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The restoration/modification of Daisy.
- Thread starter muddysub
- Start date
Ok, I still haven't gone through the video, because I don't really know how, but here's a little update from trail hero. I'll post what photos I do have and try my best to make this entertaining.
I finished up the winch mount and wiring, spooled up the rope and painted the bumper Tuesday night. Wednesday morning I loaded everything up in the truck while my friend Henri drove up from Laughlin to meet at my house. Daisy was really digging the cooler air and cruised up to Hurricane, Utah on about 1/4 tank, making plenty of power doing it. All weekend long, the temp gauge never went over 200*. We got all checked in at registration, found a cool camp spot and set up for the next few days. Wednesday night we hit the kickoff party at red desert off road in St George. All the competition drivers were there, crawl magazine, krawlzone TV, etc... It was pretty neat.
Thursday morning we got up nice and early and headed into town from camp to meet up with our group for the West Rim trail. Of course I was the only full size rig in the group, turns out I was one of maybe three signed up for the event. I only saw one other. The trail rides were all being led by a local club called the Desert RATS (desert roads and trails society), they know the trails really well and our leader did a great job keeping us informed and moving along. West rim is probably the hardest I've driven the suburban. I dragged the hell out of the sliders and bumpers, even the front. I made it through without breaking anything though I did add a little scar to the driver side quarter panel. There were two optional obstacles that I got rejected on, one would have happened with a front locker. The other, a traction bar. There were also two obstacles that I didn't fit through. My friend Henri turned out to be a damn good spotter for his first time. There were obstacles where having a good spot made all the difference, being a full size on a jeep trail.
There was an obstacle called the tollbooth's early in the trail that was too narrow for the suburban to go through the traditional line. I had to take a bypass line which turned out to be just as tight but it didn't lay you on your side like the other one did. At one point I had about 3 inches between the rock and the driver side of the body. Out the windshield all I saw was sky and Henri's right hand sticking up above the tubing on the front bumper. Afterwards he told me I was about an inch away from the rock on the passenger side. I'm pretty glad he didn't mention that while I was in there but it gave me a lot of confidence in his spotting abilities. After that driving blind wasn't nearly as frightening as it could've been. The second tight spot was right after our lunch break, it was called, ironically, "the squeeze." The suburban is 82 inches at the outside of the tires, the jeep that went before me claimed to be 82 inches as well and when his mirrors got shoved in by the rock on both sides at the same time, I decided not to become a trail tampon that day and just take the bypass line. Which ended up being a pretty fun little climb. Later on there was an optional climb that resembled the dump bump up in Moab. I watched a few jeeps walk right up it, especially the four-door ones and thought, "hell I've got enough wheelbase to do this I want to give it a shot." I tried to slow crawl it once and I dragged the rear bumper hard enough that that wasn't going to happen. So I backed up and bumped it... Everything got really quiet for a second there and it seemed like it was happening in slow motion, Henri's eyes were the size of pool balls and he had a death grip on the oh shit handle and his armrest. At some point I came down on the brake pedal with both feet and slid backwards down this rock about 10 feet to the right of where I went up it, landing hard on the rear bumper. Spectators claim that I had all four tires off the ground at one point. That was all it took for me, I humbly backed up and let a few other rigs through. One jeep taunted me by climbing in about four times.
Towards the end of the trail you're driving right on the rim or edge of a big Mesa with some impressive drop offs on the right side. At one point The trail was only a few inches wider than I was and made a slight left turn around a boulder that was a little bit taller than a 35 inch tire. Not being able to see the edge very well I hugged that Boulder a little tight and ran my drivers rear side wall into it so I had to back up and re-position a little. Henri kept telling me I had plenty of room but all I could see out the passenger side window was the town of Saint George about 15 miles away and about 1000 feet below me. I kept on hugging that rock and it kissed the quarter panel right behind the fender. I watched it happen in my mirror and backed up as soon as the rock touched it but it was too late at that point, Daisy had her first official trail damage.
