Black798's 98 limited build thread

[Unner]

Your pictures make me miss Colorado and good wheeling like that. Unfortunately Black Bear wasn't open when I went, guess that means I'll have to make another trip sometime.

The people in the UTVs doing dumb stuff like that drive me crazy. They're gonna get it shut down for the rest of us, and quickly at that rate too. I noticed the same thing when I was out there. They were everywhere, and it seemed like there was always one of them doing something stupid. I wish there was something we could actually do when we see them doing this other than just telling them to stop. Same thing for the idiot in the Xterra, they gotta ruin the fun for the rest of us.

I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of your trip. You're a lot faster at getting your pictures up than I am haha

 

[Taylor20]

The SPC rear lower control arm with bad bushing......are these the same ones that Toytec recently released?

 

[Black798]

Your pictures make me miss Colorado and good wheeling like that. Unfortunately Black Bear wasn't open when I went, guess that means I'll have to make another trip sometime.

The people in the UTVs doing dumb stuff like that drive me crazy. They're gonna get it shut down for the rest of us, and quickly at that rate too. I noticed the same thing when I was out there. They were everywhere, and it seemed like there was always one of them doing something stupid. I wish there was something we could actually do when we see them doing this other than just telling them to stop. Same thing for the idiot in the Xterra, they gotta ruin the fun for the rest of us.

I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of your trip. You're a lot faster at getting your pictures up than I am haha

Black Bear is totally worth doing at least once. I probably won't do it again simply because there is so much exposure and zero room for error. The trail itself isn't hard but not something to be taken lightly.

Unfortunately, because of the UTV crowd I don't see myself going back to this area for a very long time for any kind of wheeling. This trip was hands down the one I got flipped off the most and saw the highest amount of stupid shit. I really don't know how long the forest service will keep places like this open before they just shut it down from irresponsible use. Really is quite sad.

The SPC rear lower control arm with bad bushing......are these the same ones that Toytec recently released?

These are not the toytec arms. These are stock 4runner arms that I reinforced and then retrofitted with SPC joints on both ends. The longevity issue could be installer error but to me, it seems like they just aren't designed for handling the load of a 5500 lb truck and doing what I do. I'm interested to see some long term reviews on the SPC arms once a few people run them

 

[Black798]

Day 4: Ouray to Lake City via Poughkeepsie Gulch, California Pass, and Cinamon Pass

Day 4 was going to be a long one. The plan was to do Poughkeepsie Gulch and then drop down to Animas Fork and then make our way back towards Lake city and camp just outside of Lake City somewhere on the lower portion of Cinamon Pass.

We had planned on running into Ouray really quick to restock on some supplies and do some tourist type things and then get a fairly early start on Poughkeepsie Gulch. We also would be losing Joe and Julie in the Sequoia today as they had to be in Montezuma for an event.

Once everyone was packed up we headed down to town getting there around 8. On the way into town, I was getting a faint squealing from the front brakes that was coming and going and got pretty bad a few times on the way down to the pavement. I didn't think much of it and figured it was just some mud in the brakes from the previous night. As soon as we got to main street in town though they squealing got way worse out of nowhere. It was so loud and ear piercing that everyone that was driving, walking or even in their house was looking at my truck. Kind of embarrassing... I pulled off into one of the side streets to figure out what was going on and after pulling the wheel off I found the culprit. A wood chip, about the size of my thumbnail, had gotten stuck between the brake rotor and the vacuum plate and had basically made a giant bell. I removed the piece of wood, installed the tire, and just like that crisis averted.

Fast forward a couple hours and we were all starting back up Engineer pass headed towards the turn off for Poughkeepsie.

