Hanging on the edge (literally)
On Birdseye Gulch I was motoring along on a shelf and my rear tire rolled a rock and I went off the edge. It happened in an instant. Luckily the crew quickly jumped into action and we secured a line to the back and I pulled from the front:
This process reinforced that the most important part of any recovery is to stop, calm down, and think—because this could have been deadly but it ended up being over quickly thanks to the team of drivers with me. I did make some mistakes—namely my winch controller was totally in accessible and I had to swing my bumper open and open the hatch to get it. In a situation where a vehicle is in a compromised position already, opening doors can make it worse.
I will say, my $600 Badland Apex winch is the best money I've ever spent.
Capability
At this point, I have the confidence that I'm equipped to do anything this side of Rubicon. I may not have the skill, but I certainly have the truck. Gears and a rear locker would be nice but I didn't struggle much on anything. I will say, my 295-equipped truck cleared things that my 285/70/18 equipped cruiser breathren did not. LX for the win. Also noted—I didn't use my CDL one time during the week. It would have helped in a few places but I was so paranoid about toggling it on and off given that it works maybe 3 out of every 5 times I use it. I didn't want to hold the group.
Mechanical issues
I had two issues this trip of note:
Truck ran hot up mosquito pass. This happened to
me before, same conditions—extreme uphill angle, and lots and lots of sloshing. Up the main pass the truck quickly got to just a tick below the red line. The driver's suggested turning on the heat and it quickly came down. Upon getting to the top, the group recommended that I check my coolant and it indeed was just a bit above "low" in the reservoir. After I topped up it never happened again — however sloshing up Red Cone I did notice that the temp gauge was 2-3 ticks above the middle.
However, the big issue, and the one that was potentially a trip-ender was that my truck stopped shifting into 4lo on day 1 after using it successfully twice before. The third time I flipped the switch and just got no response-not even a flashing light. I tried the usual driving around, disconnecting the battery and nothing helped. I immediately cited
@TeCKis300 's
excellent thread on this. I was totally mentally prepared to take apart my actuator in the driveway of my AirBnB but like the recovery, I stopped and thought for a second—if the light isn't blinking and I dont hear anything, then it's likely not the actuator.
So instead I took apart the controls and found absolute human filth of old soda, hair, dirt etc on the plunger that pushed down the contact on the control board (sorry, possibly not safe for lunch):
View attachment 3072757
I got everything cleaned up and it still didn't work. So I took it apart a second time and instead looked at the switch itself. It turns out that because the plunger was gummed up, it broke the pawl on the switch:
View attachment 3072758
So I had to improvise. Even though the pawl is broken, the switch still toggled into the right spot. So I just needed to have something to push the pawl down. Enter the 4lo cotton swab—and again, I'm sorry, it's filthy:
View attachment 3072759
But it worked. This cotton swab saved my LCDC.
I did leave with some bumps and bruises but my sliders and skids did their job. Otherwise, no issues and I fully expect to make it home tomorrow in one piece.
