Trying to bring this community back... Just finished an engine swap on my Cherokee. Did the rebuild myself -- did a 4.6L stroker with an aluminum head. About 120 miles into the break in process.
That's exactly what happened for me. I follow this on Mastodon and saw your post finally show up today.
This was taken on a cruise on a rare day when the sun came out and I could watch the sun set -- at 11pm. :D
I figured I'd post just a short trip report for a Sand Hollow trip in Utah that we did last weekend.
The forecast we super hot for both days (over 100 degrees) so we decided to go in the morning.
We ran Milts Mile on Saturday. That was a really fun trail, but it claimed my passenger-side hub knob. I was able to scoot up middle monkey (which was hella steep but surprisingly not too scary).
The off-camber stuff scared me the most. In the photo above, this section of rock had me in my head so much that I stopped and my spotter and to jump out and assure me the passenger tire was still on the ground.
I don't have sway bars at all (with plans to fix that) so I get tons of body roll.
On Sunday, we ran Ridgeline and the first part of West Rim trail. My wife drove that day and had zero problems with the initial shelves and rocky climb on Ridgeline.
She was able to take the "fun" lines at the Funnel and Steps as well.
What blew me away is she managed to drive up Toll Booth #1. I didn't want to try and drive it because I was worried about the amount of body roll my XJ has, but she wanted to give it a shot, and boy did she ever.
Finally, we hit Top of the World - snagged the photo, and left via the Water Tank "road".
We've got another weekend trip planned in November and we can't wait to go back!
Recently took a cruise to alaska and the weather cleared up a bit in time for sunset.
I've got an ARB awning tent that packs relatively compact and light that I use for camping when wheeling. Works super well for me and my dogs (or whoever's with me).
Western utah after driving through a storm two weeks ago.
A couple years ago, my buddy and I had just finished enough of his SAS project on the hundie that we needed a test drive. This trail is relatively close and has some great views. We managed to rope our other friend (who owns the orange FJC) into it as well.
Nothing failed and all the welds stayed welded, so that was nice.
I've been following Jeremy's project as well. It looks super clean. I've seen an 80 series that's been converted, and an XJ. Seems like they use prius/nissan leaf parts mostly and they do okay.
Range is the biggest problem though. The way I see it, EVs fit the Rock Crawler use case pretty good (unload from a trailer, run a technical, 10-mile trail with a lot of sitting around and watching other people roll over). Overland is really limited by range though. Towing doesn't even seem to be an option.