Buggy cruising main street in Ouray
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The first few miles of Poughkeepsie is pretty bland. After making the turn off from Engineer Pass you are in the trees for most of it until you reach tree line and then pretty soon after you are faced with a fork in the road and a choice. Here you can head left and take the easy route, or you can go right and take on "The Wall." Of the remaining 5 trucks in the group 3 of us would choose to take on the obstacle. Rhodes and Aaron choose to bypass the wall due to their manual transmissions and no desire to roll or break anything. Johnny, Ryan, and myself parted ways with the other two and headed for the wall to give it a shot.
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Johnny was up first in his triple locked LX450. He initially tried the far left line but wasn't able to get enough traction to go up. So he opted for the far right line.
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It was at this point that things almost went very far south. Johny had both lockers on and was struggling to spin the tires because of the altitude and being loaded to the gills. The tires finally broke loose dropping his drivers rear into a massive hole and resulting in this.
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After backing up and resetting his line he was able to make it almost all the way up but ended up beaching the whale on the belly skid and he had to winch the rest of the way up. Pups werent even bothered by the whole experience.
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I was up next with the 4runner. I decided I would give the center line a go and if that didn't pan out I would go up the left side of the right-hand chute that Johnny went up. After I got into the center line I was faced with the same issue Johnny had on the left line where I just couldn't get the traction to climb.
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I reset the and started going up the right line and ran into almost the same situation as the 80. I had the rear locked and because of the altitude and lack of gearing I could barely turn the tires with my foot to the floor. All of a sudden the tires broke free and my passenger rear fell into the same hole and my drivers front went way up almost putting me on my side. I reset a little further to the right and with a whole lot of skinny pedal to barely turn the wheels I made it up without a winch.
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Ryan was last and decided to take the very far left line to avoid any damage to his driveline because of the long wheelbase and angry rocks. He had the same power loss issue but was able to make it look easy.
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After continuing up the trail a ways we reached the point where they bypass links back up with the main trail and regrouped with the other two trucks. We stopped for a quick lunch and then continued up past a big lake and then taking the turn for California Pass.

Now is when the curse of the ATV,UTV, Dirtbike crowd came back rearing its ugly head. The last 3 switchbacks on the pass are very steep and pretty narrow. We saw a group of 6 dirtbikes coming up the trail fast but we had nowhere to go, all 5 trucks were committed to the switchbacks and there was no room to move over.

Rather than wait though, the dirtbikers choose to come weaving through our group spray rocks, almost going off the edge, and one of them clipping my driver side mirror. At the summit, they stopped and as soon as Johnny and I stepped out of our trucks they were yelling at us for being in the way. We went down and confronted them about trail etiquette and all that and how they were being reckless and tearing up the trail and how this is what causes places like this to get shut down. Two of them then proceeded to go tearing past the "No Motor Vehicle" sign next to the California Pass sign going up a foot trail. They came ripping back down stopping next to my truck where everyone was now standing asking "do we have a problem here?" I stepped up telling them how they just went totally off the trail around the sign on a foot trail which was illegal. They had some bullshit excuse as to why they could do that saying there was already a trail there and it didn't matter if it was a foot trail. This went back and forth a few times before one of them shoved me in the chest and then tore off down the hill. I was very tempted to grab his helmet as he tore off and hook it to a snatch strap on the back of the truck but decided to be the bigger person and let it go. You can't fix stupid, and I'm sure these guys will end up getting caught eventually.

After everyone cooled off we took some pictures and then made our way to Animas Fork.

You can see the NMV Sign and the tracks from the dirtbokes in this picture. Complete idiots..
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We stopped in Animas Fork to check out some of the old buildings. Pretty killer views out the front window.
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This another thing we saw a lot of that really pisses me off. I just don't understand the point of this shit.
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It was then time to continue on over Cinamon Pass because there was weather rolling in. We passed through the summit and ended up camping about 20 miles south of lake city at a campsite that was strangely empty which worked out very well for us.
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Day 5 up next...

 

[Unner]

Black Bear is totally worth doing at least once. I probably won't do it again simply because there is so much exposure and zero room for error. The trail itself isn't hard but not something to be taken lightly.

Unfortunately, because of the UTV crowd I don't see myself going back to this area for a very long time for any kind of wheeling. This trip was hands down the one I got flipped off the most and saw the highest amount of stupid shit. I really don't know how long the forest service will keep places like this open before they just shut it down from irresponsible use. Really is quite sad.

