Drew's Rubicon Bash - Toyotas on the 'Con

---RUBICON TRAIL---------------------------------

4WD Hard - 4x4Wire Rating System
Experienced Driver
21 miles, avg. time 15 hours
Good Weekend Trip Rock Crawling Trail
Mountain Scenery, Lakes, Granite Slabs, Forested Areas

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By C. Andrew Zook


Beautiful Scenery	Granite Slabs	Lots of rocks

Drew Persson from Persson Off Road Systems organized this trip to the Rubicon which consisted mostly of members of the 4x4wire.com Toyota mailing list. The event was not official as there was no entrance fee or signup sheet. The ride was open to 4x4s of any make and was not just limited to Toyotas - although they made up the majority of the group.

Drew Persson's 4Runner

I was very excited when I learned that David Eggleston, a member of the 4x4wire Toyota mailing list had an empty seat for Drew's Rubicon Bash. Until this point, I had only seen pictures of the famous Rubicon trail, and I had never done any wheeling in California.

I packed up what little camping gear I could take on the plane, and headed out to California! Randy Burleson from 4x4wire picked me up at the Sacramento airport. After tweaking a few things on "UZI" - Randy's Isuzu, we headed out to the trail.

We met up with Scott Wilson and Jay Kopycinski (also with 4x4wire) by coincidence at a grocery store in Placerville. After grabbing some food for the trail, we were off!

Overlooking the slabs

We arrived at the camping area at Loon Lake after dark. There were already many trucks there, including David Eggleston, who I was to ride with on the trial. We spent a few hours chatting with everyone, and looked all of the trucks over before heading to bed to get ready for the big day.

In the morning Drew Persson held a driver's meeting, and we headed off to the trailhead. I spent a lot of the first day walking around trying to get some good pictures. I am used to being the guy behind the wheel, so taking pictures is not something that I normally do. It was nice to have the freedom to roam around and snap pictures, or to hop in any truck that had a free seat.

Welding Randii's driveshaft

Everything went smoothly until we got to the slabs where we had our first fatality. An FJ-40 was trying to climb the slabs when something snapped in the rear axle. We spent about half an hour trying to figure out what the broken part was, but we found nothing. It sounded like something inside of the differential, but we could not be sure without tearing into it. The Cruiser was soon on its way again, only to lock up something in the rear differential. After the rear driveshaft was removed, he returned to Loon Lake in front wheel drive.

At this very same spot, one of the welds on Randii's front driveshaft let loose. Luckily it was something that was easy to fix with a welder. Randii had some welding rod along, and some cables that he had made up to do emergency welds with 2 batteries. After borrowing a battery from Scott Ellinger, he soon had his driveshaft welded back up, better than ever!


I think he forgot to knock on wood! Check out the license plate.	Randii in the Soup Bowl.

We continued along uneventfully until we got to Little Sluice. There was quite a traffic jamb there, so we decided that it would be better to take the bypass since it was getting late in the day.

On the bypass, David's dropped drag link decided to break in two! After asking around and finding that no one had a spare that would work, it was decided that it would have to be welded back together. The parts were removed, sleeved, and welded back together within an hour.

Soon after the bypass and the Sluice joined back together, there was another break. Gibby's Jeep had broken a motor mount! By the time we arrived there, they had already removed it, and soon had it welded up and back in the truck.

By this time, it was getting dark, and the mosquitoes were out in full force! We continued on down the trail for a little while, when suddenly David's beast sheared off a spring pin, allowing the axle to move back into the body. This would have been an easy fix if the truck was on level ground, but the truck was sitting on a hill that was quite steep! With a little creative winching, and some spare spring pins, the truck was back on its way. By now it was very late - about 1:00 in the morning. Drew hiked back up from camp to show us the way down since none of us had been on the trail before.

Hon's shattered Birfield

We continued on with only minor incident, and arrived at camp at 2:30 in the morning. While backing into a parking spot, Hon suffered the first broken Birfield of the trip.

The next morning I helped Hon fix the broken Birfield, and we headed out for the day. I was now riding with Hon because David had to hurry to get off of the trial so that he could get a start home to make it back in time for work on Tuesday.

After an uneventful few hours, we came to quite a traffic jam. Apparently someone had broken a steering arm on the Big Sluice which took a while to fix. We sat in the shade and relaxed for about an hour, which was actually quite nice.

Hon lifts a wheel WAY up!

Jon from All-Pro shows an alternate line

During this time a few Jeeps pulled up. We talked with them for a while, and actually learned quite a bit about the history of the trail.

When the traffic had cleared, we headed down the Big Sluice. Turning the corner on the Big Sluice was an interesting spot to sit and watch. If the perfect line was not chosen, the rear tire lifted quite a bit as demonstrated by Hon.

From the Big Sluice, it was only a hop, skip, and a jump to Rubicon Springs. Most of the group continued out and finished the trail on Saturday night, but we stayed behind and camped at the springs. The water was very refreshing, and it was nice to be clean after 2 dusty days on the trail.

Scott, Jay, Brian Ellinger, and a few others were camped here. We all sat around and talked trucks most of the night, and Jay treated us with his amazing custom Rokclod RC truck. This little thing was a blast to drive around, and the campground area made a great little playground for it.

The next morning we packed up, headed up Cadillac Hill, and off the trail into the Lake Tahoe area. After catching a real breakfast at a little restaurant on the lake, we all went our separate ways.

Jay's custom Rokclod

Crossing the bridge to the Springs

I was very impressed by the sheer magnitude of this trail. The scenery is truly amazing - something that is not often the case on East Coast trails. From the snowcapped mountains in the distance, to the large open expanses of granite, this trail is beautiful.

I would have to say that this trail is one of the hardest that I have seen. This is not due to any one obstacle in general, but is more a rating of the entire trail. Most of the trails that I have ever run have short hard sections (often as hard or harder than the major obstacles on the Rubicon), and then have somewhat of a nice dirt road until the next obstacle. The Rubicon differs because it keeps you on your toes the entire time! There are no sections that are just a smooth dirt road. There is almost always some obstacle on the trail, and it takes a lot of concentration from the driver.

I had a wonderful time, and was glad to finally be able to put faces to the names of many of the people whom I have spoken with on the Toyota mailing lists for years.

Thanks to Drew Persson for taking the time and effort to organize this event!