Participants

People	Vehicle
Ben Smith	1972 Series III 88"
Jan Barglowski
Gerry Elam	1994 Discovery
Lynn Kot	1995 Defender 90
Jim Holmes
Rick Larson	1994 Defender 90

Itinerary

Friday, 29 December 1995
• Camp: in desert north of Needles for the early arrivals
Saturday, 30 December 1995
• 10am: meet any other arrivals (there were none)
  
• Noonish: Lunch at Piute Creek
  
• Late afternoon: explore the New York Mountains and mines
• Camp: In NY Mtns near Sagimore mine
Sunday, 31 December 1995
• Morning: more exploring of the New York Mountains
• Afternoon: crossing the desert, including Rock Springs
• Camp: Near a hill a few miles east of Marl Springs
Monday, 1 January 1996
• Morning: Crossing Soda Lake (Bed)
• Lunch: at the Gazebo in the Mojave River Wash
• Afternoon: meeting up with pavement and the traffic :(

Memorable Moments

• Gerry's wakeup call of Led Zep II on the first morning.
• Ben's wheelie climbing out of a wash. "Jan, hold on."
• The mines at the New York Mountains.
• Rick's attempt at climbing a mine tailing.
• The (cold) night desert wind.
• Ben's broken Ubolt and subsequent field repair.
• Using the GPS's to determine the New Year.
• Ben going sideways down the wash. (looks like Ben had all the fun!)
• The rock pile in the middle of Soda Lake.
• Lunch in an "anchored" gazebo in the sand dunes.
• Afton Canyon (great scenery, and water!)
• Ben getting stuck in 12" of water -- then the Jeep arrives...

The Full Story

Quotables

• At the mine site, there was a large pile of tailings from a shaft located maybe 100 feet above the streambed. (Anyone for a winching challenge up a 60+ degree tailing pile?). There was a steep trail up to the shaft. Rick with lockers fore and aft decided that he wanted to get his Defender up there. Now to paint the picture. He had to drive off of a 3 foot stream bank into the streambed (which was not much wider than a D90 is long) and then climb up the other side which was the valley wall. The other side was loose (though not tailings) crumbly rock at maybe 45 degrees of slope. If Rick could get his front wheels up 20 or so feet, he would make it. After moving some of the larger (200 lb class) rocks, and locking his diffs, Rick make his attempt. It was too steep. But in attempting, Rick managed to wedge a 6 inch thick, 1.8 foot diameter rock between his frame, rear axle, right rear tyre and the ground. His D90 still had it's front wheels way of the side of the trail. So Rick was "between a Rock and a hard place" With a section of pipe was able to removed the rock with about 10 minutes of work. (And the LR V8 was happily running with no loss or pressure at this extreme angle). After that Rick extracted himself.
  - Ben

• The instant I walked behind the Rover to get a rag, I knew something was wrong. The right rear corner was too low. I peeked underneath and saw the problem. The outboard Ubolt on the right side had snapped at the top of the threads. The Ubolt had bent and dropped the shock mount plate down a few inches on that side. (The Ubolts clamp down on the shock mount plate to hold the spring against the axle. The other UBolt was tweaked. And the plate that the break line attaches to, the one that is supposed to be between the shock plate and the spring had been kicked out, rerouting the brakeline. Luckily the brakeline hadn't kinked and wasn't leaking. So I got out the high lift and jacked up the corner to get the weight off of the Ubolts. While everyone else sat down to eat lunch and watch (and was nice enough to shove food in my direction periodically --thanks guys!). The Ubolts came off as did the brakeline plate and the shock mount plate. I pulled out my spares box and found 2 old Ubolts (I had replaced the existing ones 3 years ago). But the Ubolts were too short (from the front axle). I puzzled a bit. Then someone mentioned taking some leaves off of the spring. A grand idea! I undid the nut and removed the two lowest leaves (the ones that aren't held in by the bent clips). But the bolt that holds the leaves together isn't threaded that far. Despair not, I got a big washer from my toolbox to act as a spacer. I passed the end of the bolt through the shock mount plate, put on the washer and bolted the plate directly to the spring. Then the Ubolts fit. But I only had 3 nuts. Luckily the Ubolt nuts are similar in thread to the nuts that hold the SIII doortops in. So I uses two of those nuts on one side and two Ubolt nuts on the other and attached everything. I was back in business and the field repair had only taken 1 hour 15 minutes. Then I looked under the Rover for more damage. There are now 2 dents in the oil pan and the crossmember under the bellhousing is severely bent and crushed.
  - Ben

• The other highlight (in addition to the desert scenery) was Ben restarting his LR in the middle of the large puddle in Afton Canyon. The water was sill deep on Bens LR when he stalled. I offered a quick tow to dry land but Ben refused. There ensued the funniest field repair I've ever witnessed as Ben unloaded his tools (mainly WD40) from the rear door. Opened his hood, and proceeded to fix his LR without getting off the his LR into the puddle. At least until he had to fish his dropped rotor out of the water. Much better than any scene in the Gods Must Be Crazy. Wish I had a video camera. Just as in the movie the LR was started only after an appropriate amount of cursing and some banged up knuckles.

  Sorry Ben, but the scene was to memorable not to recount. On a positive note you can take this as a sign you'll get the girl in the end.
  -Rick

Gallery

Needles, Colorado River and Piute Wash
New York Mountains, Sagimore Mine
New York Mountains, Left Fork
New York Mountains, Right Fork
Field Repair, Soda Lake and the Gazebo
Some Times a Puddle is Just a Puddle...