I remember getting really frustrated with the UTV crowd out there too. Although if one of them had shoved me it would have been game on. That's ridiculous that they did that. My truck got hit on Medano Pass out there as well. Thankfully no damage other than a scratch, but if I'd have had a stock bumper I'm sure there would have been damage. The dude didn't stop after he hit me either. Just kept going...

I think your experience might have been worse because you were out there in peak season. I was there a couple weeks before you last year and not all the trails were open. At least you got to see the sights, run the trails, and can say you've been there, done that if they do end up shutting it down in the future.

 

[Taylor20]

These are not the toytec arms. These are stock 4runner arms that I reinforced and then retrofitted with SPC joints on both ends. The longevity issue could be installer error but to me, it seems like they just aren't designed for handling the load of a 5500 lb truck and doing what I do. I'm interested to see some long term reviews on the SPC arms once a few people run them

Ok, I would have been shocked if it were those arms. I'm trying to decide between the SPC, Rokemon, or building my own.

 

[Black798]

I remember getting really frustrated with the UTV crowd out there too. Although if one of them had shoved me it would have been game on. That's ridiculous that they did that. My truck got hit on Medano Pass out there as well. Thankfully no damage other than a scratch, but if I'd have had a stock bumper I'm sure there would have been damage. The dude didn't stop after he hit me either. Just kept going...

I think your experience might have been worse because you were out there in peak season. I was there a couple weeks before you last year and not all the trails were open. At least you got to see the sights, run the trails, and can say you've been there, done that if they do end up shutting it down in the future.

Honestly, the only thing that was stopping me from giving the guy a good shove sending him off balance and over the edge of the pass was the fact that everyone in their group was obviously fairly young by the sound of their voices and how they acted. Like 16 or 17 young with a couple 18-year-olds in there. I'm sure being there in peak season wasn't helping us any with the crowds but regardless there is no reason to be acting like that.

Ok, I would have been shocked if it were those arms. I'm trying to decide between the SPC, Rokemon, or building my own.

IMO the Rockmen arms are a better product and seem as though they would be more durable than the SPC arms. Initially, I really liked the idea of a totally sealed flex joint like the SPC arms have. The problem is though that no matter what there will be water intrusion at some point and once that happens the joint will degrade very quickly. And since the joint isn't serviceable there isn't anything you can do until you're at a shop if and when the joint fails.

However, if you decide to make your own arms that really opens up the options for joints. I'll be assembling a new set of arms soon with ballistic joints. The nice thing about these is that if they were to loosen up like the SPC joints did all it takes is a quick adjustment of the preload collar and the joint is as good as new and if the race wears out they have a lifetime warranty. They also have a grease zerk so you can always have fresh grease in the bearing race inside the joint.

Another joint you might want to take a look at is the Metal Cloak Duroflex joints. It has some nice benefits for both on and offroad driving.

 

[Black798]

Day 5: Lake City to Cement Creek

Day 5 was primarily a road day so that we could make it back up north near Crested Butte. We had a few routes that we were entertaining for the rest of the week but for the most part, it was open-ended. All we knew was we wanted to get away from the crowds and hit a few more iconic trails. Also, not many pictures from this day as it was pretty boring. So if you don't like reading sorry.


We all got up pretty late with everyone being pretty hungover from the night before. Being the one night we were into camp early and didn't have a hard timeline to keep the following day we had all cut loose a little the night before. Once everyone was up and moving we started packing up and airing up the tires in preparation for a large amount of pavement we had ahead of us.

Camp setup doesn't get much better than this...
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Around 9:30 we all rolled out of camp and headed towards Lake City. We were all in the mindset that we wanted a shower but after doing some quick recon in town there were no public showers to be found. The decision was made to push to Gunnison, refuel and see if we could find a shower there.

After everyone had restocked on ice and any other supplies they needed we rolled out of Lake City but we didn't get very far before we had to pull over. Rhodes had said he had been hearing a faint clicking from his front end so we stopped to check and see if there was something in the tire. After having several different people drive the truck though we couldn't pinpoint the sound and with nothing obviously wrong with the tires we pressed on reaching Gunnison around 11.

