AssBurns 2000 Limited Build Thread

[AssBurns]

Dusy Ershim Day #4 | 08/19/2018

Got another early start this morning. We weren’t sure how the rest of the trail was going to be considering how the past few days have been been very mixed with travel times. We knew we had to climb up Givens Hill, and there was the last rock garden that was supposed to be the 2nd most difficult part of the trail. Got at it and most of the first few miles were a little faster paced with some tough sections mixed in. Givens Hill turned out to be fairly easy as well. We got to a couple Vista Points and snagged some pictures of the stellar views. Lake Thomas Edison to the northeast and Huntington Lake to the west.
We kept moving on and came to the last rock garden. Definitely difficult but we were coming down, so gravity was on our side again making it a little easier than going up it would have been. Sure enough, right before our final rock section, [MENTION=143526]theesotericone[/MENTION] broke another CV. This time it was the inner joint, just like I had issues with in the past using this same brand of CV’s. My conclusion is that the axle shaft is too short and not getting enough plunge into the inner cup causing the tripod joint to basically tear its way out when the roller comes out of the cup. We tried to replace the broken CV but the 2nd spare I had wouldn’t fit. It was almost as if the outer joint was binding and wouldn’t let us get the spindle seated to the LBJ all the way. So instead of messing with it any more, I just pulled out the inner and out CV stubs I carry with me, and plugged the diff and hub, so he can at least get through the last section in 2 or 3wd.
That was pretty much it for the hard parts. We cruised down about another 1/4 mile to a little lookout where the trail basically turns into a dirt road, then another 1/2 mile or so to the end of the trail.
We aired up, inspected our rigs, and cruised down 30 miles or so to Shaver Lake to get gas before going down the mountain.
As we were all getting gas, we looked at our alignments. Mine was still good, [MENTION=143526]theesotericone[/MENTION]needed a minor adjustment as would be expected after replacing the tie rod, then [MENTION=135317]rkntoy[/MENTION]’s alignment was way out of spec. Way to much toe out on the passenger side. We got [MENTION=143526]theesotericone[/MENTION]’s alignment dialed in a couple minutes, but [MENTION=135317]rkntoy[/MENTION] was quite a bit more work than that. First we could not get the jam nut loose on the tie rod. We tried WD40, then held a lighter up to it for a few minutes to heat it up. Finally we got it to bust loose. We went to adjust it by spinning the inner tie rod, and only got a half a turn. How weird! Why would the inner tie rod not turn? Pulled the boot back to see the inner tie rod to be significantly bent. So glad we caught that before he hit the road for a 13 hour drive. Luckily we all had spare tie rods with us, so we got the tie rods replaced, then did an eyeball alignment. Cleaned up the tools and [MENTION=135317]rkntoy[/MENTION] was back on his way to Oregon.
[MENTION=143526]theesotericone[/MENTION], my wife and I decided to grab some pizza and beers at Shaver Lake Pizza. We also took mini showers in the bathroom there. Boy was I filthy! We got done and headed back down the mountain and continued our treks home.

Lake Thomas Edison in the distance

Hunting Lake beyond the trees

A herd of cows

[MENTION=135317]rkntoy[/MENTION]’s broken tie rod that we caught last minute before his long drive.

 

[AssBurns]

A recap on how things went:



We had a solid group of guys that were down to wheel, camp, break, and help fix whatever was needed to keep moving. I’d probably have to say this was my favorite wheeling trip I’ve ever done. It combined so many of my favorite things; Tough wheeling, Camping, High Sierras, Relaxing by the Lakes, spending time with my wife, and hanging out with a good group of guys. If you do this trail, don’t underestimate Thompson Hill. It’s about a mile of constant difficult crawling up a hill. Also, like we learned the first day, fix broken parts right away. Don’t try to limp it. Carry spare parts, we used a quite a bit of them throughout the trip. If you are dual locked and looking to have a great time, I’d definitely recommend this trail. Just be prepared for a tough, but amazing time.



How the truck did:



Mechanically, the BeerRunner did absolutely great! I was extremely surprised and impressed that nothing broke, especially since this was the first trip with everything back together after 4 months of sitting and 10 months without 4wd.



