Billings Canyon Test Run

[Wally]

Since i just finished the new frame on the YJ, i wanted to test it before EJS to make sure everything worked properly, so Josh, Greg@RME and I took my YJ and Greg's dirt bike up billings this afternoon. We heard through the grape vines that the Grand Mesa Jeep club was having a Work Day, so out of respect for them we waited till 4:00pm to go up so we wouldn't interfere.

I don't mean to go off on a rant here, but i really don't understand why this "club" will have a work day on a trail and fail to invite the public. I constantly see trail clean ups/work days posted up on this board by many MANY jeep clubs across the state, i mean really the more hands the better right They apparently these are exclusive events and the public is not allowed Anyways, to make it worse, i've NEVER seen more rocks stacked than i have today, along with TONS of oil leaks all over the trail that were clearly from today. I'm done it's not worth my efforts, it's a great trail and i have a BLAST every time i run it, and if it weren't for this club, i wouldn't have this opportunity so here's the pics.

Josh drove so i check it out, and i can't think of anyone else better suited to beat on your rig and really make an effort to twist it up and air it out at every last little obstacle...oh and the best part of the day, we never even aired down, we ran the entire lower section of the trail at 20psi and had no issues

Rock Stacking Galore courtesy of the Grand Mesa Jeep Club Work Day. Looks like the locals need to schedule their own work day to unstack the jeeps clubs rocks




Ok onto the jeeping pics

[Wally]

More pics

[Wally]

More pics

[fatwreck]

I've been waiting for a while to see these pics.....and they didn't disappoint.

It'll be cool to see how it does out in Moab with 'em all aired down.

[T3N5OR]

so you finally let someone who knows how to drive, drive ur rig, and no flops.... somewhat telling IMHO.... JK oh wait, and nothingn broke either... ouch wally, u owned urself!!! nice work josh!!!

where's the danger cart???

[Joe Dillard]

Sweet Wally.

Sorry to hear about the beadlocks.

Anyway, on the second & third to the last pics (where the rear tires look as though they are airborn), sure looks like the rear shock-to-frame clearance is something to keep an eye on.

[josh]

so you finally let someone who knows how to drive, drive ur rig, and no flops.... somewhat telling IMHO.... JK oh wait, and nothingn broke either... ouch wally, u owned urself!!! nice work josh!!!

where's the danger cart???

took me little a while to figure out what the hell that third pedal was for,

I never new wally's truck worked so well.

danger cart is dead

[Joe Dillard]

danger cart is dead

WT???? Looked pristeen last time I saw it. It had only a couple minor scratches then.....

Is that the same rig you had when we wheeled 21 rd?

[josh]

yep

[Joe Dillard]

Seems insurance would have covered some of the damage and would have put it back together good as gold.

[Greg@RME]

Thanks for letting me tag along Wally & Josh, I'm glad I finally know where Billings is! It was fun to wheel with you guys, next time Josh & I need to have our own rigs.

Wally's YJ worked great, seems like the recent axle swap, frame extension & WB addition really paid off. Plus those huge, blingn' wheels & tires!! Here's the pics I got, they're pretty much the same thing though.

[Steve]

Rock Stacking Galore courtesy of the Grand Mesa Jeep Club Work Day. Looks like the locals need to schedule their own work day to unstack the jeeps clubs rocks

Yep, let's have our own unstacking trail work day. I guess if you don't pay club dues they don't want you at their work days - strange.

How 'bout pics of other rigs, I've seen enough - no, make that too much - of that blue YJ.

[89minitruck]

Rig looks good. Great actually... NICE work on the rig man... very nice indeed. Did you upgrade to 40s?

You let JOSH drive???! Wow... I'll bet he is starting to get the shakes with his rig all in pieces! If you want somebody to test her out then Josh is your man. Josh makes it look easy though... the dude can wheel.

Josh, that picture you posted of the Danger Cart remains makes me SAD. Where are you with the rebirth of the Danger Cart II??

Thanks for calling/emailing me back Wally... I can feeeel the love. I spent the day around the house with the kid and wife. It was a nice relaxing weekend, but I'd have loved to go put some more dents in my rig...

Are we going this coming Sunday or are you off to EJS?? I'm trying to convince Chris to come down and run something on Sunday. It looks like he isn't going to EJS.

[Badbuggy]

Just a quick note to clear some things up.
I went with the Jeep clup to Billings for the "clean up".
There were 4 of us that ran the trail.
I am guessing that we were the first ones on the trail that day but I don't know for sure. You guys got on the trail at 4 p.m.
As near as I can tell there were at least 19 rigs that ran the trail on Sunday.
I think it is a little unfair to blame every drop of oil and every stacked rock on the first four rigs. There were at least 11 rigs between your group and ours. At least 3 of those rigs turned around and went back down adding to the trail traffic on the lower part of the trail.

Anyway, like you I really appreciate what the jeep club has done with the Billings project. So much so that I recently joined the club. That's how I knew there was a clean up day. But we are fortunate to wheel with guys like you who pretty much clean up not only after yourself but for the very few slobs who enjoy wheeling. There was not much trash at all and could have easily been picked up by one person. So the "clean up" day was....
sshhhh... just another excuse to go out and have fun.

By the way, it turned out it was good that we had a group folllowing us that had a welder, because we couldn't superglue the tie rod, thanks Jeff R.
We had a great time, and I think you probably did too, and that's what it is all about.

