well, it started out much like any other wheeling trip, bunch of friends getting together to have some fun.
anyway, we got up there saturday about 1 unloaded all the rigs and hit the trail, i (tan yoda tow truck) made it about 200ft when i noticed smoke coming from my front left hub. now you have to understand the night before at 11pm i installed my new 'Black Max' chromo shafts and CTMs, to say the least they were expensive) anyway back to the story. so, i head back to camp with mikie from MPs customs and tear down the front hub, axle, spindle etc. so turns out that my long side inner shaft was about 3/8th of an inch too long, so here we are looking for a grinder and a generator getting ready to cut down my new shafts, and we did. too 3/8th on and inch off the splines, flapper disced it smooth and beveled the edge, it damn near looked stock when i was down, i am very proud of it actually. so we slam it all back in there and hit the trail about 1.5 hours behind the rest of the group. we are headed down the trail when we come to the squeeze to find the buggy being winched out. . . .hmmmmm, thats not right?. find out the output on the tranny let go about 10 min before we got there and hes dead in the water. well, damn, im thinking there foes my wheeling this weekend. anyway we hook up the buggy to the 4 runner and start heading back to camp around 6pm knowing it was going to be a long night. . . very long night. anyway, im looking around and mike (the owner of the buggy is no where to be seen, while we are winching out his buggy. . . i was thinking that there was something wrong with that picture, but everyone was just ready to hammer down and get it out of there so i kept quiet for a lil while. anyway, we make it about 1/4 mile and blow a bead on the buggy, we get it back on at about dark and keep going into the night, at about 930 we had some miscommunication and ended up ripping the right front wheel off the buggy and blowing a hydro line at the same time. note to self, go and whoa sound too much alike to be using in a recovery situation. so we get the wheel back on, and i use the work on loosely, 3 lugs barely on. and JB weld the hydro line back together, at this time its about 11 and about 45* outside and its going to take hours for the JB to set up so we shoot the **** for about another hour and end up wrapping the fitting and JB weld in some high pressure tape and call er good. meanwhile mike, the owner of the buggy showed back up when we blew to bead earlier, (he drove another guys rig to camp with all the wimmins for the night, not too bad, but why couldnt somone else have down that??) anyway, now, as we are fixing the hydro line he decides he needs a ciggarette and starts walking to camp. . . WTF?? he just left his buggy for us to pull out of fordyce at midnight for a cigarrette? im pissed, but i keep my cool. . . for a llil while. anyway, we hit the trail again and make it about 500 yds when the wheel falls off again and we loose the other hydro line, now im pissed, i say f*** it leave it on the trail im outta here, and start to drive around the buggy, but i cant make it, so we all calm down a little and decide that since the owner is not here that we are tired and are leaving the buggy overnight. we get it off the trail and head back to camp to find the owner sitting next to the fire drinking a beer. . . i said f*** it and went to bed to cool off its like 1am.
get up at 10 and decide the only way its coming out is to piggyback it out. so i man up and say ill do it as long as i get a new bed and he pays for anything that breaks on the way out. so from there you can figure it out by the pics. so turns out brians tow rig blew up on the way there so he drove the scout from rough and ready to the trail head, so we load the scout on my trailer since i was on the tripple axle trailer with the buggy still humpin me. all i got to say is that scout is HEAVY!!! #6500 trail ready easily more. anyway, we make it back to rough and ready where brian hops back in his towrig and hammers down the road to see how far he cam make it. turns out he made it almost to oroville where it fianlly had enough and wuit on him. so we all catch up with him, unload the scout off my trailer, load mikies 4runner onto mine, winch his crewcab long bad chevy onto mikies trailer with inches to spare and keep on going. made it home and went to bed haha.
but its all good i get a new bed, new rear window, new grille, new headlight and some other stuff, so whatever.. . . anyway, everyone is still friends and were good to go.
thanks to brian (scout254) for being there with every recovery tool you could ever use, he was a huge part of getting the buggy out. and everyone else that helped, and was pacient waiting behind us as we headed out.
all in all, very little carnage cash wise, but what i *****.
Callen
