KOH Bound... 2 weeks til we head west...

[carwash]

Well, 2 weeks from now, we load up and head to JV to race the King of the Hammers... Pretty damn excited, actually beyond excited, about to lose my mind really.

In case you haven't seen the rig we are racing over on pirate, here are some shots of it. Kirby has built one bad ass machine....

http://www.red9fab.com/ImageFolio4_files/gallery/Shop_Projects/Off_Road_Projects/988_KOH_Benz_Buggy/DSC03197.jpg

http://www.red9fab.com/ImageFolio4_files/gallery/Shop_Projects/Off_Road_Projects/988_KOH_Benz_Buggy/DSC03199.jpg

http://www.red9fab.com/ImageFolio4_files/gallery/Shop_Projects/Off_Road_Projects/988_KOH_Benz_Buggy/DSC03200.jpg

http://www.red9fab.com/ImageFolio4_files/gallery/Shop_Projects/Off_Road_Projects/988_KOH_Benz_Buggy/DSC03201.jpg

We busted out a design to make some shirts for our friends and crew this week, ordered them today. There was a bunch of interest in them, so we ordered an assload more to sell if peeps wanted them. If you are out there and see us on the lakebed and want one, let me know and i can get you one. Or after KOH, i will ship out if anyone wants em.

http://www.red9fab.com/ImageFolio4_files/gallery/Shop_Projects/Off_Road_Projects/988_KOH_Benz_Buggy/shirtBack.jpg

http://www.red9fab.com/ImageFolio4_files/gallery/Shop_Projects/Off_Road_Projects/988_KOH_Benz_Buggy/shirtFront.jpg

Blue or black, and in any size you want.

[gothodgie]

you got fat guy sizes ? 3 or 4x...

Good luck out there...

:beers:

[carwash]

i have a few 3x coming and some 2x as well, no 4x.

[RuffedUpXJ]

Good luck. Enjoy it, remember Mike this is a business trip right?

[carwash]

yes, business... of course.

[twiztedzuki]

badass car!!!!!!!! what motor u runnin?

[carwash]

It's pretty damn sweet, i must say. Kirby planned this rig for a year in his head before he picked up one part. 500 hp LS1

[sarge]

Good luck guys , Im insanely jealous right now , I must say ......

Give'm hell !!!!!

[humpy]

i want a couple shirts...me and the woman will sport em...call me and ill pay over the phone if need be...and if you need another pit crew member hit me up...ill fly out :)

[began]

looks bad ass....let me know a price on the shirts ill take Black XL

[tjjeepjeep]

Good luck! Black one please .. medium if you can order one..

[Drivermod]

Buggy looks great. See ya out there. I'll be hanging with Todd Puckett and John Sweet. Pretty cool that there are 3 guys in the big show already from within 10 miles of each other. One more starting 9th in the LCQ, Jason Spegal, hoping to make it in. Can't wait to get to the desert. Lets show those west coast guys how to do it.

Ian

[yellowjacket]

Im still up in the air about flying out but if ugly jon will i will.. Well look ya up....either way have fun and be safe...cool benz buggy kirby!

[redcj3a]

Good luck. I hope you are as successful at the KOH as you were at the TTC.

[tubehead]

We'll be getting there Tuesday the 8th. I'll look you all up. Good luck!

[67fastback]

Benz grill for add touch..lol Nice rig sweet lines.. goood luck out there, Dont for get the hit the skinny peddle hard!!!!:beers: business trip lol right!!!:rolleyes:

[carwash]

Good luck. I hope you are as successful at the KOH as you were at the TTC.
That's the hopes man... could you imagine?

[carwash]

We'll be getting there Tuesday the 8th. I'll look you all up. Good luck!
Look for a bunch of retards out of their element, doing their best to fit in...

oh, and a giant pile of coors light cans.

[JeffK5]

Like I said before I'd kill to go but I can't afford to loose my job right now!..:(


I talked to Kirby before .. he tells me your doing some driving .. any idea when ? Since your driver of record do you have to be in the seat at the start?

Jeff

[carwash]

I have to either start or finish the race, that's what the rules say.

[JeffK5]

I have to either start or finish the race, that's what the rules say.

Lets hope it's finish..;)...good luck boys.

[biggin69]

Look for a bunch of retards out of their element, doing their best to fit in...

oh, and a giant pile of coors light cans.

Isn't that everyday for you Mike? Good luck out there! :beers:

[carwash]

Thanks all for the luck....

Shirts are $15...

