picconi (25:35.052)
Yeah.

The D (25:48.33)
like he wanted the best of all the world. So we knew right off the get-go, we were doing a wide track, J20 axles, he was adamant about those. He was adamant about the color. And one of the biggest things which we had never, I had never personally done before was doing the back build. So it was a 78 and initially we were gonna rock the 78, you know, with the booby grill and the 78 dashboard and all that. There were a couple other things that came up.

you know, uh, Vin and where it was going to be registered for the first time. So we kind of wanted to go with an older Jeep. So we went half and half and purchased a 67 Wagoneer out of Texas that had been sitting on a field. Um, so that gave us our first gen dashboard. That gave us our first gen steering wheel and steering column. Uh, he started collecting, you know, NOS tail lights, first gen, all this stuff. And as we went into the build, I was like, well,

You know, I knew in my head, I'd taken enough dashboards out. I knew the first gen dashboard would go in like done. Uh, I hadn't figured out how to convert the steering column, but we do a lot of sagging all conversions on Willy's and I don't do GM columns. That's a big no-no in my world. Uh, so we keep the stock steering wheel and column. And then right after the firewall, we cut it and modified it with a, you know, a Borgerson joint to a sagging all box. And I was like, well, we can do that on a wagon here and, you know, put the first gen steering column in it. Cause I just.

I did not want a GM steering column in there, just would ruin the look. Yeah, so then we started moving through, and the grill is easy, anybody can do the grill. You know, and the tail lights, obviously the 80s Wagoneer tail lights wrapped around, which had the general outline of the 60s tail lights. But then below that was all different. So pretty much the whole tail light section of the Wagoneer, you know, after we're talking to Paolo, he was like, you know, just do it through, you know. So we...

Chris Picconi (27:19.401)
super cool.

Chris Picconi (27:33.327)
Mm-hmm.

The D (27:44.374)
built all handmade all that to fit the first gen tail lights. You know the backup lights and then he did want like the Jeep design. What Chris did was he used an 80 smooth bumper and that was something that Palo really liked. Yes, 100% Yep, the green one we were talking about. Yep.

Chris Picconi (28:05.326)
on Chris Piscitelli's, the Moab special project.

The D (28:09.434)
I was, I'm not going to lie. I kind of pushed them to the three piece bumper. I wanted that sixties era, but he really wanted that smooth look of that bumper. Uh, so we did that and. You know, the fact that it might end up, I think he's got it in Miami now and he just posted, he's getting ready to drive it up and down the East coast. Um, you know, we did, so we turned the backup lights in the turn lights, and then we mounted backup lights down under the receiver hitch, um,

And then, you know, Grand Wagoneer seats, he wanted power seats, he picked the materials on the inside and I think they went great. But there were definitely a lot of things that just kind of, you know, in the car world, and you know this, it's like a, oh shit, if we're gonna do this, then excuse my French, then you might as well do that. And if you're gonna do that, then you might as well do that. And well.

Chris Picconi (28:59.075)
I'm a big believer in doing things first the right time. Doing things right the first time is the most important thing. Because I've done things kind of half-assed, and in the end it just costs you more time and money. And you end up going back and doing it the right the first time anyway, the second time.

The D (29:02.351)
Yeah.

The D (29:09.902)
Mm-hmm. Correct.

The D (29:15.71)
Yeah. I struggle with, uh, and not to get off topic, but I struggle with parts. Like we do a lot of partial builds. So keep a lot of the original Willy's, but add a lot of new parts to it, make it driver, but keep the patina and all that. And you always kind of struggle when you, when you fix a part and you paint it and you bolt it next to an old part, never fails that old parts going to fail, you know, and, and that's what that's, that's one of those budget killer things, but, uh, back to, uh, Palo's Wagadeer. So, you know, we moved through all the metal work.

Uh, we just picked up a six Oh truck block. Um, you know, and again, it, it never intended to be supercharged. So we went with a four L 60. Cause I was like, you know, I knew he, I know Palo and I know he's going to wheel it some and it's going to be a big road car, go to Moab. You know, he was like, I got other Jeeps to do the Rubicon. He didn't want to tear it up. Um, so we did that. And then we put, I think a two 31 or two 41 from a Chevy pickup truck, which we do a lot of. I mean.

you know, the two awaits and all that they're great. Just transfer case. Yep. And we didn't gear. We left the, I think it had factory four tens in it, uh, the J 20. So we rebuilt it, did full wheel disc brakes. You know, I kind of wrapped it. It's a 40. Yeah. 44 front and then had a 60 rear. So correct. Yeah. And one of the things that.

Chris Picconi (30:18.947)
You're talking about the transfer case? Yep, yep.

Chris Picconi (30:31.846)
What axles are in the J-20? Those are corporates, right?

Chris Picconi (30:38.291)
Oh, so they're Dana. So they're Dana 44 on the front, Dana 60 in the rear. Gotcha.

The D (30:44.51)
You know, we, the J truck we stole the parts from was a quadric truck J truck. So it has an offset 60 rear, you know, and then I have a center drop transfer case, but the Wagoneers are long enough and I've done enough of them that you get on forums and feel like, Oh, it'll never work. I've got a guy cruising around. He's got about 60,000 miles on a build. We did with an offset rear in a center drop transfer case, you know, and the drive line goes down and it's slightly off to the side and you don't have any problems.

Like Palo cracks his transfer case, but that's got nothing to do with the drive-aloud. That's the right foot in the supercharger. So he just had a friend of mine, Melvin, down in Florida, put in a beefier transfer case because he just kept cracking it. But that was kind of the end of the build. I mean, we did it, don't get me wrong. We did a lot of work for this truck. But what moved forward was him and Eric Rothenhouse flew in.

Chris Picconi (31:18.176)
Yes.

