I had all kinds of posts in mind, but I'm draggin', so here's this video:
Trying to keep all WHEELS on the ground at the Historic RUBICON Trail -- Part 1
Fab Rats
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I have been abandoned. Daughter has moved to days shifts after working nights for 2 or 3 years. Same sort of erratic schedule though, 3 days on, 2 days off, 3 days on, 6 days off maybe? 12 hour days. So Osmany has adopted the same schedule. Wife is off to whoop it up with her girlfriends and I have the house to myself, except for Gus (the cat), and he can pretty much keep himself amused. By sleeping, the lying dog. (Look at him lying there like a dog. Sleeping.)
I got a supply of Coors in the fridge, I merged the engineer's PDF with the extract from the kitchen designer's plans and sent them to Mr. Wood at the Portland Building Department, which was my chore for the week. Aside from getting my second shot of Pfizer and being miserable for 3 days.
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Where was I going with this? Ah! The video! I might be a redneck. I really enjoyed this video, long as it is (30 odd minutes). I figure that these guys, running their own businesses, need to be grossing between $300 and $500K a year. They also need a lot of energy and it's apparent that they have it. I suspect that the big difference between them and me is that I never learned, of liked, to deal with people. Is that innate or because of my experience with people? Great, another question that has no answer. Not good for someone who thinks of thoughts as data.
Back to the video. Sorry, I keep getting distracted. Around about the 17 minute mark, Paul drags the rear differential of his SUV (heh) on a big rock, not once but several times. It was most distressing. These guys, being as they built these rigs, are probably thinking about how much strain the axle can take and whether all the supporting components can handle the stress. Me, I just shuddered.
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| Fab Rats Journey to the Rubicon |
Here's Google's driving route from Hurricane, Utah to the beginning of the trail in Tanoma, California.
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| Rubicon Trail |
Scale is 40:1 larger compared to above map. I'm posting the maps because I went to the trouble to look them up, and just in case anyone else wants to see where this is. The Rubicon Trail link takes you to a page that shows the elevation of every stinking bit of the trail. It ranges from like 6,000 feet to a shade over 7,000 feet.
4 comments:
Paul didn't just drag and bounce the differential. He got the drive shaft on a sharp rock that carved a spiral in it. When they post the ride home we'll find out how it acts at highway speeds. I don't know how anyone can take the family out, drive for hours and then take The Vehicle that you drove to the trailer and seemingly just try to break it.
Trail
Not trailer,, damn computers
Is there a point other than see how much abuse your vehicle can take? If that's it then I guess you have to keep beating it until it breaks, otherwise you'll never know.
They can say all those vehicles survived the Rubicon, but we can see they didn't all receive equal punishment.
Justin, it reminds me of going to the drag strip on Sunday and race the car I needed to get me home and to work Monday morning.
When Marc & I went, we thought it would be fun, and it was. And it was an adventure. Get out in the woods, face a challenge. Our truck was marginally competent. We would have a wanted a much more capable vehicle if we went back, which would have meant spending several grand on upgrading the suspension. We had better things to do with our money, so we didn't and we never went back.
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