Build Johnny's Goatbuilt JHF buggy

Ghetto Fab. said:
I'm in commiefornia, so we don't see many broken frames unless its been in an accident. Not much rust here. Out here when you search for a tahoe, suburban, yukon, whatever, you wind up with a bunch of parting out ads where the seller has already pulled the motor and trans out to use in another project and just wants the rest of it gone. Or its a tweaker vehicle, or scam. There are vehicles and deals, but none that have really peaked my interest for the $$$ and distances involved. Vans seem to have the highest ad prices oddly.
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i get it. painfull for sort through all the scams for sure
 
Ghetto Fab. said:
Thats some good info. I was planning on doing the same for the next build and hoping it lasts for at least a little bit. How much steering angle are you using with this setup?

Also, good info on the gearing selection. I've been looking for a 5.3 4l60 combo and haven't had much luck.
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Truthfully never measured. To get it running I kept factory stops and figured I’d go back, but in 3 years I haven’t felt the need. I have JHF weld on arms and use about 9” of ram travel.

I generally out turn my friends who run KP60s.
 
JohnnyJ said:
So after I had exhaust run, I wanted to get the underhood work done. But I needed to know where I could fit things around the grille, hood, and headlights. So I worked on that next. I went with a 4 hood pin setup and it totally lifts off. The hood had some indents where stock hood latches would go, so I used some scrap aluminum to make a plate that looked like the hinge. I wanted the hood low, so I decided to punch the shock towers through the hood. Later I had to make a hole for the steering reservoir.

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Now I knew where my ebay headlights would go, just needed mounts. I also wanted a support between the shock hoops. So I built this out of 1" DOM to fit under the hood, and then built off it for the headlight mounts. Also can see the rear hoodpins in this pic.
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I made a mount to hang the ebay lights, and I can adjust side to side and up and down. They were cheap and not very deep. They do provide some light and have low and high beams. From that 1" frame I was able to make upper grill mounts, hang the headlights, and also front hood pins.

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Great build thread.

Where did you get that hood? I have one that is similar and someone told me it came from Goadbuilt, but not sure. I recently smashed mine up and the local fiberglass shops say it's 20 hours of work to fix, way too spendy. Cheapter to replace it.
Thanks!
 
The hood was bought through Goatbuilt for the JHF chassis. Based on a FB group, it sounds like they stopped making. I've heard of people using Jimmy's hood, but have not investigated.

edit: To be clear, they had someone making them and they were reselling. No idea who made them.
 
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I'm fairly certain that the "goatbuilt" hood was a Campbell unit. I've had the Campbell hood next to my goatbuilt hood and they look identical. I didn't have a tape measure to do a 100% comparison but I'm as sure as I could be without swapping the hoods between the two chassis.

Fiberglass Products

campbellent.com campbellent.com
 
JohnnyJ said:
The hood was bought through Goatbuilt for the JHF chassis. Based on a FB group, it sounds like they stopped making. I've heard of people using Jimmy's hood, but have not investigated.

edit: To be clear, they had someone making them and they were reselling. No idea who made them.
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Thanks! I heard from someone else as well that Jimmy's had the mold and makes them. I'll call them.
 
crazybluerider said:
I'm fairly certain that the "goatbuilt" hood was a Campbell unit. I've had the Campbell hood next to my goatbuilt hood and they look identical. I didn't have a tape measure to do a 100% comparison but I'm as sure as I could be without swapping the hoods between the two chassis.

Fiberglass Products

campbellent.com campbellent.com
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You are right, thanks for the link...that Campbell hood does look identical to mine.
 
They were not Campbell hoods. We bought a few molds from a guy in Missouri.

During covid, the mfg we were using went out of business, and we couldn't find anyone who wanted to deal with the onesy twosy type orders. We found one company that would work with us, but they needed to build a custom mold that was all cncd and perfect, at a cost of $11k. Then the MOQ was 50 pieces. We weren't going to do that. We talked with Jimmys 4x4, and they were interested in making/selling them. We shipped out the IBEX hood and the JHF hood to them, and they are selling them as far as I know.
 
Wisconsinite said:
They were not Campbell hoods. We bought a few molds from a guy in Missouri.

