Outer Limits 4x4 Board

Just thinking the other day, since i've owned my Sierra i have so far been pretty lucky and not broken anything major while out wheeling.

Just want to know what to do when certain components break, and the only way back to civilisation is very rough track. Particularly interested in items like CV's, Axles, diff centres etc etc. Such as, with certain breakaes, can the vehicle still be rolled so it can be towed to safety, or could a wheel fall off if you try to move it.... you get my drift. Also things like temporary fixes, and any pre-breakage inspections you can do.

My personal experiences - A while ago the distributor shat itself through a creek crossing in the Sierra. It was roughly a 10km trip through the bush, and of course it happened about 5km in.
We had to tow/snatch it to the campsite (approx 2-3km) then tow/snatch it the remaining couple of km to the road. Towed by an 80 series, and for a couple of sections snatched in tandem (by 2 vehicles) the 80 and a twin locked patrol, even then it only just made it a few sections.

Had it been any of the other 4b's in the group that died, it would have not been possible to get back to tarmac.

Only options to get back home were to snatch and tow it, or to send another vehicle to go pick up a replacement dizzy, being a Sunday that was not an option.

Pre trip inspection, ensure your dizzy gasket is in good condition! This was the main culprit.

Keen to hear some others.

Mike

I ran out of fuel in the middle of a busy intersection thanks to my trusty dented fuel tank, the dash still showed a 1/4 tank.

a can of 'start ya bastard' out the window, spraying intermittently into the snorkel, got it started and 100m up the road.

i broke a rear leaf spring in the sierra and with the use of a couple of shackles and a ratchet strap i drove home very slowly.

I've got a couple to add

On weekend - finally 1st CV went. hard hit to DS on bank. unlocked hub and drove home. 80k trip. was careful on drive.

Rear tailshaft lost and also killed a uni in separate time, both lock front hubs if not already and drive home, was a fun drive with the front auto locker

blew hub bolts off on LHS. same as above but did tailshaft uni same place so had 1 wheel drive to road then tow to mates to dodge it up for driving home.

Lost alternator output (wire had fallen off) just on dusk as always, killed all lights, stereo etc cept park lights and lasted about 10-20k drive home, was on 3cyl when got home.

My wireless keyboard will run out of batteries before ive finished talking about what ive broken. Suprisingly i havent broken a CV yet.

Driving home on a welded front diff an't all that much fun. 6 point turn to get fuel. Been there done that. Welded a star picket to a gq tie rod with batterys it worked fine, It got driven round brisbane for a week after that.

I call this major luck........

A weekend away west of Sydney, on a steep decent I snapped two (yes both ) front main leaves.
I just so happend the day prior we came across a LWB that was rusted away and half buried at the bottom of a hill, it looked as though it had been there 10 yrs or more and everything was stripped off it except the leaf springs

dad wrote:I ran out of fuel in the middle of a busy intersection thanks to my trusty dented fuel tank, the dash still showed a 1/4 tank.

a can of 'start ya bastard' out the window, spraying intermittently into the snorkel, got it started and 100m up the road.

HAHAHAHA

hyzook wrote:I call this major luck........

A weekend away west of Sydney, on a steep decent I snapped two (yes both ) front main leaves.
I just so happend the day prior we came across a LWB that was rusted away and half buried at the bottom of a hill, it looked as though it had been there 10 yrs or more and everything was stripped off it except the leaf springs

That's gold!

Rhett wrote:Driving home on a welded front diff an't all that much fun. 6 point turn to get fuel. Been there done that. Welded a star picket to a gq tie rod with batterys it worked fine, It got driven round brisbane for a week after that.

couldnt u hav just unlocked one hub and been 1 wheel drive? make it easier to turn....

GRPABT1 wrote:

hyzook wrote:I call this major luck........

A weekend away west of Sydney, on a steep decent I snapped two (yes both ) front main leaves.
I just so happend the day prior we came across a LWB that was rusted away and half buried at the bottom of a hill, it looked as though it had been there 10 yrs or more and everything was stripped off it except the leaf springs

That's gold!

NO thats just really really really really really really really really good luck

oh and Ive snaped my rear tail shaft and hade to drive home in hi range off the front all the way home

transfer held in with ratchet strap

not me, but someone on here (tuls i think it was?) broke his draglink on a rock... 3 batteries in series and welded 3 small spanners to the rod to re-join it - he wheeled the rest of the day on it and it didnt even crack a weld!

i've driven on a dead flat tyre all the way out of a track, aired up at every servo on the way home to 40psi and was at 10psi for the next servo... lol - all it was was gravel in the bead so easy fix the day after.

Broke a battery terminal off in lancelin not long after buying my zuk too - doing jumps in the dunes and the battery tie down had fallen off and disappeared, so the battery was flying all over the place held in by the cables... wrapped it in a TON of electrical tape and drove out of the 4wd area then it crapped out completely - RAC brought me a new battery an hour later =P

burnt a clutch out on the beach with the tide coming in (search: hilux surf) but managed a 60 point turn almost clutchless, got off the beach (cab filled with smoke, eyes watering like mad from it)... cooled the clutch down and got about 2km doing clutchless gearing... needed a v8 rangie to snatch me up the last big hill though - that was a 12 hour ordeal =)

cooked my engine in the same 4wd area not long after... blew the lower rad hose at the motor! managed to keep feeding it water, stopping frequently to cool down - made the 5km trek out of the 4wd area, and a further 10km to a mates house before finally deciding to get a tow home... best part - engine still turned over the next morning and drove to the mechanics - even with a completely cooked head!!!

