The next issue was not so easy. We wheeled the first half of Fins and all of Hell's on Monday. No issues. On Tuesday we hit Poison Spider. Not five minutes into the trail, and virtually no obstacles, I hear a POP, and then a bit of grinding.
And I see this:
The axel side front upper control arm mount came apart. It failed right at the intersection of the bolt-on 1/2" mount (that's it with the 3 allen head bolts) and the main body of the truss. I run a three-link front, so there is a lot of stress on this joint.
Fortunately, still close to the beginning of PS, I was able to limp back to the trail head, go back and get the trailer, and haul it back to our place. Crazy lucky it happened where it did.
Back at the place, we pulled it apart. Take a look at the edge where it was welded to the mount. To my eye the weld on top looks like it is just sitting on top of the base metal, with very little penetration. I do not have a picture, but there was no penetration on the 1/2" bar on the mount side.
I'm hoping
@AirborneTexasRanger can take a look and tell me what he thinks.
When the joint failed, the rest of the mount folded over and just came apart:
To my eye, there are several failed welds on this piece.
This is one of the few parts on the rig that I have not fabbed and welded myself. This was the original Dynatrac truss - manufactured by Dyratrac. Whoever welded this thing certainly did not do a good, or even passable, job. As hard as I wheel this thing, I cannot believe it has not failed before now.
