Road Bull's 2002 SR-5 timeline.

[Rancho5]

Thanks man! Congrats on the trade. These are great platforms for tailoring to your needs, or leaving stock for that matter. Although it's more fun to change it up a bit.

Knock out the important maintenance first, then mod to taste.

Important maintenance items:
1.) Genuine OME Lower Ball Joints! (See 3rd gen LBJ failure threads. )
2.) Replace radiator or install a separate transmission cooler. (See pink milkshake threads.)
3.) Other items as time and money allow.

Welcome to T4R man!

Thanks! The PO had all the suspension parts replaced, so hopefully good there. Radiator is on my list for sure.

Question: is there a way to look at the radiator to see how old it is? On my old Miata for instance, they turned from black to grey. Also, tranny coolers, where is the best place to mount them, IYO?

 

[BrianSD_42]

Your winter trip pics look really great. Makes me kind of wish I didn't live down here in SoCal. Glad to see you are getting out there and racking up the trips.

 

[Road Bull]

Your winter trip pics look really great. Makes me kind of wish I didn't live down here in SoCal. Glad to see you are getting out there and racking up the trips.

Thanks Brian! Yeah, the snow wheeling was fun, but at the lower elevations is is just.. a lot... of rain... I am ready for some sunny days. Today was the first time in a long time that it not only, didn't rain, but was actually sunny. It makes trying to work on your vehicle a drag if you don't have an indoor option. Ha! I changed my plugs and wires outside last year due to a misfire. It was the only sunny day of the week so I jumped on it. But... it was about 34* and the wind was blowing like a mofo. I got it done, but it was not fun.:rain:

 

[Road Bull]

Portland Overland Spotted FB meet up 02-10-18

I saw that was going down in Portland so I decided it was a good excuse for a road trip. I got my butt up at 0500 and rolled south, making sure to stop in Centralia to eat at the Country Cousin. Go there. Order bacon. Win. They cure their own bacon there and it is delicious.

I got there at 0900 and lots of cool rigs were already taking over a good portion of the parking lot. There were tons of Toyotas, LC80, 4Runners, Tacos, Lexus 470, Land Rovers, Jeeps, Subaru, Humvees, an LMTV... I met a lot of cool people. And I got a chance to hit up my favorite Deli in Portland, Kornblatt's. Their pastrami sandwich kicks ass!

 

[Road Bull]

Overland Spotted meet up continued.

More pics.

Some more cool vehicles. Man... that one GX470 was a mini RV. It had its own water inlet and electric hookup. It had a sink, small stove burner, refrigerator, micro-wave-oven!... it had a nice hard top aluminum roof top tent with its own solar panels and awning. Oh it looks like it has presidential style Moldova flags for the fenders, rockin Consular plates... What a trip. Also got to take a somewhat closer look at the new Jeep JK. I looked under the hood and there's not too many places you could fit your hand between in there. It looks like tons of electronics and sensors. I don't have any inherent hate for Jeeps myself, but I would worry about their overall reliability and probably more importantly I don't have an extra $54,000 sitting around that I feel like sinking into a Jeep.

It was an altogether cool time.

 

[Rock_Rat]

Hey Ryder, glad you made it down here. I ended up catching up on a few things at home including new front pads for the runner. Just couldn't get down there by 9. I was hoping for at least 11 but couldn't pull it off. The PDX Overland group is pretty good down here. Very active with a bunch of great folks. There's a lot of new folks in the group I haven't even met. Everyday there's a new member checking in.

 

[Road Bull]

Presidents Day Run 02-19-18, or... TOYOTAS VS. SNOW!

Been a crazy busy few days. I started off by seeing a nice and loud concert, Yob & Conan on Thursday. I shot up to Vancouver BC for a couple of relaxing days. Drove back on Sunday in time to get ready for a Presidents Day Run Monday morning. It got crazy windy and cold so I packed my snow pants (came in handy later.) and a few other odds and ends for the trip. I woke up, loaded up, and noticed the police had blocked off my street a few houses down. That turned out to be a drive-by shooting that shot up a house and sent someone to the hospital with a bullet wound to the head... fantastic.

But... I got off on time, met the group in good old Shelton, WA. and headed out to the North end of Lake Cushman. It was a beautiful, albeit cold (30s), sunny Washington day. We had a TON of windy weather the past couple of days, so I expected lots of obstacles.

