- Location
- The Village of Kay
Has this ever happened to you: After the longest week you can remember, you are 30+ miles from the nearest paved road, on a trail you have wanted to run for almost 20 years, you are so close to the end you can't imagine not making it(maybe 2 miles from the end of the trail), your health isn't quite 100% because you have been sick for 3 days, you are crawling along at a snail's pace due to the extremely rough terrain; then dropping down a wall, you hear that heart dropping, stomach churning, unmistakable, horrifying, make you want to throw up, pinging sound of metal breaking. You get out to survey the damage, and at first don't see anything amiss. Then you see it. As the severity of the break settles in, you start to think: how in the world am I going to get this Jeep 30+ miles off the roughest, longest trail, you have ever tried, then 350+ miles home, with a broken coilover shock?
It happened to me last week on the East side of the Hole in the Rock trail.
This trip report will be light on pictures because it was essentially broken into 2 missions: 1) Get to the end of the trail, 2) After the break, get the Jeeps off the trail without breaking anything else. Hence, pictures were kind of an afterthought for me. We took some, but not nearly as many as I normally would.
My story begins many years ago: 1997 is my first recalled trip to the West side of Hole in the Rock. I remember going with my dad, camping on the trail, and observing the comet Hale-Bopp from our camp at Sooner Wash. That may have been my first trip and my first history lesson on the pioneers and the area, but I can’t remember for sure.
Anyway, that trip piqued my interest in the history of the Hole in the Rock pioneers, and the rest of the trail. Then, as a young man, I read the book The Shadow Taker. That book really got me interested in driving the East side of the trail.
For the last couple of years, I have had a strengthening desire to run the East side of the trail, and late last year I decided that 2014 would be my year. In preparation, I read several trip reports on RME and Expedition Utah, planned a trip to do the Escalante side again to refresh my memory of that side of the journey (I did that trip in April), bought a new winch and air compressor for my Jeep, and planned to do the trip in June thinking it wouldn’t be unbearably hot yet. I also recruited my Dad and oldest Son to make the trip with me.
The adventure, and bad omens, started days before I even left my house for the trip. I have been busy at work and home since my trip on the West side in April, and I was late in wrapping up the preparation of my Jeep and finalizing trail plans and details.
Bad Omen #1: on Saturday May 31, in an attempt to at least prep my Jeep, I changed the air filter, changed the oil, and started greasing my control arms and steering components. As I put my grease gun on the first zirk I could get to on the passenger side upper control arm, the zirk pulled out of the control arm end. I was astonished, maddened, and frustrated right away. In an attempt to cool off, I proceeded to try another zirk on the driver side. It broke off right above the threads. Even more frustrated, annoyed, and generally pissed off, I went back to the passenger side to see if I could thread a new zirk into the first end I attempted. With no luck, and no room to tap new threads into the end without tearing down the end, I attempted to grease another end on the passenger side. Guess what happened next…it broke too! I was speechless (other than the slew of profanity that likely spewed forth from my mouth).
Crawling out from under my Jeep, totally disgusted at the prospect of not getting to go on this trip because of broken zirk fittings on my control arms, I went in the house to cool off and gather my thoughts. After a few minutes of cooling down and clear thinking, I determined to pull the Jeep into my garage, drop the control arms out from under the Jeep, replace the broken zirks if possible without tearing the ends apart, and hopefully not have to get an alignment Monday before leaving Tuesday.
Starting at about 7 pm Sat night, It took about an hour to clean up my woodworking mess enough to get the Jeep into the garage and on Jack stands so I could get the first arm out to tear the end down and re-tap the threads. I soon realized I didn’t have the right size snap ring pliers to get the end apart, so I spent the next hour driving to Lowes, Home Depot, Autozone in Kaysville, then Autozone in Layton to get a set of pliers heavy enough to remove the snap ring and get the arm end apart.
Once apart, I was surprised to find the internals of the arm end to be plastic, dirty, and coated in little to no grease. I re-tapped the threads for the zirk, scrubbed everything with a soft brush and brake cleaner, took my dremel with a wire wheel to the inside of the arm end to get the most stubborn crud off, then coated everything in fresh grease, and reassembled the end. Replacement of all arm ends is now in the near future on the Jeep.
That was easy enough I thought, so I moved onto the other broken zirk on the passenger side. As I loosened the bolt holding the arm to the axle, I noticed the washers covering the alignment slots were not welded in place per the instructions for the lift kit (I looked at the lift instructions to find what to torque the bolts to when I put the arms back in). This meant I would be making an appointment first thing Monday morning for an alignment (not in the budget for this trip). Since that zirk broke above the threads, It was as simple as putting a socket on the nut and backing it out. If only there had been room to get it out without dropping the arm! Reassembly was easy from there, but time was not on my side.
