For some of you that have a sense of what Hardcore is like, this might be new news to you, for those of you that don't Johnson Valley, home of the hammers is considered some of the toughest and most technical rockcrawling trails in the country.
This past weekend, MJR and JEEPBBS and some from Jeep forums had the annual JV rookie run up the world famous SLEDGEHAMMER.
The Sledgehammer trail consists of a series of tight switchbacks, waterfall climbs, tight squeezes for over a mile of climbing, Rocks the size of minivans, waterfalls etc. make this trail challenging for the most prepared.
Well I agreed to accompany a bunch of GREAT people through the trail in my Grocer Getter ZJ, I new this would be an extremely tough challenge for it and just basically hope for the best as I new the people attending were going to help no matter what.
So on Saturday morning we all headed accross Means Dry Lake bed in JV, CA
12 TJS and 1 ZJ for a day of wheelin'
Yeah, the doors are off, or else they would have been smashed.
The start of the trail begins with good sized rocks headin up towards a big bunch of switchback v-notches with MORE boulders
Then progressively gets harder after the 1st small waterfall
and gets harder
Its a TIGHT squeeze for a TJ, EVEN MORE for a ZJ!!! Thank YOU JKS for the Supernerfs, they worked GREAT!!
to put it all into perspective, here is a nice shot of how tight and technical the trail is. If you want to call it a trail
AH, made it to the mailbox in 1 piece!!!
mmm Creepy crawlers with 5 psi air..
Did I mention the trail is Tight!!!!
Man, my jeep feels wide!!..
Overall very little carnage, Jerry, blew up a steering box (not his fault) another guy cut an MTR which needed 20 plugs (the trail requiring you be as light as possible, so very spares are brought on the trail), and another guy had a small electrical short on his winch.
I had to winch 2xs cause of diff hangers on some of the waterfalls, but overall it was the time of my life,..
My Currie tie-rod self clearanced itself as did my (last trip on it) alu rear diff
My 35's were "barely" big enough in Some spots and my jeep is too friggen big to take it up there.
However, On some of the steeper waterfall/ledge climbs, the wheelbase was GREAT.. totally walked up spots where the built tjs were having problems, however in the narrow/technical stuff, the TJS really shined, they are just so much more nimble than the ZJ..
Thanks go out to all of the crew and friends for a GREAT!!! weekend..