Cosmetically, is another story. I got plenty of dents, dings, scratches and scrapes. The quarter panels above the rear bumper got pushed in after coming down off a large ledge and slamming on my bumper. The rear body mounts are so soft that the body came down on the bumper and got crushed. Luckily it’s only cosmetic. I also got a new dent by the taillight, probably from a tree. Somehow I managed to miss my fuel tank skid plate and hit my fuel tank on a rock or something. Nothing bad but still impressive where it hit. Driveshaft flange and spacer got chewed up from the rocks. Transmission oil pan got a ding in it. Sliders have a ton of little dents and bends. Front skid has a ton of dents and dings in it. Bumpers only got some scrapes from rocks and trees.



Front Locker is absolutely amazing. I wish I did this years ago! I think this is going to save me from breaking parts as often as I was. Maybe not though. It's amazing how you can be in a tough spot, then just flick a switch and just keep moving forward. I highly recommend getting one.



4-Link was great to really test out in multiple aspects of the trip. High speed highway driving, especially around corners, is a night and day difference. I used to really take it easy through turns when loaded down due to body roll and the gnarly roll steer that it had. If there were any bumps through a turn, the vehicle would be all over the place. Now I can keep a solid pace through the turn even when there are bumps and dips. There is significantly less body roll now when loaded down, and having no roll steer makes cornering super predictable and comfortable. Even driving straight for long periods, the truck just seems to want to stay on track better than it did before. In the rocks, I used to hit my lower link mounts and lower links all the time. Those things were major rock hangers. Now I rarely touch the links. Based on the scratch marks, I only touched the links once the whole trip. That was pretty nice.

Smashed quarter panels

Dent in the fuel tank. Wonder what caused it.

Skid plate is definitely not flat plates anymore.

Just one little scratch on the lower links.

Ding in the transmission oil pan

Some dings in the sliders.

Bumper and tank skid took some hard hits, but did their job and didn’t budge.

 

[Unner]

Nice trip report! Looks like you passed your curse of repeatedly breaking stuff onto [MENTION=143526]theesotericone[/MENTION] haha. I bet it was nice being out there on a trail like that, you probably don't get too many passerby's out there.

 

[theesotericone]

Nice trip report! Looks like you passed your curse of repeatedly breaking stuff onto [MENTION=143526]theesotericone[/MENTION] haha.

LMAO. We actually joked about that on the trail. How [MENTION=118730]AssBurns[/MENTION] was usually the broken down one in the group. I really broke 4 CV's on purpose just cause I wanted him to feel better. lol

 

[Unner]

LMAO. We actually joked about that on the trail. How [MENTION=118730]AssBurns[/MENTION] was usually the broken down one in the group. I really broke 4 CV's on purpose just cause I wanted him to feel better. lol

That was so nice of you to do that for him haha

 

[AssBurns]

That was so nice of you to do that for him haha

It really was. It made me feel much better about myself and my rig. Now I just feel a little bad passing the bad luck torch onto someone else for a little bit. Hopefully it doesn’t make its way back to me anytime soon haha

 

[BigFishAllDay]

Kick ass trail run, man!

Like I said in theesotericone's thread... the whole report was impressive from the rigs, to the trail, to the breakage. Thank you for taking the time to write it all up, it was a fun read!

Congrats on getting your rig back on the trail in 4WD. The fact that you had zero issues with the new setup, and broke it in on a trail like THAT, really speaks to the quality of your work.

High fives, cheers, and hats off to you all. :thumb:

 

[AssBurns]

Kick ass trail run, man!

Like I said in theesotericone's thread... the whole report was impressive from the rigs, to the trail, to the breakage. Thank you for taking the time to write it all up, it was a fun read!

Congrats on getting your rig back on the trail in 4WD. The fact that you had zero issues with the new setup, and broke it in on a trail like THAT, really speaks to the quality of your work.

High fives, cheers, and hats off to you all. :thumb:

Thank you! It was an absolutely awesome trip. I'm glad you enjoyed the read. I can't wait to do it again and more trails like it.

