One of the saddest sights you can lay eyes on as a gearhead is the last-chance lot next to a junkyard. You know what I’m talking about: they’ve been driven to death, but are still clinging to life. Maybe they were turned in simply because they were old and the careless owners thought that their usefulness ran up. Maybe someone who was ignorant of proper maintenance couldn’t live with the clunking of a shot ball joint anymore. The prices are fire-sale, and if nobody buys them, well, then it’s off to the giant pancake-making machine in the back that’s currently turning an old school bus into a bright yellow crêpe. Every time, you look over the offerings, and every time you usually talk yourself out of it. But how bad could one of these stragglers be?
Busted Knuckle Video and BleepinJeep recently threw down a gauntlet of challenges that involved two escapees from the lemon lot: a later-model XJ Cherokee and a pretty decent ZJ Grand Cherokee. Honestly, we need to stop by this lemon lot, because both of these rigs seemed decent enough starting points for a budget build. The challenges are simple enough, and we’re skipping past the show category and the trash talk category because…well, let’s just get to the action of seeing what these two status symbols turned used car lot hangouts can actually do.
