Welllllll.....

Gotta say that first and foremost, we had a great time. Carnage was
minimal, I suppose, but I wasn't real happy with what did break. Started
off on the way up. Apparently, my vacuum advance diaphragm has been bad,
but because most of my driving has been relatively flat, it wasn't
noticeable. Well, on the way up the hills, we discovered how bad it was.
Of course, this was at 9 PM, so no part's stores open. Did a lot of
Highway 50 at <40MPH (dropping all the way down to 20 in spots). Got up
to Ice House resort late (11PM) but we made it.

Thursday morning, open the door, and there stands Morgan and Chris,
obviously beat from the last minute preparations. We chatted, looked
over mods, and got ready for the run. Breakfast was good, biscuits,
gravy, eggs, bacon and sausage. Not bad at all.

The group was probably the largest of the run. 34 rigs! A lot of wagons,
and a lot of newbies. Excellent trail committee. Jim Adams (Gunner) was
our Trail boss, with James Henry, Bob Brown, and Dave Brown assisting.
It took a little bit to get going (someone failed to sign in and sign
their waiver), but once we hit the trail, all was well. For a little
while, at least.

We worked our way through the trail, with a few folks having problems
following lines. It can't be emphasized enough, stay close, and watch
the guy in front of you. And watch the guy behind. Once people get
separated, the guy behind, suddenly has to play leader. This is not a
good thing. We also saw what a wonderful product the Holley Pro-jection
is. 2 different rigs had similar problems with it stalling out at the
most inopportune time (i.e., while pivoting on a rock).

My first "incident" occurred while trying to warn the guy in front of me
that he was spewing gas all over the trail. We came to a pause, I throw
on the emergency brake to hop out, but forgot to take the SM420 out of
first. Fortunately, I only broke the e-brake cable, and didn't snap the
bolts out of the case. I also trashed my carb linkage in the process
(P.O.S. plastic heim jointed linkage, installed by the P.O.). Managed to
get pulled to the side, and let the group go by. A little bailing wire,
and a bungee to hold the cable out of the way, and we were on our way.
This, of course, dropped us from #5 in line, down to about #25.

A little while later, Trail Boss broke his front end. I believe it was
his steering arm, but when they tore into it, they found that the
knuckle bearing was bad as well. This spelled the end for our Trail
Boss, as the only arm that they could find was for the wrong side, which
meant that they couldn't mount the caliper, so they nursed it back to
Loon Lake.

The next spot on the trail for a little carnage was Little Sluice. I
attempted to traverse it, until being reminded by Bob Brown that it
might be better to get into camp, considering the current condition.
During our trek around the bypass, we passed Jimmy Miller, and Andy
Plaine. They noticed that my front wheels weren't driving at all. Sure
enough, drive shaft turned, but no wheels turned. It was 2 wheel drive
for me the rest of the way to Buck Island lake, fortunately, it was
mostly down hill.

We pulled in next to James Henry, set up camp, rested, ate, and then
attacked the front end. Jacked it up, put it on Jack Stands (glad I
brought those) and discovered that the right front was bad. Disassemble
revealed that the course splined Birfield broke at the spline, which,
all things considered, is not a bad place to brake. Of course, everyone
in our group had Fine Splined Birfields. James had a fine splined hub,
so we attempted to install a fine splined Birfield. Guess what? It
doesn't work :(  Seems that the axle wouldn't fit through the spindle.

We were going to attempt to change spindles (Bob had a spare), when we
walked past Jimmy Miller, and mentioned the predicament. Turns out that
Andy's kid had THREE course splined Birfields. Yee ha. Made the
appropriate payment, and installed it.

I can't say enough good things about James. He guided me step by step
through the removal/installation process. Bob was a great help as well.
The showed us (did I mention that there were 10 people watching Birfield
Repair 101?) how to separate the inner axle from the Birfield (one Jack
stand, slide the axle down, give it a quick "slam" and the inner falls
right out. Beautiful. Anyway, James continued with the instruction, ever
so patiently, and Bob had the "Special Tool" for the nut. Couldn't have
done it without them.

Friday was, for the most part, uneventful, carnage wise. Ran the rest of
the way in, had a few "seat grippers" coming down Big Sluice, but made
it through OK. Oh, did I mention I still had the hard top on? I think I
was the ONLY hard top 40 in attendance. Got a little tippy in spots, and
I can see why they are removed for this run.

A thing of beauty was Jim Brantley's SO 60. Such a nice job, and great
articulation. Jim guided it with perfection, and amazed all who saw him
drop down off the big rock in Big sluice. His wife wasn't quite as
comfortable, but hey, that's one big rig :)

The Springs were great, got to see a lot of great cruisers. Dinner was
nice, but almost missed it taking a nap. The Ribs and Chicken, were well
done, for such a large group. I'm amazed by what they manage to get in
and out of the Springs.

The raffle --- Ahh the raffle. We were sitting with the PMC crowd,
enjoying the raffle, pondering when we would get a chance to win. Jaime
Taylor was the first PMC'er to win, after we sent Tony Twiddy's daughter
up to draw a ticket for us. As we continued to see the prizes go by,
they announced the next prize as a Power Tank. I told my neighbor that I
could REALLY use that, and guess what? Winner! I was stoked. Just a few
prizes later, they announced the next prize as a $350 gift certificate
to Aqualu. These are the Crazy Canadians, and their well built, HUGE
FJ-45's. I had been reading their catalog, dreaming of their half doors.
So, guess what? I know, you're way ahead of me. Yep, won that one as
well. Couldn't believe my good fortune. But it wasn't over, as the
raffle wound down to 2 prizes left, I was drawn for the BTB 4" lift kit
and correction kit. Missed out on the Ramsey winch, but sheesh, how
greedy can a guy be? However, since I already have 4" of lift, I'm going
to either try to sell the kit, or hope that Brian will let me downgrade
to disk brakes, or some other item. Anybody out there looking to install
a 4" lift? I can make you a heck of a deal ;~)

Sunday morning we decided to take our time getting up, and have a decent
breakfast. pulled out of camp at 8:42, and into line at the base of
Cadillac hill at 9 AM. there were a few failures ahead of us, heard
someone lost an air line for their front locker. Once we got going, ran
into a few stalls, had one guy with minimal lift get stuck on a rock,
and the lost a bead. Helped them change it out, and then continued up.
We reached the top of the hill at 11:30.

All things considered, I'm VERY happy I got to make my first of
manyRubithon's. Next year, we'll pack lighter, and the Hard top will be
gone. Hopefully, we'll have disks all the way around, and who knows what
other mods.
--
Ross Woody Vallejo, Ca
TLCA #7704 -- 72 FJ40 -- Rubicon tested.