Once we had cell service a few of the passengers began searching the internet for a public shower and we found one just outside Gunnison at the KOA. It felt just plain out wrong rolling in there with 5 heavily built trucks but we made the most of it and tried to be as fast as possible. The problem was the showers weren't going to be open until 1, meaning we had a few hours to kill. When we passed through Gunnison earlier in the week I had spied a barbeque joint that I wanted to check out so everyone decided to go have lunch there and then head back to the KOA, shower, and then head for Crested Butte.

When we came into Gunnison though we finally found out what that clicking noise was on Rhodes' truck. He had now been hearing some very heavy grinding and clunking and after a quick inspection, we found the outer cage on his driverside CV had exploded. The boot had been torn awhile and we suspect the balls had fallen out of the cage the day before. Ironically the day before I found 3 CV joint balls still covered in grease at one of the places we stopped and we had all joke "somebody's balls dropped on the trail." I suspect they were from Rhodes.

Luckily though I always carry the tools to swap a CV and the Gunnison Napa had a spare shaft for a 2nd gen Taco in stock. And after lunch, I swapped the shaft out in the KOA parking lot. It took 25 minutes from start to finish. A new record for me and not bad considering as I had never done this repair on a new truck. The process was exactly the same as the 3rd gen but the inner CV cup is shaped slightly different and it makes getting the shaft out a little more difficult.

After we had all showered we fueled up and rolled out of Gunnison headed for Crested Butte. We turned off just before CB headed for Cement Creek. About 5 miles in we decided to air down and around 10 miles later found camp for the evening. All in all a pretty uneventful afternoon minus the CV shaft.

This is what I call good clean living...
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Day 6 coming soon...

 

[BrianSD_42]

It really looks like an awesome trip. I hope to get out there next spring.

Btw good choice on doing the spindle upgrade. You don’t want to end up like me with a broken spindle in the middle of nowhere. I didn’t go with TotalC, instead the shop I go to in SD (The Truck Shop) fabs their own and told me about issues with the TC design. Either way though I’m sure now that its on, you are better off.

Honestly, the only thing that was stopping me from giving the guy a good shove sending him off balance and over the edge of the pass ...

Haha ok, I assume you are joking or that falling off the pass doesn’t equal killing him. LoL.

Did you need the straps bc of the extended 600lb Kings? Or do you prefer them either way? I have std 600 lb Kings and no straps. Seems great so far. Have they settled? If you are interested I posted my thread count a few pages back in the build. I’ve adjusted my Kings 3 times so far. With a winch you likely have just a bit more weight than me.

Great pics!

 

[jb10]

great pics! and looks like some great wheeling and camping. thanks for sharing
i'm headed down to telluride in a few weeks for a trail race so i don't know how much wheeling i'll get done
thanks for sharing!

 

[Taylor20]

IMO the Rockmen arms are a better product and seem as though they would be more durable than the SPC arms. Initially, I really liked the idea of a totally sealed flex joint like the SPC arms have. The problem is though that no matter what there will be water intrusion at some point and once that happens the joint will degrade very quickly. And since the joint isn't serviceable there isn't anything you can do until you're at a shop if and when the joint fails.

However, if you decide to make your own arms that really opens up the options for joints. I'll be assembling a new set of arms soon with ballistic joints. The nice thing about these is that if they were to loosen up like the SPC joints did all it takes is a quick adjustment of the preload collar and the joint is as good as new and if the race wears out they have a lifetime warranty. They also have a grease zerk so you can always have fresh grease in the bearing race inside the joint.

Another joint you might want to take a look at is the Metal Cloak Duroflex joints. It has some nice benefits for both on and offroad driving.

Thanks for the info. I forgot about Ballistic Joints and will see which one fits best. The Duroflex have always looked like quality, just don't know anyone running them.

 

[AssBurns]

Thanks for the info. I forgot about Ballistic Joints and will see which one fits best. The Duroflex have always looked like quality, just don't know anyone running them.