The D (31:40.718)
and drove it to the Moab Easter Jeep Safari. So I was headed up to the Moab Jeep Safari in a flat fender to do the flat fender fun run and wheel all week. And so I ran in there, you know, and I'm a nervous mom. Every, every Jeep I build, like I'm, when they're done, like I'm, I'm overly nervous. I'm like, you know, keep your speed down and watch the bumps and check your fluids, you know? And I'm like, so pal is like, oh no, we're gonna get in. We're gonna drive it. And I'm like.

Chris Picconi (32:00.291)
Yeah.

The D (32:06.526)
shit. I was like, Oh, I'm all the way to Moab, Utah. And all I can think about like is what could break. I'm like, Oh, man, was that wire too close to the firewall? Did I just the brake pedal? Oh, God, what's the tire pressure like, you know, it's all freaking out the whole way out there. And it was a really good bill, but it was a big bill, you know, and we got up there and it tripped me out and Palo, forgive me, I gotta tell you a story is a great story ever. So I'm

Chris Picconi (32:07.479)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (32:20.921)
Eh.

The D (32:36.054)
Downtown Moab or at the arena in Moab, you know the Thursday Friday vendor showcase thing and we're walking around and you know Sometimes with a big Jeep build or any build like no news is good news Sometimes you know like if you ship a Jeep off and then the next day you're bombarded by questions you either have an owner that's concerned has got Questions about oil weight and blah blah, which is fine. Or hey, I got an oil spot under my Jeep

Chris Picconi (32:48.662)
Mm-hmm.

The D (33:02.474)
Okay, great. We just did the rear main on that. It's Lincoln already. I was like, great Jeep, you know? So, uh, I hadn't heard a word from him. I was like, okay, well this is good. So I'm walking around the arena and here comes the wagon here pulling in. I'm like, oh shit, there it is. Good caught. It made it. Yay. So he pulls in and people just surround this thing. And I'm like, all right, this is cool. Like I started having like that proud daddy moment, you know?

Chris Picconi (33:03.527)
Now you got a problem. Yeah.

The D (33:26.462)
not the freak out mom, but the proud daddy. And so I walk out and he gets out, he's just ear to ear grinning, right? You know, and I was like, how'd it go? He's like, oh, it's a great drive. And they went, they shot drone footage and they, you know, him and Eric, they, those two run in their own little world of that kind of marketing and that it's just, you know, the way they think. And you know, I'm the kind of town in the middle of the desert, like, oh, I like jeeps. So, so.

Chris Picconi (33:51.529)
Yeah.

The D (33:53.77)
You know, and anyway, this is the funny part of the story. So I'm talking to him and it's like, we went and met for a drink later on and he comes up and he's been driving it all week at Moab and he's tickled pink. Like this thing is like magnet for people. And he comes up and he's like, ah, drew. And I'm like, hey, how'd it go? You know, we're talking to him and he goes, driving to the Easter Jeep Safari with this Jeep is like going to a party with Scarlett Johansson under your arm. And I was like, perfect, I'll take that as a compliment. You know?

Chris Picconi (34:21.884)
Eh.

The D (34:23.722)
So I was like, well, first off, I know who you like now. Now I know who your girl is, you know, Sondra, don't be pissed. So it just thrilled me to death. So they did that drive. And again, long story, long with me. They, you know, went out and videoed it and it was having a bad problem. The rear tires were rubbing the fender wheels real bad, the fender flare. And the springs had settled over the drive. And so they really didn't wheel it hard because he didn't want to rip the, you know, didn't want to damage all the.

Chris Picconi (34:27.319)
Eh. Hehehehe.

The D (34:52.682)
metal work that was done in that thing. Yeah. So he brought it back. He called me and they brought it back and he said, Hey, I got an idea. And I was like, what are you thinking? And I knew, you know, it's not uncommon when you do a really big build for people to modify it, change it. You know, if you do a big build and they drive it for, you know, three or 4,000 miles, I'll tell them to make a laundry list. Like, you know, the turn signal cam quit work and the rear main, you know, typical Jeep shit, even though you put all that brand new stuff in it, you know, and sometimes I'll ship a Jeep.

Chris Picconi (34:53.175)
All the metal work you did, yeah.

Chris Picconi (35:18.755)
Mm-hmm. It's just the way it is with old trucks. Mm-hmm.

The D (35:22.654)
Yeah, and I'll ship the Jeep back and I'll do the repairs and modifications and ship it back I mean, it's not a big deal. You kind of have to you plan for it Some go off without a hitch and some are just Jeeps Correct old car and he comes back and he's like well it needs more power and I'm like, okay So what are we talking about more power? He's like, what do you think about a supercharger? It's like oh, I love you. I want to hug you. So, um So one of the biggest things that we didn't know and you know, it's

Chris Picconi (35:32.544)
It just comes with the territory.

Chris Picconi (35:43.274)
Ah.

The D (35:48.606)
with the 35s, I thought the four tens and the four or 60 would jive, but it ended up, it hunts real bad. Uh, you know, in slight inclines at 70 miles an hour, the transmission will click in and out of overdrive. So it was hunting and that was, that's annoying, you know, so we knew right off the get go, we were going to regear it for four 56s. And then in typical Palo fashion, let's go ahead and put new posi tracks front and rear and let's do all this stuff and build it, you know, blah. And the transmission. Yeah.

Chris Picconi (35:53.279)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (36:00.92)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (36:15.271)
Overbuild it to a level of insanity.

The D (36:17.982)
I want it the rest of my life. I want to bang on it, which he says he's gentle to it, but I wasn't You know being Vern Simons, who's a big writer You know we went out and did a photo on it for full-well magazine and the two of us just we cackled till we were stupid And blew about hearing the supercharger scream as we're just ripping donuts in the desert You know and he's like don't kill me drew I was like sorry, and I apologize in the Palo the whole time. I'm doing it. You know so

Chris Picconi (36:23.841)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (36:38.668)
Yeah.

