Sand Hollow, April 2022

[r3dd0g]

We made a trip out to Sand Hollow a few weeks ago. I'm having some issues with the picture hosting I had set up so I spun up a new one to get these uploaded. We got there a few days before everyone else so we did some easy sightseeing trails before everyone else showed up.

This is from the Toquerville Falls trail just outside of Hurricain.

Then we cruised around and did some sightseeing, huge dunes out there.

We found out just before we left that FullSize Invasion was the same week we were there, we ran part of a trail with them one day.

 

[r3dd0g]

The next day we played around with the dogs and my RC car on the dunes closer to camp.

Then our friends showed up and we started doing some real wheeling.

 

[r3dd0g]

 

[r3dd0g]

 

[r3dd0g]

Smokey burnout ftw!

 

[r3dd0g]

 

[r3dd0g]

That was a massive picture dump. Unfortunately I don't remember the name of all the trails we ran, so not much commentary. If you've never been to Sand Hollow you should get there someday. It's like Moab for wheeling except everything is right there next to your campsite.

The S-10 kicked butt on the return trip, all the repairs worked flawlessly and other than some body damage the S-10 is just as good now as when we got there. I used up a full bottle of N2O playing on the dunes and stuff, so much fun.

On the way home however, we started having a ton of issues with the RV. It was overheating on every little hill and struggling on the flat, power was way down etc. but we left on Saturday afternoon and needed to get across the rez back into national forest for the night so we kept pushing it. We camped near Mormon Lake and this is what we found in the morning before we headed home.

The flex pipe between the exhaust brake (mounted directly to the turbo) and the rest of the exhaust had broken and was dumping hot exhaust right into the engine compartment which was then blown through the intercooler and radiator.

There was a bit of damage from all the heat, some of the side compartments partially melted, we lost the rear view camera (melted/shorted the wire) and a ton of wiring loom just melted right off the wires. After searching through everything we had, I sacrificed a full can of brake cleaner, borrowed some hose clamps from the S-10 and made a temporary fix.

We made it home with no further issues and were gifted a blown hydraulic line on one of the RV jacks when we finally got it back into the shop.

 

[r3dd0g]

When we got home I spent the next 2 weeks fixing a ton of the issues with the RV (new brakes, hub seals, air bags, air filter, repaired the camera wire and some other stuff). I thought I'd post up the exhaust fix because I had fun doing it.

The factory muffler on the RV is HUGE, about 18" diameter and 3' long. It was so heavy and poorly designed that it turns out one of the other fittings has been leaking by every time I pull a big hill since I bought the thing 4 years ago. I bought a 5" ID, 7" OD 30" straight through MBRP muffler for it.

Here's a shot with the old and new mufflers next to each other.

I got a 5" 90° mandrel bend, moved one of the pinch clamps from the muffler to the end and welded it all together so it would be a direct swap.

When I did the air filter I discovered that the last person to do the air filter (HUGE PAIN IN THE ASS BTW) didn't get the inlet hose that pulls air from the side of the RV hooked up properly... This is the dirt that dumped out of the filter when I set it on my workbench.

We took the RV up near Forest Lakes last weekend as a test run. Holy cow what a difference. I've always struggled with coolant temps going to/coming back down from Payson, I'll usually hit 220-225F and have to back off or manually shift to keep the fan spinning faster. Plus there were numerous places I'd get down to 35 or slower (without a trailer).

With the new exhaust and clean air filter the coolant temperature never even got to 200F, MAJOR improvement. The slowest we bogged down to was 45 and that was only briefly, most big hills were now 50-60mph. Also to top everything off I think we got about 20% better mileage as well, the exhaust will pay for itself quickly like this!

 

[Fastereddie]

When we got home I spent the next 2 weeks fixing a ton of the issues with the RV (new brakes, hub seals, air bags, air filter, repaired the camera wire and some other stuff). I thought I'd post up the exhaust fix because I had fun doing it.

