Desert Trip III
 

Our annual Desert Trip starts tomorrow morning at 6 AM (6-25-11). We are returning to Utah once again this year to check out Top of the World, White Rim Trail, Lockhart Basin and whatever else we have time to see. We plan on being out there 5 to 7 days.

Follow us along on SPOT GPS. It is like watching ants in an ant farm as we crawl around the desert. Make sure you watch it in the Satallite setting.

The vehicles for this trip:

Mine…. She is heavy too. Ran it across the local landscaping place scale tonight where it came in at 7740 lbs and that is before loading the refrigerator, propane tank and a few cases of beverages. She is squatting a bit this trip. Rides and drives like a Cadillac though!
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My buddy’s sweet Ram Charger. We call it JesusChrysler :lol: ARB’d front and rear, refrigerator, sleeping platform, storage out the gazoo. All kinds of custom touches to this rig.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3267/...128bf730_b.jpg

An one of our friends from Phoenix is meeting up with us in Moab Sunday afternoon for a few days of back country travel. He has a neat little Toyota Landcruiser imported from Australia. RHD, diesel, full floating rear axle. All the neat Outback goodies.
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We’ll have lots of pics once we return.

Here are a two SPOT Adventure pages from previous trips. Beware, these pages load slow!

2009

2010

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Cool, once again. You guys are taking the trips I want to when I get Mongo up and running. Spent time in the 70's crawling around Northern and Central AZ and have always wanted to get back.

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Larry I so envy you... enjoy and be careful.

Just checked and you are in Maysville.. :)

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Enjoy the trip - just checked your progress on the gps spot.

Re: Desert Trip III
 

We’re still out here in the dirt!

Quick update with some teaser pictures from the trip so far. We’re 4 days into this and having a great time. So far no major issues with any of the rigs although we are licking some minor wounds tonight near Moab where I can get sketchy internet service on my cell phone. All I can say is the White Rim trail is COOL! …… and long! We took 2 days going in but drove straight out today which took 8 long hot bouncy hours living life 3 to 15 MPH at a time. It has been hotter than heck too. We’re probably going to hang out a few more days before heading back to CO. Headed towards Monument Valley area tomorrow.

Stay tuned to SPOT…

Here are a few pics so far…

Top of the World/Kokopeli Trail. Got some great video of this trail! It took 4 hours to the top where we spent one windy night. The nats and bats were terrible.
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Camp site Monday night along the White Rim Trail
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The landscape is amazing
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Lots of pucker factor or this climb. The picture serves no justice to the huge cliff out the drivers door for a 1/4 mile as the incline winds its way up to the top.
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More later….

Re: Desert Trip III
 

I know you know it,but it doesn't get any better than this. I too ran that country back in the late '70s/early '80s and sure long for more. I can smell and feel the air and hear the sounds. Nothing but the land out there. Your truck is the best custom I've ever seen.

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Great trip.

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Nice pics. Have nothing even close to that here in Va. Keep the pictures coming. I am envious!

Re: Desert Trip III
 

i've done Pritchett Canyon, Moab Rim, Golden Spike, Hell's Revenge, Porcupine rim, behind the rocks, Poison Spider, as well as some of the easier, but scenic rides like Hey Joe and Kane Creek Canyon on my atv.

Re: Desert Trip III
 

the Upper Moab Rim. dunno how it is in a truck, but the lower half is freakin' scary on an atv. the whole trail slopes toward the edge of the cliff and the highway or the Colorado below.

http://i399.photobucket.com/albums/p...Picture025.jpg

the spur to the Colorado Overlook on the Hell's Revenge trail.

http://i399.photobucket.com/albums/p...Picture030.jpg

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Looks like fun Monty! I am not sure I would want to do many of those on an ATV. It seems like a that area requires a bit more wheel base, width and height than an ATV can offer.

Well, we made it home Saturday evening around 5 PM.

The trip came in at 7 days and 1,480 round trip with a 12 MPH average speed for the entire trip according to my SPOT GPS, which includes the 60-80 MPH speeds on the highways. That said, we did a lot of low speed crawling for days!

The only trail damage suffered was the front stabilizer bar bracket at the frame broke on the driver’s side. That certainly made for an interesting drive back home! The Toyota Troopie lost an A/C idler while the Dodge came out completely unscathed.

I am impressed with the Phoenix camper as it hung on to the truck like a glove and everything worked great but I won’t lie…. You can definitely tell it is back there. In some cases the extra weight helped out in the traction department very well. On the other hand, the first POS coming off of this truck is the ORD twin stick 205 shifter. That POS may work fine for a rock crawler or a mud pit beater but not a long haul outback adventure vehicle. Every few miles it falls out of low and that is only when the linkages aren’t vibrating off. Very annoying. Then there was the fan rubbing on the fan shroud on steep climbs. No matter which way I adjusted that dang thing it would rub just enough to sound like something was coming apart. I never had an issue with the fan shroud before so I am thinking the heavy weight on the back was doing something to cause this. You’ll hear it in a few videos.

