Winter 4x4 Jambo

Like always, I had a fun time at this event.

I ran Thurs and Friday and it rained the whole time. I have been to Sand Hollow about a dozen times, but never during a period of heavy rain. Obstacles that we normally walk up easily were very difficult during this event - even stickies didn't help much. All the rigs had to use lots of throttle and burn some tread off their tires to get up the bigger obstacles. Even though tires do not grip the wet sandstone well, that stuff still sands your tires down when you spin on it!

The extra throttle required to get up obstacles caused a lot of breakage. Just on Thursday's "easy run" up Chain Reaction, we had a broken pinion yoke, a blown engine, a busted axle/hub, and a slew of minor issues. Only 2 buggies out of 7 finished the trail (I ducked out to tow my buddies buggy back to his trailer).

Even though it was wet, a least there was no mud (just wet sand).

But the bad traction did make for a great deal of entertainment. Check out this short video I made:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KtlHP-Xgxg


enjoy!

Nice video!

Looked very wet from all the pics and video I've seen. Still looks like it was a blast.

Awesome video. Thanks for sharing.

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Went down with Pkrfctr and Brian, we did the trail crew thing on Thurs and Sat. Played recovery crew on Friday.

Thursday was John's Trail and what cool group of people/rigs.

Lots of JKs and Early model broncos. No major carnage (for major carnage refer to last year) a broke front shaft on a beautiful stretched 4 door bronco and some suspension issues with another EMB.

The rain made things pretty interesting, usually it is a aggressive trail (8) but wet it was interesting lots of patience and some winching...

Friday, was the majority of the water. Lots of waterfalls and standing water. We were busy playing recovery because a bunch of trails were called off. So we ended up pre running our Saturday trail, Plan B, which was a mess. We could only get one rig over the gatekeeper so we called it and headed in.

Saturday we ran the Teraflex sponsored Trail on Plan B and we had a ton of cool rigs and drivers.

We made good time on most of the hard stuff since the rain had let up quite a bit, one of the non obstacles became a mess with all the water/mud and we ended up running a winch line to get everyone up. Thanks to Sean from Albuquerque for letting us use his winch.

We had a pretty major break after the trail was done on some optional obstacles, a JK lost a steering knuckle and tie rod. With a couple of calls and a little bit parts running we were able to help him drive out. 3+ hours later, so not bad.

All in all we only had one rig break trail etiquette and drive where he shouldn't have (off trail) to try and get up an obstacle. Needless to say the rest of the trail brought him back in line and no one else tried his line. The guy, who I am not mentioning, should have known better, but I was really pleased with the attitude of everyone else about treading lightly.

Thanks to the Desert Roads and Trails Society for putting on such a great event and letting us help.

Thanks for the trail report Jinx. Educate me on Sand Hollow. I've only been there once for winter jamboree, two years ago. Had a blast and stayed on the trails. That's a huge advantage to going to a new area with an organized group/event.

You say one guy broke trail etiquette, going off. I clearly understand that in Moab but was told that Sand Hollow is open recreation area. Is that not the case? Same Moab type rules apply?

While yes it is an open travel area, senseless driving over vegetation is generally frowned on, especially by the locals.

He wasn't accidentally sliding off the trail or taking a wrong road, he was going out of his way to cut through vegetation because he thought the existing trail was too hard and didn't want to take a strap/winch line. There is a big difference.

We as wheelers will always be judged by the actions of a few so the better stewards we can be the better and as we continue to use responsible behavior especially around organized events the better chance to keep trails open.

Pile of parts we will need to find time to go play in sand hallow. There has been a lot of work done to mark the trails and be responsible land users. I loved seeing everyone going out of there way to pick up trash.

Jinx said:

While yes it is an open travel area, senseless driving over vegetation is generally frowned on, especially by the locals.

He wasn't accidentally sliding off the trail or taking a wrong road, he was going out of his way to cut through vegetation because he thought the existing trail was too hard and didn't want to take a strap/winch line. There is a big difference.

We as wheelers will always be judged by the actions of a few so the better stewards we can be the better and as we continue to use responsible behavior especially around organized events the better chance to keep trails open.

Pile of parts we will need to find time to go play in sand hallow. There has been a lot of work done to mark the trails and be responsible land users. I loved seeing everyone going out of there way to pick up trash.

Click to expand...

I agree 100% Thank you for elaborating on the situation. Back to the thread, let's hear some more reports.