I was really impressed by the rig this trip. I was fully expecting to be in the same boat at [MENTION=143526]theesotericone[/MENTION] by the end of this trip. Thankfully, I only had cosmetic damage, which I am absolutely okay with now.

 

[rkntoy]

It was an incredible trip.

There were lots of spots I was glad I squeezed 37s on.

 

[Dirtco]

Awesome trip report, and great work on the rear suspension! Looks like I have another trail to add to my bucket list!

 

[Scramble]

LMAO. We actually joked about that on the trail. How [MENTION=118730]AssBurns[/MENTION] was usually the broken down one in the group. I really broke 4 CV's on purpose just cause I wanted him to feel better. lol

Now no one will want to wheel with you because of the curse! :yo:

 

[AssBurns]

As many of you may know, I have been struggling to find the right coil that will work for what I need and want. I’ve been trying to find something that nets about 2” of lift while tall enough free height, so that it doesn’t fall out at full droop. Well I’ve been searching for a while now and after looking at OME’s spreadsheets and getting ideas based on those measurements and spring rates, it turns out that Jeep coils might fit the bill. From here I started looking at the different coils from different Jeeps and narrowed it down to Jeep JL front coils that might be the best option. So I called a local offroad shop that specializes in mostly newer Jeeps to see if they have any coils laying around that I could buy. Sure enough they did, and I picked them up yesterday on my lunch break. After some quick measurements of the coil inside diameter and measuring the coil bucket diameter, I knew they would at least fit. Now the question was, how much lift and how will they perform?

Today I got them installed without any issues, however the free height is about 1/2” too short on the passenger side since the passenger side coil is about 1/2” shorter than the drivers side. I plan to run limit straps to protect my shocks anyways, so it shouldn’t be too much of an issue. I would rather have some preload at full droop but I can live with this.

Dropped it on it’s own weight and my ride height dropped about 2”, netting me about 2 inches of lift. That’s exactly what I was shooting for! I took it for a test drive and immediately noticed some improvement. The body roll was noticeably less, but nothing drastic. Still happy with the improvement. The lower ride height did lower my anti-squat but nothing really noticeable. The next thing was to test it in the dirt. First thing I noticed is that I’m hitting my bump stops way more often. With only 2.5” before touching bumps, that wasn’t something I was surprised about. I need to install those spacers I have to shorten the stroke to 3”. Once I started getting on it harder in the bumps and hitting a little jump, I knew I needed to stiffen my shocks and bump stops. Well I can’t add any more PSI to my shocks, so I’ll need to revalve them. They probably need to be rebuilt anyways. Adding more pressure to the bumps was easy though. I went from about 80 psi to 110 psi. We’ll see how they do.

Overall I’m very happy with how the rig handles on and offroad based on the little bit I’ve driven it. I’m ready for a desert trip soon to really test it out.

 

[AssBurns]

I got some [MENTION=146407]Plastics guy[/MENTION] bump stops a few weeks ago and have been testing them out a bit over the past few weeks. I gotta say, these are definitely an improvement over the Wheeler's Super Bumps that I've been running for the past couple years. They are a little shorter and firmer than the Super Bumps, so they actually keep you from bottoming out as easy. The Super bumps are a huge improvement over stock, but Plastics Guy was able to design a bump stop that is overall a better design and solves the issues that I had with the super bumps (Which were that they were too tall and too soft).



I definitely recommend picking up a set. It is absolutely worth it for such a small cost.



Full Review Here

 

[AssBurns]

Couple trip updates.