After 24 hours on the Kokopeli trail to the Top of the World we headed to Moab Sunday to meet up with another friend. From there we stocked up on supplies and spent one night near Moab along a river. What a stinky, mosquito invested campsite that was. Monday moring we headed to the White Rim trail. Not sure how many of you are familiar with the White Rim trail, which is the Island in the Sky district of Canyonlands. This is on National Park land so ATV’s are not allowed here. I actually don’t think an ATV could pack enough fuel, food and lodging supplies to get down into this area anyway plus to road and terrain would be easier and safer in a bigger vehicle. The White Rim trail is normally a large loop but the Mineral Bottom area is flooded so you can go ¾ around the loop then must turn back. We took two full days getting in to the furthest point on our plan (Potato Bottom) but it took 8 hours to crawl out of there Wednesday.

The files are still loading to Youtube and Flickr. I’ll post a some pictures up once they are finished.

This is a spot is about 5 hours into the White Rim trail.
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Re: Desert Trip III
 

Here is one Youtuber from the Kokopeli/Top of the World trail.

Re: Desert Trip III
 

i'd check your driver's side motor mount if the fan was rubbing...

the atvs don't allow the deluxe accomodations full size rigs do...

http://i399.photobucket.com/albums/p...re027Large.jpg

but for the most part, we can run with rigs like this while riding double on my Brute, IF we have another atv along so we have enough man power to muscle the atvs though the ledges. there are two places on the Golden Spike that we have to help each other. one is the Crack and the other is the eight foot ledge with the hard right turn at the top, whatever that was called.

http://i399.photobucket.com/albums/p...Picture182.jpg

but right now i am building a '72 Suburban for the trails (3/4 ton, SM 465, NP 205, Dana 60, 14 bolt FF, 427 tall deck truck engine, ect...). can't wait...

Re: Desert Trip III
 

The engine mounts are fine. There isn’t much room between the fan and the shroud with the 8.1L crammed in there to begin with. I think the radiator core support bushings need a looking at.

Another Video from the Kokopeli trail.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3276/...705748e7_z.jpg

http://www.youtube.com/user/DirtyLar.../7/40ae2dgCkn8

I don't know why some of these Youtubes will embed and others won't. Anybody have any pointers?

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Lathroop Trail inside Canyonlands. Tight and steep.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=IlrT2uhpZk0

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Another fine back country trip under your belt. I'm sure it is the weight causing more flex than you're used to. I'd say the broken stabilizer bracket tells the same story. Your stabilizer isn't spaced,is it? I put some 1 1/2" tube between the frame and brackets for the 4" lift and that seems to get it close to it's original position.
My '92 work truck weighs right about what your '78 does. It sits lower,has IFS,and doesn't see extreme off road. But,I know what that weight feels like. It makes for a "take it easy" approach. That's the price you pay to have a proper rig for it's intended purpose. It ain't no rock buggy,it's an off road RV. A damn nice one.

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Thanks Tim. You are always a man of kind words. I agree, I also feel the weight at the back of the truck was the cause of the shroud interference under hard climbs as it never did it before and everything looks fine as far as mounts. I like your idea of adding a spacer. Consider that done when I get a chance to start licking wounds. The loaded weight came in at 8,035 lbs. That is pretty heavy rig to be toting around the back country. I am sure I weighed twice what the Ram Charger and Troopie did.

Well, I give up on trying to post Youtubes. I got one to link up and I have no idea how I did it. If anybody wants to see Youtubes you can check them out here.

There is one video of the Ram Charger pulling me up to a flat spot where we could work on it. We thought for a while that the in tank EP241 fuel pump gave up the ghost but found the fuel pump power wire at the Delphi weather pack connector came unplugged behind the engine when it flexed hard. Easy fix and back on the trail in 10 minutes. The Ram Charger pulled 8,000 lbs up the hill very well. That is video 20110625155729

Anyway, here are some of my favorite pictures from the trip.

Dewey Bridge where the Kokopeli trail starts. Airing down the tires here
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Camp the first night on Top of the World
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It wouldn’t be any fun without the cooking pictures. Bill is always the camp chef
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We even had a hair of an internet connection by way of my tethered Blackberry this night. The nice looking lady is actually my mother-in-law! :lol: Yeah, she went with me and the boys while her daughter stayed home. Weird I know, but she likes this kind of stuff. She is a great trail spotter too by the way.
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Airing up tires and eating lunch after completing the Kokopeli trail and before heading down to Moab to met up with our Troopie friend from Phoenix.