t the end of the trail we all made our way through the sand dunes and back down to Sandhollow state park, sand dunes are not really Daisy's thing. She's heavy and has very little up travel in the front suspension. So I took it easy and cruised along at my own pace through the dunes and met up with most of the group near the highway. After airing up we checked out the vendor row at Trail hero and shot the shit with some cool people. Eventually headed back to camp, built a fire and cooked some dinner, while recapping the events of the day. (Somewhere in there I got pulled over by a park ranger for speeding, 40 in a 25. She let me off with a warning and as I went to drive away I got stuck in the sand right there in front of her. I had already aired up and unlocked the hubs for a drive into town so we had to jump out real quick, lock the hubs and get out of there with our tails tucked between our legs. )
We were scheduled to run the barracks trail on Friday, which crosses a river about 21 times. In the weeks before the event, southern Utah got a pretty good storm and the trail got flooded out to the point where it is now impassable. I was really bummed about that because it was THE trail I wanted to run up there. Fortunately trail hero had a Werock competition and a few other things going on at the state park that day. So we took the day off from trail rides, wandered around and spectated all day. It's been several years since I've been to a rock crawling competition and I really missed it. If you ever get a chance to check out a crawling competition in person, do it! There is no other motorsport that lets you get that close to the action, we were actually bullshitting with drivers like Jesse Haines and Cody Waggoner while on course. A few of my friends had driven up from Las Vegas for the Werock event. Of the five of us there, I was the only one who had ever seen one of these events in person before. It was really cool seeing how much my friends enjoyed it, especially since we are all wheelers ourselves.
We got up nice and early Saturday morning, made some breakfast and headed into town to meet up with the group for our Saturday trail run, Toquerville falls. After arriving exactly 1 hour early at the staging area we decided to kill time in the local Ace Hardware. I've got to be honest, this was probably the most impressive ace hardware store I've come across. They had one hell of a firearms section, The place was decorated with locally found barn doors and Cedar wood cabinets made from local trees, by local carpenters and all the employees seemed to be proud to work there. I love small towns and the atmosphere in Hurricane ( pronounced HURR-a-kin) Utah was really cool.
After a grand tour of Ace Hardware we headed back to the movie theater where our group had already assembled and introduced ourselves to everyone. Our trail leader for Toquerville falls was actually my trail leader at winter 4x4 jamboree when my wife and I headed up to Hurricane in January. He remembered me and I remembered him, we bullshitted about southern Utah four wheeling and what we had done to our rigs since the last time we saw each other. The ride we went on actually involved a lot more than just the trail out to Toquerville falls. We started out by driving to St. George and heading west out of St. George out to some really neat canyons and very well preserved charcoal kilns, built in 1885. We actually had lunch there at the charcoal kilns, it was 10 degrees cooler inside them than it was outside. This trail was pretty much all dirt road all day. West rim was rated at a 4 to 6 depending on the obstacles you drove, Toquerville falls is rated at a 2. It was funny to hear the old women on the CB radio complaining that this road should not be rated a 2 because it was far too rough. I shifted into four-wheel-drive twice all day folks, both for optional obstacles.
The road out to Toquerville falls is a lot of fun, the scenery is beautiful and there are a couple of challenges along the way, though optional. The waterfalls there at the end were totally worth all the dust we had sucked in along the way and it felt amazing to dip my head in the water. We got some cool group shots across the falls and a couple people took photos of the suburban at the top of the waterfalls. She was popular all weekend being a unicorn in this crowd. On the way back from the falls we headed up a steep rocky road to some radio towers at the top of the mountain. The views were incredible, you could see Zion Canyon in the distance, Sand hollow reservoir, St. George, Pine Valley Mountain, the list goes on and on. It wasn't long before we were back at the trailhead, marking the end of our run. After airing up, saying goodbye to everyone in the group and heading back into the state park, we broke down our campsite and Henri headed for home. I cruised back into Hurricane for the trail hero closing ceremony and BBQ. I hung out with some of the trail leaders and walked around the show and shine area but by that time I was pretty tired. With all the dust in the suburban after our trail that day, there was no way I would be able to sleep in there that night. So even though I wanted to stick around till the end and watch the raffle and everything I decided to jump in my truck, fueled up and head south. I got home at about 9 PM that night, it felt great to take a real shower, kiss my wife and sleep in my own bed.
Trail hero was a complete success in my opinion, I can only see this event getting bigger in years to come. Rich Klein, the guy who put it on, says he's already got plans for the next two years. I cannot wait to see how this event evolves and grows, I will be going back for sure.