I ran Duroflex joints for a couple years. I really liked them. I’m running Ballistic joints now on the new setup. Haven’t had them long enough to know wether I like them better than the Duroflex joints or not. What I like about the Duroflex joints is that there is no maintenance required. If one fails for whatever reason, it’s easy to remove the c clip and push in a new joint by hand. Lifetime warranty too! Ballistic joints seem really nice but the drawback is they will wear out and need to be greased and tightened after a while.

 

[Taylor20]

I ran Duroflex joints for a couple years. I really liked them. I’m running Ballistic joints now on the new setup. Haven’t had them long enough to know wether I like them better than the Duroflex joints or not. What I like about the Duroflex joints is that there is no maintenance required. If one fails for whatever reason, it’s easy to remove the c clip and push in a new joint by hand. Lifetime warranty too! Ballistic joints seem really nice but the drawback is they will wear out and need to be greased and tightened after a while.

I did some research last night on the Duroflex, they seem like a no-brainer for DD status.

 

[Black798]

Day 6: Cement Creek to Buena Vista via Italian Creek and Tin Cup Pass.

Been super busy this past week and haven't had much time to go through pictures. Finally got them all updated so here is the final day of the trip. Day 6 started off like the rest but I was up about an hour before everyone else and that gave me a chance to spend some time looking over the maps I had downloaded and the Colorado Road Atlas I keep in the truck. Being that we were winding the trip down and everyone needed to be headed back to the north to Bozeman or Fort Collins Sunday our plan was to get close to the highway over the next two days and head North early Sunday morning.

Today was only Friday, and I didn't need to head home until Monday. I also didn't want to be driving for 12 hours a day for the next few days either, so I decided that today would be my last day wheeling with the group and I would make it back to Denver and spend Saturday and Sunday there with my family.

Ryan also decided today would be his last day but he parted ways with the group in the morning, heading back to Gunnison and then onto Fort Collins.

I don't speak dog, but Jax didn't look like he was ready to go home...
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Around 10 the rest of the group was packed up and we headed up the Italian Creek trail. The trail is pretty easy and reminded me a lot of all the trails in Montana, small rocks ad tight trees with a lot of bouncing around.

Around noon we reached the summit, but we had to run off the summit pretty quick as a freak storm rolled in with a ton of lightning and some heavy sleet.
There were some pretty epic views though.
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We continued down over the east side of the mountain range which dropped us out in the Taylor Reservoir recreation area. We started heading towards Tincup to find camp for the rest of the guys who would be staying and swapping pictures with everyone. I had originally planned to duck out and go over Cottonwood Pass to BV but when we reached the turn off I was met with this...
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Well looks like Im headed over Tincup since there is no way I'm driving all the way back to Gunnison and then around to BV. We rolled through tincup around 3 and started heading up the pass. This first section was absolutely BRUTAL. The entire trail is made up of river rock that is basically cemented in place by clay and it made for the roughest ride I have had in a long time even with the new suspension. And as luck would have it 30 yards before we pulled into camp to swap pictures the exhaust leak I had been trying to find for the last month suddenly got a lot worse.

Turns out the sheet metal on the front of the muffler had torn out completely from all the vibration. This was obviously not caused by just this one road but still, I am not surprised it happened here. After swapping pictures with everyone it was time for me to head out. It was around 5 and I figured it would take close to 4 hours to get back to denver so I had some ground to cover. In light of the exhaust braking and knowing the road only got rougher I dropped down to 10psi to help smooth things out.

I continued up the trail and after accidentally taking the "hard" way up because of a wrong turn I reached the summit. And just for shits and giggles, I radioed down to the guys at camp and somewhat surprisingly I was able to talk to them as if they were standing next to me. I later found out that I was roughly 13 miles away. Got to love HAM.

On the way up...
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At the summit...
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I then dropped down the east side of the pass and since this side was comparatively smooth I was able to move at a decent clip and reached the small town of St Elmo after about 30 minutes. I stopped here to air up and do my usual walk around the truck before heading off for Denver. As I was looking around I saw my rear diff was dripping oil. F@%$, I grabbed some paper towels and crawled under the truck hoping it was an easy fix. Thankfully it was as I didnt have any spare gear oil with me.