The D (36:46.198)
We regeared it. We did a bunch of stuff. We added the supercharger, which ended up being a lot more work than I even anticipated. Um,

Chris Picconi (36:53.655)
You make it sound so casual, like, oh, we just added a supercharger to an LS. In a wagon here, that was a wide body conversion. It's just so casual, right?

The D (36:57.038)
Well, yeah, I wish it was that casual. Right. Yeah. It, and I, you know, I give him Palo credit, you know, and he, every once while he freaked out about the budget, you know, cause it started creeping up. I mean, this Jeep was getting really expensive, you know, and I'd never done a supercharger. So he's like, how much do you think it's going to be? And I'd throw a number out there and he knows me well enough to, like we talked about earlier, whatever I chuck out there, just go ahead and add like 20% on the top of it or more.

Chris Picconi (37:26.659)
20-30% of variance either way though. Sometimes it goes your way, sometimes it doesn't go your way. Yeah.

The D (37:27.742)
Yeah. Right.

Correct. So, you know, with electric fans and you know, the superchargers now, what I, one of the things I can't stand and I apologize to people in the do this when you do an LS conversion, they just slap an air filter on the front of the LS that's right in front of the fan. Like it's, you're not going to run right. It's getting feedback from the fans, you know, and so you, anyway, we built a custom intake and a custom box, and then we ended up having the, we were having, um, air intake temperature issues. I mean,

You know, everybody knows Wagoneers, even with the 360, they can get heat soaked. And we were having problems driving it and our air intake temperatures were through the roof. So we ended up cutting a hole in the cowl and driving, you know, pulling fresh air in, uh, right to the passenger side of the radio radiator to draw fresh air. And so up goes the budget custom intake, you know, cause it was just the, the temps were too high and, um,

So by regearing it and the supercharger, and then we did a CTS, he wanted, I'm a big fan of mechanical gauges. He's a technical guy. So we did the CTS tuner in the glove box so he could, you know, pay more attention to everything. We moved the batteries underneath to the frame. We did racing, small little racing batteries, which I use on all my race jeeps.

uh, move the tranny cooler because we needed to cool the tranny down. And then the tranny was pissed off with the supercharger. So we pulled that back out that way and got built anything in the world you can do to a four L 60. We threw it at it. You know, I mean, literally, uh, my transmission builder, uh, Harley at fast. He's a great guy and he's an off road racer. And he's, I was like, dude, 700 horsepower, just it's got to survive. And he's like, okay. You know, so we got billet blobby, the blobby bar, you know,

Chris Picconi (39:17.227)
Yeah. Yep.

The D (39:21.122)
came back and he's like, you ain't breaking this one. I was like, okay, fair. So that's when the Wagoneer snowballed. Like it went from a really nice LS powered 35s, you know, there were some things like he didn't want me to polish the grill cause he knew he was gonna drive it. And I quite frankly didn't listen to him and went out and had it polished anyway. Kind of one of those asks forgiveness after, you know? So, yeah. He's...

Chris Picconi (39:41.867)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (39:46.603)
give you that though. That makes sense. I agree with you. When you have something that is to that level of, you know, what I call an investment quality build, why not just polish it? I mean, it's a couple, a couple extra hundred bucks. It's a day of somebody, not even a day, it's a couple hours of somebody's time. It's like a no brainer. I agree with you.

The D (39:51.395)
Correct.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

The D (40:01.938)
Right. Well, he was like, no, I'm going to drive it. I'm like, OK, whatever you want. I said it off anyway. And I apologized. Sorry, buddy. So, you know, I'm doing a Willie's wagon like that. We've done everything that's Willie's wagon, a white or the red interior. Same thing. I mean, the owner is a great guy, super patient, you know, and he's like, well, I want to keep the original door panels. And they had speakers cut in them. And I'm like, yes. So I just was like, hey, just go ahead and upholster everything. I'll just.

Chris Picconi (40:07.903)
Yeah.

The D (40:30.034)
If he hates it and he bitches at me, I'll just pay for it. It's not worth to me skipping the corner. You know, if he says, Oh, it's beautiful. And I say, well, here's the bill. And that's great. Yay. And if he says, I told you not to do it, drew, I'm not paying for this. Then I'll be like, well, it's a gift because I can't stand it.

Chris Picconi (40:30.776)
So.

Chris Picconi (40:44.883)
And at the end of the day, you know you did it right. And that's the most important.

The D (40:47.478)
Yeah, and I can't, I can't oppose to the front seat and the back seat and leave the stock door panels in it with speaker holes in them. I'm like, yeah, no. So hopefully he'll be good with it. But sometimes I kind of override my customers and it's not a big deal, but sometimes you gotta kick the ball the extra foot. Yeah, a hundred percent. You know, I hate painted over bolts. I hate, there's a lot of shit I see that just, you know, we get a lot of eBay Jeeps in here. Guy balls it off eBay, you know, check out my Jeep. I paid 40 grand for a pair of Jackson Jeeps. And I'm like,

Chris Picconi (41:01.715)
It's just doing it right the first time. Yeah, so, but.

The D (41:17.234)
that's really bad you know I'm like you're so yeah you're so close you got a yeah you got a badass rig why do you have a $40 grant GT steering wheel on there come on you know so yeah

Chris Picconi (41:19.219)
Yeah, and now you need to put another 40 in it at least to get it to some level of drivability.

Chris Picconi (41:30.127)
Yeah, that's so funny. That's so true, man. So, but what, what to finish the end of Palos build? I mean, I mean, this thing is an absolutely impeccable investment quality build. And you had details that like, I got to tell you like when I first saw that build and the glove box opened up and I saw the auxiliary gauge clusters in there and, and that,

The D (41:36.803)
Sorry, I got side-dragged. That happens.

The D (41:41.739)
Yeah.

The D (41:49.557)
Mm.