My buddy’s big bad Dodge.
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I bought an Outback Extreme air compressor for this trip. It worked great!
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Re: Desert Trip III
 

Oh, I almost forgot the MIL’s Cactus Salad she made for the trip. Pretty appropriate side dish for the occasion. Good stuff too!
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Then we took a little jaunt through Arches National Park on our way into Moab
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Our friend finally rolled into Moab late in the afternoon then we proceeded to try to find a new A/C idler pulley and belt for an Australian Toyota diesel Troopie… Ah…nope…not in this town. With it being so late in the day we decided to camp outside of Moab for an early start to Canyonlands Island in the Sky the next morning. Bad choice! The campsite this night stunk crap down there and it was the most godforsaken mosquito infested place on earth I have ever been. Food was good this night though. Trail boss Bill made some shish kabobs.

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Campsite 2
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The mosquitoes were as thick as bugs on a bumper. Neat picture we snapped of the Dodge bumper the next morning as we aired down our tires at the entrance to the Canyonlands Island in the Sky district.
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See that road way down there. That is the White Rim Trail that we will be following for the next few days in 110+ temps.
http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5192/...e7e62d1c_b.jpg

Our intent was to follow the White Rim Trail for 3 days and spend 3 nights down there but the loop that takes you out the other side, Mineral Bottom, was washed out so we had to back track from our furthest point. Two days in and 8.5 long hours out a few days later. A long ride at 3 to 10 MPH

More later

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Larry, as always great trip, great pictures and videos, and an awesome wheeling trip. I'd like to do a trip like this some day. With the weight your rig comes in at, you almost need a heavier frame it looks like.

Re: Desert Trip III
 

You don't get anything this good in a magazine these days. I really enjoy reading this and seeing the pictures. I know nothing about posting on the Tube. But,once I watched the one you posted I had all the others and watched them all. I was awful concerned seeing the Ramcharger pulling you in what was obviously "dead in the water" mode. Glad to know it was just a simple "oops".

Re: Desert Trip III
 

:lol: Their actually is one good magazine that covers this kind of stuff. It is called The Overland Journal. The publisher is a friend of a friend of ours and hangs out on another forum I spend time on. Expensive rag but well worth it if you are into the 4x4 Overlanding and Back Country Adventure stuff.

Funny story about the dead in the water moment. As we were crawling up the hill we rolled over a steep off camber obstacle where the frame flexed and the entire truck tilted hard to the right. About that moment the fuel pump started screaming so I shut if off to bleed pressure off the tank by loosening the fuel cap. It has done this before in extremely hot weather where the cap needed to be opened (yes, it is a new vented cap too). Once I relieved the pressure it fired right up and died a few seconds later never to start again for a while. With the main tank running low at the moment I figured the tilting caused the fuel to run away from the pump where it may have cavitated. At that point I called the Ram Charger on the walkie to come get me and drag me up to a flat spot. I do carry an extra EP 241 fuel pump and fuel pressure gauge for reasons like this so I figured we’d set up camp and change the fuel pump in the morning. I also carry a GM Tech II scan tool, a couple plug wires, cam sensor and a coil pack in case something goes haywire with the 8.1 on the trail as well.

After the Ram Charger drug me up the trail about 100 yards to a nice flat piece of slick rock, I threw the fuel pressure gauge on it and cycled the key. Bam! 60 PSI instantly and it fired right up again and ran great. Again, I figured the pump just sucked in a bunch of air while it was hot, fuel was low and the severe angle. So we decided to keep going up the hill to our intended camp spot at the Top of the World. At that moment I turned on the transfer pump to move fuel from the RH tank to the LH tank but as I backed up about 3 feet and it died again without restarting. It tried to restart but was obviously lean knocking badly this time. We were prepared to drop the tank to swap the pump but as we were checking the power and grounds while wiggling wires we found the power coming on and off when the relay was live so I followed the power wire up the frame and found that when I installed the NV4500 a few months ago I moved a P-clamp that secured the fuel pump power wire at the back of the engine and routed it in a way that caused the fuel power wire to be too taught where it came unplugged at the weather pack connector when flexed. Whew! We got lucky on that one! It didn’t even damage the connector by being pulled apart.

Also in the video's you will hear the D-rings on the rear bumper clanging around all of the time as well as a lot of tire chirp from the rear Detroit locker. A few of these were done in 2low as I didn't notice the stupid ORD twin stick 205 shifter kept popping out of 4low.

Re: Desert Trip III
 

I'd say the truck fared well in the R&D department. I think you have it right!

Man,tough crowd. This is awesome stuff being shared here,isn't it? I'm jealous as a penned bull at breedin' time. But,still gotta give Larry props anyway...somehow :lol:

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Cool pics & trip report...this would be so fun to do!!!

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Add some oregano...i love it that way

Re: Desert Trip III
 

Man,I AM ENVIOUS!!!! Around here there is nothing like the views you got to see. Lucky if you can see more than 200 yards. pretty country,rugged but pretty.