What had happened was on my way down I had hit the diff just right that a rock had spun the drain plug loose and it had started leaking. Upon closer inspection, I found the plug was only 2 threads away from coming out... After retorquing the plug though everything was in good order and I headed off down the road.

Airing up for the last time...
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I finally made it back to Denver around 9 and promptly unpacked the truck and took th next couple days to relax.

Man do I love the Colorado high plains
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Final thoughts on the trip...
It was absolutely epic. I couldn't have asked for a better group of guys to go with and it was so much fun. The truck performed near perfect as usual and continues to impress me.

I will say however I wont be going back here for a while. Theres just way too many tourists with bad attitudes. I think Ill stick more to th front range area.

So looking forward with the truck I have found a few things I want to change. First and foremost I need to get the rear end tightened up. Im planning on tweaking the mounts a bit and using those new aluminum links to make a nice solid 3 link setup.

The other major things that will follow in time are:
1)Regear to 4.88 or 5.29, not really sure what yet... any input is welcomed
2)Front locker
3)Go to 35s, yes it is happening. I know after college I will be moving back to Colorado so the truck will be getting wheeled harder and they will make things just a little easier. Plus I do a lot of snow wheeling.
4)Get a fridge, Im sick of dealing with ice

Of course, there are other things but these are just the big things this trip showed me I need to start thinking about. I hope everyone enjoyed the pictures and the write-up!

 

[crazydubman]

Really digging the progression of your 4runner and how you are keeping everything simple. Keep up the great work and keep enjoying that thing. Super envious you are as close as you are to those amazing trails.

 

[Chuckles89]

Looks like a great trip! I was in Buena Vista a week before you :doh: Oh well...

Tincup Pass was soooo rough on the West side. I bet your ride was a lot smoother than mine though! I have super stiff KYB struts and blown land cruiser shocks haha

We had a few RZR problems on Hancock Pass with one almost running into my friend's truck. I hate those things.

 

[Black798]

It really looks like an awesome trip. I hope to get out there next spring.

Btw good choice on doing the spindle upgrade. You don’t want to end up like me with a broken spindle in the middle of nowhere. I didn’t go with TotalC, instead the shop I go to in SD (The Truck Shop) fabs their own and told me about issues with the TC design. Either way though I’m sure now that its on, you are better off.



Haha ok, I assume you are joking or that falling off the pass doesn’t equal killing him. LoL.

Did you need the straps bc of the extended 600lb Kings? Or do you prefer them either way? I have std 600 lb Kings and no straps. Seems great so far. Have they settled? If you are interested I posted my thread count a few pages back in the build. I’ve adjusted my Kings 3 times so far. With a winch you likely have just a bit more weight than me.

Great pics!

The spindle upgrades are something I feel are a necessity on any IFS setup that gets wheeled. The stock spindles are so tiny, and as you have seen first hand when they fail you're really up a creek without a paddle.

Lol yes, I am joking about the biker, mostly... Falling over the edge would most likely been death but we were a decent enough distance away he would have been fine. I generally try to de-escalate situations like this but these guys just wouldn't stop.

I had the staps before the kings and the EXT travel coilovers are the same length as the old 5100s. I choose to keep them because they reduce the load on on all the other suspension parts at full droop and act as essentially a bump stop for when the suspension droops out fast and hard.

So far in the couple thousand miles, I've had the kings they haven't settled at all. I had to do some weird offsetting on the preload from the get-go though. From king they were set at what was supposed to be 2.5 inches of lift but I had a ton of driver side lean. I ended up adding 5 turns on the driver side and removing 2 on the passenger side and now it sets at 37 inches fender to ground on both sides which equates to exactly 2.5 inches of lift. I am guessing the weird lean is caused by the heavy ass battery I have since I had to do the same offset with the bilsteins.

Really digging the progression of your 4runner and how you are keeping everything simple. Keep up the great work and keep enjoying that thing. Super envious you are as close as you are to those amazing trails.

