Colorado Krew Hangout

Wow, looks like you guys had an eventful day. Is the ear of that stubbie axle shaft bent 90 degrees?

Yep. It was a gnarly break and in a pretty bad spot. Stretched the upper ball joint and the lower ball joint was on the brink of being pulled out.
 
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Sidewinder is a fun trail, we had quite a bit of play time. Nothing to extreme but a lot of flexing. Rockers made a lot of contact. Trough was a different story. Still had a blast but it was testing all of our rigs. I need to do a much better job on throttle control. Also, raised body mounts would have been a huge help yesterday. I got home a little after 1 am this morning.
 
Throttle control is for the old folks home ;)

What is the trick for getting home with a ruined ring gear? Can you drive without the carrier installed? Take the ring gear off the carrier? I know very little about diffs.

EDIT: thought about it for a second. I assume the only way to get home is to take the ring gear off the carrier and reinstall the carrier. Sounds like a rough job on the trail.
 
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Did you guys determine a root cause for @hosejockey61 ’s ring gear?

His rear ARB isn't working, so he thinks the front was over stressed yesterday trying to get thru the trails. He wasn't doing anything crazy that I noticed that would break teeth.

Throttle control is for the old folks home ;)

What is the trick for getting home with a ruined ring gear? Can you drive without the carrier installed? Take the ring gear off the carrier? I know very little about diffs.

EDIT: thought about it for a second. I assume the only way to get home is to take the ring gear off the carrier and reinstall the carrier. Sounds like a rough job on the trail.

Watching some of the video I notice that I tend to bounce backwards once I inch up to the rocks. Then a lot of jerkiness while trying to slowly climb. I'll get better!

Exactly that. Took the ring gear off the carrier. We were in the parking lot for a few hours trying to get it driveable again.
 
I agree... When we ran Holy Cross it was a zoo. I think people tend to shy away from these two trails because of how short they are. But don't let that fool you, trough is a great trail. Just be prepared for breakage. If somebody can't fix their own stuff or have a trailer then I wouldn't recommend it. Also, body damage likely.
 
Throttle control is for the old folks home ;)

What is the trick for getting home with a ruined ring gear? Can you drive without the carrier installed? Take the ring gear off the carrier? I know very little about diffs.

EDIT: thought about it for a second. I assume the only way to get home is to take the ring gear off the carrier and reinstall the carrier. Sounds like a rough job on the trail.

Couple of different options. If it's just a broken tooth or two and you can remove them, you can simply remove the broken pieces. I would also remove the front drive shaft. There other option is to remove the ring gear all together. The part that sucks about that is that you still need to put great oil back in for the carrier bearings. Since I travel light, I had to use my small cooler bag as my oil catch 🙄. It sucks doing all that on the trail versus my shop that's for sure.
 
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My Dana 30 is a road block for my build right now. I've almost pulled the trigger on the mid-arm a couple times just to realize I'm going to throw it on a Dana 30. The cost of getting a Dana 44 under the front with an ARB and gears just to have the same Dana 30 outers is frustrating. Not sure what the plan will be for the future. I've thrown so much money at the 30 I might just run it.
 
My Dana 30 is a road block for my build right now. I've almost pulled the trigger on the mid-arm a couple times just to realize I'm going to throw it on a Dana 30. The cost of getting a Dana 44 under the front with an ARB and gears just to have the same Dana 30 outers is frustrating. Not sure what the plan will be for the future. I've thrown so much money at the 30 I might just run it.

That's exactly the problem. I do have to say, this one has run well for me for about 8 years or so. I already have all the other parts and another HP30 laying around except for the ring and pinion. I'll probably just build another. I'd like to build a"tons and 40's" project but I truly do have a lot of fun with what I run now.
 
That's exactly the problem. I do have to say, this one has run well for me for about 8 years or so. I already have all the other parts and another HP30 laying around except for the ring and pinion. I'll probably just build another. I'd like to build a"tons and 40's" project but I truly do have a lot of fun with what I run now.

