- City
- miami
- State
- ok
My son and I just got back from spending the weekend participating in an event we had marked on our calendar when we heard about it nearly six months ago. Ultimate adventure style event, wheel your vehicle then drive it to the next park. King Of The Off Road. Camp Gruber ORV Park in Braggs Oklahoma, then Twin Mountains in Quinton Oklahoma, and for the last day Cross Bar Ranch in Davis Oklahoma. There were three levels of trails, we did red.
* Green – Stock ride height & A/T tires (Jeep, 4Runner, Forester friendly)
* Yellow – 33–35" tires & small lift recommended; rear locker a plus
* Red (Buckle Up!) – 37"+, long travel, front & rear lockers recommended. Ideal for SxS and built rigs.
Their description was “Three Days. Three Hundred Miles. Three Off-Road Parks.” We added a few more numbered items to our own list. Three fuel pumps. Five O’Reilly’s visits. Five fuel filters and one belt tensioner. Bought the scrambler this spring out of South Dakota. Kept putting off finishing up the details on it until the last minute. I knew I should have shook it down but just didnt work out with weather and free time. It was roughly 100 miles from my house to Gruber so when I pulled in there I had roughly 101 miles on the scrambler, which that extra mile was from driving it in the yard, haha!
Originally planned on trailering to Gruber then having my dad chase us with the trailer in case we had issues, but he had foot surgery the first morning so we decided to drive it to the first spot. (He ended up picking us up with the trailer in Davis considering it was almost a 4 hour drive home. It sure was nice to have cruise control and being able to carry on a conversation!). Lost the tensioner pulley about an hour down the road. At that point we were 20 miles from the closest auto parts store. I actually had a new one that came with the jeep the guy gave me. I saw it in the box and wasn’t sure why it was in there as I had the belt off at one point and checked the pulley, seemed fine. Apparently the seller knew something I didn’t,
. My wife had to get out of bed (we left the house at 5 am to allow more than enough time, or so we thought, to make it to Gruber by 8:30. Was a 2 hour drive. She delivered us the tensioner assembly. Also in that box was a water pump, told her to bring that as well because apparently I missed the mark on the tensioner. Put it back together and limped it to oreillys as it was already surging before we lost the tensioner, I was guessing thermal issues with the pump. Pulled the pre filter, post filter and pump. That oreillys didn’t have the pump but had the filters. The closest pump was 20 miles down the road. Once back together it was running really good. The pre filter was plugged up. The tank that was in it was new but had sat half full for several years. I had siphoned all the rancid fuel out and refilled with fresh fuel and a can of seafoam. Guessing the roll half of the tank was crusty and being full all that started breaking loose.
Made it to the next oreillys to get the pump and one more filter, jeep was running great…..at that point didn’t think I needed the pump. Went on to Gruber and started running the trails. Started surging again. When pulling the pump the fuel from the filter looked like chocolate milk. Cleaned the filter and fresh pump was back in business for 5 minutes. Then back under the jeep to pull filter and clean. Had to do that almost every five minutes of run time. Had the idea to go get a quick connect filter and run it to the fenderwell so I didn’t have to climb under the jeep and undo hose clamps as often. Setup that bandaid and headed towards the second park. Had to stop every so often to clean the filter and let the pump cool off. All the debris in the filter was starving the pump for fuel. Made it to the next park after stopping half a dozen times. Let it cool off and setup camp. A few guys I knew swung by and said they were going to find a swimming hole. We followed. Issues were even worse on the trail without the air flow from road speeds it was only wanting to run for a minute or two. Finally made it back to camp. Found that 20 miles down the road they had a pump in stock. Woke up the next morning and crossed our fingers it would make it. Drove straight there without incident, cooling off overnight helped it out. Was able to warranty the pump and added another fresh filter. At this point the filter fuel was looking a lot better. From here on the jeep pretty well worked flawlessly outside of blowing one transmission cooler line off the second day at twin mountains. Tightened it back up and topped off with fluid. Didn’t have to work on the jeep at all of the last day.
It rained everyday, about the time we would dry out it would rain again. To quote Forest Gump on that subject “We been through every kind of rain there is. Little bitty stingin' rain... and big ol' fat rain. Rain that flew in sideways. And sometimes rain even seemed to come straight up from underneath.”
Even with all the issues we had it was an absolute blast. I think if it had been easy, finishing wouldn’t have been nearly as sweet. I told my wife the first night I felt like the smart thing to do would be head home versus continuing to beat my head against the wall with the same end result. Fortunately I’m too dumb to quit so the next oreillys trip for the third fuel pump was a “third times a charm” type of deal. From that point on things started looking up and made all the trouble worth it.
The icing on the cake was the grand prize they raffled off my son was holding the ticket as they called the number, I wish I had been filming because the look on his face was absolutely priceless. Something I’ll cherish from now on. Truly made memories this weekend that will last a lifetime. Along with making a few new friends!