 

[Road Bull]

Presidents Day Run 02-19-18, or... TOYOTAS VS. SNOW!P pt.2

As we started whining our way up the mountain we noticed a few obstacles. There were a couple of large trees that had fallen across the trail. The first one was about two and a half to 3 ft in diameter. It wasn't going anywhere. We had a chainsaw but this would have been a little bit much. we were able to get around by hugging the log really closely and just staying on the trail and not falling down the mountain. There was another couple trees blocking the trail there were much smaller in comparison. I believe we cleared one with the saw and drove around the other one. One of the hillside washouts that had dumped onto the trail was a fairly interesting stealth obstacle as it was covered with snow and lifted the hillside Wheels or vehicles up quite a bit. The lead vehicle actually went sideways but was able to right itself on the trail. But the second vehicle I believe a Lexus 580, was having a hard time. This vehicle had 18-inch wheels and could not air down as much as the rest of us. We ended up shoveling a bit of the washout to try to level the hump for people to cross over without sliding off. It worked pretty well and it would not be the last time that I use the shovel on this run.

We had about eight vehicles and the lead vehicle got fairly far ahead before we ran into yet another down tree over the trail that we were assessing when everyone started to get stuck in the over 2 ft deep snow. The heavy Lexus was just breaking through and was having a rough go at it. But in actuality, no one was doing well in this deep snow. We even had a solid axle old Toyota early 80s truck it was not faring any better.

Are lead vehicle got as far as negotiating the last down tree by going under it and just off the trail on the hillside. We are lucky he didn't go much further as our nightmare was just beginning. I mean it wasn't that bad, but it was far more work than any of us anticipated doing that day. The lead vehicle had a hell of a time trying to come back around the last tree to return to the group. He got caught up in the snowy ditch and was in the trees. I thought for sure that he was destroying the whole side of his vehicle, but somehow miraculously, he was able to avoid any serious body damage. His mirror got snapped forward and I thought it got snapped off. I was relieved to discover his vehicle took no major damage. I was the only one out of the group that brought a full size shovel. Someone else had some sort of packable type of shovel that probably would have been great for excavating old World War II sights. But we had enough manpower there and a good cross-section of different traction pads that enabled us to free the lead vehicle and get it stuck back with the rest of us in the group. Hahahahaha!

 

[Road Bull]

Presidents Day Run 02-19-18, or... TOYOTAS VS. SNOW!P pt3

Okay, so we spent the better part of our day testing our recovery skills. Bahaha! This snow was no joke. We had one very tight place that was still part of the trail to turn around. In the picture it looks as big as a baseball field. However much of that is off the trail and very very deep. Not to mention turning in this snow Quagmire was a feet that was almost beyond comprehension. Over the next 3 hours we essentially built a roadway one traction pad at a time enough to execute three-point turns for all eight vehicles and get them pointed in the correct direction. This was very tiresome work with plenty of shoveling and freeing vehicles that were buried up to the frame from the mountains snowy clutches. I was the first vehicle, only due to positioning, to be able to get turned around and clear from the deep snow. Winching was not very effective as it generally got the winching vehicles stuck and would provide one more vehicle to have to liberate. But I have to say comma people worked together and got the job done while maintaining fairly positive attitude. I have a lot of respect for people who work hard and don't *****.

We may not have got to our destination, but we had one hell of a journey. And I hear that's what it's all about. Either that or the Hokey Pokey I'm not sure.

 

[theesotericone]

Over the next 3 hours we essentially built a roadway one traction pad at a time enough to execute three-point turns for all eight vehicles and get them pointed in the correct direction

Nice write-up man. Sounds like a really fun trip.

That quote above is why I prefer to wheel alone or with one other rig. It's not that I don't like groups. I just have zero patience. If I'm stuck solo I can recover quickly and be on my way. If a whole group gets stuck it's never quick. Add that to the fact that you never know most of the other drivers skill levels I tend to be a loner. lol

 

[Road Bull]

Nice write-up man. Sounds like a really fun trip.

That quote above is why I prefer to wheel alone or with one other rig. It's not that I don't like groups. I just have zero patience. If I'm stuck solo I can recover quickly and be on my way. If a whole group gets stuck it's never quick. Add that to the fact that you never know most of the other drivers skill levels I tend to be a loner. lol

Yeah, it might have gone better had we only had 3 or 4 rigs, but none of us would have gotten much further on that particular trail. I think for what we were anticipating, it would not have been an issue. But no one thought that the area got THAT much snow. We had a couple days of extreme weather. Winds and storms hit a lot of the passes, but the Olympic Forest was a bit of an unknown quantity. I have been joining a lot of local community runs till I run into a small like minded group to hit the trails.