Motino Wash

This past weekend [MENTION=143526]theesotericone[/MENTION] and I joined some of our buddies from TacomaWorld for their event they have been doing for the past few years. The whole event had over 50 rigs but our group was about 7 rigs on the most difficult trail.
We got up there Friday afternoon and proceeded to have a few beers (or much more than a few, [MENTION=143526]theesotericone[/MENTION]) and hang out by the campfire until we all eventually made it to bed.
In the morning we got a decently early start, and got to the trailhead in pretty good time. This was the same trail that I busted my stock gas tank a little over a year ago, on the first obstacle. Sparking me to do the tank swap. This year my rig was much more capable with the increased ground clearance (despite the lower ride height), and a front locker. What’s nice about a front locker on a trail like this is that it’s not really necessary but it’s extremely convenient to just flip the locker on instead of repositioning your line. I wish I did this years ago! My wife decided to drive the last half of the trail and really kicked some ass and even made some of the bonus lines look easy. Even [MENTION=143526]theesotericone[/MENTION] made things look easy with his dual cases, even with 33’s.
Some of the other rigs didn’t fare so well though. One guy took a bad line that got him stuck and eventually caused him to break both front CV’s. Another guy busted his rear driveshaft, and a few others got stuck at one point or another needing a push or pull.
Overall it was a great trip with a good group of guys that were down to wheel hard and have a good time.

I only got a couple pictures from the trip.

Here you can see I got a little too close to a rock and got some new gouges across the gas cap door and quarter panel.

For Labor Day, we decided to cruise up to Coyote Flat and just do some light wheeling and enjoy camping and the views.
We stayed two nights up at Baker Lake Camp and did some exploring from there. First day was spent traveling and getting to camp and little hike up to Baker Lake. The second day was our full day to go check everything out that we could. The goal was to get to Green Lake Lookout and as much as possible in between. First stop was because one of the guys in our group got a flat tire. He tore the sidewall somehow on his brand new Coopers. Then we cruised up to South Lake Lookout and hung out for a little bit, then up to Green Lake Lookout. This was almost 12,000ft elevation, so it was a little chilly and windy but we hung out here for lunch and beers. From here is was back down towards Coyote Lake, which wasn’t all that cool, so we just stopped for a quick second and kept moving on back to camp.
The next morning we decided to head down the other route out of Coyote Flat into Big Pine. 95% of this trail is super easy, but about 1/4 mile of it is rated Black Diamond. There are a couple nice rock gardens, and a waterfall to climb up. It was definitely a more fun way to leave the area than the normal route.

The family and I looking down on South Lake

 

[AssBurns]

Finally I got around to installing the spacers to destroke my hydro bumps from 4" stroke down to 3" stroke. It feels so much better now that less than half my up travel is bump zone. I think I still need to bring the stroke down to 2" or 2.5". I'll have to get a buddy to make another set of spacers.

BTW, I probably won't be updating this build thread as often over here these days. I will be continuing the rest of the build over on idpor.com. It's a forum dedicated to actual IFS offroading instead of vehicle specific like most forums.

You can follow the build here

 

[AssBurns]

Here is my latest trip to Cougar Buttes if anyone cares to check it out. We didn't get many pictures of the harder stuff, but Hammer Down trail was plenty difficult

https://www.independentoffroading.c...assburns-beerrunner-build-thread.9/#post-6071

 

[AssBurns]

Dang it's been slow over here lately. Anyways, I figured it might be worth sharing my latest project that I never got around to sharing. I made a swing down tire carrier. It's attached by two bushings bolted at the bumper, then uses hitch pins on either side of the hatch to keep the carrier attached to the hatch. It's not the most convenient setup when trying to access the cargo area but it's strong, high clearance, and doesn't move or wobble in the higher speed stuff which is the main reason i went this route.

Well never mind. I can't figure out how to upload pics. Every time it says failed upload. Oh well.

 

[Road Bull]

Double check the size of the pics. I have to mod all my dumb pics to get them to fit. I changed a phone setting, and it was trying to load unedited pics. I was getting the same fail message.

 

[AZBub]

Dang it's been slow over here...

Everyone is over in 5th gen land apparently. [emoji23]


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[AssBurns]

Double check the size of the pics. I have to mod all my dumb pics to get them to fit. I changed a phone setting, and it was trying to load unedited pics. I was getting the same fail message.

Just not worth the effort anymore. I may try again down the line but when it becomes a PITA to upload photos, it just doesn't make it fun to update the thread. Plus the site is just super slow to respond.

Everyone is over in 5th gen land apparently. [emoji23]


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Some of us have been over on ifsoffroad.com, but the 5th gens are definitely taking over this site. There is a ton of useful tech info over here on t4r.org, but the stuff that is fun to watch is slowly dying off. It's a shame really.