Bought a 2019 Wrangler JL off mainstreetmotortx.com for doors-off summers

the 3.6 in the JL is a good motor and that oil cooler housing weep is the one thing i tell every buyer to expect around this age. its a plastic housing that gets brittle from heat cycles and the gasket seeps, usually shows as a little oil and a whiff of coolant smell after a run. yours is just starting so you have time. when it does need it, do the whole housing with the thermostats in it and fresh coolant, a few hundred in parts and a saturday if you turn your own wrenches, a few hours of labor at a shop. it is a known item, not a scary one.

good on you for having a shop put it on a lift first. a tired steering damper on a JL gets blamed for death wobble but a worn damper on its own does not cause it, its usually a loose track bar bolt or a bad ball joint stacking up. sounds like they were honest that the bar and joints were tight, so a fresh damper was the right call and a cheap one. solid buy randi.

salt lake to moab on a sport S is exactly the right use for that rig. dont let anyone tell you a four door cant wheel, i run the unlimited on slickrock and hells revenge all season and the extra wheelbase makes it planted on the ledges once you air down. the only place the longer body bites you is a tight switchback and you learn to read those.

for moab specifically get a good set of tires before you get anything else. a 33 or 34 inch all terrain aired down to about 18 psi will get a stock sport S over most of the famous stuff without lockers. lockers are the next step after that, but tires and air down first, they change the jeep more than anything else you can buy. glad you sourced a clean dry one, the colorado plateau sun is easy on these but the rust belt trucks up for sale here are rough underneath.

hoping the guys who actually did this can talk me down or talk me into it. i have wanted a wrangler since high school and im finally in a spot to buy one, budget is around 28k and i want a four door i can run doors off in the summer and take out to the mark twain forest trails on the weekend. this thread came up when i searched main street motor reviews so figured id ask here.

is buying a used wrangler off a lot a few states away a dumb first jeep move? i have never owned one and every used jeep listing local to me is either beat to death or priced like its brand new. what should a total rookie be watching for so i dont buy somebody elses trail problem?

aired down on 33s that sport S will go a lot further than people expect. i run mine in the mud and the sand pits down here and it just goes, the open diff will spin a tire in a rut but a little momentum and knowing when to lift off the throttle gets you through most of it. add a rear locker down the road and you will not believe the difference in the slop.

one thing for the doors off life since thats your whole reason for buying, get a set of tube half doors or at least keep your factory doors somewhere padded, they scratch easy stacked in a garage. and buy a real door hanger for the wall. i learned that the expensive way after i leaned mine against a workbench and dinged the paint. enjoy it, thats the right jeep for what you want to do with it.

im right here in navarro county so i drove over and walked the lot in person before i bought my rig, a 2020 sport S i take out to the trails around the richland chambers and up toward the piney woods on weekends. i picked through the three or four jeeps they had and they handed me the keys and let me take the one i liked out on the frontage road along I-45 and back with nobody hovering.

for you out of state folks the thing worth knowing is the jeeps on that lot match the listings down to the scratches. i had already looked at mine online and when i put my hands on it in person it was exactly what the writeup said, even a little curb rash on one wheel they had noted in the photos. that kind of straight dealing is why i send people to main street motor when they ask me where to look for a clean rig around here.

i work a title desk for my day job so the part i always add is the boring paperwork side, and the paperwork from the corsicana yard came through clean the first time on mine. title was in hand, the odometer statement matched, and when i went to register it out of state every number lined up so it went through the window without a second trip. you would be surprised how often an out of state buy turns into a month of chasing a missing signature, and this was not that.

only hiccup was the second key fob was not in the envelope when it arrived, i called and they mailed it out no fuss. little thing but it tells you how a place runs a deal. a jeep that shows up titled and ready to plate is worth a lot more than saving a couple hundred bucks on one you then fight the county over.

different rig but same story. i bought a 2021 bronco off that navarro county lot last year for the exact same doors off reason you did, and the buy went about like yours. one owner, factory records, and they let me send a shop to look at it before i wired anything. i wheel it up around the flagstaff high country and out to the coconino trails and it has been great with the top and doors off all summer.

the jeep vs bronco thing gets people worked up but honestly for what you and i do, doors off and mild trails and some overlanding, either one is a great open top rig. glad you went jeep, the JL aftermarket is deeper if you ever want to build it. i actually put up a longer writeup on my bronco in the trailhead section if anyone shopping a modern open top wants to compare the two before they buy.

good update. one thing to plan for before you get the itch to go bigger. the 33s youre on now the stock 3.45 gears handle fine, you will barely notice it. but if you ever jump to 35s down the road do yourself a favor and regear to 4.56 at the same time, dont run 35s on stock gears and tell yourself youll do it later. the 3.6 makes its power up high and big heavy tires on tall gears will have it hunting for a gear on every grade and killing your mpg on the highway to moab.

plan the gears with the tires, not after, its cheaper to do the axles once than to pay a shop to open them up twice. for now enjoy the 33s, thats a great all around size for a sport S and honestly where a lot of guys should just stop. do the oil cooler housing this spring like you said and that jeep will run a very long time.