- First Name
- Valhalla
- Joined
- Jan 29, 2017
- Threads
- 85
- Messages
- 3,561
- Reaction score
- 6,933
- Location
- Chattanooga Tn
- Vehicle(s)
- 2023 Bronco,1996 Bronco, '05F350, '14JKU, '13Silverado, '26Atlas cross sport
- Your Bronco Model
- Badlands
- Thread starter
- #1
We hit the general store parking lot about 8 am. We off-loaded vehicles met a new face from the Windrock 6G group @lanline who will forever be the gasman to me (more on that later). We headed out of the parking lot and hit 61 and took Big mountain road to come in on 35. We made our way to 81a This is a "difficult" trail (black diamond on the windrock scale). A few rocks twist and turns and we easily climbed this steep trail. We had a couple of wrong turns into dead ends to contend with and got on to 81, another difficult trail. They have dozed the deep rutted section of this trail. So we quickly put this one in the rear view with only minor rock obstacles that did not stop our quartet of 2 Broncos A Taco and a TJ. We made it to 35 and had some confusion as to whether we had made trail 26 (it was actually 35) and we made it over some rough twisty tire lifting fully flexed out sections. (at least for a 2 door). I led up and across one of the many natural gas lines and came out on the junction of 35/G35. I heard the call back and sound of "Johnny just lost a tire" I told him to get past the gasline to where the trail was flat before he lost all his air. As I walked back down the hill, I could hear the 4-banger grumbling as it rotated the GY MT across the gash. "swoosh!! to ssss... Swosh!! ssss.." As I approached, I thought "damn! how much air is this guy running in his tire??" Then I thought oh God, is that hot antifreeze I am starting to smell?? I could see then from where the noise was coming. front right, the smell was getting stronger, and my brain was scrambling to match the smell to what distillate that was from. I saw the tire looked to still have offroad pressure as the gasman rammed and prodded low gear in the pony to climb!!! I noticed he was cutting to climb the bank and as he tried the GY would flex and let his wheel bang into... into the GAS LINE!!!! that smell is the chemical they put in natural gas!!!!!! HOLY SHIT HE RUPTURED THE GASLINE!! my brain screamed!! I told him to get out of there it was gas!! He shut the engine off.... "no" I said "back down the hill!! get away!!" I called out on the GMRS for the others to turn around and head back (there was a bypass on G35). I called Windrock security once I got to a place my cell could get out. I told them we were on 26 and had ruptured the gas line.. the guy on the phone said " so do you need a ride to the parking lot" I realized I was unclear and said "no the gas line in the ground. He said " OH the natural gas pipe!" I said we would keep people off till they arrived. This is where my MISTAKE of where we were at cost an hour. We were still on 35, not yet to the turn on to trail 26. my cell lost reception after that and we waited. We turned 3 groups back from the trail and I honestly almost left. i put it up for a vote and Jason "Tallboy' was the voice of reason. I carry 2 phones on different carriers so I went to a spot and found reception. I was calling to give a polite where the hell are y'all at and when the hell are you coming. From the vantage I got to just before they answered I could plainly see the skinny yellow post with "35" on it at the trailhead. I quickly explained to the guy I was a douche and He needed to have them come to 35@ g35. He called the gentleman in the security SXS and directed him to us... We asked he said this happens 6 to 8 times a month. I was floored. There is a lot of exposed gas line in the park as after probably 100 years of coal mining they converted to pull gas out of these peaks.
We were rolling again. We hooked up with 26 not far from there, did some rocks and ledges getting down to the pavilion, made a wrong turn and had to back track a bit. and hit pavement, the tiny town right there was having a fall festival we had to dogleg around, and we were out on hwy 116 known in the biker world as the devil's triangle. (It has more curves than the infamous tail of the dragon.) We passed the old prison (Brushy Mountain is now a tourist place a brewery and restaurant.) and got back to trail at 43. They have dozed the first section as the ruts were getting deep enough 37's struggled in wet weather to get up through here. This section has several rock sections that are challenging. Gas man had to remove his steps on the "big" obstacle (or have the auto removal the boulder had in store for him occur). We made the rocks on this area with ease and twisted up into G6. We had a short snack break talked to a nice lady from Missouri wheeling her ducked out JKU that had lost her group. We then headed to American knob (83) to hit 82. (I think Gas man said they call it brake check). We got to the gatekeeper which has only gotten worse. I had to heat up the Mickey Ts as they were not sticking to the rock very well. Several attempts later and I was up unassisted. Gas man saw the trouble I had and decided to save it for another day as the last obstacle is a bit of a doozy. He took 83 as a bypass and met us at the last obstacle. We got there, I'd like to say there is no go around from here to this obstacle, this was my fourth time here. Every group I have made it here with has decided to save it for another day. Every time we turned back...not this day! We looked at our options. this is basically a multi-step down boulder in the bank you are coming off of with a right-side rut of about 4 feet. The path is to hug the bank at the top of the boulder on the driver side drop the driver tire off the first edge (about 1 foot) while the passenger front starts the rollover of the edge going into the 4-foot rut. the complication is that this is all on about a 20* angle sloping down with two rocks only inches wider than the track on most vehicles. You rock slightly driver before dropping hard passenger. Then belly slide forward as the driver side steps about 1 more foot down and then you