Winch, done.
Group shots from west rim.
Daisy's new scar.
This the rock that a bounced around on in silent slow motion.
My favorite place to wake up.
I want an ibex, bad. @MNorby, these things are awesome!
There were some very cool rigs to be seen at this event.
WEROCK
A cool canyon our Saturday morning.
Toquerville falls.
If you're going to selfie, selfie dangerously.
Almost laying on my side at the tollbooths, had to back out of this one.
This was the "bypass line" which was still pretty damn skinny.
I finished up the winch mount and wiring, spooled up the rope and painted the bumper Tuesday night. Wednesday morning I loaded everything up in the truck while my friend Henri drove up from Laughlin to meet at my house. Daisy was really digging the cooler air and cruised up to Hurricane, Utah on about 1/4 tank, making plenty of power doing it. All weekend long, the temp gauge never went over 200*. We got all checked in at registration, found a cool camp spot and set up for the next few days. Wednesday night we hit the kickoff party at red desert off road in St George. All the competition drivers were there, crawl magazine, krawlzone TV, etc... It was pretty neat.
Thursday morning we got up nice and early and headed into town from camp to meet up with our group for the West Rim trail. Of course I was the only full size rig in the group, turns out I was one of maybe three signed up for the event. I only saw one other. The trail rides were all being led by a local club called the Desert RATS (desert roads and trails society), they know the trails really well and our leader did a great job keeping us informed and moving along. West rim is probably the hardest I've driven the suburban. I dragged the hell out of the sliders and bumpers, even the front. I made it through without breaking anything though I did add a little scar to the driver side quarter panel. There were two optional obstacles that I got rejected on, one would have happened with a front locker. The other, a traction bar. There were also two obstacles that I didn't fit through. My friend Henri turned out to be a damn good spotter for his first time. There were obstacles where having a good spot made all the difference, being a full size on a jeep trail.
There was an obstacle called the tollbooth's early in the trail that was too narrow for the suburban to go through the traditional line. I had to take a bypass line which turned out to be just as tight but it didn't lay you on your side like the other one did. At one point I had about 3 inches between the rock and the driver side of the body. Out the windshield all I saw was sky and Henri's right hand sticking up above the tubing on the front bumper. Afterwards he told me I was about an inch away from the rock on the passenger side. I'm pretty glad he didn't mention that while I was in there but it gave me a lot of confidence in his spotting abilities. After that driving blind wasn't nearly as frightening as it could've been. The second tight spot was right after our lunch break, it was called, ironically, "the squeeze." The suburban is 82 inches at the outside of the tires, the jeep that went before me claimed to be 82 inches as well and when his mirrors got shoved in by the rock on both sides at the same time, I decided not to become a trail tampon that day and just take the bypass line. Which ended up being a pretty fun little climb. Later on there was an optional climb that resembled the dump bump up in Moab. I watched a few jeeps walk right up it, especially the four-door ones and thought, "hell I've got enough wheelbase to do this I want to give it a shot." I tried to slow crawl it once and I dragged the rear bumper hard enough that that wasn't going to happen. So I backed up and bumped it... Everything got really quiet for a second there and it seemed like it was happening in slow motion, Henri's eyes were the size of pool balls and he had a death grip on the oh shit handle and his armrest. At some point I came down on the brake pedal with both feet and slid backwards down this rock about 10 feet to the right of where I went up it, landing hard on the rear bumper. Spectators claim that I had all four tires off the ground at one point. That was all it took for me, I humbly backed up and let a few other rigs through. One jeep taunted me by climbing in about four times.
Towards the end of the trail you're driving right on the rim or edge of a big Mesa with some impressive drop offs on the right side. At one point The trail was only a few inches wider than I was and made a slight left turn around a boulder that was a little bit taller than a 35 inch tire. Not being able to see the edge very well I hugged that Boulder a little tight and ran my drivers rear side wall into it so I had to back up and re-position a little. Henri kept telling me I had plenty of room but all I could see out the passenger side window was the town of Saint George about 15 miles away and about 1000 feet below me. I kept on hugging that rock and it kissed the quarter panel right behind the fender. I watched it happen in my mirror and backed up as soon as the rock touched it but it was too late at that point, Daisy had her first official trail damage.