The factory muffler on the RV is HUGE, about 18" diameter and 3' long. It was so heavy and poorly designed that it turns out one of the other fittings has been leaking by every time I pull a big hill since I bought the thing 4 years ago. I bought a 5" ID, 7" OD 30" straight through MBRP muffler for it.

Here's a shot with the old and new mufflers next to each other.

I got a 5" 90° mandrel bend, moved one of the pinch clamps from the muffler to the end and welded it all together so it would be a direct swap.

When I did the air filter I discovered that the last person to do the air filter (HUGE PAIN IN THE ASS BTW) didn't get the inlet hose that pulls air from the side of the RV hooked up properly... This is the dirt that dumped out of the filter when I set it on my workbench.

We took the RV up near Forest Lakes last weekend as a test run. Holy cow what a difference. I've always struggled with coolant temps going to/coming back down from Payson, I'll usually hit 220-225F and have to back off or manually shift to keep the fan spinning faster. Plus there were numerous places I'd get down to 35 or slower (without a trailer).

With the new exhaust and clean air filter the coolant temperature never even got to 200F, MAJOR improvement. The slowest we bogged down to was 45 and that was only briefly, most big hills were now 50-60mph. Also to top everything off I think we got about 20% better mileage as well, the exhaust will pay for itself quickly like this!

That RV is like hell yeah!

 

[r3dd0g]

That RV is like hell yeah!

Yea, it's like driving a completely different rig now. Sounds like a big rig too so that's fun.

 

[ktmoutfront]

Just taking the muffler weight off added 20 hp.

 

[K85 Octane]

That or the idea the engine could breath again haha

 

[r3dd0g]

That or the idea the engine could breath again haha

It's breathing fresh air and not pumping hot exhaust through the intercooler and radiator. I have a friend that's a Cat mechanic hook his computer up to my RV a few years ago, he said there are two levels of defueling based on EGTs and I had been hitting both levels frequently. I had no idea why, I just assumed that was normal when pulling hills. Apparently the issue was an exhaust leak the whole time, that's why there's so much more power, no more detuning.

 

[K85 Octane]

I’ll bet!
I figured that poor air filter didn’t help either.
My C10 didn’t have EGT issues but it sure had high AITs. Dumb open intake with the air filter in the engine bay. Routed it into the cowl and BAM way cooler temps. Can’t imagine the heat buildup in the RV though.

 

[miniwally]

Very Nice,

Along the lines of the breathing in and out easier, as well as the effect the exhaust blowing into the engine compartment thus making the temps higher: Since I do a lot of towing the same load all year from the Western Slope to the East slope of Colorado I have collected a bunch of practical knowledge about ambient air temps, air filters (dirty vs. new and clean) and how those relate to EGTs and power.

In the winter time with air temps at say 30 degrees or less I can do really dumb shit to my Superduty on full power levels (I don't have any piss injection systems to worry about anymore), EGT's stay at 1300 or less (many times it's hard to get over 1200) and it's hard to spike them higher. I can also do this with a dirty air filter. All my temps, coolant, engine oil and trans stay in humane areas, less than 230 typically engine oil does get to 240+ at times.

In the summer with air temps in the 70's I have be careful, I can easily spike EGT to 1400+, running on full power levels requires some careful observation and throttle control, my coolant temps creep up to 230+, oil temps get to 250+, trans pushes 240, etc. I can tell if I have a new air filter or not

When air temps get to the 90's if I don't have a clean air filter it's pretty wild how far down on power the truck is, how easily it get's hot, and EGT's are what I have to drive off of. I had one day at 100 degrees coming west out of Denver that I was running 50 to 55 with everything hot and needing over 50% throttle, where I can run 70+ in the winter while not even using close to 50% throttle.

Good Clean air in, and open well breathing exhaust out.

 

[Tnsejed]

Nice work on the RV! Sand Hollow looks like it was a blast!

 

[r3dd0g]

Nice work on the RV! Sand Hollow looks like it was a blast!

Thanks, Sand Hollow is an awesome place, tons of trails right by the campsites.