It was a learning experience. There are many different types of snow. This was not wet. It was dry and something above powder that at least made it easy to shovel, if not drive in. I might be done with snow for the season. I guess it is better than bad mud, but to what degree, I haven't a clue.

 

[theesotericone]

It was a learning experience.

That's what it's all about man. I've seen enough of most terrain to be able to judge what it will do. Even with that knowledge, every so often, it does something I don't expect. Both snow and mud can be hard to read. Both can get you stuck or let you pass with ease. The major difference is snow is way easier to clean off. lol

 

[Road Bull]

That's what it's all about man. I've seen enough of most terrain to be able to judge what it will do. Even with that knowledge, every so often, it does something I don't expect. Both snow and mud can be hard to read. Both can get you stuck or let you pass with ease. The major difference is snow is way easier to clean off. lol

That's what I kept telling myself as I was on my knees shoveling out from under vehicles. "At least I am not up to my knees in mud." That would have been cold mud too. Hahaha. When I can, I want to pick up some TRED Pros, and a snatch block. The winches would not have helped us much in that scenario. The couple times that it pulled someone out, it got the winch vehicle stuck. So the winch is not a get out of jail free card. Sometimes they are invaluable, but this wasn't that time. I still had a good time though.

 

[habanero]

I made a lot of eeks faces about that snow run. While it'd be cool to practice recovery technique that seems like an awful lot of experience!
Also I now have a craving for pancakes and mac and cheese.

 

[Road Bull]

I made a lot of eeks faces about that snow run. While it'd be cool to practice recovery technique that seems like an awful lot of experience!
Also I now have a craving for pancakes and mac and cheese.

Hahaha, right?!?! Well, live and learn I guess. I don't think many of us knew how much snow extraction we were signing up for that day. I didn't grow up around snow in Florida. And while it snows all the time up near the mountain passes, it doesn't make its way down to the greater Seattle area all that often. This might have been all of like, the fourth time wheeling in snow. Every time has been a little different. Different combinations of wet snow, dry snow, packed snow, powdered snow, ICE, Ice buried under snow.. and so on and so on. Traveling across these combinations is everything from exhilarating fun, to a show stopper. I think I am ready for spring though.

And yeah, those food pics do the same thing to me too. LOL.

 

[Road Bull]

A short drone video of our our run.

So here is a drone video someone on our run made. Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrpNre0nR3k&feature=youtu.be

 

[Unner]

Nice pics Ryder, looks like you've been having some fun with the 4Runner.

That's what it's all about man. I've seen enough of most terrain to be able to judge what it will do. Even with that knowledge, every so often, it does something I don't expect. Both snow and mud can be hard to read. Both can get you stuck or let you pass with ease. The major difference is snow is way easier to clean off. lol

I was going to say the exact thing. Snow melts, mud just drys and cakes onto everything. Then it falls in your face when you crawl under the truck. I hate mud, especially the nasty clay mud we have down here. I avoid it at all costs, and get it off ASAP.

 

[Road Bull]

Nice pics Ryder, looks like you've been having some fun with the 4Runner.



I was going to say the exact thing. Snow melts, mud just drys and cakes onto everything. Then it falls in your face when you crawl under the truck. I hate mud, especially the nasty clay mud we have down here. I avoid it at all costs, and get it off ASAP.

Thanks Gavyn! I am meeting a lot of people on these trail rides and it has been a pretty cool time. There are a few that I have gone with three or four times, but always new peeps too. I am lucky that there are a ton of cool places to see in my neck of the woods.

And I'll take being snow stuck over mud any damn day. Or water for that matter. You can pretty much wear something to keep the snow at bay, but I don't pack waders with me when I go out. These things make for lousy U-boats. LOL.

How are you liking your ST Maxx so far? I am a long way out from new tires, but I think those will be my next shoes. I think that they are a great blend of something between a mud and AT tire. I think the Nitto Ridge Grapple are cool as well, but only come in 17" options :flipoff:

 

[Scramble]

So here is a drone video someone on our run made. Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrpNre0nR3k&feature=youtu.be

Nice music. :moon:

 

[Road Bull]

Nice music. :moon:

Right?!?

I was kinda hoping for Coolio Fantastic Voyage, or maybe some Norwegian Black Death metal. But I guess we'll have to hold out till I get a drone the film a trip and bother editing it. Till then I guess we'll listen to what we got. :jump: