SPOTS OF BOTHER.....

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Their comes a time in everyone's 4wd career that you will find yourself stuck, out of fuel, broken, or otherwise in a place of misery.  The iconic Rick Russell once said "If you haven't been stuck, you haven't been four-wheeling..."  and he is more right than he knows.  Having done so many trips in the Desert Southwest, I didn't have all that much experience with being stuck, well, I do now.  At first it came as a blow to my four-wheel ego, but know I've come to embrace it as one of those pleasures of being in the bush with the right people, and the right equipment.  These are just some of the many.  Don't try this at home....

Pete and his Samarai.  Hmm, I was happy to be the photographer on this one.  Check out those nice newly painted rims....

Richard found out just how deep that grassy muskeg field was.

Ken's Sonoma found a small hole and luckily the Mog was there to help.  This is one deep hole that surprises everyone.

Do Mogs get stuck?  This was a pretty bad one.  I broke the front winch line and had to use the rear mounted Milemarker to get me out.  The moral of the story is that Mogs don't belong on ATV trails.

This was a bad day.  I had two tires lose their beads on this trail.  Lucky for me the work crew was there...  and no, it wasn't my fault they looked like that.  Pete's Samarai with no doors was the culprit.  Days like this make you improve your truck.  After this I had the rims sandblasted and power-coated to remove some build up of rust around the inner rim.  It makes quite a sound when a 42" tire blows out with 15psi of air in it....  I had used my spare on the first tire so we had to re-mount the second one.  It actually went a lot easier than I expected.  Kudos to Dave, Richard, Barb, and Pete.

This was actually a road accident, and luckily nobody was hurt, although the Commando was hurting pretty bad....  RIP.

The Rover got hung up here, good axle articulation shot though.  I find that a lot of the times you get stuck, is when you are trying to avoid going through something.

Keeping to the left is usually the way to go.....

Dead electric Fuel pump.  Glad I had a spare or it would have been a long walk back.  Lucky for us it wasn't located in the fuel tank.

HUMMERs get stuck too.  This was the same hole as the Rover fell into above.  The Slantback made it out ok, but the wagon broke its power steering box bolts and had to spend the night in the swamp with a group of unfriendly locals....

This was probably the ultimate stuck.  Henry found himself in a flash flood while traveling a "highway" in Belize.  Thanks to old technology the Rover was back on the road after changing the fluids and draining the water.  Take special note of the Soldier who was there trying to help out.  I heard it was a long ride back home on a wet seat.....

These are a little hard to make out.  But Kudos to Pete and Ken for getting the old Range Rover back on the trail after snapping the steering shaft.  A little creative work with a ratcheting tie-down strap and I was able to drive the Rover back to the road.  In fact, the steering felt tighter than it did before the break.  We just took the tie-rods out and replaced them with the tie-strap and tightened it in the middle.  A sort of "metal substitute"....  (Not recommended for highway travel, void were prohibited...) 

Bob's 1999 Soft-top blew a Power-steering pump right outside the front door of Barker Ranch (Manson's Ranch).  A quick 6 hour trip to the local NAPA and we were back at the ranch and Roger had the truck going in about an hour.

Coldwater, Ontario has some of the worst (best) mud-pluggin' trails around. 

This can be embarrassing at times.  You pretty much just need to take it with a smile....  This was a Transfer Case cooler loop failure.  At least we made it off the trail in Cottonwood, AZ. first before it gave up.  The cooler loop inside the case cracks and fills up the t-case with trans. fluid that is normally used to cool it.  This was a common problem on early model HUMMER's which has since been fixed.  Kudos goes at AMG.  I ended up by-passing the loop at the hotel and drove it back to San Diego for Terry at American Outfitters to repair.

Pete got the Samurai stuck quite nicely in the Coldwater Clay, and I guess Stu was feeling lonely so he jumped in to keep him company.  The result was Stu's well-built TJ stuck right next to the Samurai.  The 2002 Tj (mostly stock) went to move into help and got stuck on the way.  Stu's 9500ti came in handy on this one.

Some more quagmire from Coldwater.  Pete's Toyota on 35's and Stu's Tj on 37's this time around.

Another Coldwater victim.  Jason's YJ high-centered as he tried to avoid the infamous Coldwater goo.

No doubt more to come in the days ahead......