Jack's 2007 Chevy Build

[locrwln]

Sunday morning, my wife and I decided that we wanted to see Fordyce and we figured we could see the eclipse as well. The original plan was to drive into Meadow Lake and hike down the the last river crossing. As they say, best laid plans...

We drove up 89 and made the turn to head up toward Meadow Lake. We crossed a few snow drifts and then we hit the big one. Up to this point the drifts were pretty small and we eased right over them. I got to the big one and decided it would be wise to scout it out. This drift kept going and going. It lasted at least a 1/2 mile and was too much to risk. I orignally pulled up on the drift and decided to back down. Ours were the only truck tracks we saw up to that point. Everything else was quad tracks.




Not wanting to call it quits and figuring anywhere else we tried in that area would have us into the snow again, so what to do??? We still wanted to see/hike Fordyce, so we heading back to the highway and to 80 and over the summit to the Eagle Lakes turnoff. I figured we could make it a ways on the trail, find a place to camp and hike to the first river crossing. We drove in and met a few rigs coming out here and there. We finally met our match at about the 2.5 mile mark, which is just this side of the "Driveline Hill." We found a decent spot and parked the truck.

The obstacle that stopped us.


Working our way down the trail (these are actually on the way out on Monday morning).

Little tight here and there.





Jack

[locrwln]

We have driven Fordyce many times, but this is the first time we have hiked it and I have to say, it gave it a whole new feel. We saw a lot more wildlife.

Starting with a little garter snake (didn't get a picture), then a small "tree frog:"


And more lizards than we could count. Because it was a Sunday afternoon and the river was flowing over 500CFM (according to some of the guys we talked to), we had the trail to ourselves for the most part.


Waterfall in the distance.


The water flow at the river.



And camp.


The hike was a little over four miles round trip and was absolutely awesome for the views and weather.

And I didn't have to "test" the sliders, which was good for me.

Jack

[chilliwak]

Hey Jack, thanks for posting up. Your pics are absolutely awesome with the nature captured in almost every frame. Seeing your pics just makes me want to get out and enjoy the nature. Cheers, Chilli.

[locrwln]

Thank you Chilli. We try and get out as much as possible and really are enjoying more hiking than in years past. We used to just "drive" through everything and while we got to see it, we didn't get to really see it up close. We are thinking of heading to your neck of the woods next year. We have been to BC a couple of times, but haven't been able to get into the back country too much. First time was at a Vincent HRD motorcycle rally and the last time was in the big truck/cabover combo and we were on our way to Alaska, so we just kind of blazed through.

Jack

[chilliwak]

Jack, I am driving through the scenic nature of B.C. every summer, so just let me know when we should meet up. Hey, I will even buy you a cold one! Cheers, Chilli.

[poriggity]

Hey, I recognize those photos Lookin awesome!
Scott

[Nor-Cal Nick]

We made it to camp and once we had everything set up and had dinner, we took a walk and saw a hornytoad lizard, we saw him three times total, so we christened the spot as Camp Hornytoad.


We met up with the rest of the crew on Saturday morning and headed down to the remains of Murietta and started our way up the canyon toward our goal. We worked our way up and came to a "Guzzler" and the only one of our group that had ever been there, was on an atv some years ago and he was just following, so it took us a while to figure out the trail. From the guzzler, we started up what is labeled as a Jeep Road. Pretty much the only thing using the road any more are ATV's. On the shelf.




And then we finally found a spot too small/rough for a stock truck. We had turned up the canyon to continue our (new trail from this point on) journey.


There was a small ledge that was too tall for the approach angle, open diff, belly dragger Chevy, so I attempted the bypass. Unfortunately, it was all depocomposing granite, so imagine a course sand. I buried the truck and made it to within a few millimeters of taking the bed out on the rocks.

After a lot of winching, jacking, rock stacking, help, snatch blocking, etc, we got the chevy out of it's hole.
Here is the ledge.


The only damage and that was from a rock being thrown into place. A big thanks to the Battle Born Cruisers of Northern Nevada for the rescue.

Some great pictures showing the terrain and obstacles faced, LOVE IT!! Really like you are not afraid to put the truck in some tough spots.

They needed some metal to keep you from stepping through them and to make them more effective as a step.
Oh and I decided to add some seam sealer on the underside of the tubes/metal



Both sealed and drying



Test fit and measuring for the "legs"



I decided to use Durabak spray can bed liner on them so that there was some grip and hopefully it will hold up to road spray.



The final product



The are the perfect height and distance sticking out for use as a step, but not so much that they are in the way when getting out.

Jack

How have these been holding up for you? Look great and the concept is very useful.

Also, how is the engine driven air working, I have done the Kilby kit on a couple Duramax's in the past, one is installed on a close friend, camping buddy's LBZ and we also had belt issues. He has spares and after the first alignment issues we had all has been good for him and man does that set up put some air out.

Anyways, nice to see your complete build over on this forum, been surfing it for alittle less than a year now but finally started a user name a couple months back to see more and after seeing you on DP.com I figured I look over here for you because it sounded like you where legit and not another regular guy on DP talking off road lol (no disrespect to DP members at all) just easy to see you are truly putting your HD through some tough trails for a truck this size..... KUDOS!!! Love it and sub'd to follow more.


Nick

[locrwln]

Some great pictures showing the terrain and obstacles faced, LOVE IT!! Really like you are not afraid to put the truck in some tough spots.
How have these been holding up for you? Look great and the concept is very useful.

Also, how is the engine driven air working, I have done the Kilby kit on a couple Duramax's in the past, one is installed on a close friend, camping buddy's LBZ and we also had belt issues. He has spares and after the first alignment issues we had all has been good for him and man does that set up put some air out.

