Louie4's YJ by Louie4

9 minute(s) of a 411 minute read

Well I don't have any updates on my build. This is more of a trail report putting my work to the test. This past weekend me and 4 other buddies drove our jeeps from Atlanta to Laurens County, South Carolina where we camped and rode at Gulches ORV park. It was a 3 hour ride and though riding your junk to the trail is risky I generally think of it as part of the challenge.



Skip, the owner, was a very awesome guy. He helped us out a good bit and took us on a tour the evening we arrived. He let us borrow some gas (sorry we didn't fill it back up Skip), directed us to a fab shop for repairs and he had a great park. We ended up reserving a riverside campsite. Here's some pics of me and my crew.

Here's my buddies YJ. He finally got it on the trail for the 3rd time. This was his first venture with the new 33" Mickey Thompson MTZ's.



My buddy's CJ-7. We've been building this thing for 2 years. He just got the 35" KM2's and he had a tough weekend.



Other buddies YJ. He has a lot of money in this thing. Notice the Warn Power Plant winch. He only has 31's for now. He's new to the 4 wheeling world and I think his first lesson needs to be how to buckle his seat belt.



Here's the campsite. It was nice and we already had some firewood stacked up when we got there.



Here I am. Bi-winning.



Here my other buddy he's got a 4Runner.



More to come.

Well the night we arrived Skip took us on a tour of the trails and near the end my CJ stopped running. Can you see what's missing in this photo?



Luckily the 4Runner buddy was coming from Statesboro and was able to pick us up a new fuel pump. Once we got that on we were good to go. In the mean time me and the other guys did some riding.

Both the other YJ's have fresh 4.5" RE lifts on theirs so they have a little bit of an edge on my worn crummy suspension.

Here is where the day gets better. My buddy with the CJ was climbing a good size hill and then something snapped.

Ouch

That was a little bit of set back and my buddy thought his weekend was done. But we went to see Skip since he deals with this stuff day in and out. He said to go to his friends shop about 3 miles down the road. He said he's a fabricator and might have some pipe laying around that we could sleeve the driveshaft with. Well we found the house and it had a lot of projects and parts all around his shop so we were sure we found the place. He also had an intense Great Dane named Titan.

My buddy who owns the CJ and Titan. Just to note my buddy is a relatively large guy.



Brad, the guy that helped us out was awesome. He had some 2.5" O.D. steel tubing with 1/4" wall. He got us straightened out.

My buddy didn't get over this because he's open in the front and rear. We were also hitting our drivers rear spring mount big time.



I got a little horizontal when I rode the side wall up. I have a video of it but I still need to load them.

Here's me with a strap on the front. I used it just to keep from rolling on one obstacle. This obstacle to be exact.



Better pic:

My CJ buddy just couldn't catch a break (pun intended). He was coming off these huge culverts and slammed down on the front end hard. Really hard. So hard his engine shifted forward enough for the fan to nip 7 rods in the radiator, then steam city.



So we had to get creative. Luckily another buddy had some waterproof JB weld. We ripped out the copper fins in between the clipped rods then we squeezed the rods shut and rolled them up. The lower open ones we put JB weld on. Miraculously we made it home with zero leaks.

That's my front driveshaft. I lost a u-joint cap. Most likely because my 5/16" deep well 1/4" socket was cracked in 2 places. So when I tried to torque the bolt, it gave.

I have a ton of pics so I won't be able to post them all. I will get the videos uploaded though. Here's a couple more and some of us going down the road on the way back.

My buddy was stoked that he actually made it out. So he showed it.



Here's me back in South ATL after spending all weekend in the woods. My hair didn't need any gel to stand straight up. Grossness.