"Hi Rudy, I wanted to thank you for all your help getting a Jeep back in our family. When I told you the story of what happened to our beloved 85 CJ 7 I know you were a little skeptical, but with your vast knowledge of everything Jeep you confirmed how it could happen. It was such a far out story. I thought you would like to share it with all the other Jeep Junkies who visit your site. If you don’t that’s OK too. So here it is.

Ever since I took my first ride in a Jeep I knew I would own one someday. One of my best friend’s wife bought a brand new 1985 CJ 7 for here daily driver. It was a Plain Jane but with new wheels and the light blue color it was sharp! My buddy and his wife and I and my wife would cruse in it with the top down  for hours on weekends, lots of great memories! I told Chris, his wife if she ever sold it to call me first. Years past and life happens. Jobs took us away and we started a family. One day out of the blue I got the call, the Jeep was for sale. It didn’t take much convincing my wife, and the Jeep was ours. It had around 90,000 miles on it by now and had seen its better days. (Jeeps and Ohio winters don’t get along too well) but mechanically it was solid and it became part of our family as a runabout. Over the next several years I repaired the body the best I could and repainted it. It ran great most days and from 50 feet away it looked great. Every spring I would pull it out of the barn and take the top down, and that’s the way it would be all summer. Taking kids to the pool, running to the store, tooling though the woods, going to the lake on Sundays. We didn’t put a ton of miles on it but we loved our old Jeep. I mentioned to my wife about selling it one time and she said NO WAY… it wasn’t going anywhere. I knew sooner or later I would need to throw some serious money at it, my thoughts where to put a new steel body on it at some time (fiberglass was out of the question) and completely go through it but like other things it got put off.

 Old Blue.                                                                                     When the Kids were young with their cousins.

Fast forward to the spring of 2014….So we have a Son and a Daughter. When our son was getting about ready to drive we (well really me because my wife see’s right through me) decided that it would be a good father son project to fix up a car. He liked old muscle cars and after a long search we found a 72 Nova that sat in a barn for 10 years. The price was right and we had a ball fixing it up and burning through a couple sets of rear tires. Our Daughter is a couple of years younger and was getting close to driving when she started bugging me about her “Fun Car” … Her only request was it had to be a convertible. Half joking I said well why don’t I give you the old Jeep? She couldn’t say yes fast enough. She loved the Jeep and couldn’t wait to get her hands on it! The fall before she got her license we spent hours in it teaching her how to drive a stick shift. Now I know why they put that grab bar above the glove box! So in the spring she couldn’t wait to hit the road. We serviced it and waited for the weather to get warm.

This is where the story gets weird.. Memorial Day weekend came and everyone was busy. I was in my shop working on some things and my son told me he was meeting a few of his buddies in town about 4 miles away to play soccer at the park? Being a nice day he asked if it would be ok to take the Jeep. I said he could but just put it back where he found it. It was backed into the way back of our shop out of the way. So off he went. Three hours later he comes home and to my surprise (teenage boys have short memories) he backs it right to the spot where he took it. I asked him if it ran OK. He said like a champ! We had to go to a graduation party so we both went into the house to get cleaned up. A few minutes after I jumped into the shower my wife noticed smoke from the back window of our bedroom. She yelled down from the upstairs to our daughter to find out where it was coming from…That when she about broke down the bathroom door yelling THE JEEPS ON FIRE!!!! … As I was slipping around the bathroom floor trying to get my shorts on I could see the amount of smoke passing by the bathroom window. My thoughts immediately went to “there goes the Jeep and my shop up in flames”! I about fell down the steps trying to get outside to see the inevitable damage. When I got to the back door I nearly froze in my tracks. Only minutes ago I watched my son back the old Jeep into my shop. The shop sits roughly 300 feet across our driveway from our house. When I got to our back door our old blue Jeep was sitting about 10 feet from the back door….burning…. I looked around expecting to see some Good Samaritan who was driving by our house and noticed smoke and pushed our poor Jeep out of the shop thus saving the barn, but no one was to be seen. I grabbed the garden hose which conveniently only 15 feet away and started to fight down the flames. I took only about 10 minutes to put it out, but the damage was done. The old jeep was dead, but how did it out of the shop? I could see from the lingering smoke in the shop that it had started burning inside the building. Maybe it coasted out? I checked the gear shift and it was in first gear. After some head scratching the only theory I could come up with was this. Somehow when the fire started from an electrical short it engaged the starter and it drove itself out of the back of the building, through a 12’ door, across the driveway, slightly turning to the right so not to run directly into our attached garage and at the same time missing our sons car which was parked in the turn around. When it got within 10’ of the house the fire was burning big enough that it melted the battery which disengaged the starter stopping it where we found it a few moments later. Wow! Really? …

So with the fire out and the mystery solved to the best of our abilities I finally noticed the look on our daughters face. There goes my Jeep is what it said. She didn’t come out and say it but I knew she was heartbroken as the rest of us were too. That old Jeep with all its rust and quirks was part of our family and we would miss it.

Where we found her burning.                                           Where she started burning.