t the end of the trail we all made our way through the sand dunes and back down to Sandhollow state park, sand dunes are not really Daisy's thing. She's heavy and has very little up travel in the front suspension. So I took it easy and cruised along at my own pace through the dunes and met up with most of the group near the highway. After airing up we checked out the vendor row at Trail hero and shot the shit with some cool people. Eventually headed back to camp, built a fire and cooked some dinner, while recapping the events of the day. (Somewhere in there I got pulled over by a park ranger for speeding, 40 in a 25. She let me off with a warning and as I went to drive away I got stuck in the sand right there in front of her. I had already aired up and unlocked the hubs for a drive into town so we had to jump out real quick, lock the hubs and get out of there with our tails tucked between our legs. )
We were scheduled to run the barracks trail on Friday, which crosses a river about 21 times. In the weeks before the event, southern Utah got a pretty good storm and the trail got flooded out to the point where it is now impassable. I was really bummed about that because it was THE trail I wanted to run up there. Fortunately trail hero had a Werock competition and a few other things going on at the state park that day. So we took the day off from trail rides, wandered around and spectated all day. It's been several years since I've been to a rock crawling competition and I really missed it. If you ever get a chance to check out a crawling competition in person, do it! There is no other motorsport that lets you get that close to the action, we were actually bullshitting with drivers like Jesse Haines and Cody Waggoner while on course. A few of my friends had driven up from Las Vegas for the Werock event. Of the five of us there, I was the only one who had ever seen one of these events in person before. It was really cool seeing how much my friends enjoyed it, especially since we are all wheelers ourselves.
We got up nice and early Saturday morning, made some breakfast and headed into town to meet up with the group for our Saturday trail run, Toquerville falls. After arriving exactly 1 hour early at the staging area we decided to kill time in the local Ace Hardware. I've got to be honest, this was probably the most impressive ace hardware store I've come across. They had one hell of a firearms section, The place was decorated with locally found barn doors and Cedar wood cabinets made from local trees, by local carpenters and all the employees seemed to be proud to work there. I love small towns and the atmosphere in Hurricane ( pronounced HURR-a-kin) Utah was really cool.
After a grand tour of Ace Hardware we headed back to the movie theater where our group had already assembled and introduced ourselves to everyone. Our trail leader for Toquerville falls was actually my trail leader at winter 4x4 jamboree when my wife and I headed up to Hurricane in January. He remembered me and I remembered him, we bullshitted about southern Utah four wheeling and what we had done to our rigs since the last time we saw each other. The ride we went on actually involved a lot more than just the trail out to Toquerville falls. We started out by driving to St. George and heading west out of St. George out to some really neat canyons and very well preserved charcoal kilns, built in 1885. We actually had lunch there at the charcoal kilns, it was 10 degrees cooler inside them than it was outside. This trail was pretty much all dirt road all day. West rim was rated at a 4 to 6 depending on the obstacles you drove, Toquerville falls is rated at a 2. It was funny to hear the old women on the CB radio complaining that this road should not be rated a 2 because it was far too rough. I shifted into four-wheel-drive twice all day folks, both for optional obstacles.
The road out to Toquerville falls is a lot of fun, the scenery is beautiful and there are a couple of challenges along the way, though optional. The waterfalls there at the end were totally worth all the dust we had sucked in along the way and it felt amazing to dip my head in the water. We got some cool group shots across the falls and a couple people took photos of the suburban at the top of the waterfalls. She was popular all weekend being a unicorn in this crowd. On the way back from the falls we headed up a steep rocky road to some radio towers at the top of the mountain. The views were incredible, you could see Zion Canyon in the distance, Sand hollow reservoir, St. George, Pine Valley Mountain, the list goes on and on. It wasn't long before we were back at the trailhead, marking the end of our run. After airing up, saying goodbye to everyone in the group and heading back into the state park, we broke down our campsite and Henri headed for home. I cruised back into Hurricane for the trail hero closing ceremony and BBQ. I hung out with some of the trail leaders and walked around the show and shine area but by that time I was pretty tired. With all the dust in the suburban after our trail that day, there was no way I would be able to sleep in there that night. So even though I wanted to stick around till the end and watch the raffle and everything I decided to jump in my truck, fueled up and head south. I got home at about 9 PM that night, it felt great to take a real shower, kiss my wife and sleep in my own bed.