Thanks, man I am really loving what the rig is turning into!

Looks like a great trip! I was in Buena Vista a week before you :doh: Oh well...

Tincup Pass was soooo rough on the West side. I bet your ride was a lot smoother than mine though! I have super stiff KYB struts and blown land cruiser shocks haha

We had a few RZR problems on Hancock Pass with one almost running into my friend's truck. I hate those things.

Damn, I wish I had of know you were out there! I was in Denver from the 14th to the 21st and I ran Chinamans on the 21st.

Tincup is by far the bumpiest road I have driven to date. Watching the other trucks around me I could see the kings were making my ride way better but it still was rough as hell.

 

[Black798]

The Morrison Jeep Trail. A series of unfortunate events

Last weekend I ran the infamous Morrison Jeep trail with a group of local guys. This trail is known for the same reason as Black Bear Pass, lots of exposure and very tight switchbacks, 27 to be exact. The trail starts in a river valley outside Clark Wyoming at roughly 4,000 feet and climbs to 8,000 feet at the end of the switchbacks, later reaching nearly 10,000 feet on the Beartooth highway in Montana.

I left work Friday at 4:30 headed home real quick and then started the 3-hour drive to the trailhead. There were already a few guys there that I was meeting and another group of 3 that were about an hour behind me. Its a pretty uneventful ride but I took the time to take some pictures since I was the only one around for miles. Typical Wyoming.

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After the picture stop I proceeded up to the end of the pavement, aired down, and headed off to find the other two guys that I was barely able to get on CB. I later found out they were only 1.5 miles away in clear line of sight and barely in range. I really hate CB.

After meeting up with the other two we headed to the base of the switchbacks to set up camp and wait for the other group who rolled in around 10.

The sky was super clear making for fantastic pictures.
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Next morning we had two more trucks joining us and we were able to start up the switchbacks around 9 AM. We were trying to beat the heat since the switchbacks are known for being ridiculously hot once the sun gets on them. Little did we know we would find that out first hand. In all we had 7 trucks, 2 80s, a 200, a 100, 2 FJs, my 4runner, a Taco, and a Montero.

Headed up.
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Everything was going super smooth up until around switchback 10. There were 4 of us out front who had stopped to let everyone catch up, the 2 80s, 200, the first FJ, and myself have all bunched up about 4 switchbacks above everyone else. We had heard a few shouts and some scrabbling rocks and I looked over the edge to make sure everything was kosher.

I saw this.
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100 was making one of the tighter and looser turns and everything seemed fine. About a minute goes by and I hear someone holding the mic on the CB shouting at the driver. I then hear Aaron the tailguner come over the HAM saying "guys you need to come down here, the 100 is in a really bad spot." I grabbed my recovery bag out of the truck and started running down the hill.

Once I reached the 100 I saw hjust how bad it was. he had somehow slid out of the turn and was totally sideways face first into the wall with zero room to move forward or backward.

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After stepping back and evaluating our options we decided we were going to need two trucks to pull the recovery off. Simple right? NOT. The taco was behind the 100 with a winch which was easy but the next closest truck with a winch was mine which was 5 switchbacks up and I had the montero right behind me. After hiking back up to the truck and some sketchy maneuvering I was able to get turned around and past the Montero and started driving down the switchbacks. It was about here I started having flashbacks of black bear. Once I was 1 switchback above the 100 I pulled into the turn and backed down the switchback and around the nose of the 100 to get into the switchback he was stuck on. Thankfully this was one of the larger switchbacks.

Getting rigged up
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After we were rigged we took up the slack in the lines and immediately had a problem. Between the loose shale, my truck being lighter than the 100, and trying to pull him uphill I was just sliding down towards him. This meant the 100 would need to help by spinning the tires which would potentially increase the chances of him sliding over the edge. But thankfully doing this worked, once we got him moving the recovery went absolutely textbook and we were able to pivot him back to straight right in the middle of the trail. There is a video of it floating around that Ill find and put up here.

Alright disaster averted and we can continue you on now right? right. We all jumped back in the trucks and started making the final push to the summit, by now the temps had climbed into the triple digits and everyone was in need of some shade.