Other than that i've been VERY fortunate and not done any other major carnage *touch wood* mostly due to pre-checks before going out.

after SPOA i was soo keen to wheel i never checked the spline in the drive shaft anyway went for the wheel and on the way home down a really steep road that has some nice hook turns it came out and took the brake line with it, that was a fun drive back to tamworth the whole 70km!


then a few months back my diffcenter flew apart, riped the carrier apart drove home at 40kph, sounded like a auto locker that was lound and fucked lol

Broke an accelerator cable 4k's from home, used the choke to get some extra rev's so it wasn't holding up the trafic too much.

zooker wrote:transfer held in with ratchet strap

Witnessed.




*Cooked motor. towed home. found melted wires..But didnt see them b4 the tow..
*Ran out of fuel. Mate towed me to the nearest servo.
*No other breakages

broke 3 axles giving it to much juice over a rock down south (snap crackle pop) then had to drive about 5kms back to the road with the front drivers wheel still working and the other 3 wobbling like they were going to fall off.
then on a car trailer 2hrs home.

after the mud run at willowglen, driving back to sydney my accelerator cable snapped cause it was jammed with mud, so i got one of the guide ropes( you know the real thin nylon ones) out of the tent, tied it to the accelerator arm on the carb, looped it over something, (so it pulled it up), ran it out the little slots in the side of the bonnet and in the drivers window, hey presto, hand accelerator all the way back to sydney... about 100 ks..

zooker wrote:transfer held in with ratchet strap

Who hasn't ...

After bending the brackets that hold the transfer case up, I replaced them with Spidertrax brackets. So then the mounts on the chassis broke.

Needed to be pulled up a Hill climb and then everything was ratcheted and I limped home.

I have broken my rear shock mounts before on the diff so once drove home with no rear shocks mounted was fun.

i had the clutch stop working in a hilux and that was in the first few hours of a weekend trip, just flat shifted for the next two days and it was good trying to tracks with as little stoping as possible.
ps the pic on the left was taken when the ign wire melted off and the car was blanced on two wheels.

Drove my td42 from Double Island Point Qld to Melb with no clutch. 1800 odd kays

on the way home from fraser island blew radiator at collongatta airport, drove it home to sydney stopping every 20 min or so.... took 26 hours to get it home...

snapped an axel at wattigans-welded rear so just drove it home in 1 wheel drive clunking all the way back home to syd..

snapped 3 clutch cables, drove home and then to wreckers to buy new ones..

drowned motor a few times, take air filter out started her up and drove around on spare one

stuffed alternator a few times-at night so when no battery left(injected car with fuel pump) the car dies... so just keep hookin my car up with jumper leads to a mates for 10 min then drive for 10 min and so on till i get home...

Broke a rear spring pin on my old lux at Stockton, driving doen the F3 every time i turned right I could hear a VRRERRERRERRERR sorta sound. Turns out it was a small leaf working it's way out of the pack and rubbing on the inside of the tyre. Hammered it all back in, tightened it back up and drove back to Richmond.

FJ40 i had a long time ago had the alternator fall off the 253(broken brackets) now as
you need the alt to run the fan belt it was a bit off a problem.
the solution was to put the fan belt onto the alt and then wire the alt
to the inner guard with fencing wire. it flapped around a fair bit but the water pump worked fine.
even had a rego inspection and they didn't notice.

zooker wrote:transfer held in with ratchet strap

big cable ties the 10mm wide ones work a treat for this

snapped the steering box output shaft 1.5 km from end of track on a night drive.
we had to kick the wheels in the right direction and drive between 5 - 20 metres and do it all over agin until the end of the track. no fix unfortunatly had to go and get trailer at 2 in the morning got back home with the zook at 6 am.

did an accelerator cable, due to my brand new dual battery kit leads somehow rubbing through on in, in some muddy crappy rocky area just as i had to climb this mongrel of a staircase. Pulled some of my speaker wires out, tied it onto accelerator cable, through the bung in the firewall and woohoo, hand throttle. next problem was, it had no back tension cause the spring decided to dissapear, so it was then running on full noise. so a piece of flexy plastic under the bonnet with a zip tie or 10 to the throttle cable guide doover holding tension. worked a treat. broke an exhaust mount so it was hanging off near draggin on ground. no bush welder so i just walked up and down a nearby fenceline till i found some excess wire, and wrapped it up. blew my light fuse (repeatedly due to earthing difficulties) in the middle of winter, and ended up with no spare fuses, and no lights. car still running, my handheld spotlight out the window at what felt like -5000 degrees 40 km home.

Zute wrote:Broke an accelerator cable 4k's from home, used the choke to get some extra rev's so it wasn't holding up the trafic too much.

ha ha where i used to work on a feedlot we snapped the throttle cable out the back and threaded some bailing twine through the bonnet vents to the carby and tied it to the mirror on the door , was like riding a motorbike it stayed like that for over a year that i was still there

damo

built4thrashing wrote:i broke a rear leaf spring in the sierra and with the use of a couple of shackles and a ratchet strap i drove home very slowly.

a wooden log or a steel pole and farmers best frend(fenceing wire) is a better option