I've considered getting an ECGS HP30. I can swap my brakes, shafts, and locker over. Factor in the cost of getting someone to gear it for me and it is about $2k - $3k just to get a marginally better axle than what I currently have. I will never take my Jeep past 35's, so I'm considering just getting a truck and installing the mid-arm on my LP30. I think I'm done with this 'driving my 230k mile TJ across the country to wheel' thing anyway. But I say that after every time I do it.
 
I've considered getting an ECGS HP30. I can swap my brakes, shafts, and locker over. Factor in the cost of getting someone to gear it for me and it is about $2k - $3k just to get a marginally better axle than what I currently have. I will never take my Jeep past 35's, so I'm considering just getting a truck and installing the mid-arm on my LP30. I think I'm done with this 'driving my 230k mile TJ across the country to wheel' thing anyway. But I say that after every time I do it.

That's exactly why I learned to set up my own gears and also to weld. I hate spending that kind of money. Plus it's just a lot of fun to do your own work lol.
 
That's exactly why I learned to set up my own gears and also to weld. I hate spending that kind of money. Plus it's just a lot of fun to do your own work lol.

I have either an off camber parking garage or an uncovered asphalt lot to deal with. Simple stuff like bumpers I can do but the harder / more time consuming stuff gets farmed out to a local shop. I don't trust them with the mid-arm, so I'll be heading down to a buddy who is a certified welder to get that on (if I go that route). Every time I see a photo of your shop I get a bit jealous.
 
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I've considered getting an ECGS HP30. I can swap my brakes, shafts, and locker over. Factor in the cost of getting someone to gear it for me and it is about $2k - $3k just to get a marginally better axle than what I currently have. I will never take my Jeep past 35's, so I'm considering just getting a truck and installing the mid-arm on my LP30. I think I'm done with this 'driving my 230k mile TJ across the country to wheel' thing anyway. But I say that after every time I do it.
I was just patient with a craigslist watch for factory rubicon axles. It took about a year, but I got front and rear 44s already swapped over to 4.88s with the factory air lockers for $3k. Even got a set of 5 35" MTRs with about 70% tread left thrown in the deal. The guy was going to 37s on D60s and dumped his entire kit.
 
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I was just patient with a craigslist watch for factory rubicon axles. It took about a year, but I got front and rear 44s already swapped over to 4.88s with the factory air lockers for $3k. Even got a set of 5 35" MTRs with about 70% tread left thrown in the deal. The guy was going to 37s on D60s and dumped his entire kit.

I'd need a very good deal to swap in a rubi axle considering the outers aren't any stronger than the 30. Paying $3000+ for a slightly stronger front ring gear just doesn't add up to me, but I'm also not sure I'd want to mid arm the 30. The mid arm is in the future but I'm not sure what axle might be.

EDIT: Just searched FB marketplace. Could go grab a front Dana 44 for $1600. After an ARB and a regear, I'd be in for around $3000. Ouch.
 
@jjvw and I were on a number of trails up in that area a couple weekends ago. Everything was open as far as I could tell minus Webster Pass itself. The shelf road headed south towards CR60 was still blocked with sizeable snow drifts.

I got my father in law to Jefferson Lake early Saturday AM; his old Ranger recently blew a head gasket so we put his kayak on the LJ. I think he appreciated the lift; he needed the break from life.

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My son and I went back and checked out Red Cone. We did about 3/4 mile of the rough stuff before I decided I'd pushed my luck far enough. Stuffed the tire in the wheel well. My rig still needs some basics before it'll handle roads like that. Not to mention the driver needs some upgrades too. But it was fun and a good learning experience.

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We backtracked to Jefferson and went to the top of Georgia Pass. Insultingly easy drive, but still nice to get some altitude. We only had half a day (reality bites) so headed back to the city shortly thereafter. Still, half a day in the high country is better than another day in the 'burbs.

Hoping to try Argentine with a hike to Edwards/Grays this weekend!

IMG_6393[1].JPG
 
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