2012 JKU Rubicon Build/Adventure Thread

[Septu]

A couple shots taken at sunset in Anchorage AK lastnight. Sunset being 11pm local time. Which is impressive since it's late July. Took a ton of photo's... but I'll limit you to these. Being alone, had to stack a couple rocks to see how far backwards I could back up before getting into major trouble. Photo's taken over Potter's Marsh, on the highway to Seward, just outside of Anchorage.

 

[Dan Grec]

Very, very nice

Have an awesome trip!

-Dan

 

[heehawhardy]

that is some gorgeous views septu...WOW!

 

[Septu]

Little guy is all hooked up!

Kitchen:

Slept in it for 2 nights now. PO put a 2" memory foam in there over top of the stock mattress. Found that wasn't enough for me the first night. Not bad, but still lacking. So I put my 4" thermarest under that... holly hell it's comfy now. When they put on the new axle, they put it to it's highest setting (maybe 1-2 inches higher). However now without the handy folding stool that the PO left, I can't easily get into the trailer. Oh... and while packing up camp this morning in the rain (basically taking things out of the kitchen and putting them in the jeep, and getting my book/laptop out of the trailer) I ran over the stool this morning in my haste. Maybe I can find another one when I go back to Anchorage? Plan was to go to MaCarthy today and stick around... but if it's raining there like it is here, I don't see me staying.

With the hitch setup they have (just the metal work) it hits my spare tire, so I can't open the tailgate more than a foot or so. Using the spare tire re-locator bracket I have (pushes the tire out and up) might just be enough to get over that. However with the battery right on the tongue, I'm not sure it'll matter. But I have it (at home) so will use it. Trailer with the off road hitch and everything in position to get the tongue as high as possible rides fairly level. However it still feels like it's nose down when sleeping (even before adding the thermarest). I had to drive the jeep up onto some small rocks to give the nose that extra few inches.

With the rain lastnight, lots of condensation on the metal frame of the door. Not sure how I'll deal with that going forward (but writing this, just remembered I need to close the vent). One thing thats going to take me some time getting used to, is the lack of noise from this hitch vs the pintal on the m101. This trailer also seems easier to backup. Not sure if that's the trailer... or me just getting more used to backing up a small trailer. Weight... PO said ~1600lbs. But it sure feels heavy on the massive hills. I have to go up Thompson Pass this morning (2700 feet?) from sea level. Will see how it does... but am not holding my breath lol.

Overall am happy with it... but I don't see myself falling in love with it. No real kitchen (although that can be modified to an extent), no real electrical system (lights/fan/12v outlets - but nothing more, again can be modified), and the weight! I do think I'll put a for sale sign on it when I get home (for something close to twice what I paid) and see if I get any bites. If so... then I could order one of Wavebreakers teardrops. If I don't... then I'll hang onto it for a while longer while making minor and cheap alterations to make it more suited to what I'm looking for.

 

[Septu]

Seeing as my camera battery died, and I seemed to have misplaced the charger... this is all you get for now. The rest will either be when the new charger arrives, or I find the old one.

On a side note, even with my frequent trips out to Gridwood (100km) and what I used around Anchorage, I'm surprised my KM total and Googles varies as much as it does. 5600 vs 4785 km. Oh well.

Tried to keep track of my spending. Broke it down into a few categories - Food, entertainment, gas, showers/laundry and shopping (which basically means anything I bought to take back). As I wasn't camping nearly as much as I'd hoped, my food cost was a lot higher than I had planned for. The flip side being that my accommodation costs were next to nothing. In fact I only "camped" for 3 nights. 7 nights was spent in the jeep (thank God for my cheapie bug screens) and the other 7 in the trailer. Every night in the jeep was either spent in a rest area, Walmart or Freddy Meyers. I spent 3 nights camping in the trailer, with the rest in Walmart or a rest area. At first without the trailer it was such a pain in the *** to get out the camp stove and other cooking stuff (from how I had it all wedged in the jeep, so that I could sleep) that I didn't bother. Once I had the trailer, it was easier... but I still rarely cooked for myself. In fact I only cooked 5 meals the entire time. Which was kind of pathetic, however it's just the way it panned out.


