My first off road trip....AHHHH!!!!!

well as some of you may know...i have been trying to convince my parents to let me go offroading. Well needless to say it didnt go so well...i got my mom to take me offroadung in our neighborhood. Its a new neighborhood and part of the road isnt finished....so its all dirt

well all of the mud is not rocklike....and there were puddles that had some snow on them...i thought they were shallow...well they werent...it was snow on top of ice that was about three inches thick with water underneath

i put it in 4 wheel drive and attempted to drive through it....i got stuck a quarter of the way through it...so i out it in reverse and attempted to get out...after a few tries i got out...i turned around and headed out to the paved road...well on the way back i felt a weird wobble...i had never experienced this before...i got on the paved road and realized the tire was blown...i got out and called my dad...i started to take out the donught and the jack...at first i put the jack on the rails by the door because that is where i have always seen my dad put it on his sequoia...well it didnt lift it up at all...so i thought i had broken the axle...then the next thing i see its a speedingcar coming towards me...i thought it was my dad coming at us all pissed

it wasnt

it was the cops...they thought we were trying to steal stuff off of the construction site...we werent of course...they get out and put their spotlight on me and flash their flashlight on me and yell

"What the hell are you guys doing!!! Stay where you are...dont move!!!"

i say i have a blown tire he says o okay...then he notified the station

we explained our situation and he said "well we are going to stay here till you fix the tire...just so the neighbors are see the crusier here."

he then tried to explain to me that my jack wouldnt lift the jeep and he said we should call AAA

i went on and disregarded his statement...the jack worked fine once i put it on the sub-frame...i took of the rim and put on the donught...i felt so bad!

so the final total

10 minutes of offroading= repairs to a blown tire and never offroading again..maybe

o yeah it was 10 degrees out with a windchill of below 0

and another great reason why to never wheel alone!

your lucky the cops didnt want to charge you all with trespassing or terroism or sumthing...they will here in florida!

sorry you had such a lowsy time your first time out...maybe it was just one of them days!

Damn, all the worst luck.

i just got back from my ordeal 10 minutes ago...it was a dirt road that was beaten up...i never thought i would need someone else..but i didnt get stuck luckily...lesson learned

also...i lived in the neighborhood so the cops didnt charge me...they knew what it was like to be sixteen.

yoda, great advice, never wheel alone.

Also, proper tires make a MUCH better experience offroad.

You should tell your parents that the offroading is inevitable, and they should at least let you do small, roadsafe upgrades that will help you offroad.

A well built rig makes for much better, and much safer times.

To stay at a near stock height (2" lift or so), the stock axles can hold up for that purpose, I'd recommend a locker in the rear, $200, Tires, 2" Budget Boost lift, $120 or so ( I believe), and You'll be amazed. As will they

It's imparative to have your rig suited to your conditions, which can be done rather easily if you don't want to go all out.

The above combo would be VERY streetable.

Yoda said:

and another great reason why to never wheel alone!

your lucky the cops didnt want to charge you all with trespassing or terroism or sumthing...they will here in florida!

sorry you had such a lowsy time your first time out...maybe it was just one of them days!

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X2

the same thing applies here in Indiana

well not right now...im not gonna push my luck..i may try and go for a new set of black steelies and some stock size BFGs..well see

Speed_racer said:

offroading is inevitable

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LOL that is GREAT

If I was a current paying member that would be my sig

"offroading is inevitable" say it loud and proud

One of the first 5 times I went offroading, which was in my dad's Chevy Blazer by the way, My friend driving behind be in a Montero rear-ended me and totaled the truck...try bringing that home to your parents

at least all you got is a flat and a scare

Did you pay for the Jeep you got? Do you pay for insurance/gas/repairs??

I'm still in college but when I do have a family I wouldn't let my kid take a truck that I bought, I insure, I put gas in, and I have to pay to repair off the road for one second

I'm about 5 years older then you and on my 3rd XJ, I've got them all with my own money and I gas them and repair them, My parents got heated when I brought the blazer home even a little muddy, so you can only imagine when I brought it home totaled

Once I bought my own Jeep and was paying for it they never made a peep so i'd keep that in mind

I could go on for hours with shitty happenings while wheeling and i'm not even that old, but the good times far outweight them, keep at it dude

I got a similar story out in your parts.

I had just bought my 87 4Runner and went to go visit my brother out at UMASS. We went to some party out in an old farmhouse with a field near the Hadley Police Dept.

I drank a ton of beers and decided it would be fun to take it mudding through the field. I put it in 4wd and floored it off the grass and into the cornfield only to make it about 50 feet and got stuck, axle deep in mud. It was really wet out and I was trying to reverse it out but the front wheels weren't spinning. I realized my front hubs were junk in that thing and i was stuck in mud in 2wd.

I asked some kid with a brand new Silverado to pull me out and he said f-off so I just kept revving it till the neighbors flipped and called the cops. They saw 20 drunk kids coverd in mud trying to get this thing out, and just told us to wait till the morning to get it. So I came back with my buddy with a Grand Cherokee and we pulled it out.

