I think a programmable led setup would have been awesome.

Me too... alas, ESAB did not fully agree.

On a related note: it's crunch time. I have been heading to the shop afterwork the last few days and will be taking Wednesday and Thursday off to be at the shop all day, wrapping up and race prepping the buggy. If you are on the east side and want to swing by, text me to see if I'm still there, but the more hands the merrier at this point. It won't fully reach epic "Geoff's Driveway" status, but we'll be working up until the last possible minute and "pre-running" on Friday will more than likely also be the shakedown run. LOL.

Wrapping up the rear with the bumper (which must extend beyond the rear tires) and a little extra protection for the fuel cell and the fuel cell shut off valve.




Skins on with a coat of black paint on the BACK since the wrap wouldn't be ready in time for the race. Co-driver Mike Bradley putting in his time to help with the car.




Jeff Wilstead, welding right up until the absolute last minute before she had to go on the buggy. We ran out of time for a proper skid plate, so my old skid plate was just welded on. Good thing we didn't need access to the transfer case during the race. ;-)




View of the rear dovetail and the rear tire clearance.




Rear end again, skins in place, rear tail lights being installed. This is NOT the final spare tire location. We simply set the tire up there to get it out of the way. A spare tire mount will be fabbed that keeps the weight over the rear axle.




OFFICIALLY - she started on her own and drove up into the trailer... which looks almost custom made for her. We are ready to go racing!




Andrew's big trailer w/living quarters on the left, new welding support and 2nd car trailer behind my truck.




Once we got to the race location, she wouldn't start. At all. Drove on to the trailer, wouldn't drive off. We pushed her off and started chasing electrical demons...




We got her running after about 4 hours and hit the course for pre-running. We made it 1.5 miles before she died... had to take a strap home AND we ran down the battery trying to get her going, so I had to get a jump from Michael D'Avy's honda. Those little portable battery machines are pretty handy. ;-) The Friday before the race was a really REALLY long and frustrating day.

We did finally get to pre-run more than 1.5 miles. Simon Saines with Slapstick media snapped this shot while pre-running and posted it to the Ultra4 facebook page... most action the car had seen all day! LOL.




We made it to race mile 12 and lost power steering on the ram. The fittings were rubbing against the front dif and had come loose, spraying PS fluid all over the place. Crew Chief got down with an angle grinder and helped create clearance. HUGE thanks and props to Crew Chief for all his help on Friday.




Saturday morning rolled around. Daniel Avis and I started the day off with a prayer for the drivers and the car. Mike Bradley and I took it up to the starting line and were as ready as we could be for the race. It was such a rush to even get the car put back together, the only stickers we had were race numbers to make her legal. Andrew helped with the LetzRoll branding.







Here are some race shots of the car in action. Only issue we had was the fuel line coming loose from the fuel filter (at race mile 1.5!!!! Same stinkin' place we had died the day before! Mike Bradley crafted a fuel line harness out of zip ties that held up the rest of the race!)

So incredibly proud of this team. In 10 days we went from this to this:




We also just happened to win the race! Back of the pack to 1st place! There were GREAT competitors with great rigs, but ours is the one that held together. A true testimony to the team that build this car.




I was beat, but happy.




In fact... so happy that I decided ONE NIGHT of celebration wasn't enough. I took the trophy to work with me on Monday, as well as other places during the week. This team deserved more than one night of honor.

Monday




Wednesday...




Friday lunch with Tim Ray...




Great job, team. I sure am proud of you guys!

A couple of race observations on the changes:

1. Lowering the center of gravity: totally worth it. Handled so much nicer and in control on the corners. No massive sway or "top heavy" feeling when diving into corners. Both my co-driver and me noticed it immediately. Great stability and feeling.

2. AW4 swap: again, totally worth it. I run an Atlas 4 speed transfer case and run most of these races in 2:1 ratio (great for getting up and down washes and enough pull to rock crawl without having to go lower... use the skinny pedal! LOL.) Top end was where I was losing out. The extra gear in the AW4 let us get great top end speeds without having to go to 1:1 ratio. Makes a difference on these short, tight courses to be able to get up to speed and then out of it without having to do much.

3. RADesigns Baja III shifter: We were able to run a prototype of the Baja III shifter from RAD. LOVE IT. Took me a couple of miles to get natural on the shift gates (I kept jumping the gate from 2nd to 3rd and kept pushing up in to 4th without meaning to...). Once I figured out there was a gate on the right side, I could easily and comfortably go from 2nd - push it full right and up to 3rd where it stopped, then release it and we were in 3rd until I needed 4th. Such great control. I rode 2nd and 3rd gear all through the course and the ability to shift when and where and HOW I needed too increased our speed significantly. Exactly what I wanted to do.. drive it like a stick without having to screw with the clutch when rock crawling. Strongly recommend.

4. Weight distribution: Part of the build was to redistribute the weight since it was pretty nose heavy. We moved the fuel cell back, but we were not able to get the spare tire mount in place. Back end was still light. Jury is out on the effectiveness of this one. We'll need to wait and see how she handles once the spare is mounted an on.

