Carp run (Night!) - Aug 16th

[trixter192]

Mitko is on holidays, so I'll just pretend to be him.

Carp is the easiest trail we have, aside from power lines, but those are really just access roads. Matt would do a hydro line in his Sunfire. Why don't you just toughen up and go wheel with the experts instead of derailing trail run discussions. I've seen a stock JKU on 29" street tires go though Carp. You're plenty capable.

 

[2Greys]

My opinion is that he holds off and does it during the day. Our minimum recommended for carp now is 31's he could probably do it but since it is his first time on the trail its better if he defers to a day run when he can see what he is about to go over. He can't follow the same lines as us. We have already said for him to defer and I have no issue with him commenting in the thread (it's not like it is that busy of a thread). Stock JK is a different beast than a Liberty even with 2". If he had done Carp already during the day so he knew what to expect I would say feel free to tag along.

 

[2Greys]

Bump for tonight, I am planning on being at Carp Fairgrounds at 8PM and leaving for the trail at 8:15.

 

[Burger]

Rubicon is ready and just loaded the YJ on the trailer. We will see at the fair grounds but may be running a few minutes late.

 

[2Greys]

Sounds good.

 

[2Greys]

So there were 4 of us:
Me
Burger
Pat (red Cherokee)
Burgers Dad (didn't catch his name) Black YJ

We met up at the fairground and after all the legal proceedings were done headed off to the trailhead. There were about 4 signs right at the trailhead saying Trail unmaintained, but the one I noticed that interested me was it said no trespassing snowmobiles only. Now I would assume that would be mostly for winter but you would figure they would have been taken down at end of season. Should we look into it?

Typical trail run until we got to the mud pit. Bunch of pansies have made a bypass to the left of the rocks before the mudpit. My guess is some 4 door JKs don't like the sound of rubbing their TC skid on the rocks. Tsktsk

It was pretty dry on the trail but of course the other three decided to give it a shot going through the mud pit. Needless to say the pit hasn't changed. Actually I think it has got a bit deeper. Cherokee got tugged out and took the bypass. YJ took the left side and ended up getting stuck in further and Cherokee was able to pull him out. It was interesting as he was able to move back and forth and kept moving forward an inch at a time and actually got his front tires lined up with the trees where the mudpit and bypass meet. Problem was he had to get over the pile of mud he was pushing forward in front of him so he backed up a bit further and then got stuck.

Scott tried in 4low and got stuck pretty much where the Cherokee did. He thinks if he had stayed in high he might have got further. He winched himself out. This was after Pat decided to be helpful and waded into the water in just rubber boots and proceeded to fall into a rut. The water was about 2 inches below his rock lights which with the height of his lift gives you a pretty good idea how deep the ruts and water was.

On the way out YJ decided to try to go out through the mud pit and made it about 8 feet in and got stuck. On the way out a couple times he jumped underneath as he was hearing some noises and was thinking it may be u-joint issues in the driveshaft (should mention this was his first run with it and had replaced the axleshaft u-joints right before leaving last night). I was two vehicles behind and I could hear it even with the radio on.

We turned left off the trail and onto the access road and about 20-30 feet down he came to a (literally) grinding halt. At that point we weren't sure if it was the Transfer Case or rear diff as he was having problems shifting it into neutral but I suspect the whole system was in a bind. So they got underneath and checked the diff fluid level and hit fluid with a full finger in (so it was really low and also cloudy). He had checked the front before leaving but I guess he had never checked the back. With the back and forth in the mud pit and low fluid I suspect it was a recipe for disaster. He also suspects he may have engine issues as well.

He pulled the rear driveshaft (did I mention it stopped in a puddle) and the rear was still seized so it was definitely diff. We attached a towstrap to the front and Burger started pulling him. He was able to force the front to overpower the rear to help but it was still dragging its ass.

We got it back to the trailer and got it on uneventfully. By the time I got home it was about 1:20 in the morning.

All said it could have been a LOT worse for what it was. We were fortunate it broke where it did and not earlier.

 

[Burger]

We were lucky we broke were we did. Still a fun run, and good thing dad has a spare axle at home. Thanks for leading us around in the dark chris

 

[2Greys]

I think if we had broke at the mud pit the easiest thing we could have done would have been pull the pinion (that is assuming we could get it out of the pit). Pretty drastic but as long as we got the carrier back in. the wheels would have turned fine. (well that is assuming the spider gears were ok which since this a Dana 35 would probably not be the case)

 

[Burger]

Well dad pulled apart his rear end this weekend... and let me tell you its a good thing we didnt try to pull the pinion on the trail. He pulled the diff cover and instead of diff oil, mud and sand came out. The ring and spider gears looked perfectly fine, which was not what we were expecting. Pulled the carrier and then the tires would spin so the problem was obviously the pinion. Pulled the pinion nut and then we could see the pinion bearing was piled up. The pinion refused to come out of the rear end. Finally he pulled the axle out from under the jeep and worked on it on the bench. Took a good few hours but he managed to get the pinion out without smashing it up. Had to grind out the bearing and race to push the pinion out. All in all not a terrible break, should be going back together after the long weekend.

 

[2Greys]

So new bearings is all it needs? Did he figure out how it got full of mud?

 

[Burger]

still have to grind off whats left of the pinion bearing, but ya looks like with new bearings and a good cleaning of the internals should be good to go

 

[2Greys]

Got off lucky then