Chris Picconi (41:53.939)
That is something I do on all my bills, all my switches, all my, if I do have to do auxiliary gauges, I always hide them inside the glove box to keep the dash as original, as clean as possible. I just like it. I, the worst thing, there's nothing that bothers me more than seeing a triple gauge cluster hang off the bottom of the dash. It like, it kills me. Absolutely kills me. Or even worse that one like

The D (41:55.679)
Right.

The D (42:04.878)
clean.

The D (42:15.658)
Right. Yes.

The D (42:21.506)
when they put it where the glove box is, they build a plate over it. I'm like, come on, man. Right, right.

Chris Picconi (42:24.051)
Yes, yes. What is going on? Or even worse than that, like drill it into the original dash and just destroy the, I mean, so I gotta tell you that what a great, I mean, every detail has been addressed. Nothing's been overlooked on that thing, but it's the little things that always matter, which are super cool. But to end that, you know, we gotta tell our listeners, you finished up all this, the second.

The D (42:33.599)
Yeah.

Thank you.

Chris Picconi (42:50.591)
we'll call it the second phase of the build, right? Which is a supercharger and everything. And then he flew down, came and picked it up. And it was at a time when he was moving to Miami and drove it from your shop in Phoenix to Miami, right? Which you must've been the most nervous mom there ever was for that because it was also in the middle of the summer too. It was not cool out. Yep.

The D (42:59.438)
correct.

The D (43:04.338)
Yeah. Oh yeah. Well, even.

Yeah. Oh yeah. And I had driven the Wagoneer. I, you know, you know, force me to, you know, you've got to go test drive a supercharged Wagoneer, twist my arm. You know, I mean, I drove, I drove, I drove that actually quite a lot. Like it was my daily driver back and forth to work, which, you know, my commute went down by like 30% driving a supercharged Wagoneer cause every stoplight, I mean, it happily roasts 35 inch tires through a stoplight. I mean, thanks nothing of it. But yeah, it, you know, like,

Chris Picconi (43:18.891)
Yeah.

The D (43:41.034)
the nervous mom thing, like he, and of course he, you know, I have clients that want to fly and drive and I know, Palo is a Jeep guy and I'm 100%. If you've owned Jeeps and you want to fly in and drive your Jeep home, have at it. You know, we do a lot of restorations for not Jeep people. They're just always wanted a Jeep. And that person scares me when they want to fly in and drive it home. I'm like, yeah, let's ship it. Why don't you get used to it around your neighborhood a little bit, but correct.

Chris Picconi (44:05.667)
especially if you've never driven it before. Cause I think people have expectations with classic cars and trucks that like, oh, like my daily driver, it'll be kind of like my daily driver. And then they get like, you know, 20, 30, 40 miles into it. And they're like, yeah, maybe I should have transported it. Like I have another thousand miles to go, 500 miles to go. This is gonna be a really long work. You need to know what you're getting into, which is what it is, but.

The D (44:10.249)
Yes.

The D (44:16.117)
Mm.

The D (44:22.622)
It's... Uh-huh.

The D (44:30.348)
Right.

Yeah, he did and he loved it, you know, but there's always like that little bit of Mm hmm. There's that always Yeah, little bit of you know, I remember right before he when he flew into drive at a Moab like we're all and I don't want to say we're like, you know, there's moments that you know, we've all watched card, card TV shows, you know, and you kind of laugh about that. Oh, it's gotta be it's even tomorrow. And everybody's freaking out, right? You know, and I'm like, that's not really true. Like

Chris Picconi (44:34.091)
Hey, he made it all the way to Miami. That's where it is now. Yeah, flawlessly, not a problem with the supercharger. Everything was rocking and rolling, man.

Chris Picconi (45:03.254)
Yeah.

The D (45:03.274)
Why are you, if you planned your build, you wouldn't be slamming it together at the last minute. Right? Get it done. I mean, you know, we're doing a build with, I don't even have to say it, but I don't care. HB tuners for SEMA coming up 24. We're doing a pretty bad ass lower Wagoneer. But the night before Palo flew in, well, he flew in, I knew he was in town. He said, I'll be at the shop tomorrow. And you kind of give me a once over the Wagoneer and I'm gonna drive it to Moab. And one of my texts wasn't,

Chris Picconi (45:19.8)
That's awesome.

The D (45:32.45)
thinking and you know the first gen Wagoneers review mirror mounts Above the windshield and the visors kind of clip in it and it's got a pole that hangs it down Well, it was it had been sanded and painted and wasn't installed yet And of course we're like putting the last little and he glued one of the modern rear view mirror plugs to the windshield when the black plastic one goes on and I walked out and I was like why is that on there? He's like, oh damn it, you know and so

Chris Picconi (45:54.018)
Yeah

The D (46:00.622)
one of them's like, Oh, well, just grab it with a pair of pliers and pull it. And it was Phoenix. It's a bazillion degrees. Yep. Cook death. The windshield goes, and I was like, Oh shit. I was like, he's going to be here in the morning at six AM. And this is like five o'clock the day before. So, you know, it's those moments that I'm a believer. Like I find a guy that I like or a company that I like, and I stick with them like glue, you know, I don't bounce around for the best deal. Like

Chris Picconi (46:05.059)
That sounds like an absolutely horrible idea. Yeah.

Chris Picconi (46:15.351)
Yeah.

The D (46:27.862)
You took care of me, I will use you to the end of my career. And I got a windshield glass guy, he's awesome. I called him, I was like, here's the story. He's like, shit Drew. And I was like, what can you do? He goes, I'll be there in an hour. And we all stayed late and he popped it back in. And of course the stainless trim around a Wagoneer windshield is one of the most aggravating things on earth. Hate it. Yep. Should be shot. Uh-huh.

Chris Picconi (46:41.047)
Yep, that's awesome.

