At this years ZuZoo you may have noticed I didn't bring the StinkBug for the first time, and instead brought a new buggy I built with my friend Wayne. After a few days of wheelin his rig I decided it was time to build myself something a little more extreme than the current StinkBug. When I mentioned parting out my rig however I got a ton of negative responses from people who really like my rig. Truth is I agree with all of them, I LOVE my rig and I took it as a huge compliment when so many people told me they felt the same. Problem is I couldn't afford to buy all the parts needed for a new rig, and I REALLY like my current drivetrain.

Well that problem has just been solved. I've just aquired the original Super Trooper. This was one of the first troopers to get a full drivetrain and axle swap, years before I started wheeling, and its still a pretty nice package. Current specs are as follows.

'91 Chevy 4.3 V6 TBI
700R4 Transmission
Dual toyota T-cases
Rear Isuzu 12 bolt W/ARB
Front Toyota minitruck axle W/ARB

Most of that will be transferred to the new rig, some will go to the previous owner, and some will either be sold or scrapped. The plan is to build a totally new tube chassis, that will meet the 2006 W.E.Rock Modified Class rules. The 4.3, 700R4, and 12 bolt rear will remain. A Dana 300 with twinstick will replace the toy cases, and a wagoneer D44 will go up front. Basically all the drivetrain will be a duplicate of the current StinkBug. The suspension will not however. I plan on closely copying the suspension on waynes Buggy as I really liked how it worked both crawling and haulin butt. The chassis itself will be a mix of a number of rigs I've watched closely and worked on in the last couple years, but will borrow a lot from the rigs built by Jason Paule and the folks at Twisted Customs in South Dakota. No denying it, they build some of the best rigs out there and I've been lucky enough to spend a bit of time carefully examining them to see what makes them so good. Hopefully a little of that will come through in this build. The bodywork will definitely be based on the trooper, but will be shorter and narrower. I'll probably hack up and reuse the hood and fenders, but the rest will be fabricated.

So without further delay heres a peek at what I'm starting with.



It wont be lookin like that for long though. The Trooper is gonna get stripped pretty fast and about 90% of the body will be goin to the junkyard. The building of the new chassis probably wont be getting started for a while yet because of other projects going on right now, but stay tuned, I'll keep you updated as things progress.

Dallas