And I unstacked as many rocks as I could, cause I sure don't need em.

[Roy]

[QUOTE=Wally]
I don't mean to go off on a rant here, but i really don't understand why this "club" will have a work day on a trail and fail to invite the public. I constantly see trail clean ups/work days posted up on this board by many MANY jeep clubs across the state, i mean really the more hands the better right They apparently these are exclusive events and the public is not allowed Anyways, to make it worse, i've NEVER seen more rocks stacked than i have today, along with TONS of oil leaks all over the trail that were clearly from today. I'm done it's not worth my efforts, it's a great trail and i have a BLAST every time i run it, and if it weren't for this club, i wouldn't have this opportunity so here's the pics.


Rock Stacking Galore courtesy of the Grand Mesa Jeep Club Work Day. Looks like the locals need to schedule their own work day to unstack the jeeps clubs rocks

Whoa Wally!! Where are you coming from here? We have had you along on work trips before and you know we like having you along. You also know that Billings is also pretty clean and doesn't require a lot of clean-up. The projects that we needed to get done didn't require a large number of people. I don't know why the public needed to be invited. It isn't like some of the trails we have seen posted on here that require untold man hours to get cleaned back up.
You also know that I have unstacked my share of rocks. From past experience I know that you can't unstack them fast enough or often enough to keep up with the users that need to stack them. Unstacking the rocks wasn't on the list of things we were going to do on this work trip.
We were the first group up Billings on Sunday and you were the 5th group. I don't know why you think we were the group that created all the problems for you, but there were a lot of people between us. There isn't anyone in the jeep club that is trying to be an elitest, a very small percent of the jeep club use this trail. We are fulfilling our agreement with BLM assuring that this trail will be there for YOU to use!
If you want to help on the work trip; call me, that's what everyone else did.
If you don't like the stacked rocks; unstack them, that's what I have to do.
If you don't like the oil leaks; clean it up, that's what I have to do.
If you don't like the trash; pick it up, that's what I have to do.

[Volcom]

More pics

This picture totally looks like an RC car The big tires with those wheels look RC like. Nice pics

[Wally]

If you want to help on the work trip; call me, that's what everyone else did.
If you don't like the stacked rocks; unstack them, that's what I have to do.
If you don't like the oil leaks; clean it up, that's what I have to do.
If you don't like the trash; pick it up, that's what I have to do.

Roy i'd love to help on a work weekend, but i found out literally a day before, and already had plans, you know me and many others who are NOT club member go up and work on this trail in our spare time, so it would be nice to include the community on these trail clean ups, even if you feel it's just a "minor" one.

As for the rocks, that's what we did when we saw them, but it being a work day, i can't imagine that many rocks being stacked up, it was with out question the most rock stacking i've EVER seen on this trail, and the fact that it was a jeep club work day just didn't seem to sit well. I'm sorry if i'm in error calling out the jeep club on this, but on a trail that rarely see's more than two groups a day, and it being your work day, you can see my logic here I do apologize if it was not you guys, but i am still going to head up there after jeep safari and unstack the hell out of that trail with a few other guys.

I thought josh was going to fall over from all the dirt and dust he was kicking on the oil spills trying to clean them off the rocks. I think josh takes more pride in this trail than anyone i know, he fly's off the handle when he see's oils spills and trash, and he doesn't even enjoy wheeling it unless it's covered in snow

And yes we did pick up some trash, a few broken ujoint caps to be exact, including one of the cclips that let loose an obstacle before we found the ujoint

[YJgirl]

Wally - It looks like the front end is working well, but is the back flexing at all? I can't really tell from the pics.

[2yotame]

Hey Wal,

Don't know you but nice rig looks great.
Trail looks like abit of fun. Oh and nice and clean to, Great job.

[Wally]

Wally - It looks like the front end is working well, but is the back flexing at all? I can't really tell from the pics.

I'm not entirely pleased with the rear shackle mount, it seems to be a bit steep right now and restricting the flex compared to the old set up, but it still is flexing a decent amount. I'm going to wait until i install those T&T Custom Corner's, they're 3/16" steel and will add a fair amount of weight back there, as well as the gas tank cover/floor and my tools. I had alcan build those springs for 100lb's of gear and a 37" spare tire/carrier, so right now there's not really enough weight back there for the spring rate, we'll just have to see...guess i'm gonna have to go up billings agan next weekend

[Colorado Cruiser]

I may be game for billings on sunday..... If my driveshaft comes back. I want to see some Pics of Danger Cart II From Josh's garage. Quit holding out and post them up!

chris "AJ's Friend From Glenwood"

It pains me to write that last part

[89minitruck]

Chris,

That makes me laugh... Wally is out for Sunday. He's got a lot to do yet before EJS. But get your rig done and let's go play... we'll take Josh along too.

AJ

[jimminyC]

So what are the sunday plans? I still need to test the cherokee!
I'd like to meet some more of the junction crew. Ill be booked on sunday untill about 12:30, but i'd like to go somewhere for a few hours if anyone would like to go?
Brian

[89minitruck]

JimmyC-

The jury is out right now, but I can email tomorrow if we're going.

aj

[tim"toolman"]

Wally, My old tires look good but what happened to the bead locks? I thought you ordered them from us6x6 at the same time I did? Mine where late and not exactly what I ordered but they are good? My rig is almost done. Heading for Moab May 5th. Tim