Driving away on soft grass I got stuck again and had to get pulled out again. It sucked dude. make sure your gear is in good shape before you go wheeling... and dont try to go through mud with bald tires and in 2wd.

Great western mass stories, keep em coming. I'll be out in amherst on sunday and am in the process of making a custom bumper.

If you wana wheel i got a lota buddies that go so let mek now if u wana come

Time to go drink beer seeing its my 21'st.
Cheers,
Alex

Lucky, I ruined my motor my first time out.

Great you got out. I realize you are only 16, but here's your lesson now.

ILLEGAL WHEELING RUINS THE SPORT FOR EVERYONE

Whether it be a harmless looking construction sight, or an seemingly unmarked trail, illegal wheeling is still just that, illegal.

Please don't wheel illegally. It gives everyone a bad rep, and fights against progress towards maintaining trails and opening new wheeling.

I'm surprised no one else has said this yet.

End rant.

x2, i never thought anything of going where i shouldnt, until i got caught. I felt like a menace to society. Aside from that, Im pretty sure its a rule that you break something your first time out. I had motor mounts go, which lead to a leaking radiator, and a cut A/C steel line (in addition to being stuck). And of course I didnt learn my lesson then, I had to go through another radiator to get the point. Offroading will break things. Ill stick to the potholes in traffic until I can build a single purpose offroad XJ

Nothing there implied he was wheeling illegally. An unpaved road in a neighborhood is still that, a road. I'd be willing to put a $20 down that the road is on the city map, it was grated with taxpayers dollars, and the only thing done wrong was a lack of going prepared.

I'm sorry that your first experiance went south like that. Take your time, be chill, and with time your mother will probably be willing to go again. You didn't get stuck and require a tow truck, and you didn't do anything wrong. The experiance sounds like it was a bad one for your mother, but in time she'll realize that nothing happened but a lesson learned and a $75 tire.. which you were capable of changing yourself given a little time and getting home.

My first time offroading in my first 4x4 truck was alone, panicked, trying to find where I left my father laying next to his dirtbike with a broken collarbone and arm out in the middle of the desert two hours before. It took a total of six hours from crash to recovery, and another 3 to the hospital .. and probably three months before he was able to do simple things like get in a car and drive somewhere.. more than a year before he was able to go to work. I was 15, had gotten my learners permit no more than a month before.. and it was my first time not only offroad in a truck, but driving stick (although, i had the idea down from my dirt bike). I blew the engine, flattened a tire, and did some fair body damage. Dad fixed all of that given the circumstance, but it took a really long time until he was physically able.

Now I wheel a built cherokee and he wheels a built Range Rover.

It doesn't sound to me like your first time went so bad.. be calm and work with your parents, and they will eventually work with you. Check for a local jeep club, see if you can go out with them - adults, not a bunch of teenagers - as a passenger. Parent's like when you learn about your interests in a safe and responsible manner.

With these large number of hezbollah training camps in the US, who knows who could be lurking in the neighborhood. At least you don't have kids in the back telling you your going to jail for offroading in restricted areas.

the road wasnt illegal...i know the builder...he sold our land to us and his firends with the man who built our house...it isnt on the maps but not a big deal...i will just head back out in the spring and try it again...dont worry im not giving u guys a bad name...it was ILLEGAL...people run and walk down there...i even seen dirt bikes tearing downw the road..no worries

bmyohn said:

...dont worry im not giving u guys a bad name...it was ILLEGAL...people run and walk down there...i even seen dirt bikes tearing downw the road..no worries

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did you mean it was "NOT" illegal??? that would be a little better.

don't worry. take your time with the whole offroading thing. instead of being so worried about going wheeling, how about you start learing about the jeep, what it has, how to fix it, and how/what to upgrade. that way you can slowly start building up your jeep a little bit to make it handle better, and if you do find yourself in a situation like that, you'll know how to handle it better. i'm sure your parents would also be alot happier with you if you can fix the stuff yourself instead of having to take it to a shop everytime.

but for now, how about you upgrade the tires first. not necessarily for offroading, but even for the street and snow. as your first set of "upgraded" street tire, i would recommend a set of GOODYEAR WRANGLER AT/S. my wife had those on her jeep for the first few street year. they look slightly aggressive, without some of the negatives of mud tires, and they also work really well in mild offroading. and in my opinion work MUCH MUCH better than BFG's.

bmyohn said:

i started to take out the donught and the jack...at first i put the jack on the rails by the door because that is where i have always seen my dad put it on his sequoia...well it didnt lift it up at all...

he then tried to explain to me that my jack wouldnt lift the jeep and he said we should call AAA

i went on and disregarded his statement...the jack worked fine once i put it on the sub-frame...i took of the rim and put on the donught...i felt so bad!

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Are you talking about the stock bottle jack from under the back seat, or something else? The stock jack lifts from the axle tube.

Do yourself a favor and read the owner's manual. What works on a Toyota will not necessarily work on a Jeep.

Oh, and before you go any further afield than a dirt road, look into finding yourself a full-size spare tire.

rob

the jack is supposed to go on the axel...i put it on the sub frame and it worked fine...didnt know that thanks