It was purchased for $1600.00 in May of 1995 and, though it ran fairly well, it had little else going for it. It was a salvage title. It had heavily oxidized teal blue paint. It was missing the majority of the interior trim and it had a recently burglarized not-very-good aftermarket radio housing. The tires were also mis-matched, with slightly different sized pairs being mounted front and rear.

On the plus side, it had a brand new single-piece BestTop (as the old one had been cut when the radio was burgled) and it had never been seriously off-roaded, so I was fairly sure the drivetrain was in pretty good shape. It also had a back seat, which I needed at the time. There were approximately 86,000 miles on the clock.

What could I say? I'd been looking for a Samurai for a while, the price was OK, and I was looking for a project anyway?

I promptly exchanged the yet un-mounted one-piece BestTop along with some cash at the place it had been purchased for a BestTop SunPort.

I spent the next six months haunting junk-yards looking for trim parts, and miscellaneous screws, nuts and bolts. The roll-bar pad, the out-board rear seat-belt ends (those suckers were hard to find and expensive), The front belt upper trim. A replacement interior door handle mechanism (another expensive one). Radio mountings. Ashtray. About half of the flare anchors. All were eventually found and purchased (including one treasure-trove of miscellaneous small parts and the interior rear panels exchanged for a case of ice-cold sodas on a 115 degree day at one wrecker's).

I broke down and bought a new windshield washer bottle and a radio housing and panel from the dealer. I bought a new stereo and added some speakers I had to the rear, as well as purchased replacements for the front.

Plugs, wires, cap, rotor, new rubber, you-name-it and it got checked and repaired or replaced.

After I couldn't see to drive home one night in the winter fog, I added a pair of KC fog-lamps.

And the little guy ran pretty well, until that day in November on the way to Lost Wages to catch a plane?