Devils Pit 19/09/10

[hipo1024]

My 1st PnP day ever as a driver and what a blast!! I went there with my brother and a friend and of course my truck!

I made it round all day on road tyres and only got stuck twice, both of which I got cross axled/beached so all in all I'm bl#dy chuffed! I was expecting to be getting stuck all the time, even more so when I checked the weather and it was ment to be heavy rain the night before. I made it up some prity steep inclines, and down some even steeper decents!

I havn't washed the car yet so I dont know if these any paint damage (it was very scratchy), but as bobbinsjob warned me my rad did get clogged with silt and as a result the temp gauge kept bouncing between 80 and 100, but never went above 100 so hopfully it's a-ok! I did take a squirty bottle with me, hense why the temp went down, and then back up again. When we got back to my local yet wash I unbolted the top rad brackets, pushed it back a bit and gave it a blast and its stayed at 85 since.
The lady at the "gate" said that we'd probably loose our side steps....but they didnt even get bent! Also those standard skid plates took a beating without breaking a sweat, or breaking! Althogh I think the cross member for the torsion bars took most the the hammering as its bang in the middle.

Heres what it looked like on the way home when we stoped off for grub. - and yes I know I diped the air box corner in the drink, but it was shallower on that side - I havn't checked the air filter to see if it got wet or not, but I guess it probably did a bit.





Are there any area's I need to clean other than the body and underside, would it be a good idea to take the skids off and yet wash the underside of the engine and g/box ect.?? any hard to get spots that need cleaning out to prevent catastrophic rust?
Dan

[bobbinsjob]

You're a braver man than me Dan. Great to see you had a good time. Just make sure you give the rad a good hosing and the intercooler. not jetwash bar risk of damage to the fins

[Rifleman]

Seems that your roof light gota bit of a doing too. They're blinding aircraft pilots.

[hipo1024]

I've just cleaned it and OMG! it has loads of deep scratches. what's the best thing to put on them?
thanks, dan

[BoxCleva]

I had a similar problem after this weekends greenlaning. A couple of hard polishing sessions with Autoglym super resin polish sorted mine. When you say deep, do you mean to the metal ?

[jason]

Don't worry about the scratches mate,you will get loads of them,i have gave up trying to polish them out

I take it,that you have not checked your air box yet
I would do asap,and take a photo,so we can see

[gregster]

I've just cleaned it and OMG! it has loads of deep scratches. what's the best thing to put on them?

FOG STICKERS!!!!

[bobbinsjob]

thats right!!!! why do you think mine has more stickers than paint

[hipo1024]

I had a similar problem after this weekends greenlaning. A couple of hard polishing sessions with Autoglym super resin polish sorted mine. When you say deep, do you mean to the metal ?

not to the metal no, but most of them are down to the primer (creamy colour) and they stick out like a b!tch on a black truck. My mate wrote "I like dity things just like your mum" on the bonnet after the 1st go through the lake and then "clean me baby" just before we left and both of these are still readable in the paint
My gran said to use t-cut?? any good? will it do the trick and is it cheap enough to make it worth wile? or shall I stick with Cleva Box's idea of "Autoglym super resin polish"

I take it,that you have not checked your air box yet
I would do asap,and take a photo,so we can see

yeah I have and yes the filter has some mud splattered on it, but only about a quorter of it, if that really and I went through the lake (large puddle) 4 times I think. Im just glad I opted not to go through the middle because it was coming up and over the bonnets of a lot of the disco's (I watched for about 10 mins before sucking up my sak and going for it)
I will post a pic tomorrow for ya.

as for the stickers, my other half wont let me have any more FOG stickers on it because the orange bit clashes......... yeah what ever love.

Damage update: the middle skid/bash plate has a large dent in it, which is odd as its plastic? hmmm may need to look into that.
also the front standard recovery loop got bent, not sure if thats due to mashing it into the ground or from being dragged at a funny angle after getting grounded

[andysd1]

trick of the trade, don't let any one write on a dirty car, it can be worst

[bobbinsjob]

make sure that every bit of that silt is cleaned off, and then I have got an electric bonnet polisher/buffer you can use if you wanna pop over to get it

[BoxCleva]

I have used the coloured polishes on a car with similar problems to yours in the past with reasonable results.

http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stor ... yId_165527

I'd try it by hand first. A buffer might be a bit severe with that.