Days: 15
Mileage: 5600 km
Food - ~550
Entertainment - ~400
Gas - ~750
Accommodations - 79
Showers/Laundry - 86
Shopping (clothes/booze/other) - ~500

 

[Septu]

Oh and Whittier. You have to drive through an active train tunnel that's 4km long.

 

[Comanche Scott]

Oh and Whittier. You have to drive through an active train tunnel that's 4km long.

That gives a "literal" meaning to "the light at the end of the tunnel"... :beer:

 

[GetOutThere]

Oh and Whittier. You have to drive through an active train tunnel that's 4km long.

Wait... what?

That's different.

 

[Septu]

Wait... what?

That's different.

It was different. The only road into Whittier AK is through an active train tunnel. Cost me $12 to drive through (vehicles with a trailer cost $20, motorhomes and transports cost more). They have it on timers/schedules to avoid the trains. I lucked out on both trips that I didn't have to wait, and had no one in front of me. I didn't like the town enough to do it again (unless with other people), but it was close to Anchorage, and different.

 

[Septu]

Well finished the Telkwa Pass. Pulled the trailer through... and other than disconnecting in one spot (that I probably could have done with it hooked up) it did amazing. A couple wild off camber situations where it's going over the rocks... and in the technical stuff, many very tight tight corners with lots of rocks... but with only some mild pin striping on the tent, the trailer did great!! Now I just need to repaint my rock guards on the jeep!

A couple pictures... we figured there were over 700 taken between all the camera's... and I haven't even looked at mine yet... so these will have to do till I get a chance to have a look at them. But I'm so glad I did the trip. The trail might not quite have been worth it (when you consider I had a 2500km drive to/from the trail) - it was good/fun... but the company was more than worth the trip. There's another trip in Sept that I'm hoping that funds/time/work allows that I can at least consider coming down for that one as well.

A couple pictures till I get a chance to look at more (and pilfer the ones others took).

 

[Septu]

Some pictures from the last week. Did 2 separate trips. One was to explore a trail that a friend took (he couldn't make the trip) and the other was to get up to the top of a mountain before it snowed, which would mean having to wait till late next summer to try again.

Sundays trip:

Didn't get high at all... and were almost entirely in the valley.


Lovely colors

Where we turned around. Narrow and sketch... but passable... just decided that with the low clouds, and my buddies time crunch, that this was a good place as any to turn back.

Lastnight's trip:

Creek crossing. I was pretty nervous about this. Waded out in my boxers and flip flops to check the depth... roughly half way across it was still only mid thigh... so I went for it.

Success!

Sun is starting to set... but still have time to explore!

Snow anyone? This is at 4500 feet. Snow is likely snow from last winter.

This is where I turned around... Was about 8:15pm PST

The trail continues! This was only the 2nd time I made it up to this part of the mountain... the previous times I'd been up there, this trail was covered in snow and wasn't passable, and the other time we started to attempt it, had issues due to the rain and how steep and loose the rock was (and never made it this far). I'd like to spend a full day or so up here exploring where these roads go... Might have to and set up a basecamp in the valley below and spend a weekend checking things out. Now to convince my buddies!

Alligator Lake. We normally take a mud/water filled trail in from the other side. I wonder if the trails down the mountain towards it connect to it?

To the right goes back down the mountain. To the left, it looks like it goes down the mountain... but have never gone down it... again... need time and multiple rigs... The plateau at the 1 oclock position to some extent is reachable by following the trail we took on Sunday. Thank goodness for my Back Country Maps app on my Nexus... never would have realized that we were on the same hill. I wonder if these trails connect?