Trail hero was a complete success in my opinion, I can only see this event getting bigger in years to come. Rich Klein, the guy who put it on, says he's already got plans for the next two years. I cannot wait to see how this event evolves and grows, I will be going back for sure.
Winch, done.
Group shots from west rim.
Daisy's new scar.
This the rock that a bounced around on in silent slow motion.
My favorite place to wake up.
I want an ibex, bad. @MNorby, these things are awesome!
There were some very cool rigs to be seen at this event.
WEROCK
A cool canyon our Saturday morning.
Toquerville falls.
If you're going to selfie, selfie dangerously.
Almost laying on my side at the tollbooths, had to back out of this one.
This was the "bypass line" which was still pretty damn skinny.
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Nice ride report!
I don't remember seeing those lights on the bumper. What are those and what would you say about them?
I don't remember seeing those lights on the bumper. What are those and what would you say about them?
They've been on there a year or more. They're from offroadledbars.com but they're no longer available. I love them, they reach out there a long way!
Great report, and glad everything worked well. A trail photo summary:
Jeep, Jeep, Jeep, Jeep, Suburban, Jeep, Jeep.
David
Jeep, Jeep, Jeep, Jeep, Suburban, Jeep, Jeep.
David
Awesomeness. 
You've brought it a long way from this!
And to think, he almost sold it! Have enjoyed watching it come back to life!
Looks like tons of fun. Great report dude.
That F250 with a popup is my ultimate goal.
That F250 with a popup is my ultimate goal.
So Christy and I were supposed to be in Phoenix this weekend for a concert. But she got sick and the band we were going to see has, in the last few months decided that they are going to be supporters of black lives matter. Flying banners at their concerts and writing songs about police brutality... so I'm done with them.
So in my newly freed up Saturday I decided to finish my new power source for the center console. The old one worked for a time but it eventually broke and spent a month or so flopping around, being of no use. I cut, bent, drilled and welded up this cool little box to house my new Blue Sea power outlet. I got it wired up and installed this morning. I even added a switch to keep the volt meter from staying on all the time. I'm actually kinda proud of this one, I swear sometimes it's like im a real life grown up.
Disregard the fact that my truck is filthy, it's been a while since she got a good scrub and spending 4 days in it last week, out wheeling made things worse.
So in my newly freed up Saturday I decided to finish my new power source for the center console. The old one worked for a time but it eventually broke and spent a month or so flopping around, being of no use. I cut, bent, drilled and welded up this cool little box to house my new Blue Sea power outlet. I got it wired up and installed this morning. I even added a switch to keep the volt meter from staying on all the time. I'm actually kinda proud of this one, I swear sometimes it's like im a real life grown up.
Disregard the fact that my truck is filthy, it's been a while since she got a good scrub and spending 4 days in it last week, out wheeling made things worse.
Sometimes I wish my truck was a crew cab so I could do awesome things like that.
You could join the Suburban club, Ben. Or even get a K5!
Pops didn't buy a k5 or burb in 1991 so I'm out.
After that last post is was really bugging me. So I cleaned the Suburban today. Vacuumed and scrubbed, this is about as clean as it's going to get here at home.
Nothing like a clean bath.
@firemedicsafd was in town and wanted to see some mountains so @Phil513 and took him up over wheeler pass just north of town. Daisy has ran that one a few times before, if you hit all the optional lines it makes a nice shakedown run. I spotted a couple things that need some attention. The lower bearing on the column has been loose for too long, so I tore that apart and ordered a replacement.
One other thing I've noticed that's been bugging me is that the front end of the truck seems to be looser than it should be. I found that the drivers side fender is broken up at the top of the firewall and the passenger side is cracking. I'm guessing I'll have to loosen up all the bolts on that fender and see if I can get it realigned and weld it back together. Then I'm going to have to do something about stiffening the front end of the frame.
One other thing I've noticed that's been bugging me is that the front end of the truck seems to be looser than it should be. I found that the drivers side fender is broken up at the top of the firewall and the passenger side is cracking. I'm guessing I'll have to loosen up all the bolts on that fender and see if I can get it realigned and weld it back together. Then I'm going to have to do something about stiffening the front end of the frame.
