I live in Tennessee so we rarely get snow. When we do, it is usually not like the snow they get in colder climates. When I worked the Snow*Drift Rally in Michigan, I got to see what driving in real snow was like.
Here we normally get slush. In colder climates, the snow is more powdery and from my experience in Michigan, actually has some traction. The ice however is about the same both places. Except in Michigan, it seemed at times to actually get cold enough for the rubber to stick to the ice. Here, it never does.
In colder climates, they use soft siped tires like Nokians that get great traction in the ice and snow. A set of siped soft compound tires would not last long here as the roads get warm and dry pretty fast.
This morning I woke up to 17 degrees and about 1/2 inch of snow on the driveway. The ground was solidly frozen underneath. This is rare for Tennessee. Normally the ground will still be slushy under the snow.
I actually considered mounting up the Kumho Rally tires to my Jeep, but correctly guessed that the snow would only be on my half mile long dead end road. Once out on the main road the snow was packed to ice. My BFG AT’s get poor traction in snow and ice but the Kumho Rally tires are not much better on ice.
I used the part time setting of my NP 242 transfer case which locks the center differential as I headed down the steep hill of my driveway. The snow and frozen gravel gave plenty of traction. As I made the transition onto pavement, I found it a bit slipperier but still fine.
As I turned off my dead end road onto the secondary road, I found it covered in ice. I could see from the tire tracks in the ditches and from the number of downed signs and mailboxes that it must be pretty slick. I had no trouble accelerating even up hills in Part Time four wheel drive, but I knew stopping would be another matter.
Just before I topped a steep hill, I tested the barking traction and found indeed it was very slick. I was glad I had topped the hill slowly as I saw there were lots of skid marks on the down slope. I am glad I did not meet whoever was trying to get up earlier and left all the marks in the oncoming lane.
One I made it out to the State Highway which had been salted, I found the normal slush and mostly just wet pavement. Here, I switched the NP 242 to Full time opening the center differential. This allows the transfer case to compensate for my unevenly inflated tires and allows cornering without binding.
As I got closer to town, the pavement was mostly dry with occasional slick spots. With the open differential I was able to remain in four wheel drive for added security all the way to my office.
Last year my son Scott and I visited Wooly’s Off Road park near Lewisburg, Tn while our wives shopped on the Friday after Thanksgiving. Last year we took his mom’s Cherokee complete with street tires and Motives Makeup decals. We saw enough of the place to know we wanted to go back. It took us a year but we finally made it back to Wooly’s with our off road Jeep.Playing on the rocks at Woolys
The trails at Wooly’s straight right out of the parking lot. There are also trails on both sides of the road. Unfortunately they don’t have maps available. There is a crude map on the wall where you check in but nothing to take with us. However the trails are really compact so you really can’t get very lost.
After playing around on the trails a while and exploring, we decided to tackle so of the more challenging obstacles. There is a nice rock climb right behind the barn. As I was going off the top of the climb we saw a couple of Wranglers. They told us about another rock climb near by so we headed over to try it out.
The trial we were on led us to a spot about a quarter way up the climb. It was a narrow trail that intersected at a 90 degree angle. As I tried to maneuver onto the rocks to head up the hill, I got hung up on a stump. I thought I could use it to pivot the back of the jeep down the hill an get the nose pointed up. However, that did not work and I ended up sliding sideways down the hill. After a few dozen back and forth movements while feeling very tippy, I finally got my Jeep pointed up the hill. However in the process, I managed to severely bend one of my newly installed ZJ lower control arms. With the aid of my front locker I made it up the climb relatively easily.
With the control arm bent we decided to take it easy the rest of the day. I went back down to the parking lot and it seemed to track straight so we headed across the street to the less rocky side of the park. I thought this would be a good time for Scott to get more experience behind the wheel.
It took him a few stall to get used to the clutch but after he did he got really good at maneuvering up and down the hills. At one place there are several paths up the same hill. Scott did three or four runs at progressively steeper climbs.
We then headed over to the part of the park where the old home place is located. There we found an old spring house.Spring House
Water trough
We remembered a rock garden that we had tried in Janice’s street Jeep but did not go very far last year. It took us a while to find is because it had become over grown by weeds and briers.
Small Rock garden
This was a good place for Scott to learn where the tires were and how to place them on the rocks. He ran the course several times taking different lines.Fun in the rocks
It looked like fun so I decided to give it a run. We played around on some more trails before heading back to the trailer in the early afternoon.
We then decided to explore the south part of the park. With no map, it took us a while to find the right trails to connect to that part. Scott found a really fun climb between two trails. It had large rocks but with good access.
Scott climbing rocks
After running this climb several times using different lines, Scott noticed were running low of fuel. We took a long run around the perimeter of the park to make it back to the trailer. Even though there was still daylight left, we decided to pack up an go because we were very tired and there was now fuel station anywhere close.
There is still alot of trails that we never ran. A guide or a map would be a great help. Thinking back, we should have joined up with the two Wranglers and followed them around. But we did have a lot of fun just exploring on our own pace.
For Halloween, Janice, Jenny and I decided to visit Golden Mountain Off Road Park for their Halloween ride. We really had no idea what to expect. We had seen pictures of other off road parks that had Halloween rides and expected to see lots of rigs decorated for the holiday.Princess in costume
Jenny had decorated her Jeep for a spirit contest at Caleb’s school so she left part of that in place. She and Janice also dressed as Bunnies. Her son Caleb dressed as the Black Knight.
What we first noticed when we drove through the gate was the beautiful fall colors. It was easy to see why someone named it Golden Mountain. The landscaping around the many pavilions was very nice as well. I am not sure what this place used to be but it was something really nice.