[KillerKoatings]

Thanks Mike for the activation. Save me a blue and black XL I definately get them next time I'm down there.

[tjjeepjeep]

Thanks Mike for the activation.

That explains it...had a heart attack...

[carwash]

sorry lisa... meant to tell you or pm you and dropped the ball.

[Hotwheels]

Good luck at KOH. I was there last year for the whole week and had a blast. Wish I was going this year :(

[tjjeepjeep]

sorry lisa... meant to tell you or pm you and dropped the ball.

No worries...its just that I'm old and I may miss those years later in life :rolleyes:

[Drivermod]

Todd Puckett and John Sweet should be on the lake bed today. Here is a pic of them stopped of at Todd's parents house in Phoenix. See you guys there.

http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo140/drivermod/BuggiesinPhoenix.jpg

[carwash]

Damn, they had an early start, wow! Will look them up when we get there.

[tom tom]

i will take two t shirts good luck out there:thumbup: just pm me when u get back on the t's

[carwash]

I will be back here in the shop on the 15th. Should have plenty of shirts to sell.

[67fastback]

you guess might see this guy out there
http://www.facebook.com/#!/album.php?aid=2230849&id=30610267


http://a6.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/hs260.snc6/180870_693978404857_30610267_37825399_5002704_n.jp g

[Drivermod]

Damn, they had an early start, wow! Will look them up when we get there.

They'll be easy to find. Pit #2 with Nazir Adams right at the starting line. Have a safe trip.

[RuffedUpXJ]

Watched Team 999 go through the line with Camo, TechTim and Jessi. Looking good, lots of buzz about you guys on the chat during the window.

Ian I saw you in this vid, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUfYwCBzLGQ&feature=player_embedded#at=42

[RuffedUpXJ]

Everyone can follow Carwash and Kirby here http://irctracking.com/2011/King-Hammer/ and just click to follow car 999. Good luck guys, I see that your at the starting line staging.

[tjjeepjeep]

Watching the live feed on pirate...it's awesome

[JeffK5]

Kirby/Carwash hung on Back Door ... winching

[Hotwheels]

Now they are broke on backdoor :beers:

[RuffedUpXJ]

Rear driveshaft I think on BackDoor.

[JeffK5]

I've been up that trail.. it's a *****!

[sarge]

Any word ??????? my battery died last night while they were on BD broke :mad::mad::mad: no up dates on pirate :mad::mad:

[tjjeepjeep]

I forget what time I checked but the comments on pirate were that they were out because of the break (driveshaft I think)...but I can't find anything today to confirm that. Only results I found were unofficial and only the top 10. Probably not the bday present he'd been hoping for huh. If you hear anything let us know.

[RuffedUpXJ]

From the thread on Pirate, sounds like somehow broke a steering pump shaft but had a spare to fix then winched up back door only to break the detroit in the 14B. Watched them one trackign a lot of the day. Seemed to get stuff in traffic at Outer Limits. The winner, Shannon Campbell, passed by over 40 rigs while they waited there and was one of the first done with the lap and they start 62nd.

[sarge]

I talked to him a little bit ago , he is on his way to Vegas for a some good times .

he was a DNF , they broke a something in the rear end and the steering shaft , fixed the steering at the top of back door and then limped it out to the sand hill and couldn't make it any further.

Not bad for a first showing in the toughest race in the world ..... Great Job and :beers: to Carwash and Kirby ....

[67fastback]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ahbjfTBwFo

Shannon Campbell pass to take it to the bank!
Congrats Shannon on the second win at KOH!!!!!

Oh yeah nice buggy!

[tjjeepjeep]

I talked to him a little bit ago , he is on his way to Vegas for a some good times .

he was a DNF , they broke a something in the rear end and the steering shaft , fixed the steering at the top of back door and then limped it out to the sand hill and couldn't make it any further.

Not bad for a first showing in the toughest race in the world ..... Great Job and :beers: to Carwash and Kirby ....

I was hoping he'd call you for some first hand info...

x2 on the great job!

[tjjeepjeep]

Couple pics posted on facebook ...

3384

3385

[93 Krawler]

From this angle the top of his truck says 666. :eek: LOL

[RuffedUpXJ]

Rig looks sick on the rocks, awesome job guys.

[98tjls]

here is one....

