Category: Inspiration

I saw this Scout on Instagram a week ago, and I really like the look of it. The indoor lighting is a little funky, but I dig the combination of a dark green paint job, traditional 1972 grille (with a silver surround), a white travel top, and blacked out steelies with narrow tires. This is a really traditional look, which is something I’d like to get Peer Pressure back to someday.

I saw a post on Instagram a couple of days ago featuring a mint-colored Scout with an interesting roll bar setup. In the comments, the poster mentioned he’d used a Jeep TJ rollbar as a base, cut it down, fabbed his own mounting plates, and made it all work. I commented that I would love to see more pictures of his setup, and it turns out he’s actually on the Binder Planet in a thread I’ve looked at before. He bought the whole cage two years ago for $100 and had the whole thing mocked up a month later.

What I like about it is that it’s a square cage that surrounds the passenger area—the rear of the cage fits over the rear seat so there’s more protection, and the whole thing has built-in shoulder belts. I like the look of it, and I love the fact that there are a ton of aftermarket products for the TJ bars—padding, speaker bars, new belts, and lights.

Our local junkyard has a Wrangler in stock every once in a while, and “large rollbars” are listed at $100.

I really think I’m going to be purchasing a welder this year…

Hagerty released its 2020 Bull Market List, a wrap-up of classic vehicles they predict will rise the most in value in the coming year. Smack in the middle of that list is the 72-80 Scout II. Some takeaways:

• They say the usual dumb stuff—”parts can be difficult to find.”
• Also: “Gen X is 56 percent of the quotes, and if Gen X likes it, the values are going to go up.”
• “American rivals such as the Ford Bronco and Chevy Blazer have out-appreciated the Scout.” Really? I don’t see Chevy Blazers anywhere. Early Broncos are everywhere, but I fail to believe a second-gen squarebody Blazer is more valuable than a Scout. Maybe a mint condition K5.
• The comments are divided, but I see more than one person saying they’d only take the Scout and the Ferrari from the total list of 10 vehicles.
• I’ve owned two of the other vehicles on this list: the Honda CRX and the Jeep Cherokee.

It looks like Scouts are popular on Instagram; my feed was topped with Peer Pressure this year.

Hey, would you look at that! Scrolling through the Instagram feed of a Scout acquaintance, I noticed he’d taken a picture of a magazine spread about the 2018 IH Nationals in FourWheeler magazine. He’s the fellow grilling lunch on the front bumper of his Scout.

But if you look carefully behind him, you might notice a particular purple-and-red-and-yellow Scout.

I’m going to order a back copy of the magazine just to say I’ve been in FourWheeler.

This thread on the Binder Planet is amazing: a guy in Pennsylvania bought a roached out Scout II and decided he was going to rebuild the tub one part at a time. He started in September of 2018 and he’s already got the tub bedlined and in the middle of sanding and blocking. His metalwork skills are superb. This makes me want a full shop and a couple of months of spare time SO BAD.