With the passenger side buttoned up, I moved to the driver side. I dropped the arm out and noticed the washers weren’t welded on that side either, and that the zirk broke below the hex in the arm end. I rummaged through my toolbox for my bolt extractor set, hoping I had one that would fit since it was 11 pm on a Saturday night. I found my set, had one that would work, and got after removing the broken threads. After reassembly, I tried to grease the fittings on the other end of the arm, only to find they can’t be accessed with a standard grease coupling. Plan A was to lift the front end as high as possible, hoping that would get the arm to drop enough to get a grease fitting on the zirk. No luck. Plan B was to drop the axle end of the arm again and then try to grease the fitting. Success, but a lot more time consuming!
After wrapping up all the repairs, it was 3 am Sunday morning and I had developed a nasty cough. I was done with my repairs though, and the trip as still on!
Bad Omen #2: Monday morning, waking up feeling like I had been hit by a truck, I made a call to Fat Bobs garage in Layton to schedule an alignment and have them weld the washers in place on the axle so I could drop the arms out again without having to worry about alignment if I didn’t change the length at all. They had time to do it that day, so I threw my bike into the Jeep and headed over to drop it off.
It is only a 3.5 mile bike ride from Fat Bobs to my house, but when I got home, I was EXHAUSTED. I tried getting some work done, but ended up heading for my bed. After some not so pleasant bodily functions later, I spent the entire day in bed, only waking up occasionally to take conference calls for work and then to pick up my Jeep from Fat Bobs. I decided that if I still felt horrible Tuesday, the trip was off.
Tuesday I woke up and felt slightly better, so I texted my Dad and the trip was still on, but I had a TON of work to do. I got busy working and put off packing and other trip prep in an attempt to get some work done for my Job, and preserve an income for my family. After getting several things off my to-do list, and speaking with my boss, I shut down my computer around 3:30 pm and began assembling my gear for the trip. I even threw in some extra tools I don’t always carry.
Loaded up, gassed up, and ready to roll around 7 pm, my oldest son and I hit the road to my dad’s house. He was just finishing loading his jeep on the trailer when we arrived, and a few minutes later (5+ hours later than we originally planned), we were off to Hanksville.
Still feeling weak and not 100% healthy, I wanted to camp in Spanish Fork canyon. Looking at the map from the rest stop in SF Canyon, we decided to go to the Price Recreation Area for the night. Never having been there, and not knowing exactly where the turn off was, my dad past it before he could stop, so onward we went. We ended up driving to the turn off for Goblin Valley just north of Hanksville, and camped on a knoll overlooking the valley. It wasn’t the best camp spot, but we were exhausted and ready for bed.
It happened to me last week on the East side of the Hole in the Rock trail.
This trip report will be light on pictures because it was essentially broken into 2 missions: 1) Get to the end of the trail, 2) After the break, get the Jeeps off the trail without breaking anything else. Hence, pictures were kind of an afterthought for me. We took some, but not nearly as many as I normally would.
My story begins many years ago: 1997 is my first recalled trip to the West side of Hole in the Rock. I remember going with my dad, camping on the trail, and observing the comet Hale-Bopp from our camp at Sooner Wash. That may have been my first trip and my first history lesson on the pioneers and the area, but I can’t remember for sure.
Anyway, that trip piqued my interest in the history of the Hole in the Rock pioneers, and the rest of the trail. Then, as a young man, I read the book The Shadow Taker. That book really got me interested in driving the East side of the trail.
For the last couple of years, I have had a strengthening desire to run the East side of the trail, and late last year I decided that 2014 would be my year. In preparation, I read several trip reports on RME and Expedition Utah, planned a trip to do the Escalante side again to refresh my memory of that side of the journey (I did that trip in April), bought a new winch and air compressor for my Jeep, and planned to do the trip in June thinking it wouldn’t be unbearably hot yet. I also recruited my Dad and oldest Son to make the trip with me.
The adventure, and bad omens, started days before I even left my house for the trip. I have been busy at work and home since my trip on the West side in April, and I was late in wrapping up the preparation of my Jeep and finalizing trail plans and details.
Bad Omen #1: on Saturday May 31, in an attempt to at least prep my Jeep, I changed the air filter, changed the oil, and started greasing my control arms and steering components. As I put my grease gun on the first zirk I could get to on the passenger side upper control arm, the zirk pulled out of the control arm end. I was astonished, maddened, and frustrated right away. In an attempt to cool off, I proceeded to try another zirk on the driver side. It broke off right above the threads. Even more frustrated, annoyed, and generally pissed off, I went back to the passenger side to see if I could thread a new zirk into the first end I attempted. With no luck, and no room to tap new threads into the end without tearing down the end, I attempted to grease another end on the passenger side. Guess what happened next…it broke too! I was speechless (other than the slew of profanity that likely spewed forth from my mouth).
