Mxpatriot's Locked and Long Travel 4x4 Tacoma / Alaska Offroad Thread

There's a huge bull moose in this picture.



Close up of him.



Crossing under the Alaska pipeline.

 

Wrote an article that was published on Expedition Portal. Would appreciate comments / sharing, let expo portal know you want more like this.

http://expeditionportal.com/going-alone-single-vehicle-offroad-travel-safety/

 

Just read that one this morning. As someone who frequently travels alone I thought it was a good read and certainly food for thought as I pack things up for this season and begin to look forward to next season and beyond. I do appreciate articles like this as I think they are extremely relevant not only to seasoned travelers but weekend warriors alike. It is certainly a good conversation starter that I think is easily overlooked in a day and age when people can get in over their heads quickly under the assumption that help is only a quick text message or Facebook post away. It may sound like an exaggeration but having the knowledge and skills to recover truly can be the difference between having a good camp fire story and being a case study in what not to do.

I would most definitely like to see additional articles. Is there anything you currently have in mind? As fun as it is to geek out over truck builds or cool new mods I'm increasingly finding that adding knowledge to my mental toolbox is far more stimulating and likely to positively impact my experience than a crawlbox or snorkel will...

 

I do have a few more planned. Will post them up as I complete them. Also have a few trip report style ones I need to write up for trips already completed.

 

Good article. Last summer I did a trip from LA, Ca to the arctic circle alone. Had a great time.

Related to your article, over the last 2 years I have had 3 XP-10s fail on me. They would not even warranty them, even though they were confirmed as authentic and not the chinese fakes. All 3 became swollen and would not charge, this even happened to one that never even left the box. So now i carry the fullsize jumpboxes that use tech ups batteries, and can swap just the battery out if it ever fails.

I should mention that all of them were babied. 2 lived in a air conditioned garage and never even jumped a car. One lived in my truck and may have seen high temps. The two in use where plugged in every couple months for maintenance.

 

I've had no issues with mine. It rides around on my four wheeler and snow machine, and sits in the truck at -20.

Use it all the time in the field to charge stuff and have jumped a few vehicles with it.

 

Yeah, i think i just got unlucky. The scond one i ended up taking apart to see if i could just replace the battery. But none of the part numbers matched anything on alibaba or any battery manufacturer.

But after jumping through hoops with their customer service, i have decided to just go with a servicable unit. The size sucks, but it is barely bigger than any of my quad batteries, and can actually be used as a quad battery when i rotate it out for a fresh one.

I do still carry one of the chinese knock offs in all my vehicles and they all seem to be going strong.

 

Just read the ExPo article. Great read, awesome rig.

 

Good job on article. Enjoyed it

 

I enjoyed your article, great truck and awesome scenery! I often head out on my own, my buddies are working and I don't want to wait till whenever to go out. I follow your advice and always have satellite gps communications with me. As well as having gear for water treatment and fire, and a sleeping bag.
The drive to Prudhoe bay is one I would like to do one day.

 

That's always been my fear relying on one of those jump packs. A dual battery setup seems like it would be the ticket, minus the cost of course.

 

Hi Chase,
Just read your article "Going Alone" - well done. I think a lot of people don't give this enough thought. I've gone off into the wilderness alone on my motorcycle and probably not been as well prepared as I should have been for something going wrong. I have recently purchased an InReach to mitigate this - I see you're a fan as well. Question: I see you are using an iPad for GPS Navigation. I've been using an iPad mini for a couple of years and have tried dozens of apps. They always seem to come up short in some fundamental way and I end up using more than one for different circumstances. Have you found one or more that you really like?
All the best,
Dave

 

Dave,

MotionX GPS is my favorite. The paid version is less than ten bucks and you can download any map you want. I use satellite maps a lot as it let's you see trails that aren't on any maps.

Chase

 

Linked to this thread from Expo- nice article.

 

Did some load testing and zero work in sub-zero temperatures today.





Hornady's new ELD-X bullet performed well. This 178gr. ELD-X five shot group was fired at 100 yards off a cold bore, using my zero from my previous load - a 168gr. HPBT.



You know it's cold when your breath freezes to your rifle.

 

What specific issues did you have with the All Pro LT set up? I am on the fence between AP and TC for a +2 set up.

 

Disclaimer: I have the older version of their kit. Some of these things have been rectified. Regardless, Total Chaos is such a bigger name (for a reason) in performance suspension that it's a clear choice.

- The shock bolt design is very prone to seizing in place, even with copious amounts of anti seize applied. It's a very long bolt, and you can't get at it on the back side to pound it out. At least six or seven times now I've spent multiple hours (each time) getting this single bolt out.

- No ability to add a secondary bypass.

- Powder coating sucks / does not last.

- UCAs should give more camber than they do. Cams will be maxed out to get an alignment in spec. At least on my truck, your experience may vary.

- Takes a specialty coil over, rather than the standard 8" that TC uses.

 

Probably the only long travel truck to ever carry Caribou.

 

New signature test fire

 

And again