Chris Picconi (46:48.351)
Oh, it's so notorious and it screws into the gasket. Whoever designed it was like, hey, let's take the gasket, which is supposed to really weatherproof it and let's screw chrome trim into it. Like I never understood that. One thing I will say is SJ windshields, believe it or not, are plentiful. I had a similar situation where I was having, I had a Wagoneer Limited.

The D (47:01.747)
Through it! Yeah, exactly!

The D (47:07.779)
Uh, yes.

Chris Picconi (47:16.123)
82 Wagoneer Limited that was going to a photo shoot for a high end designer the next day. It was scheduled. It was ready. And it had a little chip. And at the time, my warehouse, where I store all my trucks, was not climate controlled. And this was for a holiday shoot. But holiday shoots, which come out November, December,

The D (47:23.01)
Mm-hmm.

The D (47:37.144)
Mm.

Chris Picconi (47:42.239)
In this case, it gets shot in, I think the end of July, early August. And I, no joke, walked in that morning. The transporter was there for, was supposed to be there in about two hours. And there was a crack across my windshield from end to end. And I freaked out called my trusty glass guy and I go, there's no way you have this. He goes, you're not going to believe this. Believe it or not. They're actually plentiful. I can get one. I got to drive to the Bronx and you're going to, you know, Bronx, New York, and you're going to pay for it.

The D (47:53.537)
Mm-hmm.

The D (47:57.088)
Right.

The D (48:05.57)
Hehehe

Chris Picconi (48:11.159)
but I will have one there in a couple hours and I can install it very quickly as long as the gasket's still in place. And it happened. Similar situation, it's so funny that that's how it played out. There's always something that you gotta do.

The D (48:12.259)
Right.

The D (48:17.964)
Right.

Yeah, it's crazy. There's always some, there's always some BS. It just, I hate it. Just never phase it. You know, I, we joke like, you know, it, you know, the whole Jeep, Jeeps don't leak. They mark their territory and it cracks me up. Like we'll literally strip a Jeep down and it's like a body on a dolly, right? Out in the parking lot and you walk by and there'll be a puddle of oil under it. I'm like,

Chris Picconi (48:34.868)
Yes!

The D (48:43.438)
How the hell is there a body leaking oil? Yeah, there's nothing in it, but it's all the grease, you know, and the Arizona heat is coming loose. And I'm like, only a Jeep can be a steel body with nothing on it. No, not a single screw left other than, you know, doors and a tailgate and it's leaking oil. That's just Jeep, you know? So.

Chris Picconi (48:44.927)
It doesn't even have a powertrain in it! Yeah!

Chris Picconi (49:01.391)
Yeah, it's so true. So let's talk about, let's kind of switch gears as we get into the end here and go back. You mentioned something earlier, which I think is really cool. The original Renegade that your dad, and I'm assuming it was a CJ5 or a CJ7 Renegade. CJ7 Renegade, you still have that. And I love stories like that. Now, did your dad get rid of it and then you tracked it down somehow, or it always just stayed in the family?

The D (49:08.255)
Uh huh.

The D (49:16.534)
Seven, yeah.

The D (49:26.982)
No, he had it. Yeah, it, my dad, my dad, love you dad. He likes wives. So he was on wife number three, I think, at the point. He just loves wives. We love Louise, his fourth wife, the one he's married to now. She's awesome. The other two before that were coo coo. So anyway, he had, he loved that jeep. It was like sort of part of his identifier.

Chris Picconi (49:39.211)
He collects wives.

Chris Picconi (49:45.831)
Yeah.

The D (49:55.818)
you know, um, and it, he, anyway, uh, he, he was on wife number three. She hated it. It didn't run. It had been sitting out in the backyard, uh, in North Carolina and the, like the oak leaves that etched themselves into the paint and he had the sweet ass wood center console he built when I was a kid. You know, we had the igloo one and then he had a wood one and like ants were in it and oh yeah, the, the orange and tan one.

Chris Picconi (50:19.011)
I love me an igloo cool rest every single Jeep. I actually have the small, so I actually have a gray, the gray and blue, the rare gray and blue igloo cool rest in my J10 right now. And every Jeep, I always throw an igloo cool rest when I replace the console. It's my favorite thing. I'm so glad you just brought it.

The D (50:29.834)
Mm-hmm. That's cool. Yeah.

The D (50:37.046)
Yeah.

The D (50:40.254)
Yeah, it's, you know, there's things like, uh, when my dad bought the Jeep, the very first Christmas, you know, and I think he, he loved the fact that like, um, you know, we during he bought the Jeep right around when my parents got divorced and of course I was infatuated with riding in the Jeep, like to the point where, you know, I was short. So I was a kid, six years old and I would sit with my right leg underneath me, seatbelt it in. He was a big seatbelt advocate. You know, he wouldn't even turn the key. We just.

As a family, we'd be sitting in the driveway and he wouldn't be moving. And everybody's like, why aren't we leaving? And he would just sit there all quiet and we'd all start looking at each other's seat belts. Like my sister didn't have her seatbelt on. It's like click, and then he would fire up the Jeep. He was, you know, which is cool. I mean, he drove them. And anyway, back to the story, squirrels were living in it. It was nasty. It had been to a bunch of shops. Nobody could get it running. And it was the little line.

Chris Picconi (51:19.584)
Yep, that's cool.

The D (51:33.722)
Right after the fuel pickup in the gas tank the little piece of hose in there that was sucking shut and I didn't even Know what it was. I was in my I think I was 24 maybe Those over there one day and Barbara's third wife hated that Look, yeah, you know Anyway, and he's like you want to buy the Jeep and I was like buy it bastard. So let get it to me You know, he's like well, I'll sell it to you. I was like how much he's like $2,500 If you can get it running and drive it off the property

Chris Picconi (51:54.475)
Yeah!