Crawling out from under my Jeep, totally disgusted at the prospect of not getting to go on this trip because of broken zirk fittings on my control arms, I went in the house to cool off and gather my thoughts. After a few minutes of cooling down and clear thinking, I determined to pull the Jeep into my garage, drop the control arms out from under the Jeep, replace the broken zirks if possible without tearing the ends apart, and hopefully not have to get an alignment Monday before leaving Tuesday.
Starting at about 7 pm Sat night, It took about an hour to clean up my woodworking mess enough to get the Jeep into the garage and on Jack stands so I could get the first arm out to tear the end down and re-tap the threads. I soon realized I didn’t have the right size snap ring pliers to get the end apart, so I spent the next hour driving to Lowes, Home Depot, Autozone in Kaysville, then Autozone in Layton to get a set of pliers heavy enough to remove the snap ring and get the arm end apart.
Once apart, I was surprised to find the internals of the arm end to be plastic, dirty, and coated in little to no grease. I re-tapped the threads for the zirk, scrubbed everything with a soft brush and brake cleaner, took my dremel with a wire wheel to the inside of the arm end to get the most stubborn crud off, then coated everything in fresh grease, and reassembled the end. Replacement of all arm ends is now in the near future on the Jeep.
That was easy enough I thought, so I moved onto the other broken zirk on the passenger side. As I loosened the bolt holding the arm to the axle, I noticed the washers covering the alignment slots were not welded in place per the instructions for the lift kit (I looked at the lift instructions to find what to torque the bolts to when I put the arms back in). This meant I would be making an appointment first thing Monday morning for an alignment (not in the budget for this trip). Since that zirk broke above the threads, It was as simple as putting a socket on the nut and backing it out. If only there had been room to get it out without dropping the arm! Reassembly was easy from there, but time was not on my side.
With the passenger side buttoned up, I moved to the driver side. I dropped the arm out and noticed the washers weren’t welded on that side either, and that the zirk broke below the hex in the arm end. I rummaged through my toolbox for my bolt extractor set, hoping I had one that would fit since it was 11 pm on a Saturday night. I found my set, had one that would work, and got after removing the broken threads. After reassembly, I tried to grease the fittings on the other end of the arm, only to find they can’t be accessed with a standard grease coupling. Plan A was to lift the front end as high as possible, hoping that would get the arm to drop enough to get a grease fitting on the zirk. No luck. Plan B was to drop the axle end of the arm again and then try to grease the fitting. Success, but a lot more time consuming!
After wrapping up all the repairs, it was 3 am Sunday morning and I had developed a nasty cough. I was done with my repairs though, and the trip as still on!
Bad Omen #2: Monday morning, waking up feeling like I had been hit by a truck, I made a call to Fat Bobs garage in Layton to schedule an alignment and have them weld the washers in place on the axle so I could drop the arms out again without having to worry about alignment if I didn’t change the length at all. They had time to do it that day, so I threw my bike into the Jeep and headed over to drop it off.
It is only a 3.5 mile bike ride from Fat Bobs to my house, but when I got home, I was EXHAUSTED. I tried getting some work done, but ended up heading for my bed. After some not so pleasant bodily functions later, I spent the entire day in bed, only waking up occasionally to take conference calls for work and then to pick up my Jeep from Fat Bobs. I decided that if I still felt horrible Tuesday, the trip was off.
Tuesday I woke up and felt slightly better, so I texted my Dad and the trip was still on, but I had a TON of work to do. I got busy working and put off packing and other trip prep in an attempt to get some work done for my Job, and preserve an income for my family. After getting several things off my to-do list, and speaking with my boss, I shut down my computer around 3:30 pm and began assembling my gear for the trip. I even threw in some extra tools I don’t always carry.
Loaded up, gassed up, and ready to roll around 7 pm, my oldest son and I hit the road to my dad’s house. He was just finishing loading his jeep on the trailer when we arrived, and a few minutes later (5+ hours later than we originally planned), we were off to Hanksville.
Still feeling weak and not 100% healthy, I wanted to camp in Spanish Fork canyon. Looking at the map from the rest stop in SF Canyon, we decided to go to the Price Recreation Area for the night. Never having been there, and not knowing exactly where the turn off was, my dad past it before he could stop, so onward we went. We ended up driving to the turn off for Goblin Valley just north of Hanksville, and camped on a knoll overlooking the valley. It wasn’t the best camp spot, but we were exhausted and ready for bed.
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). The trip was a blast. I will be sure to take more pictures the next time I do this trail.
