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

[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! 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]

Originally Posted by 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 ??????

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]

Originally Posted by 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.

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...

[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.

[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]

Originally Posted by carwash

One of my fav's so far...

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]

Originally Posted by carwash

One of my fav's so far...

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



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]

Originally Posted by T-bird

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

[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]

Originally Posted by kirbyiv

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

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]

Originally Posted by carwash

bad shafts

My troubles usually start there too ...