The D (52:00.986)
And so I cheated and put a gas can on the floor and ran a hose straight into the carburetor. And, you know, drove it off the property. And so, yeah, I had it and I moved to Arizona. And well, I bought it and the, I drove it pretty much as it was did an old man, EMU, a YJ kit on 33s. You know, back then did the YJ rear fenders and steel horse seats and like everything you did back then. But I've always been a

Chris Picconi (52:26.979)
That's cool.

The D (52:29.066)
a polisher. So I always had shine and, um, anyway, drove it, motor started smoking, two 58 straight six. Uh, it was a Levi edition renegade. Well, 79 when the Levi edition, but it had the Levi false Levi interior. Um, you know, and, but it had manual steering, manual brakes, soft top, like it was like a base model Jeep, but yet it was a, you know, Levi renegade, which was surprising. Um,

Chris Picconi (52:46.327)
Mm-hmm. With the blue buttons.

The D (52:59.038)
added power steering to it. And then finally I did a 350 swap was a 383 with an envy 4500. Uh, it's put in a Dana 300 and man, I used to race Corvettes. I think I had 33s on it. It would just blast the rear tires off and then moved to Arizona and everybody out here, rock crawls. And I'm from North Carolina. It wouldn't rock crawling. You know, you move some mud and drive up a rock, but you didn't go actually out to go drive up rocks. There were rocks.

Chris Picconi (53:23.639)
Yeah.

The D (53:27.494)
in the trail to get to the next mud hole. And then that was rock crawling in North Carolina back then, you know, and moved out here and one ton axles, 37s. And I started wheeling it, but I always was picky about the paint. The paint's still gorgeous, still has the original paint on it.

Chris Picconi (53:43.779)
Does it have the original Renegade decals on them? That's cool. Are they cracked and faded? I love that patina. I love the patina on the decals like that.

The D (53:45.79)
Yep. Yeah. It's all there. The only thing that got yes, not a little bit, little bit faded, little bit cracked. But as a child, I was obsessed with the Jeep, you know, when, um, it would just sit at the end of the driveway. Uh, my dad had another car. He would drive to work and like, I would come home from school and just start waxing it for no particular reason. Like, you know, detailing it and shit like that. I'll never forget. I was, I was in middle school and

you know, for some random reason, I decided I wanted to repaint the motor blue. So I came home from school and I started ranking carburetor, exhaust manifold. I didn't label anything, right? I just started pulling it off. I was like, yeah, I'm gonna paint this motor. You know, it's scraping, you know. My dad had came home from work, he was so pissed. He was like, what the hell, Drew? And I was like, I'm painting the motor. I didn't label anything. He was like, great, now I know what I'm doing this weekend is I put my damn motor back together, you idiot. So, you know.

Chris Picconi (54:26.753)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (54:42.741)
Yeah.

The D (54:45.77)
And then I taught myself how to backup a trailer with it. So I hooked up the boat and dad, I don't know where he was. And he came home and I was in the middle of road and the neighbor came out because I had the Jeep and the boat jackknifed in the middle of road. And I was, you know, 12 years old and I was practicing backing up a boat. Cause I thought it was a good thing to do. You know, neighbor finally came out. He's like, what are you doing? I was like, I'm stuck. You know, anyway, go ahead.

Chris Picconi (55:07.543)
So what condition is it in now? I'm assuming it's at your house or shop or whatever. Is it still all original, you know, paint? You did that 350, the Envy.

The D (55:12.202)
Yeah, it's...

Well, so it's original paint. Yeah. Well, it was a 383 with a tune port back in the day. That was it for fuel injection. There weren't like aftermarket fuel injection kits. So you bought a Corvette tune port, which still has, it still has the tune port in it. It's heavily modified with a fast computer, like the GM computer shit out years ago and nobody actually programs proms anymore. So we wired a fast.

Chris Picconi (55:23.391)
Okay.

The D (55:45.078)
computer in it fast So it hasn't run in I want to say two and a half years and that's Not the jeeps. Well, so back when I built it, you know Everything was steel braided with the red blue a ends like I thought that was everything I mean I had to a in line for everything You know bill it please and you know all this shit. So I'll probably about

It ran and probably about two years ago, I think I went and turned the key and it shot fuel six feet out of both sides and it, the rubber inside the A and lines had just disintegrated and then that got up into the injectors and, uh, so I bought a, uh, gin, right. Cause it still had the stock gas tank in it with like a Walbro gas pump or fuel pump and all the years I wielded the Walbro would overheat like I'd be in Moab and you hear really or near.

One of the last years I went to Easter Jeep Safari, I've been going more recently, but when I was with the Red Rock four wheelers, it was building up so much fuel pressure that it wouldn't run and I popped the gas cap off and it shot the gas cap out of my hand and blew my hair back and I was like, oh, that can't be good. And it was coming out the charcoal filter and so I knew it was messed up. And you know, a brand new motor, I don't think that motor's got 15,000 miles on it, but it's been hard miles. I mean, it spent half its time wheeling with the nose up in the air. And I think the

Chris Picconi (56:52.734)
Yeah.

The D (57:07.09)
It's you know, it warms up and it the oil pressure gauge, which is mechanical just goes pink to like nothing And I did a drag race in the oil pan with baffles high performance oil pump Anything and I just think it just starved itself because I was wheeling it hard And I just starved the bearings and so, uh, I kind of parked it and then I kind of got back on it and Kind of reverberated back to I just started buying jeeps. I'm like

Chris Picconi (57:12.515)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (57:22.666)
Mm-hmm.

The D (57:36.066)
this. Ooh, I like that one. I like that one. You know, and the business has finally gotten to the point now where, you know, for all the years I ran the business and, you know, worked seven days a week and, you know, like some of my favorite jeeps in the past, I had to sell in order to pay the bills. Like, my wife, you know, there was a point with the G farm when I'm like, Hey, baby, I need gas money, you know, and she's like, here's $30, go mow the grass, you're like my grandfather. So

Chris Picconi (57:37.117)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (58:01.506)
Yeah.