This is where Rudy enters the picture….I had noticed some of Rudy’s ads on Craigslist before our Jeep had burnt. It said he was located in Findlay Ohio and being only 15 miles from Findlay I had always thought I would look him up when I needed parts for our old Jeep when I finally got around to fixing it up. Now that she was toasted I looked up his website. From what I read he was the guy to possibly get her back on the road. From what I could see it was defiantly going to need a whole new wiring harness, heater box, valve cover, gauges, plus much more. I called him on a Saturday and he said to come on over and he would see how he could help. After telling him my story of what happened and seeing his initial shock, he said he could defiantly see how it drove itself out of our barn. We discussed what it would take to get her running again and the parts I would need. He said he understood our attachment to the old Jeep, but before throwing a bunch of money at it and still have a pretty rusty, patched together Jeep he wanted to show me something behind his shop. We walked out back where he keeps some older Jeep’s that he tears down for parts. We walk up to a faded red 83 CJ 7. I wasn’t impressed.

The paint was gone on the top of the hood and fenders, fender flares were falling off, it just looked like a mess. He told me to jump in it and start it. He said he hadn’t started it for 2 months when it was shipped in from California. I hit the key and the 258 cu in came to life and purred. Lifting the hood he pointed it out it was equipped with a Howell fuel injection kit, a much better set up than my old Carter carb. He then told me to craw underneath it. What I found was a totally rust free tub and frame. Compared to my old winter driven Ohio born Jeep it looked brand new! He told me to look past the faded paint and consider the whole Jeep. It didn’t take long before I was asking…How much? I was pleased to find he would trade in my old Jeep for parts and swap some rare parts from the  California Jeep (it stared its life as a Laredo) and the difference wasn’t all that much more than what I would have in rebuilding my old blue Jeep. After convincing the two women in my life how this old faded red jeep was the way to go, we made the swap and my next project got on its way. Everyone pitched in. We got right at it and tore it down. Our goal was to have it on the road as quick as possible. All it really needed was a paint job and a few odds and ends mechanically. It went back to its original Oriental Red color plus a black spray on bed liner on the inside of the tub. Besides a small dent on the right rear corner the body was flawless. Every time I crawled under it I couldn’t believe how clean it was on the bottom. The frame still had its original paint! About 3 weeks after we got it was on the road. It’s not a show Jeep and we didn’t want it to be.

It’s my daughter’s fun driver. She drives it everywhere when the sun is shining. It’s the coolest car in her high school parking lot! She calls it her Cali Girl and grins from ear to ear when she meets another Jeep on the road and gives them the “Jeep wave” ( It’s a Jeep thing). So I wanted to thank Rudy at Rudy’s Classic Jeeps for his advice and expertise for helping us find our new family member. I would highly recommend him for all your CJ 7 and Scrambler needs. 

Tony Rieman

Arlington, Ohio"

Hi Rudy,

It’s been 6 months since I purchased my California CJ7 from you and I wanted to check in and let you know that I amthoroughly enjoying summer. I took your advice and decided not to drive it during the winter to avoid any salt contamination. It spent the first few month’s sitting either at my house or in the shop for some steering and performance improvements. I got to know the Trailquest team on your recommendation and they have been great to work with. I also replaced the soft top and added a bikini top. I removed the Wrangler-style roll bars and added CJ7 mirrors to restore the look. The past month I have had such a blast driving it and it runs like a dream. Everyone who looks at it is amazed that this 30 year old Jeep has no rust and runs like new. I have some more upgrades planned over the next year, but for now I love this Jeep! It was great working with you and I enjoyed visiting your (old) shop. Thanks for doing what you do and best of luck with your new shop.

Thanks,

Paul

Hello Rudy,
 
Its been several weeks since you delivered the CJ7 and CJ8 and I have been having a great time with them.....and just as you predicted, they really do stop traffic and draw a crowd. It happened the first time with the two guys in the truck that followed you to my house when you delivered the jeeps so they could ask where they came from, then a few days later a very nice couple waited for me outside Starbucks to ask about the CJ8, then there was the crowd of sales and service personnel at the local Jeep dealership that gathered around the CJ7 when I stopped by there, and more recently, just this past week I had a semi-truck driver follow me off the highway exit and roll down his window at the traffic light to ask me about the CJ7.
 
Truly, none of that comes anywhere close to the fun I'm having driving around in these two jeeps that are each nearly 30 years old. How good is that ?! Its absolutely awesome !
 
I want to thank you for all you did to help me with both of these jeeps and the restoration and modification work you did. The '84 CJ8 as a one owner Scrambler needed no restoration and the originality of it is rare.
 
Please, feel free to share my referral to any prospect or interested party that may be considering buying one of your jeeps. What I'd like them to hear from me is that after working with you and purchasing a jeep from you, I can genuinely say I enjoyed the entire experience, have complete confidence in your work and know I can totally rely on your word. I appreciate that you were always straightforward with me, even when it was not in your best interest. I found your honesty and plain talk refreshing and reassuring.
 
 I wish you much continued success and I already look forward to the next jeep I buy from you. Its just a matter of time. I greatly enjoy old jeeps and I know of no other place that comes anywhere close to doing what you do. And none have the knowledge and enthusiasm you have for old jeeps or the know-how and network to find so many great old western jeeps.......its really exciting to see them.
 
 I'll keep in touch and be up to see you in Bluffton a little later this summer. I'd love to look at the jeeps you have....the 83 original, red CJ7 that you have for sale right now looks like another great find !!!
 
 Catch you soon.
 
 John

Cincinnatti, Ohio