Awesome post, and awesome site!
Like probably everyone elseon this forum with a 5th gen, I have been drooling more and more over various mods. I used to have a lifted Suzuki Samurai, and thought I was over moddinv vehicles for offroad, but hah! Still, even ignoring the financial investment, every upgrade I would love to do to my TRDP (the same ones we would all love to do...) come at some cost, as you mentioned. Right now we are averaging about 21-22mpg, we park both of our cars in the garage at home, and have 3 dogs that we like to carry around without sacrificing the rear seats. We do have sliders and 17x8s with 285s, but nearly every upgrade beyond that adds additional compromise.
I am no stranger to hiking and bikepacking, and I am a blissful "zombie apocalypse prepper." So, I definitely understand the desire and need to be prepared, especially when deliberately heading out into the wild. But, quickly reading through your site, it seems like you have a lot of advice for both novices and "hardcore" folks like yourself, regarding how to get into this sport / hobby.
As far as mods go, I have been kindof leaning toward biasing toward a good daily driver while adding some necessary capabilities for travel (in part because it is technically the wife's car haha). For example, I know I can't really replace a full Gobi rack when it comes to taking a month worth of supplies down the road, but one of those strap on roof bubbles could get average folks close enough for a comfortable 2-night trip with 4 adults and the dogs in back. I was also recently looking into small compressors (both 110v and 12v) that I could just throw in the back for wherling trips to re-air tires that I have softened for the trail.
Obviously, everyone differs in needs, tastes, and even general willingness to sacrifice some comforts of a stock or near-stock daily driver. So, thank you for providing a great resource for folks to evaluate the pros and cons and how-tos building a daily-driven outdoor rig!