Anyways, nice to see your complete build over on this forum, been surfing it for alittle less than a year now but finally started a user name a couple months back to see more and after seeing you on DP.com I figured I look over here for you because it sounded like you where legit and not another regular guy on DP talking off road lol (no disrespect to DP members at all) just easy to see you are truly putting your HD through some tough trails for a truck this size..... KUDOS!!! Love it and sub'd to follow more.


Nick

Thanks for the compliments. I have gotten some looks when someone sees it on a trail. I have to say, it has impressed me with where it will go and where it will fit. I know I talked to you about a year ago regarding a Cognito 4" NTBD lift, I just decided to try it as is and see how I like it. The plus is that I still fit in the garage with the camper on, which I wouldn't with a lift. So for now, it stays.

The sliders have been holding up great because they have only had to be steps so far... They make getting in and out easier and they don't stick out too far when getting out so that they are in the way.

The OBA has been great, almost. Because of some manufacturing issues, the a/c compressor and york compressor don't exactly line up, so I have positioned the idler pully to split the difference. As you can imagine there is a belt chirp that is driving me insane. I have been through three idler pullys and two belts trying to figure out what the problem is. I love the system otherwise, but this chirping has got to go. If you have any ideas for getting everything aligned better, I'm all ears. Without re-doing the bracket holes to move the york, I am at a loss.

My goal this weekend is to tackle it one more time. I even ordered another york clutch assembly and am ready to address the a/c clutch bearing, buy a different belt (two kilby versions so far) and attempt to source another idler pully, hopefully from some OEM application versus the kilby supplied one. Like you said, amazing amount of air. I had one on my LC and have friends with yorks and sandens on their rigs and once you have a belt driven OBA, you can't do without.

I haven't updated the build with the AeroTanks 52 gallon fuel tank yet, which is one of the better mods. I love having capacity.

Hopefully, now you understand why I am interested in 2.5" shocks and where I am coming from.

Thanks again,

Jack

[Nor-Cal Nick]

Thanks for the compliments. I have gotten some looks when someone sees it on a trail. I have to say, it has impressed me with where it will go and where it will fit. I know I talked to you about a year ago regarding a Cognito 4" NTBD lift, I just decided to try it as is and see how I like it. The plus is that I still fit in the garage with the camper on, which I wouldn't with a lift. So for now, it stays.

The sliders have been holding up great because they have only had to be steps so far... They make getting in and out easier and they don't stick out too far when getting out so that they are in the way.

The OBA has been great, almost. Because of some manufacturing issues, the a/c compressor and york compressor don't exactly line up, so I have positioned the idler pully to split the difference. As you can imagine there is a belt chirp that is driving me insane. I have been through three idler pullys and two belts trying to figure out what the problem is. I love the system otherwise, but this chirping has got to go. If you have any ideas for getting everything aligned better, I'm all ears. Without re-doing the bracket holes to move the york, I am at a loss.

My goal this weekend is to tackle it one more time. I even ordered another york clutch assembly and am ready to address the a/c clutch bearing, buy a different belt (two kilby versions so far) and attempt to source another idler pully, hopefully from some OEM application versus the kilby supplied one. Like you said, amazing amount of air. I had one on my LC and have friends with yorks and sandens on their rigs and once you have a belt driven OBA, you can't do without.

I haven't updated the build with the AeroTanks 52 gallon fuel tank yet, which is one of the better mods. I love having capacity.

Hopefully, now you understand why I am interested in 2.5" shocks and where I am coming from.

Thanks again,

Jack

I am considering a custom slider/step combo on my next build, only problem I see is how far the stand off is from the frame and how to make it from flexing against the body but not also be over engineered with metal everywhere. Going to have to see once I get to that point.

Here is my buddies truck build we used the Kilby kit on http://www.dieselplace.com/forum/sho...123502&page=10 I think I will have the truck in my shop next week to put new wheels and tires on it so I can take other angles if you would like or I can try and hook up with him over the weekend if you need anything sooner, it's a family friend so I see him anyways, just need him to drive his truck if we meet up with the family somewhere. I really can't remember what my tech did back then to fix the problem. Another one of my good friends used to work for Kilby so he was the one that helped us with the project. If I remember I believe the belts are a 5 grove cut down or something weird like that when we looked into it for spares. This I am sure will all ring a bell for you or the other HD owner that was the R&D truck, I think I may have talked with him in the past but can't remember it's been so long. Atleast i can say the kit still works and kicks *** when we are out on trips.

52 gals is always awesome, stopping to find fuel sucks when you are on the road or off road for that matter ha ha. Congrats on the new tank upgrade.

I may come into work over the weekend to put my build post together so I can get it up on the forums, I have a couple renderings done already from a few months back so we still will be changing the over all look but I finally found and purchased a 08 2500HD CC SB I will be using for the foundation of the build so it's game on and I am excited to say the least. I hope I can do your expedition life style justice, it's a first for me personally to build a truck for myself in this way so I have been soaking up all the stuff I have been reading on this forum and others over the months.

If you feel you will overwhelm some of the options I gave you on shocks I am happy to see what i can do about maybe letting you try and couple options on your next excursions coming up, can't do any worse than the stock shocks you have now ha-ha If your interested I love to gain the feed back.


Also, not sure if anyone has heard of this, Oasis XD3000 Air Compressor. We have used these a few times and they are pretty good on air supply also. Down fall is size and finding a place for it, OK and price also but it's not far from what the Kilby set up ran from what I remember. Just another option I have thought about.


Nick

[chilliwak]

Glad to see that your truck did not take any serious damage Jack. The sliders look awesome and I look forward to seeing more cool shots of the wilderness that you explore. Cheers, Chilli.