We waited at the vacant pay booth for a while. Finally I decided to call the phone number listed. The fellow said he was doing some work on the toilets and would be right down. He was very friendly and when he found that it was our first visit, he gave us a map and told us the general layout of the park and which trails he recommended we start with. He then informed us that we had the whole park to ourselves and he did not expect any one else to come.
We parked in the huge gravel parking area just inside the gate and I unloaded Scuffy while Jan and Jenn found the restrooms. The restrooms are located in a big building that overlooks what used to be a stock car dirt track. It has more recently been used for motor cross racing from the looks of it.
The guy had warned us that it would be slippery on the muddy trails. Well, with that warning in mind we set out for trail 1 marked “easy.” We made it a few yards up the trail before we found out just how slippery the mud is there. No worse than Harlan or Aetna but no better either. The “easy” trail was now quite a challenge.
Jenny got hung up on the first few rocks and had to take time to air down before she could go further. I made it to another set of rocks and my lockers just allowed me to get scarily sideways before I called it quits and let the front end slide back down the hill.Trail 1
Easy trail? What else was in store for us here?
We then took trail 3 also marked easy but at least it was flat. Off to both sides was lots of fun looking hill climbs that would have to wait for a drier day. We soon intersected trail 2 and followed along to an interesting pavilion in the middle of nowhere. It looked like it had a fishing pier but there was not really much of a lake there now.
We followed trail two on further and came to a ledge that reminded us of the one on trail 15 in Harlan. Remembering to keep up momentum going into it we both made it up just fine. Trail two ended at a gravel road beside a beautiful lake and more picnic pavilions. We walked around the area for a while before following the gravel road down to the parking lot to get our rain gear.Bunnies at the picnic pavilion by on eof the many lakes.
This time we took trail two up the hill. I tried in vain to stay out of the big rut on the down hill side of the climb but I eventually gave up and hugged the rut to the top. Once at the top I realized I was in two wheel drive. Jenny made it up just fine.
Running between trails 2 and 3 is trail 16. It looks like a rock garden. It reminded me of Pinball at Harlan just about one third as long. The rocks were slick form the mud but I really enjoyed the small climb. Janice and Jenny took turns riding with me as I ran the trail two more times.
I then tried to run another upper part of 16. This trail looked easier but it was not. The rocks were larger and there was more mud between them. After banging on my rock rails a few times I finally backed out and we went exploring again.
The park is really compact so you are never really very far from lots of fun trails. It looks like there is plenty of variety for every body from stockers to buggies with plenty of fun stuff in between for trucks like mine.
We drove back up two and this time took the other loop of the gravel road. This lead us to the camping area which has RV hook up as well as lots of space for more primitive camping. There is also a huge and I mean HUGE picnic pavilion there. It has restrooms, a full industrial kitchen in the concession area and a beautiful fireplace. There is even a bar.
Beside the pavilion is a monster playground for kids. We took time to walk around this area and explore before heading back to the trails.Play Ground
We then took trail 2 again and attempted to loop back to the part of 1 where we got stuck in the morning. The trails were drying out and the easy trails were in fact easy. The moderate ones were still difficult and the difficult ones impassable.
At the top of the hill on trail one we found a spot marked difficult. Jenny and I both drove between the rocks. I think you are supposed to go over them but we had fun running the trail our way just to say to ours selves we ran difficult trail in the mud.
Coming up trail one we had crossed some ruts that we really did not want to go back down through so we scouted the top of the hill and found trail 21 with connect down. The top of the hill was the only place in the park where the trails were not perfectly marked. However with the aid of the map I quickly figured out where we were.
We drove down trail 21 and took a few minutes to walk around on trials 22 and 23. I don’t think I will ever run 23 in a Jeep but 22 looks very interesting. I will have to give it a try some day.Trail 22 - want to try this one.
Late in the evening we decided to head out. We really did have the whole park to ourselves all day. It was fun that way but I really hope the owners get more business in the future to keep the park open.
I think Golden Mountain is now my favorite place to go off road. The park is small but there is a lot to do there. Lots of trail variety and the fall colors were simply beautiful. I am already looking forward to returning.Heading out
Yesterday, I traveled to Nashville to check out my son Will’s Jeep. He had called complaining of a severe stumble and stalling in traffic. I remembered that this was a problem when I bought this Jeep for him.
When I first arrived, his Jeep would not start. I was finally able to start the Jeep but it did not idle correctly.
I took it for a test drive and found that the idle air controller was sticking and allowing the engine to stall in traffic. Unless I was really alert when decelerating, the engine would stall.
I made my way back to his apartment and used carburettor cleaner to clean the idle air control circuit in the throttle body. After a few squirts the valve started controlling again and was able to catch the engine when it slowed down.
I noted that there was a lot of oil sludge in the throttle body so I checked the vent from the valve cover and found it partially stopped
up. The connection at the manifold was also clogged. I used the carb cleaner to clean the tube and the connection.
I never experienced the stumble but I suspected it was caused by the ECU connection. I removed the big connector from the ecu and wired down the connector. If I had had some contact cleaner handy, I would have sprayed the contacts before re-seating it. The folks at Hesco say there is a common failure of the ECU due to over tightening of the connector bolt. The circuit board cracks here or the threadsert pulls out of the board.
I put just a small amount of torque on the bolt as I tightened it back in place. We let the engine cool a bit and then took it for another test drive. It ran fine taking us to dinner and back. I hope this will cure it for a while.
I also showed Will how to do these checks himself if it does act up again.
