4500 Mile Trip Planning for a 1st Gen

I bet that has more to do with your leaf springs than your shocks.

Glad to hear things are going well. Post some pictures.

 

Yeah I messed with OD off a bit and it was better.

If I traveled this much on a regular basis I'd definitely upgrade leaf springs.
Rear shocks are original 4600s so I'm sure they aren't doing great.

Haven't gone anywhere super cool yet. Been visiting family. Going to Mount Rushmore in a bit. Will try and snap some pics soon. I've done all the driving so far (my own fault) so not much free time to hop on here or anything.

 

I recently took a trip out to west Texas in mine towing a small 1500lb trailer. It did a lot of gear hunting in CC, even on small grades. I found toggling OD helped a lot, but similarly ended up not using cruise as much, and always having od off.

Looks like an awesome trip. Excited to hear about the progress. We plan to take ours up to glacier NP at some point this summer, camping in National forest and BLM land on the way.

 

No need to drive 80 just cause that’s the speed limit. 65-70 is pretty decent in these trucks. Any faster and the wind drag and the weight your carrying around is gonna fight you hard. Your MPG would likely improve 2-3mpg going 10mph slower. Unless your in a big hurry, find a great station or stream a great channel and lay back and enjoy the ride. Leafs are likely worn out like mine. Shocks help, but I need new springs. Your carrying a bunch of weight. Exacerbates the problem.

 

Great read so far. I can't imagine the hit your wallet is taking with fuel costs. We were planning a trip out west this summer, but once fuel prices started to climb, we reconsidered..
Have fun, take some pictures and enjoy every mile!

 

All of this!!
I tried to stay at 65-70 on our last trip, trying to keep our friends with a trailer in view, definitely no need to do 80 with no sway bars. I also went slower than normal on the trip up due to weight and only having a inch or two of suspension travel being weighted down so much. My bhole clinched going over certain bridge transitions on the way up!

 

Agreed! With weight and trailer I found ~60-65 to be a pretty nice sweet spot on open roads to get pretty reasonable fuel economy.

 

I drive my 2001 everywhere without really even thinking about it. I drove 10 hours to Kansas one way. I drove to SD to hunt birds 12 hours one way. Planning to drive 8 hours to Moab very soon. If it runs well and hasn't given you any issues, then highway miles should not be a problem.

 

In my opinion, keep OD on, pick up speed on the highway and try to keep rpm's under 3k. Acceleration might suffer but driving like that has saved me fuel on my long trips (Seattle -> Wyoming -> Black Hills/Mt Rushmore -> Utah -> Idaho -> Seattle).

I only use cruise control selectively. Flat road, not much traffic.

 

Yeah I wish we had more time to BS on the way but a week and a half is all we got so I'm trying to get where I'm going as quick as possible with a few stops on the way.

We planned this trip 3 or 4 months ago and I said gas wasn't gonna stop me from going. It hurts on the wallet a bit but I think it's worth it.

It's got a lot of new parts on it with few miles. I'm driving the truck further on this trip than I have since I've owned it.

Here's a pic from Mt Rushmore.
Nothing too crazy exciting there but glad we went and saw it.


Off to bed now. On to CO in the morning.

 

Made it to CO. Check engine light turned itself off. About to go out and do some trails we know from prior years.

 

Won't help much but at least gas mileage will improve until it comes back.

 

It's the old downstream o2 sensor I couldn't get the nut off of. Don't think downstream has anything to do with how the truck runs though. Gas mileage varies quite a bit anyway from the different land we travel over so I'm not sure I'd even notice.

 

Correct...thought I read front earlier, so keep on trucking and have a safe enjoyable trip !

 

So I made a mistake assuming trails would be open where we are in CO. Everything is closed because of snow buildup. Hoping Moab will be better to us.

Odd observation I've made is that the truck is shifting better from 1st to 2nd. As long as I've owned it 1st to 2nd has bang shifted. Takes a bit less than a second to complete the shift. It's almost entirely quit doing that but now 2nd to 3rd is a bit rougher than before. Not sure what's caused any of this but just something I've noticed.

Various pics




This is what the cool jeep people do I guess


And one I missed from the drive to CO when they had a temporary traffic light set up and we sat and waited for 10 minutes due to construction.





Heading to Moab tomorrow.

 

Been a bit behind due to just going non stop.

Moab was fantastic. Did a bit of offroading in the truck but ended up renting a RZR for 8 hours and we went all over the place. If anyone has time to go I highly recommend it.


I've got a weird clunk in the driver side front end that I'm hoping is my sway bar end link. I know others have leveled and run stock links but just seems they aren't long enough as the bushings are pretty well ruined and the bar is rubbing on the metal of the end link. Doesn't make any noise on the road only off the road so just rolling with it.

Spent part of a day in New Mexico and we just went around and saw some of the Breaking Bad locations are dinner and went to bed.

Went to Texas yesterday and met up with @bmf4069 and went to dinner.


Went to Cadillac Ranch this morning and are on our way to Tennessee now.

Pretty soon after leaving TX my corner light that has a clip missing popped all the way out and all the clips that were left broke so had to get creative and drilled a hole in a couple places to run 2 zip ties through to get back home.


Have P0420 again but not worried about it. All good otherwise.

 

Meeting with the legend bmf himself is sure to be the highlight of your trip.

 

Lol. I'm no legend, just a dumbass with an internet connection.

 

I kinda agree with Evan, I think we need a “dinner with BMF” thread

 

This sounds like a solid idea. Maybe "Michelob Ultras with BMF" instead, but dinner works too.

And you are a legend in my opinion. The only man on the face of the internet that had solid information on my rear axle seal leak that is now fixed. I pressure washed my wheel far too many times getting all that grease of em. Forever in your debt BMF.

 

nah, gotta stick around for breakfast. Dudes a gourmet chef when it comes to eggs and bacon.

 

Damn, we need a breaky with bmf thread!

 

Don't forget washing car parts in the dishwasher.

 

Gorgeous pictures!

 

Been busy but we made it home yesterday. Nothing eventful for the last bit of the way home. I don't know that I'd do it again but we don't regret the trip at all. Everything is really hectic most the time though we did see a lot of cool stuff.

Glad things went smoothly overall. We did skip the Grand Canyon on this trip as it cut out about 6 hours. We are hoping to make a separate trip out that direction and see that and Vegas and maybe some of California.

It was nice to meet up with someone else from here and lay around in a parking lot and look at truck stuff just like the first time I met up with @Tundra2

Y'all get out there and see some stuff.

Need to get my fuel receipts together and calculate fuel costs.

 

Glad you made it back in one piece! If you're ever back out this way just holler.

 

Little overdue but I finally added up all the receipts I had in the center console. Totaled $1034.72 for gas for this trip. Though it looks like from my MPG notes that I'm missing 3 so probably closer to $1200 or so if I had to guess.
Still enjoyed this trip, wish we could do it again but with a month of time instead of a week and a half.