drop 3 feet. You are now leaning driver ass on the rock passenger tire on the rut wall. Hard turn driver drops the keister off the rock. The roll potential is high if you are not accurate and quick to be between throttle and brake. Our solution to safely traversing was to have a vehicle strapped to a tree winch everyone down to mitigate the roll potential. Tall boy dove the taco off first. A spotter and a winch controller (brake man) let the person in the vehicle work the brake and steer in increments as the winch is let out. Rigging takes a few minutes some tedious minutes lowering then they are free to drive down the hill! After the long wheelbase test subject was dropped down, we hooked up the TJ. The short wheelbase gave us a few tense seconds but was quicky down as we had learned where the danger spots were. We reset to a different spot to let me use my rear winch to drop myself down, after a couple of rigging glitches I was on my way! winch controller in the right had, tiller in the left and right foot braking. I had a front and rear spotter as I have only used the rear winch one time to pull and never with this much stress. Honestly inside it felt fine. I have not seen the pictures yet, they said I had tires "way up in the air". The first part I left the disco hooked and actually turtled to where I needed some human "help" moving down. Kevin put a strap on the bull bar and pulled me from about 30 feet away to break the friction on the skid. his 200# broke me immediately free. I had hit the disco and it let me slide forward and took pressure off the tire on the rut wall. The sun was westering, and we decided to get while the getting was good. We had started around 8:20 and were back to the store at 5 to load up. It was a good day.
I will upload the pictures I have and include the ones from the others as I receive them over the next week.
Valhalla
We were rolling again. We hooked up with 26 not far from there, did some rocks and ledges getting down to the pavilion, made a wrong turn and had to back track a bit. and hit pavement, the tiny town right there was having a fall festival we had to dogleg around, and we were out on hwy 116 known in the biker world as the devil's triangle. (It has more curves than the infamous tail of the dragon.) We passed the old prison (Brushy Mountain is now a tourist place a brewery and restaurant.) and got back to trail at 43. They have dozed the first section as the ruts were getting deep enough 37's struggled in wet weather to get up through here. This section has several rock sections that are challenging. Gas man had to remove his steps on the "big" obstacle (or have the auto removal the boulder had in store for him occur). We made the rocks on this area with ease and twisted up into G6. We had a short snack break talked to a nice lady from Missouri wheeling her ducked out JKU that had lost her group. We then headed to American knob (83) to hit 82. (I think Gas man said they call it brake check). We got to the gatekeeper which has only gotten worse. I had to heat up the Mickey Ts as they were not sticking to the rock very well. Several attempts later and I was up unassisted. Gas man saw the trouble I had and decided to save it for another day as the last obstacle is a bit of a doozy. He took 83 as a bypass and met us at the last obstacle. We got there, I'd like to say there is no go around from here to this obstacle, this was my fourth time here. Every group I have made it here with has decided to save it for another day. Every time we turned back...not this day! We looked at our options. this is basically a multi-step down boulder in the bank you are coming off of with a right-side rut of about 4 feet. The path is to hug the bank at the top of the boulder on the driver side drop the driver tire off the first edge (about 1 foot) while the passenger front starts the rollover of the edge going into the 4-foot rut. the complication is that this is all on about a 20* angle sloping down with two rocks only inches wider than the track on most vehicles. You rock slightly driver before dropping hard passenger. Then belly slide forward as the driver side steps about 1 more foot down and then you drop 3 feet. You are now leaning driver ass on the rock passenger tire on the rut wall. Hard turn driver drops the keister off the rock. The roll potential is high if you are not accurate and quick to be between throttle and brake. Our solution to safely traversing was to have a vehicle strapped to a tree winch everyone down to mitigate the roll potential. Tall boy dove the taco off first. A spotter and a winch controller (brake man) let the person in the vehicle work the brake and steer in increments as the winch is let out. Rigging takes a few minutes some tedious minutes lowering then they are free to drive down the hill! After the long wheelbase test subject was dropped down, we hooked up the TJ. The short wheelbase gave us a few tense seconds but was quicky down as we had learned where the danger spots were. We reset to a different spot to let me use my rear winch to drop myself down, after a couple of rigging glitches I was on my way! winch controller in the right had, tiller in the left and right foot braking. I had a front and rear spotter as I have only used the rear winch one time to pull and never with this much stress. Honestly inside it felt fine. I have not seen the pictures yet, they said I had tires "way up in the air". The first part I left the disco hooked and actually turtled to where I needed some human "help" moving down. Kevin put a strap on the bull bar and pulled me from about 30 feet away to break the friction on the skid. his 200# broke me immediately free. I had hit the disco and it let me slide forward and took pressure off the tire on the rut wall. The sun was westering, and we decided to get while the getting was good. We had started around 8:20 and were back to the store at 5 to load up. It was a good day.
I will upload the pictures I have and include the ones from the others as I receive them over the next week.
Valhalla
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