During covid, the mfg we were using went out of business, and we couldn't find anyone who wanted to deal with the onesy twosy type orders. We found one company that would work with us, but they needed to build a custom mold that was all cncd and perfect, at a cost of $11k. Then the MOQ was 50 pieces. We weren't going to do that. We talked with Jimmys 4x4, and they were interested in making/selling them. We shipped out the IBEX hood and the JHF hood to them, and they are selling them as far as I know.
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Great info. Thanks!!!
 
Info on my Fox 2.5 air shocks from when I bought them. I saved it off so I would have a starting point if I ever opened them up. I have been super impressed by them, and many people have remarked that they've never seen air shocks work so well. Moving here so it's easier for me to find in the future.

9T3XJ
Dec 22, 2015

Currently single bleeds front and rear but I'm going to open the second bleed hole in the rears back up.

I've always run stock oil levels but I have played with valving. Valving alone makes a big difference in the 2.5's.

If my memory is right my fronts are valved 90/40, and rears are 70/40 but I think I'm gonna try 70/30 in the rear when I open up the shocks again.
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Since I haven't opened them up, I'm not sure if he ever adjusted them after he posted this.
 
JohnnyJ said:
Info on my Fox 2.5 air shocks from when I bought them. I saved it off so I would have a starting point if I ever opened them up. I have been super impressed by them, and many people have remarked that they've never seen air shocks work so well. Moving here so it's easier for me to find in the future.
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That's pretty basic valving too.
I'm sure you can improve on that.

Do you remember your pressures? Makes a big difference on airshocks.
 
This is why I need to write it on here, because the pressures on a piece of paper that I tossed. I wanna say 100# up front and 75# in back. I'll keep looking to see if did write it somewhere. Pressures were adjusted until I had between 4-5" up travel.
 
Update . Buggy is just over 4 years old. This trip it was obvious the import rod ends are wore out and getting loose. Last fall I said I should change them out over the winter, and I'm saying it again.

This trip I had some breakage. On day 1 I was playing on a bonus line. I made the climb, got ****y, drove off the back of the obstacle and dropped the rear driveshaft on a rock. Broke the retainer tang on the 14-bolt's 1410 axle yoke and chucked the caps. Once again I used white-rhino trail welder and welded a washer to hold the replacement joint. It looks like bird ****, but it held for the rest of the trip. Fresh forged yoke from Wide Open is on the way.

Then after a nostalgic day at Rausch Creek we were all playing in the comp area. Another climb with a bad ending. Climbed up a ledge, front slid off line, and in backing out of the obstacle I took out a stock 1550 inner axle shaft. Pretty happy with the longevity of the stock super duty 1550 shafts. I'm no bouncer, but I have put some abuse on them and have been surprised at their longevity. I decided to upgrade to a 4340 shaft from Branik.


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Finally got some time to work on it. I had ordered a Crane 1410 axle yoke and Branik 4340 inner axle shaft when I got home and had them sitting on the table. Started digging in and found it was the outer shaft that broke. Just ordered the outer from Branik, hope its here this week. Took quite a bit of hammering to get the inner out. Welded a bolt on the broken inner and got after it with a slide hammer. Splines look a little twisted. New Branik shaft slides in no problems.

Bummer is the rear bearing on the unit bearing was wiped out, so I'll have to swap in a spare. Need to put it back together for a local day out on the 18th.
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Cool stuff rolled in today from Branik Motorsports! Last week I called the shop and got Stan himself on the phone. I told him I was looking to buy one 35-spline chromo outer and he asked where mine broke. I told him, and he said most of the 35-spline stuff is breaking at the keyway slot and recommended I upgrade to 40-spline outers. I already have been running his 35-spline slugs in my 05+ D60, so he offered to sell me just the slugs and a pair of 40-spline outers. We had one of their original set of slugs way back when in our racer that we ran 05+ outers on. I love it when you talk with a vendor and talk real with you about why just buying a replacement is throwing good money after bad and have a good conversation on what options are based on what you do.

Stan's awesome. The whole family is great, enjoyed racing TREC and Ultra4 with those guys, and nice to still be doing business with them. Nice part is the stuff came in just in time to install tomorrow or friday night and hit the local park for a locals run.
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Installed the Branik shafts on the driver's side with no issues and made it to the run to play on the rock course. Good time as always.

No issues with the Spartan locker after breaking the axle shaft. Also grabbed a few fresh Spicer 1550 joints since I'm in there. Will do the passenger side next time it's in the shop. Recently ordered some fresh rod ends and plan to swap them out before we head to Texas in 2026.

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image from white-rhino as always
 
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