5. Overall weight loss: losing the tub and going with skins was great. She was dynamic and responsive and I could feel the difference being lighter made, especially in the rocks. I am very happy with this change. Next step is to actually do the wrap and skin her. The "Ninja Black" is cool and all, but I miss the red and I noticed the loss of horsepower from loss of stickers. Stickers make you faster. ;-)

Great assessment man. Thanks for letting us know why you keep getting faster 8)

Baby needed new shoes... so a fresh set of Pit Bull Rocker radials going on.

Fresh tires all the way around for the Dirt Riot Rampage in Bridgeport, TX this weekend.

Rock rings yellow in prep for the new ESAB wrap for Hammers.

Cool

When I did a front summersault I kinda bent the cage. :-)

Here is the repair process. LOL.

http://youtu.be/YzUXSkb-rv0

Nice man very nice

Surprisingly short build list for this year... well, at least compared to previous years anyway

ESAB vehicle wrap (Jan 8th - scheduled)
Rewire the entire buggy (race wiring, circuit beakers, strip out old wiring harness, power block, etc...) ~ In Progress
New skid plate ~ LROR to fab ~ In Progress
New spare tire carrier ~ LROR to fab ~ In Progress
New tire and rim sponsors
Goodyear tires for 2014
Raceline Wheels for 2014
Mount new tires on new rims
Break down Pit Bulls from the Walker Evans (T.C. has dibs on the tires, but the rims will be for sale)
New steering column (true buggy steering column instead of the current stock / mess) ~ In Progress
New dash (simplified, smaller, ROUNDED so I don't cut me leg when I roll...) ~ In Progress
New 5 point harnesses (already arrived, just need to install) ~ In Progress
New 2.5" ADS coilovers with reservoirs (old shocks were the 2" Radflo). ~ In Progress
ADS is a new team sponsor for 2014 (old Radflo are already sold/spoken for)
Install race radio (ordered from Rugged, along with Push to Talk buttons, antenna, install kit, etc...)
New Griffin race radiator ~ Complete
New high flow fan ~ In Progress
Install new ARTEC battery holder (Yellow Top specific)
Install new ARTEC quart crate carrier
Install new police siren

Shock tuning in Johnson Valley with ADS is scheduled for January 4th. I'm really looking forward to factor support all season with custom ADS shock tuning.

Here are a completely of rough ideas of the new dash concept (it will be a "center console" style dash so that Frosty and I can both reach everything). Of course I'll post specifics once its built.

The 2013 “Road Trip” was awesome. Dusty, dirty, rocky, and fast… I was blessed to be able to race in California, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, and Texas. None of that would have been possible without the great guys who were brave enough to get in the car with me. Thank you Geoff, Ivan, Army Mike, Miller, and Chris. (sorry I almost killed you, Chris... and you too, Geoff.)

This video is just a ride through the desert from inside the cab, starting with the Everyman Challenge and ending with the Dirt Riot Rampage… thousands of road miles, hundreds of dirt miles, stories, jokes, smiles, beers, friends, and family… what a great 2013. Thanks for riding along with me on this adventure.

http://youtu.be/9qmSPwPFbPQ

Shock tuning in Johnson Valley with ADS happened last weekend. ADS shock support on the lakebed (and at the shop) is amazing. They weren't happy with their level of control dialing it in fully, so they want to add by-pass shocks to the rear. Um... OK! LOL.


How she sits without the spare on the Lakebed:




Shock tuning (but you can see the location of the spare):

Cant wait to see this bad boy fly over the finish line!

Awesome Alan, just awesome.

So sexy! What happened to the wrap pictures promised Friday night??? :p

LOL. More wrap delays, so we pulled the buggy back to the shop for another week while they get their act together. We lost a week of shop time... :-(

alanzona wrote: We lost a week of shop time... :-(

Ouch..

After tuning, we did what every good team does... completely gutted the car three weeks before Hammers and started a complete, front to rear, re-wire of the whole buggy. During this process, we elected to change put he dash as well so that it is better for both Frosty and I to reach everything.

3 weeks before Hammers:










There was a HUGE pile of "trouble waiting to happen" that has been removed from the car. There were four generations of wires: Stock, Troy's crap, first EMC efforts, and two years of patches / fixes / butt connectors.




Here are the new harnesses about to go in. Wiring was completed this weekend. I'm pretty sure we used all yellow wire for everything to make it easy. ;-)





HUGE shoutout to Joe and the guys at Austin Machine for the custom drive shafts! Really appreciate it and can't wait to get them on the car.





While shock tuning, we never fully got it dialed in and the guys at ADS decided they wanted to go with triple bypass shocks (in addition to my 2.5" Coilovers) as well so we could fine tune and make up for some of my horsepower issues with suspension speed. Here they are being build in Tucson, AZ at ADS. Fantastic products and over the top service.





Oh yeah... and we released our 2014 race schedule! Looking forward to see in old friends, meeting new ones, and racing hard. We leave for KOH on Feb 1st. The vehicle wrap and some other odd and ends need to be completed the next 10 days, then we are already to LetzRoll!