NW WA Meet / BS Thread

Today was a slider install, locker install assist, and BP51s on a 5th gen runner.

KDSS is a bitch.

That rust eating coating that you paint on your frame, makes all welds turn into lava rock. What a pita.

 

The tail gates are the other big difference. Third gens have thicker tail gates by a couple inches.

Are you selling your shell?

 

No, a friend of mine just bought a 2018 Taco and was asking about one he found on Craigslist.

 

I still have my bestop soft shell if he’s interested. I think g2 and g3 are the same size

 

I think he was going to look at snugtop in B'ham.

 

Can confirm

 

Sunday story time.
So my buddy and I went out near Easton Saturday morning to scout hunting locations, then play around with night vision and thermal while hunting coyotes Saturday night. It was just a single over-night trip, and sadly saw zero coyotes. But the chance to play around with our night vision was worth it. Naturally my thermal scope didn't arrive in time, with UPS saying it will be here Monday. Should have ordered it sooner, so that's on me.....

Today we were driving around and got close to I-90, and we had a decision to make: check out some more coyote spots or get some lunch at the Turtle Cafe in Easton (officially it's called the Parkside Cafe, but that giant, ugly fucking turtle fire place.....) Hunger won the battle, so we headed towards Easton. We noticed the traffic on I-90 W was total and complete shit. Like 90 minutes of traffic delay shit. That is going to suck to flog through that.......

As we are eating lunch at the Turtle (A BLT with a fried egg is a delicious variation!), we fire up our nav options and find a NF route that takes us by Lake Kachess, which then connects us to NF-4832


Fucking brilliant! We can bypass all the traffic all the way to the shy side of the summit on NF roads. At the time, Google Maps was saying the I-90 route to that dropped pin shown above was 45 minutes SLOWER than taking the NF road. Waze is saying 2 hours and 5 minutes to go 63 miles on I-90. We have a plan, and after fueling up, head off with the goal to AVOID the traffic jam. Little did we know.........

We get to the dirt portion of the road just as Sparks Rd ends, and we see about 5 vehicles in front of us, debating whether they should continue past the end of the pavement: a big truck with a HUGE horse trailer, a mini van and bunch of sedans. Clearly Waze or some similar routing App has sent these poor souls off the beaten path to try and avoid traffic.

4 of the 5 cars in front of us press on, the big truck/trailer staying behind. Fools the lot of them. As we press on, we notice EVEN MORE sedans and mini-vans in front of us. I'd estimate 30 vehicles (one 2 of which should really be there, including us). Whatever, the road isn't THAT bad, but you might get a bumper scrape or two. But instead many of them decide to chicken out after a mile, or two, and then turn around. So that causes a more back ups as they slowly 86-point turn and get turned around, and then create more traffic as the road is really just a single lane. Damnit.......

We keep pressing on, and more sedans abandon their path and turn around. Audis and SUVs, Honda Accords and mini-vans. We end up in a small clump of vehicles finally, most of which seem capable, or at least capably driven: A Ford F150, some flavor of mid-size GMC SUV, a Ford Econoline van with a 5x8 enclosed trailer (!!!), then us and finally a scrappy Subaru SUV behind us.

Since we are stuck behind the Econoline Van with the trailer, the F150 and SUV eventually disappear from sight. The road is rough in a few places, but nothing that an overloaded-and-at-stock-height-with-Good-A/Ts Tacoma can't handle (we were in my friend's Tacoma, not mine.) The scrappy Subaru keeps up with us. The Econoline/trailer combo makes the trip, but they are really, really slow. A courteous driver would have let us pass in one of the turn-out spots, but nooooooooooooooo....... We joke about what we'd do if the van/trailer got stuck in front of us (mostly centered around having them unhook the trailer and rolling it over the side to clear a path....)

After bumping along for an hour, we finally hit the pavement on the far side and quickly make our way to the turn off for NF-4832. The trip should have taken no more than 30 minutes. But because of all the clowns in their sedans on the road, thanks to some Nav App with a desire to see sedan carnage, we were held up. Oh well, what can you do about that. I really wish I had taken my phone out and grabbed some pictures.

Once we get to the turn off for NF-4832, we notice that the rest of the vehicles keep going straight to I-90. Good. NF-4832 is in great shape, so much so that the sedans could have easily made it. We make our way around and eventually back to I-90 at Hyak, with no traffic in front of us.

It's actually a great bypass route, providing it isn't stuffed full of people in the wrong kind of vehicles. Now I just need to find a stitch route to get me from Cle Elum to Easton on the side roads.......

And hey, if you managed to get through all that drivel that I just barfed up on the screen, thank you!

 

You're posting a secret bypass in a public forum... You should be tarred and feathered.

 

Apparently not so secret when Suzy Soccer Mom and 30 of her friends are plugging the road.....

 

Right? @bobsuruncle has a story about a motorhome or something doing that bypass.

 

If it's real shitty you can go as far as the tinkham exit.

 

@JimSnell any chance I could interest you in helping me fab something like this?

 

That's a heck of an idea. Tubing bender should be here tomorrow. To do the nice gentle curve takes a roller though, and I'm still a ways out on that piece of equipment. Might be able to do something with just strategic bends instead. PM me, we'll talk about it in a few weeks. After the learning curve is over.

 

Bends would probably look better on the Tacoma cause of the angles. This is what I had in mind, I just need to figure out a lower mounting point. My drunk ass has some great paint skills.

 

I have one for 1.25". It's for boat frames, will handle .060 just fine, not sure about anything thicker, but that's plenty strong

 

@JimSnell is there a wait list for your custom frame sliders i need to be put on

 

Quite the adventure!

Just a PSA for Wazers and North Bend. The town completely hates it when you follow Waze through town instead of staying on I-90. People are trying to pick up their kids or get to the pharmacy and it takes an hour to get through this tiny town. I actually did that once before moving here. Didn't realize how bad it is on the towns people.

http://www.livingsnoqualmie.com/eas...locals-want-visitors-to-remember-this-summer/

 

@JDAM you haven't figured out the back roads yet? More like tips and tricks.

 

I know the back way into the neighborhood. Not seeing many other options for getting to the pharmacy and around the city girl that's checking out all her camping groceries at the pharmacy counter, then being told her alcohol has to go through the normal check out line, then she says that's ok I'll do both.

 

I will never complain about putting a canoe on my truck again. How the heck do you get it on there?