IronPeaks Forest Road Cruiser

Toyos seem to pack up with mud pretty easily/ retain it. Caused some ass puckering slippage on a trail today. Turning the steering wheel and getting no response from the front of the truck next to a 20ft dropout on my side was, well, interesting.

 

It's always terrifying when the truck doesn't respond to steering input. And that's a lot of mud!

 

Moved away from outside a bedroom window and to the city. Time to hear my truck lock and unlock again! Removing the earplug from the door unlock beeper was harder than I thought, ended up having to dig it out. It had hardened up. Hey, while I'm at it let's make it louder! Duh, of course Toyota had engineered this thing to be as loud as possible in stock form to save materials. So, I melted some plastic off an old dog leash i had around to fill the dum-dum holes I drilled, and ended up mounting it outboard instead of pointing towards the battery/engine compartment. See pics of my adventure below. I want my 20 minutes back but have only myself to blame.

 

Death Valley, my in shell setup.consisted of a ridgerest, yoga mat and a 3" memory foam twin. Slept very well on all nights. Higher elevations tested the limits of my 15° syn sleeping bag.

 

Hey Eric, is your bag EN rated?

 

Yes it was literally the very first purchase with my tacomaworld support, post tubbs fire. I put most of the gifts towards essential camping gear and truck maintenance (windshield, brakes) as that seemed appropriate. I'm an AT thru-hiker and, like you, a gear junkie. So I had a quiver of bags that I will miss. I started with an all-purpose, couch surfer/truck camper long/wide syn mummy from Marmot. 130$ at REI.

 

Ideally you want a bag with a comfort level about 10 degrees higher than any temps you actually expect.

Or go like me and figure fuck it.. I think my bag is -20. Never been cold though.

 

I was looking for the most all purpose bag I could find and the long/wide model trestles 15 seemed to fit the bill. Came with a compression sack and packs quite small for a synthetic. I especially miss my 25 year old EMS down bag. If that bag could talk, wow.

 

Appointment for spark plug swap. Had the plugs I bought for planned swap in the truck in Oct, so they survived the fire. My tools? Not so much. I think this quote is quite reasonable (114$) Would do it myself, but in this case I prefer an accountable dealership worker to be threading steel to aluminum.

 

Plugs swapped at 45k for 114$ Oakland dealership, look ok. Haven't checked gaps, not sure I'm going to bother. I think waiting on the interval is ok as I believe it is emissions/mpg related and not as important as they say. Letting them go to 100k? Probably not a good idea. I met in the middle.

 

Hmmm pretty good price, wonder how it compares to a Crosby. 1/5th the price there's that....

 

Not a fan of those. These instead: 3/4" Van Beest Screw Pin Shackle

 

Purchased some dxl29 extra leaves for my Dakar pack from @SUMOTNK , delivered via TW express by @BudMan . I am fixing up an older property and have been hauling quite a bit of construction junk, and even just my tools and/or camping gear have been pushing my regular Dakar pack to its weight capacity limits. Here's pics with around 800#, and without. Shows the negative rake with a load I commonly haul. Need to get these installed soon.

 

Chalk test commencing, 30lbs.

 

100 yards later kinda inconclusive, going to try again and drive a shorter distance

 

Try #2, re-checked I'm at 36lbs hot tires, looks ok. No noticeable gaps in ground contact patch.

 

A friend had his tailgate stolen while he was at a FUNERAL in Sacramento yesterday so I decided to upgrade my weak security (screw clamp faced up) today. Added some thread locker because there was some thread engagement lost with my washer/piece of a sharpie pen spacer. Might fill the torx bolt with epoxy or something at some point.

 

One less raccoon in Oakland as of 130am, trip to vet today. He rode in the bed in my leer shell.

 

My friend in LA, who had his tailgate jacked at a funeral of all places, gained HP with this new v6 tailgate (his is a 4 banger). Sending him a little kit that I made shown above, to secure his tailgate cable.

 

Some urban carnage this week, looks like I'll be needing a new passenger side taillight. Tried clear packing tape as a bandaid, and it actually looked good, barely noticeable, but the recent storms filled the light with water nonetheless. Drilled a couple of drain holes. My upgrade 12v landscaping GY6.35 reverse bulb hasn't shattered yet despite being submerged completely for the last week or so. Also my new windshield dropped my rearview in my lap, going to have to stop in to have it re-glued.