Gotta big run coming up and im now wheeling a jeep commando instead of my m38. my trailering needs have changed and dont want to spend a fortune before this run. Its a 7 hour drive to go there and wheel it and make it back home. The run will be in windrock and i have built my truck pretty solid. Question is would you drive your junk to Windrock from here and wheel it? OR have you?
I would, *IF* I had a few extra days to make it relaxing. Driving experience, well, can't be worse than driving my deuce 4 hours on the highway @ 5th gear redline...
yep i have the whole week off and the only thing i would have to worry about is that i dont have cromoly rear axles but being its a scout axle i could carry one spare for either side. everything else is new, everything.
went there 2 yrs ago with a built cj, 3/4 ton axles, (44 front) some kinda fancy high dollar axle u-joints (wanna say OX, but not sure). he spent the entire 2nd day replacing front right axle shafts, and ball joints. he was running 38's i believe. that being said, i had a yj with 44 rear, and 30 ft, on 33's and had no troubles, but, i didnt try the trail he exploded on. depends on how many tools you are bringing, and how good you are at gauging your trails.... they got mild to retarded..
Personally no way in hell id go farther than 1 hr without a trailer. even if you dont break on the trail, you have to make it home after a lot of abuse and possibly unseen damage.
Go have fun don't worry about the little things. With that said make plan for the "what if". A buddy with a trailer that will come get you or a ride home and get her later. Towing insurance?
im thinking about just going for it, the money id save in fuel and having to buy new trailer tires covers the chromoly axle shafts and then some. Just found a set brand new delivered to the house for 200:rock::rock:
Nope, not me. I trailer in comfort, wheel without worrying about if I break, and trailer home in comfort. Having major carnage hundreds of miles from home sucks. I've had stupid unexpected stuff break, like losing the planetaries in my transmission while idling down a trail.
Windrock has some nasty trails and is capable of breaking any rig, regardless of how well built.
will you be in decent comfort driving the rig there and back compared to towing it?
will the added expense of towing hurt you that much?
will you be able to have the mind set while wheeling that you have to drive it home, some people can't and end up breaking big stuff regardless of the need to drive it home, and then sometime shit happens even when you are taking it easy...
I prefer to trailer for most any trip, but then my rig doesn't get that much different fuel economy over the tow rig. Knowing I'll get home broke or not is worth the extra expense to me, but as a few have said, it is definitely doable.
I have driven my rigs all over the eastern us (hot springs, tellico, rausch creek 2x, wellsville, tracy city tn and some others)), wheeled for several days and driven home....never a issue.
That being said I now have a trailer and would not go back to driving.
I never enjoyed wheeling as much as I did when I trailered my rig places. As oldrhino mentioned, trailer there in comfort, ride have fun, trailer home in comfort.
I drove my Jeep 6 hours to wheel ( when it was on 35s ) And wheeling you have to be very cautious not to explode anything.. And the drive home sucked...
I wheel without a trailer...and it was not nearly as exhilarating when I knew that I had a plan B(trailer). Working without a net has added a lot of pucker factor to my wheeling.
But it does blow when you have major problems 100's of miles from home.
I watched a friend trailer his rig to tellico, wheel 3 days, then blow the trans on his towrig 3 miles into the trip home leaving him stranded...his trailrig was fully operational and would have driven home.
:sonicjay: Bummer that shit happens. But, do the math. I'm sure you will find that the likelihood of a trail rig seeing carnage is far higher than a tow rig. That climb in and out of Crawford's Camp was a killer. My motorhome puked a bunch of trans fluid towing my 24' enclosed up that winding hill.
One of the bigger differences is the type of wheeling a person does. A simple trail riding vacation is far different than wheeling some of the hardest trails in the country. The other is the type of vehicle you have. My jeep is fun to drive up to Dairy Queen or drive 20 miles to a trail head. But driving hundreds, if not thousands of miles in a rig that is noisy, drafty and bouncy revving along at a high rpm because of low gears is not my cup of tea. Not to mention that it quickly wears out very expensive tires. Then add in the difficulty of packing luggage and spare parts is a PITA.
I have driven my 73 Bronco to the Badlands and back and just retruned from a 2600 mile trip in a 97 4Runner which included some wheeling. At one time I had an F250 and trailer but have since decided that it wasn't worth the agravation of keeping them around for the few times they were used. I also figure that it would be easier to get one rig home with a U-Haul than a tow rig, trailer & trail rig.
True. The stupid part of that deal was his truck could have easily been patched together enough to drive home with little effort and no risk of further damaging it but he was pissed about it breaking he just flipped out and stoped listening to any and logic.
I have driven to the Badlands numerous times, wheeled the shit out it..drove it home...I also was lucky.. Attica is a flat easy ride that last a few hours (for me anyway) so loading up rig with tools , spare parts, camping gear blah blah..that is by the far the longest I would drive. My last trip there the weekend was so intense in places that I had 10 foot tunnel vision for most of my drive home.:sonicjay:
Tow it, load it on a truck whatever you can afford. It makes the cost easily worth it. The drive home is waay more comforting knowing that you played hard and can just unpack. You can fix, unfix, inspect and clean rig as time allows. :thumb:
It all comes down to your driving style and attitude. Can you say no to a trail you might break on?
I have trailered my junk as well as drove to my destinations and I can honestly say I broke a lot less when i didn't trailer it, but i have a lot more fun now that i dont have to worry about it coming home in one piece.
also dont have to worry about airing up or down. unpacking gear ect.
Trailering is a luxury, and a pain in the arse alike. I've done both.... trailered and drove. Even trove a 4"yj to colorado and wheeled some smaller stuff, great time no real troubles. Also trailered to attica, in which my buddies buddy blew up the diff in his tj and he drove mine home while i trailered his. I guess a safety net for one guy is all it takes to wheel stupid. I say roll the dice if it's in the state... out of state trailer it!!
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