The D (58:03.91)
I joke, but my wife really did. She supported me and, uh, but the, you know, the business has gotten to the, the place now where, I mean, I can kind of use the business a little bit to. Like by jeeps. I mean, it sounds silly, but it's real, you know? And I'm like, I'm going to, that's a cool Jeep. I'm going to buy it. And like, I just sold a, I bought a 77 green chief, 92,000 Z code 401. I just thought it was neat as hell. It was on one of the forums. I'm like, I'm buying that click, you know, and

Chris Picconi (58:17.805)
Yeah.

The D (58:32.342)
drove it for a little while and then finally somebody was like, that's what I'm looking for and I sold it. You know, I mean you buy and sell cars. That's when you, yeah.

Chris Picconi (58:38.411)
Yeah, I mean, that's just how it happens. You get, I sold one in Midtown Manhattan once. I was driving a Defender in Midtown Manhattan and guy comes up, knocks on my window and says, "'Hey man, what do you want for it?' I drew him a crazy number. Guy says, "'Okay, cool. Sounds good, man. Yeah, just meet me here and bring the title and we're good to go.' I was like, okay, sounds good. It just, sometimes that's just how it happens, man. Somebody sees something they want and they go with it. This is a...

The D (58:43.996)
Right.

The D (58:47.927)
Hmm?

The D (58:52.69)
Okay, yeah, yeah.

The D (58:59.114)
Yeah, and it's, it's how we just and we use it as justification. Yeah, like you can justify it now as an adult that's working to get somewhere in life, you can justify it. Like, you know, my employees give me shit somewhere, you buy another Jeep? I'm like, yeah, I did. You know, I worked my asshole for it. So I'm gonna buy a Jeep. You know, but we can justify it like I'm gonna sell it someday. Go ahead.

Chris Picconi (59:15.254)
Yeah.

So is the Renegade running right now? Is the Renegade running right now or where is it at?

The D (59:24.218)
No, it's got a gin right about it. I got sidetracked again. I bought a gin right gas tank with the intake YJ pump so I can get the pump in there and then I got all the black a in fittings and the soft black line and That and it'll run again. I mean it'll run it's still not gonna be no pressure still gonna be pissed off Which I just figured Yeah, my goal is

Chris Picconi (59:44.939)
Gotcha. But you just, it needs a new fuel system and that's it. When you have time and your techs have time, there's a little downtime and it'll get done.

The D (59:53.014)
Yeah, I, you know, I, I try not to have my techs work on my own junk. It happens. Um, but we're so busy. You know, I find myself taking it home and I want to do it. And you know, I've got employees have been with me for two and a half, three years, I've never seen my Jeep, you know, and they've heard about it. And so my goal is what before it, you know, we call it jeeping weather, which is the fall for everybody else. You know, it's not 118 degrees and we can actually go enjoy our cars and not, not feel like we're driving through a hairdryer.

Chris Picconi (59:58.586)
Uh-huh.

Chris Picconi (01:00:07.575)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (01:00:16.959)
Yeah, so wild, man. Yeah.

The D (01:00:20.874)
You know, you drive a Jeep now, which I do. It's like 20 minutes driving it and your eyes are all dry and sticky. And you're like, you're like, this is miserable. You know? Um, but yeah, the goal is to get it back on the road. Um, but you know, I keep, I've gotten into collecting vintage race Jeeps and love them just absolutely. Can't stop buying them. Uh, you can actually, I don't even see back here, race the mint last year with a friend of mine and he races a vintage scrambler, um,

Chris Picconi (01:00:31.971)
That's too funny.

The D (01:00:51.178)
And I've got a bunch of old race jeeps and keep kind of buying those. And like I'm ready for it to cool down a little bit so I can drive some of my junk, you know? Yeah.

Chris Picconi (01:00:59.043)
with them. That's fun, man. Well, I'll leave you with this one. We're gonna, we'll end on this one last question, right? So when you founded Jeep Farm in 2010, right? It was AMC, Kaiser, Willie's Overland Jeeps, right? So it was, you know, 86 and older, you know, with the asterisk that there are the SJ Grand Wagoneers up to 91, but that's all you were working at. But that was 2010. Now it's 2023, right? And time has gone by and there are...

The D (01:01:08.897)
Mm-hmm.

The D (01:01:20.014)
Mm-hmm. Right.

Chris Picconi (01:01:28.475)
is a whole new generation of Jeeps that have become classics in that period of time, right? In this past 13 years, which are the Chrysler era, right? Very controversial era, but the Chrysler era. So now you have YJs, XJs, TJs, which fit into that category, classic Jeep. So here's the question. Does the Jeep farm

The D (01:01:38.158)
Hmm.

The D (01:01:50.382)
They're technically vintage now. I know.

Chris Picconi (01:01:56.839)
expand as they get older and go into the Chrysler era? Maybe. That's actually the answer I was looking for, maybe. Cause that means there's a chance. Ha ha ha.

The D (01:02:00.522)
Maybe, well, so here's my, maybe here's my thought process. So here's, there is, I did one XJ and I, again, you know, sometimes I do builds cause I like the story. And so it was a dude and his dad had grown up with this blue pioneer XJ, it's on my website. And he, he had grown up, become doctor, wanted to do something for his dad. And he said, his dad never shut up about this damn XJ and it rusted.

They lived in Canada and it just kind of rusted into pieces. And I like this story. And sometimes I'll step outside of my bounds. Like we just did a, a YJ Sahara, same thing. Dad wanted, it was a family. It was grandpa's Jeep. Then it was his Jeep. The daughter was brought up in it. She's graduating from UNM. Dad wanted to restore it as a graduation present. Like I'm a sucker for that shit. You know, same thing with the XJ. Point with the XJ, they're so hard to find parts for.

Chris Picconi (01:02:54.071)
That's cool.

