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REVIEW: Strike Force Zebra Half Doors

19K views 31 replies 14 participants last post by  Jim74656  
#1 ·
Hey guys and gals, mentioned these in another thread and a few people were interested in seeing some pictures and hearing my thoughts. So here it is, I'll get straight to it:

The good (in no particular order):
-Very lightweight, all four doors weigh less than one driver door (auto window, power mirror)
-Lightweight rotomolded plastic is durable and flexible to trail impacts.
-They look great
-Cost is significantly less than Mopar doors.
-HUGE interior door pockets on all four doors.
-Hard uppers are available (fronts only right now, but rears are supposedly in the works).
-Weather seals on the doors.


The not so good:
-The fit is pretty good, but they will almost certainly need some finessing to fit with equal door gap all around.
-Weather seals are good, but not perfect. I think due to the rotomolding process the doors can potentially shrink more or less and the fit isn't perfect. I have a few small spots where the door jamb makes its curve below the strike plate where I can force some fingers through.
-I had to pull off the hinges on a few doors and actually make the mounting holes in the doors larger in order to get the adjustment I needed.


When I ordered my first set I ran into a few issues, Steve over at Strike Force gave me his personal cell phone number and walked me through a few things as well as address the problems I had. My passenger rear door had some sort of white residue in the plastic which looked pretty bad and my driver rear door would not lock properly. He sent me two new rear doors with no issues and a return label for the defective ones. Also the passenger front door mirror mounting holes did not align with the recesses molded into the doors (pics below). I didn't make too big a deal about it, but Steve did tell me a small percentage of doors have to be drilled off center due to the shrinking of the doors during curing. It does not affect function, but it just didn't sit great with me when spending $1400 on a set of doors, but oh well, really not that big a deal to me.

Took them wheeling this weekend and they were great, trails were pretty wet and a few water crossings. No water got in the Jeep and they prevented a lot of mud from coming in. I pressure washed the Jeep at home, including the doors. I didn't spray directly on the door gap where the weather seal is, but did spray the entire door. I had no water intrusion so I was very happy about that.

If anyone has any questions or wants specific pictures, let me know!

Pics and descriptions in a follow up post coming here in a second...
 
#5 ·
Thanks for the write up. I design plastics machinery for the pharma industry. No rotomold machinery but injection molding and extrusion blow molding equipment. It is really hard to control shrink on something of that size. If not controlled properly then the part warps, buckles, basically turns into a giant Pringle potato chip. Looks like overall a good product but I'm not surprised of the slight fitment issues. I'm still interested for sure because for what I need they will work perfectly and I would be willing to take a shot on them because more importantly their customer service sounds top notch!
 
#8 ·
The guys at SFZ don’t recommend painting them, but it is possible. In fact I saw a set on Craigslist in my area that were painted white. They do have a texture which it sounds like it needs to be sanded down first. Then special paint that remains flexible is advised (from what I read). SFZ recommends having them automotive wrapped if you want a certain color.

Image



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#13 ·
I like mine too. More family friendly surfaces compared to my bestop element doors. A lot better for my toddler getting in and out of the back seat.

I painted mine. I did it rattle can. Sanded and primed. Used duplicolor perfect match to chrysler bright white and coated with spraymax 2k.

soon as the get some dirt, they'll match the rest of my jeep. hahaha.
 

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#14 ·
Great post, I just put a set of these on this afternoon and after a drive figured out those split tube things were for the latch like you showed!

Mine came with normal hex-head bolts for the mirrors, did you reuse existing hardware to get the black allen? Can't see them when the door is closed so I don't really care either way.

The hinges came totally loose but the fit is pretty good, once they're latched shut just tightening them up is enough to make them look good, the front back aren't 100% in line this way so I'll probably loosen/shim/tighten if it bothers me.

Took them out on the highway and no real rattle or anything besides the latch when you hit a bump, and I added the split tubes now so that should go away. Really cuts down on the crazy crosswind you get on highways sometimes with no doors.

The only fitment issue I've got is the weatherstrip on the rear driver door isn't sealing at the very top, its stuck on with some kind of 2 sided foam tape stuff so may just get some of that and move it a bit if it bothers me.

The posts on the "other" forum said any day now we should be seeing 4 door soft and hard uppers! So I've been checking likely daily for that. Would love to leave these on all summer and not worry about the rain!
 

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#18 ·
The black hardware was just from another project I had laying around. I actually think they were meant for my spare tire carrier, where a steel plate mounts to replace the stock tire carrier on the tailgate.

The weather stripping is a little janky, I noticed some of the adhesive was losing stick on one of my doors. To get a really good/best fit you might have to pull the hinges off and open up the holes on the doors with a drill or Dremel to get the adjustment that you need for best fit.

I wouldn't hold your breath for those rear uppers! I guess SFZ had been promising front hard uppers for a few years before they finally came to market. Though I did read something about a possible change of ownership at some point? No idea if its true, but maybe the new owners are more serious about getting things to market?
 
#21 ·
Any body have the uppers yet?
Wondering how water tight the door/upper combo is.
 
#28 ·
I'd get these over a tube door. I've had tube doors and honestly just kept taking them off because you may as well go door-less which I prefer anyway. So I wound up selling them.
 
#29 ·
I plan to run door less during the summer (hopefully it will be warm to do so soon) but seeing as I am not 100% sure on how LEOs around here would act seeing a jeep compleatly naked I am figuring the tube doors would at least allow me to go "see there still a door with mirrors" but I am liking how these are just plastic doors with almost half the weight loss of the all metal doors currently on the jeep...im just concerned about the fitment and what I saw in one of the pictures where the mirror doesn't seem to lign up correctly (that would drive me nuts)