[carwash]

kirby's recap copy/pasted from pirte...

checking in from El Paso tonight. We are beat and decided to grab a hotel. Everything went as well as I could have hoped for during the week. We ended up pre-running the first 35 miles of the course on Monday and bent the Rock Equipment sway bar arms as we entered chocolate thunder. I had torchmate cut some new arms out of 3/16" and Dan and the guys at Ruffstuff pit were more than happy to let me use their space and welder to build the new arms.

During the week I was getting some cavitation in the steering system and talked to Tom at PSC where I learned the dual pump setup is very difficult to accomplish, so we deleted one of the pumps for the race. Got to thank Tom for the advice on that.

The guys at KING shocks happened to be out past hammertown when we were testing shocks and saw us do a few passes. The front end was packing up and they immediately told us to come by their trailer and pull the front shocks so they could re-valve them. Can't thank them enough for their support. Carwash and I were pretty beat up and soar after the first 35 miles of pre-running, and needless to say we ran harder and faster during the 62 miles of race we completed and we are not even sore. We were able to sustain about 50 mph in the rough which I felt was pretty successful for being on 175 lb, 43" tires with a big scrub radius.

As for race day, we were doing decent off the start and maintained a steady pace up until outer limits. We got held up for an hour and a half due to roll overs, broken cars and bottle necks. We picked up the pace once again and then lost the clutch after first pass on the remote pit. I had to drive about 10-12 miles with no clutch through aftershock, jackhammer and a few other rock sections until we could get some more clutch fluid at remote pit pass 2. We kept rolling through and by our checkpoint before main pit we were car #45 to go through. We started #66.

Then backdoor happened.

We waited for a good while at the bottom while a few cars winched up the ledge. When it was our turn, I figured we would give it a couple shots and pull cable if it did not want to go. At that point in the race our rear driveshaft was dented, bent and scarred up pretty bad, so I didnt want to beat on it too hard and risk breaking (our spare shaft was about killed when we pre-ran outer limits) We came off the ledge for the last time and the rear tire would not pull. Detroit was gone in the 14bolt. As we winched up, I fought the steering and had absolutely no steering. At one point Carwash was helping me try to keep the wheels pointed left as we winched up but it was no hope. Finally we got to the top of the first ledge and pulled over to the side. The steering pump shaft had sheered right off, so we swapped in the spare. with no rear wheel pulling, I decided it would be easier to back out the top of backdoor instead of going forward. We barely made it to sand hill with Carwash pushing the front bumper as we creeped through the sand. At that point it was about 4 or 4:30. We had a spare detroit at main pit about 2 miles away, so it would be approx 1 hour or so before we could huff it to get the parts needed for the rear axle fix. We had to call the race.

All in all I think we were doing pretty well, but as many other racers out there, we ran into some bad luck.

Carwash, you were awesome out there, thanks for all your support and sorry we could not push further and make it across the finish line. Tandi and Scott and the rest of the Dust Junkies crew and Bomber Crew, you were too generous in all you did for us. We truly could not have done it without you. Gotta give thanks to my Dad, Ryan, Jason and everyone else who came out to support us. We had an absolute blast. To all of you who I spoke with during the week, thanks for your support as well. See you next year.
__________________

[Drivermod]

Valiant effort guys. That race was unbelievably brutal. What an experience!:beers: We didnt' get Johns buggy extracated from Outer Limits and back to camp until about 3 am.

[carwash]

Outer limits was the suck. We spent 1.5 hours there in traffic on the first lap... then had to drive the right side cuz the italian rig was flopped in the center line. we got hung up on a rock and had to have a competitor tug us back off it. No wonder some guys got a 1 hour lead on the competition. Getting to outer limits in the first 10 rigs very well won the race for those guys.

[sarge]

Seems to be a flaw in the race ! If you get your name drawn in the front you have a huge advantage . Wait till guys start teaming up and having a team mate hold the rest of the pack up at a bottle neck ...... almost seems that you should have your time stop while sitting still in traffic..... a nightmare to keep track of ??????

[RuffedUpXJ]

Are the spots drawn?

Also i don't understand how the LCQ guys get to go before the guys who qualified long ago or last year's Top 20.

[Drivermod]

Seems to be a flaw in the race ! If you get your name drawn in the front you have a huge advantage . Wait till guys start teaming up and having a team mate hold the rest of the pack up at a bottle neck ...... almost seems that you should have your time stop while sitting still in traffic..... a nightmare to keep track of ??????

Just part of it. Yeah very frustrating but thems the breaks. I cannot imagin how they could keep track if they stopped the clock every time a competitor was held up. Too much of a judgement call. FYI the winner, Shannon Cambell, started 66th. He was just so frickin fast he didn't have to deal with much traffic at Outer Limits.

