Urban saw/wood truck

[bendjoseph]

I burn nine cords at my summer camp.  All the wood is free wood that has fell or dying or damaged trees I drop for people.  A lot of the wood comes from farm land woodlots.  I have picked up a 2000 Jeep Cherokee for $200.  I want to make this into my saw and tool truck.  I will also use it to help me position the wood for sawing.  So, with all that said I plan on doing the following:
Heavy duty front bumper and winch
Heavy duty rear bumper
4.11 gearing with locking diffs

Any other suggestions?

[york]

Yes,this sounds interesting-please get your camera going...

thanks albert

[Leigh Family Farm]

Safari cage on the roof rack with lights, reinforce the trailer hitch, double check the shocks and leaf springs ($200 makes me think of rust and damage), and the skid plate might need to be replaced if you are offroading. If you don't need the back seats, take them out and you can install a tool chest to keep you organized. Might look into installing an inverter with an outlet plug near the back for regular AC power. Take the spare tire and put it in the safari cage, so you get more ground clearance.

Just my thoughts...

[Cypressstump]

For a winch, I have recently purchased a couple elec winches off fleabay. You'd be surprised of the lower prices you can find now days.

I bought a 10k and a 10,500 lb 'tuff stuff ' brand for less than 300 bucks. It's actually a very decent winch and carries a 3 year warranty. It's worked flawlessly for me so far. I am normally a Warn or Ramesy guy. But those winches have gotten higher in cost lately.

[beenthere]

Do you plan to trailer out the firewood behind the jeep? Doing the bucking and splitting in the woods where the tree fell or dragging the logs out to a landing?

Not sure what you mean by "positioning" the wood using the jeep, other than yarding the logs to a place to buck and split.

Wish you well with the jeep 'venture and hope to see some pics.  Maneuvering a jeep off trails in a woods could be exciting.

[fuzzybear]

  I take it the Jeep will no longer see road use. If that's the case I would recomend welding the rear spider gears together for full time 4x4. never mind the expence for a locker.  You have to take corners wider and slower but you will never have to worry about loosing traction.  I also run tire chains year round. This way you don't need "good" tires, as long as they hold air the chains will do the rest.
  If it has 4x4 low range then you shouldn't need the 4:10 gearing. My 3/4t with 4x4 low can pull 3-24"x60' trees at a time without a problem. The S-10 with a 4cyl, can pull 2 trees at a time. never tried to pull more than that with it. I'm sure it could have.
  I'm not sure if a Jeep is a unibody truck or full frame, if it's unibody I would add sub frame connectors or things will go "pop" real fast pulling logs. 
   Lights in the back can be had by wiring the reverse lights up to a switch, if you need more you can add them.  I strip out everything that is not needed, it lightens the truck up witch means I can put more on the truck.  If it doesn't have one I would add a headache rack to hang stuff and protect the rear window.
FB

[easymoney]

you stole that jeep. it would bring more for scrap metal than you gave for it.

[thecfarm]

Too bad you couldn't shorten it up some too. I been in the woods with my old truck. Just too long for me really. A bother to turn around. My woods is not the best anyways.If a tree is not in the way a rock or some big dip in the ground is. I think I would remove the drivers door too. I just felt it was a bother with a door.But leave the passenger door on. This way nothing will fall out on that side. I would put the chains on it too. I don't know if you could put some old chains through the holes in the rim or not. I would look for some higher tires too. ground clearance helps out over stumps and rocks. I would also keep a hyd jack with you too and a few 2Xs. This way you could jack yourself up if the pumpkins get hung up on something.