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Sneak peek from the trip!    Friday we ran a milder day of blues and blacks, but saturday we went out to the NE side in an attempt to run as many Black & Red trails we could get in. All told ran a solid 8.5 miles on Saturday. Only left when we did to get back to the campground so we didnt miss dinner. Ive got a few more pics & video i need to sort through, and i know some other cameras were flying, so we'll see what vid turns up. Friday, pt.1: Rausch Creek Went over to Rausch Creek. Had my navigator with me:  Ended up over on the NE side of the park with a pretty big group, 9 or 10 in total i think. Joe from Bock's Garage was there, his dad with his one-ton K5, our usual wheelin buddy Jim, Rich, Tim (with that sweet 6G on portals), and a bunch of EBs.
Jameson had his TRX4M Bronco out and was running the trails every time we stopped for the group   Jameson spotted a lizard so we had to get a pic of it 
Joe's dad tried the ledge on F trail, the two of us are the only ones who were able to get up and over it  Joe giving it another go   Got a good luck at the undercarriage, this thing is pretty heavily armored!  I have some video of the day that im going to try to put together at some point, but not a single pic or vid of me on the trail, except for a poser pic at lunch. I have more pics and vid of the kiddo running his r/c bronco around than i do of mine! Rausch Creek!  Joe:  Joe Sr:  Ox:  PXL_20251122_202236042.jpg PXL_20251122_170558488.jpg PXL_20251122_174644129.jpg trail_f.jpg PXL_20251122_150939407.jpg PXL_20251122_151215846.jpg PXL_20251122_203406136.jpg PXL_20251122_163113763.jpg PXL_20251122_202940250.jpg I sheared off a brake line adapter on the rear axle  and i bent the crap out of my steering so ive got to fix that too  Epic day of wheeling. I dont really know where to start, but there was lots of video shot, so at some point in time myself or Joe will probably get a video put together. The diesel ran incredible, im guessing ive had a big boost leak for a long time because boost is up and EGTs are down. Well worth all the headaches! Got the big one all cleaned up and on the trailer thursday...  ...and spotted the driver leaf spring had a broken main leaf  Last year i broke the passenger side main leaf, so i guess this one was on borrowed time  thankfully i had another spare main, so the repair went pretty quick  lets try this again!  So we made it about 10 miles from Rausch Creek when the bypass hose for the heater core blew on the diesel and we lost a couple gallons of antifreeze pretty quick  Fortunately our buddy Jim was close by and he grabbed a barb fitting & some hose clamps from the store and we cut the bad section out, shortened it up and refilled the radiator. We ran the east & west sides of the Rausch Creek with Joe from Bock's Garage, his dad in his 68, and our buddy Jim with his 95. I didnt really take any pics during the trip. I brought the boy along with me for his first wheeling trip which he thought was super cool, so i kinda just hung out with him and made sure he was having fun  Everywhere we stopped he had to get his r/c bronco out and hit the trails to  We came down the Pole Line on the east side and he saw the big mud holes and said "I wanna go in the water holes!" and just like that it turned into a mud run! (i cant embed YT shorts videos so click here!) It was a pretty muddy day, but the little dude had fun so it was worth it  Now i gotta go outside and fire up the pressure washer! I was at Rausch Creek yesterday with a cool group of rigs:  Thats Joe (from Bock's Garage) powerstroke bronco in the background. The Centurion was owned by a buddy of his (also 7.3), and then their buddy showed up with this monster Cummins powered jeep on Axletechs:  Not too many pics taken from the trip but lots of video. Stay tuned... And we're back! We checked in at our cabin Monday afternoon. Brought the wife's 90  and my 88  The diesel towed well with the new suspension. Much smoother on the highway than ever before, even loaded down pretty heavily, so im calling the new suspension a win. (i do have a new upper tracbar bracket on order, so that will be getting swapped in the next couple weeks so i can put my front sway back on) We did family stuff tuesday - friday (pools, amusement parks, water parks, campfires & smores!), but Friday was also the car show, which i posted pics of yesterday. Saturday i went over to Rausch with a couple buddies while the wifey stayed back at the cabin nursing a sunburn. Turned out to be a good idea because it was the hottest day of the heatwave that rolled thru PA, and i dont think the wife/kid would have enjoyed the trail with that level of heat. Anyways, i only snapped maybe 15 pics, here's a couple. Overgrown trails:  Joe Sr
Joe Jr
Our buddy Jim was going to come out with us but was having tcase issues so he jumped in with me for the day. i was trail leader for the day, and we didnt stop much so no real pics of mine. He did get a cool snippet of me squeezing thru some boulders down in the Quarry on the south side of the park though The dogs enjoying the truck ride home. Jack is in his glory, as the wind from the wing window is blowing directly on him:  Home and unloading   This is the only real carnage from the trip that ive found thus far  Overall a good time, and weve already re-reserved our cabin for next year's event. Gotta wash the gray one tomorrow, check for any other damage, and then get stuff packed up so we can go rescue an old tractor Thursday morning! Here's some video from the one day we got out wheelin during the East Coast Bronco Roundup. Another rainy day at Rausch Creek, it seems this is starting to become a trend! We made it back alive! It started raining sometime Thursday night, and didnt stop until very early this morning. It turned yesterday's Rausch Creek trip into the wettest muddiest trip ive ever been on there! We were joined by Ox in the mogster, and Joe with his beast of a 7.3 PSD powered bronco, both on 43s:
Despite the abysmal weather and it raining non-stop the whole day, we ran a pretty decent amount of miles, close to 10 if im not mistaken. Honestly did not get a ton of pics as it was pouring all day long, and we really didnt stop very much at all. We took the typical pathway into the East side, taking B to C to O. We detoured and ran CV trail while we were there  I absolutely walloped the driver rock rail! It took quite a hit, but it did its job well, the rocker & door remain unscathed    From there we went down and ran Topless for Tatas, and then made our way via B/E over to the west side, where we went down J, across 11 and then into Rock Creek we went!    Here we stopped for a soggy lunch break  ...and then further into the creek we went    Finally at the other end we decided to keep going and run Death Trap, which was completely under water
 Out the other end we picked up 19 and took it up to 11. At this point Joe's transmission was overheating so we escorted him back out 11 to H and up to Tower Road, were the front pump seal gave out and he started puking (extremely burnt) ATF. so his copilot stayed behind with the truck, and we brought him back to the parking lot to get his truck & trailer since it was clear the bronco wasnt going to make it back on its own at this point. After all that me & Ox went back out into the park and went down into the South side to run Cemetary, Boot Hill & Tomb Stone   From ther we went further in yet and ran down S1-4 over to Snake Bite and Camel Back, which is probably the tightest trail you could run a full bodied rig down! That one was a snug fit for my wide rig, but we made it thru w/o and body damage thankfully. However, we did manage to get a log up underneath the body, where it smashed my gas filler neck!  crumpled the steel neck, tore the rubber hose and popped it off the gas tank entirely, so im pretty sure my tank is full of water & mud now. From here we headed back to the parking lot and called it a day! So, first impressions are that the bronco did really good on its shakedown run. I have some minor issues with the engine tune that i have to correct before the next trail ride, and of course im going to have to drop my gas tank to clean it, and replace that filler neck! The trepadors appeared to work very well; it was a rainy slippery muddy mess and they seemed to hook well, and the tread pattern stayed nice and clean despite how muddy the trails were. Sidewalls are stiffer than the iroks and the tires seem to work better on a heavy rig as a result. Very curious to see how well they hook on dry rock! |