Now here is where this basically becomes a story with no pictures because I left the camera in the truck. We had reached the switchback I had originally turned around in to reach the 100 and it had a wierd off camber step that was covered in loose rock. Everyone walked up it including myself untill the Montero reached it. By this point I was 50 yards up the trail when I head "Im about to roll over I need some help," come over the CB. I jump out of the truck and ran back down to help the Montero. His front tire was roughly 3 feet in the air and he was tetering towards the edge. I jumped on the front bumper and was able to back him down safely.

I was at this point that I decided to not take any chances and just hook a strap to him from my truck to get him over the ledge without any chance of a wheelstand. So I walk back to my truck to go to start it and it just cranks and cranks and cranks. F%&@! Somehow the fuel system had pressurized and was trying to flood the motor. So after some venting of the gas tank, I was able to relive the pressure and get the truck to reluctantly start. I backed down to the montero, hooked up the strap and them drug him up the ledge. Alright, crisis number two averted. Now everyone should be good right? Wrong!

I had now gone up to the next switchback to wait for everyone to clear the turn and started chatting with the guy who was driving the 100 series. After about 10 minutes I was starting to get worried the others hadnt caught up and they werent answering their radios. I decided to walk back down to see what was going on. I was met with this...

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Well shit, do to some questionable spotting, poor visibility in the FJ, and the super dry conditions Aaron had managed to nearly slide off the switchback and go over the edge. Ironically this was the switchback that a couple had rolled off of last year in a RZR.

I spent about 5 minutes looking at the situation and the only logical solution seemed to be to have Aaron winch himself off the taco to pull himself back up onto the trail and forward. We started rigging up the winch and after 10 feet of line was out it bound up and woudnt let the line come out. This was because when the winch was installed the line hadnt been pre tensioned and at some point during a previous pull had slid under itself making a friction knot. I cant stress this enough, PRE TENSION YOUR WINCH LINES!!

So at this point the recovery had gone from pretty simple to much more difficult, there were no solid winch point to use a different winch and snatch block, and the FJ was barely clinging to the hillside. With no other options at this point, we had to rely on brute force. I backed my truck down the switchback, hooked up the taco and then hooked the taco to the FJ and after 4 hard snatches we were able to yank the FJ onto the trail and thankfully no one was hurt.

After this, we all stopped at the top to decompress and have lunch. In all, it took us 3 hours to make it up the 27 switchbacks. But the important part was everyone and their trucks survived.

Once you pass the switchbacks the trail is a cake walk through some high plains and an alpine forest untill you reach the Beartooth. From there it is a quick drive to red lodge and from there its all highway back to Bozeman.

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And there ya have it, the Morrison Jeep trail in a nutshell. This was one of those trails that should have been super easy but somehow everything that could go wrong seemed to go wrong which this trail has a reputation for. But as always it was a good learning experience for everyone and everyone survived to tell about it so you can't ask for a better time.

 

[Flemster]

Sounds like Morrison was a cluster F$%&... Thats crazy how when we ran it, it seemed to be such a joke how hyped up the road was... but a matter of weeks to let the trail dry up and it leads to that. I'm sure conditions were a factory on top of driver/spotter error. When we ran it I only spun a tire when loose rock felt like it needed to reseat itself, never on the dirt. The only close call was a failure to put a vehicle in park and turning the key off.... lets just say my E-Brake doesn't work very well loaded down for Broverlanding... whoops.
Glad everyone made it out unscathed and the trip was a success. Your Colorado stuff was dope too! Excited to hit the snow with you when you move back.

 

[habanero]

Awesome pics and report! Morrison looks worse than Black Bear from your pics, nice teamwork getting everybody through.

We were on Tincup on Aug 2nd, my husband almost took that same atv/old trail going up Tincup, if it's the one it pretty much has to be, going straight where there's a switchback somewhat hidden by trees. He ended up coming back for the main trail.

Cottonwood was closed because of fire, we heard about it on our way to Pearl pass from Crested Butte.