The D (01:02:58.962)
So I get emails constantly on restoring XJs and the generation younger than say you and I, they grew up around XJs and now they're getting older and you know, yeah, they drove a beater XJ like we drove beater Jeeps when we were younger and they want nicer XJs and maybe that's something I'll get into. I mean, my wife and I had one for 300,000 miles. It was hers, great Jeep. I mean, you drive those things to the end of the earth and they just keep fucking running. Excuse my French, you know, but.

Chris Picconi (01:02:59.241)
Mm-hmm.

The D (01:03:29.106)
Long answer along with me is yes, maybe right now. I mean, I have 142 Jeeps on the books right now in the yard. And I'm still running a backlog of I'm not even bringing Jeep. For restorations, I'm still booking a year out. We swing repairs in the big restorations. But maybe if it gets to it, I mean,

I just, I, there's still so much demand for the Jeep that I love. And I prefer to work on things that I, you know, XJs are great. I had a TJ. I bought it. It had been wrecked. I fixed it. I drove it one week and turned on and sold it. I was like, eh, it's got AC, but I love my steel dashboards. I mean, I'm not going to lie. That's just where that's what screwed up my personality, you know, and I'm not bagging them out at all. I mean, they're great vehicles.

Chris Picconi (01:04:17.005)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (01:04:22.947)
That's cool.

The D (01:04:24.858)
their TJs will run forever, XJs will run forever, they're great wheelers, they do everything kind of right. You know, you can have a top and you can have air conditioning and you can still have a Jeep. Problem is, is every Jeep I buy that has a top, the first, my employees laugh at me, first thing I do is take top off. I mean it could be raining and I'll drive to work and a CJ just grinning ear to ear and I don't really don't care. I'll sweat, I like being dirty, you know, I go out wheeling

Chris Picconi (01:04:36.024)
Mm-hmm.

The D (01:04:54.486)
Thank God wheel and old Jeeps has kind of come back full circle. Like there's all these flat fender groups now vintage runs, you know, and that's my, I like that, but you know, for a while there, I was the dude in Moab and it was all four door Wranglers and TJs and I'm in a Renegade and the guy comes up and he goes, that's a nice Wrangler. I'm like, yeah, that's not a Wrangler, you know, anyway, sorry. Someday.

Chris Picconi (01:05:01.196)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (01:05:16.871)
Yeah, yeah, sure. But that's cool though, that eventually at some point, there's a maybe, right? Maybe, so you're telling me there's a chance, right? That's cool. YJs are coming into their own though, man. The square headlights are coming into their own. You find a real, real clean, all original YJ Rio Grande or a Sahara.

The D (01:05:24.318)
Yeah, there is a maybe. If I'm... I think... I mean, I'd like to believe there is, and another, you know... I kinda dig YJ's.

The D (01:05:39.378)
in their prices. Yeah.

Chris Picconi (01:05:42.807)
Oh man, are they doing numbers these days? They're coming into your own. And like you said, I'll tell you, it's generational. And as the generation of collectors gets older, they want what they grew up around. And that was, hey, my first car was a square headlight YJSC, man. So I haven't had a YJ since then, but again, there's the answer.

The D (01:05:45.578)
Yep. First gen YJs. Yeah. If you can find, yeah, a hundred percent.

The D (01:05:59.982)
Correct.

The D (01:06:05.441)
Mm-hmm.

The D (01:06:09.07)
They're great drivers. I mean, we, I'm honestly surprised that, you know, everybody saw CJ prices go through the roof and you're living in a closet. If you haven't realized Wagoneer prices are just, you know, up there. Yeah. I mean, we still hope that there's some people that don't know what the internet is, that still has a Wagoneer that'll sell it to me for four grand, but they literally don't have to have the internet like, or a grandson that says, grandpa, your dad's worth, your Wagoneer's worth $40,000.

Chris Picconi (01:06:11.691)
Maybe I'll pick one up for the collection. So, but.

Chris Picconi (01:06:23.563)
Bonkers, yeah.

Chris Picconi (01:06:29.598)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (01:06:33.783)
Yeah.

The D (01:06:38.154)
You know, cause grandpa was like, ah, it's a crappy old Jeep. I'll sell it for four grand. Yes, here's my money. You know, so, uh, anyway, I, we did that Sahara. I did this. I think it just drives great. Like you go down the, you know, 80 miles an hour down the interstate with AC on, you're like, oh, this is, I forgot how good these things drive, you know, so, uh-huh.

Chris Picconi (01:06:38.77)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Chris Picconi (01:06:55.679)
Yeah, man, with the 4.0 high output, I mean, that's a good engine. I mean, it's sad that we got rid of the 4.2, 258 for it, but hey, you know, it at least went to a good place. But Drew, man, I can't thank you enough for your time today. Yeah, man, we had so much fun. We have so many different common friends we'd never met before, never crossed paths. So this is the first time we got to cross paths, but you guys are doing great stuff out there at the Jeep farm. You're building some really cool stuff.

The D (01:07:02.413)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Oh, that's fun, man. I can talk all day.

The D (01:07:13.936)
Uh.

The D (01:07:18.062)
Thank you, I appreciate it.

Chris Picconi (01:07:20.907)
You're a ton of fun to talk to, man. So really can't thank you enough for your time today. Really appreciate it. And again, to all of our listeners out there, if you don't follow Drew and the Jeep Farm on the social channels, make sure you do. Check out his website and check out Palo's Build. You can, you know, he posts a lot on his social channels, which is Cherokee Land, but you have a bunch of info on your website about it. We talked a lot about it. So it's a pretty epic investment.

The D (01:07:24.599)
Thank you.

The D (01:07:41.746)
Yes. Yeah.

The D (01:07:48.064)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (01:07:50.339)
build. So again, Drew, thanks a lot, man. I appreciate your time and wish you all the best.

The D (01:07:51.243)
Thanks, man. I appreciate it.

The D (01:07:56.606)
Well, thank you. I appreciate it.