[Drivermod]

Are the spots drawn?

Also i don't understand how the LCQ guys get to go before the guys who qualified long ago or last year's Top 20.

Starting positions are drawn. They throw the LCQ spots in with the drawing as place holders until those spots are decided. Waiting to qualify in the LCQ could be a great move strategically but it doesn't leave you any options if you make a mistake. I'd rather know on the ride out that I was already in the big race.

[carwash]

Cambell started 61st I believe. We were 66th. He was only 2 rows in front of us. Passed almost 50 cars on his way to outer limits. His starting position seemed to be no problem for him. If it werent for the turtled italian rig in outer limits, the outcome of the race may have been very different.

Waiting for the LCQ to qualify gains you nothing strategically. You have as good a shot of drawing a lower number to start in either position. Trust me, if yer gonna do it, prequalify if you can. The LCQ is a big gamble, just watch the videos of the back door coverage.

[yellowjacket]

Back door videos...? No thanx.

Just kiddin mike. Im actally impressed that you actually thought to bring a spare detroit for a 14 bolt and a extra psc pump... Who woulda thought!

[carwash]

Well, the pump is a stock gm pump, and it was actually bolted onto the motor already. It used to run the two pumps inline, but psc told us to delete the one or we would cavitate to the point of failure. We also had a third one in the truck.... we were set with steering.

[carwash]

One of my fav's so far...

http://www.red9fab.com/ImageFolio4_files/gallery/Trips_and_Events/2011_Events/King_of_the_Hammers_2011/P1100405.jpg

[93 Krawler]

That would make a good poster for the shop. Do you get a copy of the onboard video? I bet it's killer. :thumbup:

[KillerKoatings]

Hey Mike good news, my brother got a 6' length of stainless tubing dropped to his house today to start the R/C build. He would like to get some measurements of some of the main bars as well as overall length so he can start bending it up into #999. Not a huge rush but if you are like me I can't wait to see what he comes up with, I think it is going to be pretty badass!!

[tjjeepjeep]

One of my fav's so far...

http://www.red9fab.com/ImageFolio4_files/gallery/Trips_and_Events/2011_Events/King_of_the_Hammers_2011/P1100405.jpg

I agree...

[blazerbrad]

Of all the potential failure points, the Detroit in the 14FF would have been very low on my list.

[carwash]

i hate detroits....

[kirbyiv]

One of my fav's so far...

http://www.red9fab.com/ImageFolio4_files/gallery/Trips_and_Events/2011_Events/King_of_the_Hammers_2011/P1100405.jpg

that is awesome. Apparently I did have that look on my face the entire time

http://chadjockphotography.smugmug.com/2011KingoftheHammers/In-Your-Face/DSC5704/1188555668_oXGz6-O.jpg

I'm going to run a grizzly locker in the rear, they are serious beef compared to a detroit and are even warrantied if a broken shaft kills it. I would spool it but I love the cutting brake.

[T-bird]

Did Carwash bend that grab bar down before you got your shocks tuned?

[kirbyiv]

Did Carwash bend that grab bar down before you got your shocks tuned?

haha. the shocks were actually decent for being out of the box. Once tuned though, it was night and day difference.

Here it the rear axle carnage. Those are 300M double spline shafts and fractures in the detroit drive gear

http://pirate4x4.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=578382&stc=1&d=1298078740

http://pirate4x4.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=578384&stc=1&d=1298078740

[kentuckytwostep]

I'll say it again, great job out there. Bad ass car and would love to see it in person. When's the next race?

[carwash]

Thanks! Rausch Creek Qualifier

[blazerbrad]

haha. the shocks were actually decent for being out of the box. Once tuned though, it was night and day difference.

Here it the rear axle carnage. Those are 300M double spline shafts and fractures in the detroit drive gear

http://pirate4x4.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=578382&stc=1&d=1298078740

http://pirate4x4.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=578384&stc=1&d=1298078740

I know you originally said the Detroit failed, but based on the pictures I'm guessing the shaft broke first which then took out the Detroit (fairly common). What are your thoughts?

[carwash]

Axle mfr is saying that it was most probably a bad batch of axles. He's only had one other ever fail and it was from the same batch. These shafts go behind 1300hp pulling trucks without issue, so I'd say we had some bad shafts. Kirby can expand further if he wants...

[tjjeepjeep]

bad shafts

My troubles usually start there too ... :whistle: