by Matt Konkle
Managing Editor
LAS VEGAS — Just to the western side of the Las Vegas Convention Center’s West Hall’s outer parking area, sits one of Las Vegas’ top food destination spots — Siegel’s Bagelmania.
It isn’t an over-the-top building like some within the city limits. There aren’t crazy flashing lights or people out front hawking coupons, discounts or other stuff.
No, besides the large bagel out front that serves as a tourist photo spot, this place has been known since 1989 simply for high-quality, from-scratch food. Eat in, or take out.
We’ve been going here since almost the start of our Specialty Equipment Market Association adventures over a decade ago. And this is just where we began our third day.
Siegel’s didn’t officially take its current name until 2018, when longtime customer Stephen Siegel purchased the place, utilizing his longtime experience and love of food and concepts to expand the shop into a true authentic Jewish delicatessen.
From there, the quality of food and dining experience kept building the business into something now that never closes and features food far beyond simply bagels.
Pro tip, though. Use the Sigel’s app to order ahead and avoid the masses. Because Siegel’s Bagelmania always draws a crowd.
So what better way than to grab a perfect breakfast before heading inside the LVCC West Hall to begin the third day of SEMA. And our Day Three SEMA Three.
Overlanding Experience
Luckily for us, SEMA, once again, offered up its Overlanding Experience area outdoors, just a few steps away from Siegel’s Bagelmania.
Overlanding, for those new to the game, is a form of adventure travel that combines off-road exploration with self-reliance and camping. It’s about the journey, not just the destination—traveling to remote places using a rugged vehicle, like a Jeep, equipped to handle off-road terrain and carry essential supplies for extended trips. Overlanding emphasizes exploration, freedom, and self-sufficiency, making it a favorite activity for those who love the outdoors and want to escape the worn-out, everyday path.
SEMA has offered the Overlanding Experience for a few years, and has expanded it from a small spot inside a tent outside South Hall, to today’s large footprint in the lot outside West Hall.
All kinds of overlanding builds are displayed, showing off products specific to enhancing the experience of heading out into the wilderness — where the destination, like we said, is not as important as the journey itself.
Sure, there were plenty of Jeeps at this year’s Overlanding Experience, but also numerous Toyotas, Chevys and huge beasts called Unimogs that are highly capable off-road monsters.
Besides the vehicles and products, highly qualified overlanding experts were around to answer questions about the ever-growing world of Overlanding, as well as hosting educational panels and workshops, demonstrate how certain things work like rooftop tents and solar panels, and highlight just how eco-friendly overlanding can be when done right.
All to simply help attendees draw inspiration and understand what trends are important moving forward into 2025.
“The SEMA Show is committed to educating attendees on the latest aftermarket products and trends, and since its debut in 2019, the Overland Experience has become an attendee favorite,” said SEMA Trade Show Director Andy Tompkins. “By transforming the Diamond Lot to showcase elements of overlanding, we highlight custom vehicles and introduce exciting new features that demonstrate what is coming next in the category.”
Factor 55 HammerLoop
Sometimes, innovation in the Jeep world comes at the hand of an engineer who somehow finds a way to create a product that makes things easier for enthusiasts. Or safer. Or even gives them a better way to enjoy their vehicles.
Sometimes, innovation is found in the field.
Such is the case with Factor 55’s new HammerLoop winch rigging accessory.
This item was the result of numerous years in California’s Johnson Valley desert at King of the Hammers — where each race often hangs on who can perform the fastest recovery and get their vehicle back into competition.
From all kinds of feedback, Factor 55 said it developed this product to be ‘the ultimate race-specific winch rigging accessory designed for the toughest off-road challenges’.
But it can also be highly beneficial to anyone who takes their vehicle off-road as well.
Factor 55 engineered the HammerLoop from ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene rope and wrapped it with a durable polyester cover for superior abrasion resistance.
Essentially, this piece works perfectly with Factor 55’s UltraHook, seamlessly attaching to the hook and then providing quick adhesion through another vehicle’s wheel, around a roll cage, or other recovery point, for a fast and sturdy connection when every second counts.
Made in the USA, it weighs in under 10 ounces, sits at 30 inches long and offers a stunning minimum breaking strength of 27,800 pounds.
RJ Fabrication 1949 Willys Pickup
A supercharged Willys wagon with an extended cab, unreal horsepower and torque, paddle shifters, chrome-moly tube chassis, Ultra4 quality suspension and many other serious upgrades.
Past meets present.
And it shouldn’t come as any surprise that this 1949 Willys Pickup finished in the top four of SEMA’s hugely competitive Battle of the Builders contest.
Finished off in a piercing candy-apple red paint scheme, this thing was a huge labor of love for RJ Fabrication — taking over 9,000 hours of labor for completion where every detail was, for lack of a better term, measured 100 times and cut once. Aluminum panels were hand formed and Jackson Motorsports said the custom wiring was one of the most complex harnesses it had ever worked on, ‘running everything on a CAN bus system for streamlined control and diagnostics.
Said RJ Fabrication, 'the build was designed to look as factory as possible while including all kinds of modern innovations. This meant retaining the classic Willys Pickup appearance but stretching the cab out a bit, including that chrome-moly chassis, and an off-road suspension providing 22 front inches of steerable wheel travel as well as 30 inches of rear travel.
Under the hood, the vehicle boasts a 427ci LS3 engine with a 2.9-liter supercharger, providing a stunning 870 horsepower and 930 lb-ft of torque. Mated to the engine is a durable 4L80E transmission featuring modern paddle shifters.
Inside the cab sits Baja XP seats with convenient under-seat storage — a nice option in that tighter cab space. Additionally, the original gauge cluster was replaced with a Holly Pro Dash with two touchscreens, providing all the vehicle monitoring anyone needs to operate the Willys.
Finally, all that power needs some high-end cooling. And with the compact aspect of a Willys, RJ Fabrication said it devised a system that pulls air from the front and channels it under the vehicle to cool the transmission and engine radiator. A top exit scoop handles engine cooling, while a bottom scoop services transmission cooling. There are also numerous fans and ducts that exit behind the cab.
”We wanted it to look factory — like if Jeep were to make an extra cab,” said RJ Fabrication’s Rob Lindsay. “This is a small vehicle, and we are packaging a lot of stuff in very tight spaces. It was difficult to make everything work.”
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