[FronteraGirl]

Jeez, looks like you had a great day out there!

[hipo1024]

I'll look into prices tomorrow, maybe
We had another spell of overheating today on the M11, which is strange as it was fine all day monday. This morning (before it overheated) I jet washed the engine bay with focus on the oil cooler... so it managed fine with a caped oil cooler, yet overheats with a clean(er) oil cooler....sometimes I just think its me.....but Im sure that dont make much sence???? especially as I was doing 70 (high air flow) and monday I was buzzing around town (low air flow). I'll have to have yet another look at the rad, but it should be clean now... :/

anyways, heres some more pics - the camera hasnt picked up the dirt on the filter very well, but oh well. nothing got through the filter which is the important thing!







enjoy!

[si_hoss]

Hipo - I can't see the pics as at work (they block anything cool) but the only time I took my Frontera off road was at the Devils Pit back in Feb 08 - in fact my profile pic is from there! AWESOME DAY OUT!!

However, cleaning the clay/mud after isn't. I only live in Stevenage but had to stop 4 times due to overheating. And then, the whole truck including engine bay needed a good 6 jet washes to get clean, then the front sump guard might as well have been a massive ice cream scoup!!! No chance of getting it out of there! I saw another Fronty there that day and he was putting card in front of the rad (like a black cab in the winter), which would have been a good way of peeling the mud off for the drive home, although I'd watch the temp when playing.

That colour polish stuff in Halfords did bring the paint up nicely I must say, looked like a new paint job. I think cleaning it after was the main reason I didn't go again before selling it

[hipo1024]

Hipo - I can't see the pics as at work (they block anything cool) but the only time I took my Frontera off road was at the Devils Pit back in Feb 08 - in fact my profile pic is from there! AWESOME DAY OUT!!

However, cleaning the clay/mud after isn't. I only live in Stevenage but had to stop 4 times due to overheating. And then, the whole truck including engine bay needed a good 6 jet washes to get clean, then the front sump guard might as well have been a massive ice cream scoup!!! No chance of getting it out of there! I saw another Fronty there that day and he was putting card in front of the rad (like a black cab in the winter), which would have been a good way of peeling the mud off for the drive home, although I'd watch the temp when playing.

That colour polish stuff in Halfords did bring the paint up nicely I must say, looked like a new paint job. I think cleaning it after was the main reason I didn't go again before selling it

Thats a good idea, putting card infront of the rad. I might look into that because my rad has some really nasty looking fins on it atm.
I lost count how many times we stoped, but it took over 2 and a half hours to get back to cambridge.

Damage update:
The middle skid plate is all shaged out, good n propa! chunks of it are missing and the back two bolt holes are ripped out, well one is, the other has gone altogether, only the front two bolts holding it on now. defo need to get metal ones made up.
Also the trailer power socket got totally owned! because the plate its screwed to has a notch for the cable it hasnt bent all as one and the socket got pulled apart, I still need to bent the plate back so I dunno if I can save it or not yet, but I'm not holding my breath.
And now my aux. belt has started squeeling

fun times, fun times!

Vids coming shortly!

[hipo1024]

ok, the engine has bitten the dust.....see HERE

anyways, the vids........ (mute the sound if your easily offended by some ripe language)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OvW-4U63zbg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZxIla1rwaI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZTwyuDIXss

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9TlP8MnUds

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2g7LLntWIec

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHfGzwGgH7s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kO2I5a1wrZE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5ZwZrfHkB0

[BoxCleva]

Vids aren't showing up . Here's the links.

Considering the tyres I thought it did well

Oh, and there are some rude words, so mute it if you easily offended

http://www.youtube.com/v/OvW-4U63zbg?fs=1&hl=en_GB

http://www.youtube.com/v/yZxIla1rwaI?fs=1&hl=en_GB

http://www.youtube.com/v/6ZTwyuDIXss?fs=1&hl=en_GB

http://www.youtube.com/v/NHfGzwGgH7s?fs=1&hl=en_GB

http://www.youtube.com/v/kO2I5a1wrZE?fs=1&hl=en_GB

http://www.youtube.com/v/o5ZwZrfHkB0?fs=1&hl=en_GB

[hipo1024]

Vids aren't showing up . Here's the links.

hmm, I was hoping it was just my computer, I'l edit the above post then. Also, just to be a pain, you missed 2 of the vids

And thank you, I think it did very well aswell, was very surprised!