That being said I plan on taking the goat built chassis on this adventure next year. This trip was the motovation I needed to finish up that project. But I think I’ll wait till the day before to finish it. The uncertainly of every mile made this trip that much more exciting!!!
* Green – Stock ride height & A/T tires (Jeep, 4Runner, Forester friendly)
* Yellow – 33–35" tires & small lift recommended; rear locker a plus
* Red (Buckle Up!) – 37"+, long travel, front & rear lockers recommended. Ideal for SxS and built rigs.
Their description was “Three Days. Three Hundred Miles. Three Off-Road Parks.” We added a few more numbered items to our own list. Three fuel pumps. Five O’Reilly’s visits. Five fuel filters and one belt tensioner. Bought the scrambler this spring out of South Dakota. Kept putting off finishing up the details on it until the last minute. I knew I should have shook it down but just didnt work out with weather and free time. It was roughly 100 miles from my house to Gruber so when I pulled in there I had roughly 101 miles on the scrambler, which that extra mile was from driving it in the yard, haha!
Originally planned on trailering to Gruber then having my dad chase us with the trailer in case we had issues, but he had foot surgery the first morning so we decided to drive it to the first spot. (He ended up picking us up with the trailer in Davis considering it was almost a 4 hour drive home. It sure was nice to have cruise control and being able to carry on a conversation!). Lost the tensioner pulley about an hour down the road. At that point we were 20 miles from the closest auto parts store. I actually had a new one that came with the jeep the guy gave me. I saw it in the box and wasn’t sure why it was in there as I had the belt off at one point and checked the pulley, seemed fine. Apparently the seller knew something I didn’t,
. My wife had to get out of bed (we left the house at 5 am to allow more than enough time, or so we thought, to make it to Gruber by 8:30. Was a 2 hour drive. She delivered us the tensioner assembly. Also in that box was a water pump, told her to bring that as well because apparently I missed the mark on the tensioner. Put it back together and limped it to oreillys as it was already surging before we lost the tensioner, I was guessing thermal issues with the pump. Pulled the pre filter, post filter and pump. That oreillys didn’t have the pump but had the filters. The closest pump was 20 miles down the road. Once back together it was running really good. The pre filter was plugged up. The tank that was in it was new but had sat half full for several years. I had siphoned all the rancid fuel out and refilled with fresh fuel and a can of seafoam. Guessing the roll half of the tank was crusty and being full all that started breaking loose.Made it to the next oreillys to get the pump and one more filter, jeep was running great…..at that point didn’t think I needed the pump. Went on to Gruber and started running the trails. Started surging again. When pulling the pump the fuel from the filter looked like chocolate milk. Cleaned the filter and fresh pump was back in business for 5 minutes. Then back under the jeep to pull filter and clean. Had to do that almost every five minutes of run time. Had the idea to go get a quick connect filter and run it to the fenderwell so I didn’t have to climb under the jeep and undo hose clamps as often. Setup that bandaid and headed towards the second park. Had to stop every so often to clean the filter and let the pump cool off. All the debris in the filter was starving the pump for fuel. Made it to the next park after stopping half a dozen times. Let it cool off and setup camp. A few guys I knew swung by and said they were going to find a swimming hole. We followed. Issues were even worse on the trail without the air flow from road speeds it was only wanting to run for a minute or two. Finally made it back to camp. Found that 20 miles down the road they had a pump in stock. Woke up the next morning and crossed our fingers it would make it. Drove straight there without incident, cooling off overnight helped it out. Was able to warranty the pump and added another fresh filter. At this point the filter fuel was looking a lot better. From here on the jeep pretty well worked flawlessly outside of blowing one transmission cooler line off the second day at twin mountains. Tightened it back up and topped off with fluid. Didn’t have to work on the jeep at all of the last day.
It rained everyday, about the time we would dry out it would rain again. To quote Forest Gump on that subject “We been through every kind of rain there is. Little bitty stingin' rain... and big ol' fat rain. Rain that flew in sideways. And sometimes rain even seemed to come straight up from underneath.”
Even with all the issues we had it was an absolute blast. I think if it had been easy, finishing wouldn’t have been nearly as sweet. I told my wife the first night I felt like the smart thing to do would be head home versus continuing to beat my head against the wall with the same end result. Fortunately I’m too dumb to quit so the next oreillys trip for the third fuel pump was a “third times a charm” type of deal. From that point on things started looking up and made all the trouble worth it.
The icing on the cake was the grand prize they raffled off my son was holding the ticket as they called the number, I wish I had been filming because the look on his face was absolutely priceless. Something I’ll cherish from now on. Truly made memories this weekend that will last a lifetime. Along with making a few new friends!
That being said I plan on taking the goat built chassis on this adventure next year. This trip was the motovation I needed to finish up that project. But I think I’ll wait till the day before to finish it. The uncertainly of every mile made this trip that much more exciting!!!
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