A little bit of movement when I took this picture... but unlike most blurred pictures... I actually dig it.

The descent is kinda narrow... the tracks you see are quad tracks...

And another narrow spot...

A long way down...

 

[Septu]

It was a nice day today... decided to check out a trail near my place. Kinda wish I'd turned back way before I did. I mostly kept going because I didn't want to have to go back through the crap I came through on the way in... It was mostly a quad trail... so lots of tight tree's....

Just the way the tree's were, I made it through just fine on the way in. Tight, but not a big deal... unfortunately the tree's on the way out were just in the wrong spots for me to get the right line... Almost tore off my door handle, bent in my rocker panel, bent my stock rock guard down, and bent my fender in. Whops. The sad thing is I have rocker panel guards that I bought last summer that I haven't installed yet. Not sure it would have prevented this, as I think it bent due to how the stock rock guards mount. But now when I do install it... it'll at least hide this. I'll be getting my buddy to make some brackets and will weld the rock guards to the frame sometime this winter now.

This is actually my first real trail damage to my JK (at least this one).

 

[Comanche Scott]

Just catching back up with your travels. Beautiful rugged country. Great pictures! :beer:
Sorry to see the body damage. That was one tight trail. Sounds like you've already got plans for body armor, and that's a good thing.

 

[Septu]

Went a little crazy lately. Initially it started off with some 90w (9x10w) LED lights for the pillar. However my existing A Pillar guards were the first version and the mounts for them were a little small, and I would have had to modify them to mount the light with my AEV snorkel. So decided that since I could sell those, and get a pretty fair price on a new pair, decided to order some new pillarguards that had the mount for a 50". Then decided that what the heck... and ordered a 50". It has 24x10w LEDs. Both the light bar and the pillar lights are spots.

Pillar lights & mounts came from Pat Harrison at Trailskinz. Light bar came from Sidetracked Offroad. They have free shipping (only to US) but gave me a discount on my shipping. Their light bar was actually pretty cheap. No it's not a Rigid/VisionX/etc... but for 500 shipped... I'm really not complaining... especially after seeing it.

Well tonight I got to mount them up. Spent a ton of time trying to hide the wiring... and unfortunately I'll have to re-do it for the light bar. Light bar has 12g wire - which is what the wire is coming out of the light, however I don't think that is big enough as it's getting very hot very quick when I touched the wires to the +/- on the spod. But decided I was good to do a quick test run (I mean I just had to try it out on the highway). Now I have TL LED headlights - that I really really like. The TLs are not perfect, and I've been considering the new JW Speakers, or some of the other ones that should be better... You know... just looking for that little extra bit of distance out of them. Well not any more. I've now decided that the TLs will be "good enough" around town and on the highway. And when I need that extra little bit? 2 buttons and problem solved.

Tonight I hit the highway and turned on the bar and pillar lights. All I can say is holly ****! :Wow1: The light bar with the pillar lights are not even perfectly aimed yet - just quickly aimed them in the parking lot - and haven't made any adjustments to the light bar since I mounted it and guessed at the aiming... but all I can say is holly ****. My high beams of the TL headlights are useless. Both in distance and in width. You just can't tell that they're on other than the blue light on the dash. There's that much light going down the highway. That's never been the case with any of the many lights I've tested before. Needless to say am very happy with this. Just sucks that I'll have to re-wire the lightbar (figure 10g should be good)... but better safe than sorry.

I also have some new JW speaker fog lights... however looking at them, I'm not sure I'll be able to mount them into my LOD midwidth bumper. But with access to a large heated shop at work... I'll play around with those after I re-wire the lightbar sometime in the coming weeks.

Will post a couple pictures tomorrow.

Oh and the really nice thing about LEDs, is no warm up time... when those jack asses don't turn off their highbeams (after being flashed twice with my highs)... less than 1 second with the light bar (a really quick on/off)... and they go off pretty damn quick.

 

[Septu]