I has a massive headache right meow.
I has a massive headache right meow.
slam a large gatorade, always helps when I get a headache.
JonB sucks at KINOD threads.
Tried a new trunk lid to replace my rear ended one- hoped to solve the gap between body and lid... but no success!
the latch has a bit of play... even tried new latch, still some wiggle...
cant figure out what the gap is caused by... my trunk tub rim doesnt look bent- and the latch mounting area seems fine...
so pissed, was really hoping i could just pop on a new trunk lid
That shit is vertically adjustable, you know. It has ~1/2" of adjustment room. Loosen the two bolts that hold in the latch mechanism to the trunk wall, and move the latch mechanism itself downwards.Originally Posted by artcentermiata
“I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed, or numbered! My life is my own.”
http://prisoner.gigacorp.net/sounds/...l-sixofone.mp3
^ that.
use painter's tape to mark your adjustments, saves some time.
We miss you BTW you big Lug you....
I drove 2500 miles angry in a 24' turbodiesel moving van. I can do anything.
Driving that truck was like racing a Miata, you have learn to use momentum to keep your speed and use the draft to pass.
miss you steve!
yeah, i tried the "move latch downward" thing previously, it helped some, but its still giving me a gap... UGH
This is the most i could get out of it, even with non bent trunk lid installed... it still has up and down play too... never did before... what the hell, even with new latch it had play
Last edited by artcentermiata; 05-25-2012 at 05:07 AM.
Hmmmm...the finish panel and lights look correct, so I don't think the tub is bent. However, in pic three, the horizontal gap between the bumper and the fender on the side looks odd. It might be worth it the disassemble the rear (bumper, crash pad, finish panel, inner trunk panels, trunk lid) to look for damage. Maybe slotting the latch mech moutning hole may work, but THAT is a lot of rise. The leading edge look OK, maybe see if the hinges are aligned or binding.
SEAN - post your smog woes up here.
You need some help from guys local to you. You have some funky stuff going on and the longer you run like that, the more damage you can cause.
Steve, are you all moved in to your place in NC? Hope it's all going good for you!
Woolery... i want to have your porsche-
Please...
Yeah, all moved in.
Here's a little story about it...
I packed up the majority of the moving truck on Thurs, May 10. Thankfully, Dustin came by in the early afternoon to help with the last few items I couldn't move by myself. It was tough, but we wanted to leave a day early so Tina could use that extra day to rest before returning to work on the 21st.
We left our place in Aliso Viejo on Friday morning about 10am. Our first leg of the drive was going to end in Flagstaff, AZ. It took a little baptism by fire to relearn driving a truck that big. The first two or three hours were driving through OC, then the IE.
That steeled my skills with the truck quickly. I have to admit, this was probably the best rental truck I have driven. It was a 24' turbodiesel and I added a two axel trailer to tow my Miata. Most moving trucks I have use in the past 10 years have about 30 degrees of slop in the wheel, making small corrections tricky and constant. I was also extremely please the truck maxed out at 75 mph, but I didn't discover that until later that day. I had been hearing the stories of guys towing their racecars through CA getting popped for going over 55mph in the back of my mind. I just rolled with the truck traffic and Tina followed behind me in her Miata.
Puma rode in the cab of the truck with me. I put a couple of boxes between the edge of the bench seat and the dashboard to give her a bigger area to stretch out on. I placed her favorite bed on that. I had a backpack filled with her items as an armrest under my right arm. It had stuff like dog treats, poop bags, food, etc. I also had a couple of plastic dishes in there so I could give her water quickly when she needed it without stopping. The drive across stressed her out, but she did sleep occasionally.
Driving through CA was uneventful. Tina's car doesn't have AC and I didn't expect the desert to be as hot as it was. We stopped somewhere in the Mohave, I guess, for a bathroom break. When I opened the door on the cab, the heat hit me and I could see Tina walking towards me. She looked irritated and sweaty. I had the AC going to calm Puma and it worked well. Anyway, because the truck sat so high, I had to lift Puma in and out of the cab. She weighs about 70# and the seat is about 6 feet off the ground, so I had to climb the step on the side of the truck and scoop her up like a rancher carrying a lamb or calf, leaning back on the open door for balance, and scoop her out. That first pitstop injured Puma. The ground was so hot, it burned the pads on her feet. We didn't realize this until the next morning when she had great difficulty walking. So, from there on, I had to scoop her out, carry her over to some grass or soft ground, place her down and wait for her to do her business. It was sad.
Anyway, we picked up the I 40 at it's beginning outside Barstow. At the entrance to the highway is a sign that reads "Wilmington, NC 2554 mi." I don't know if it's a sick joke or an interesting factoid, but the first thing that popped into my mind was 'fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuukc!'.
This was my view to my immediate right for the majority of the trip.
The desert of California.
You can see Tina tailgating the rig in the mirror.
Puma don't give a shit.
Crossing the Colorado River in AZ!
Yeah! Arizona!
Now, I LOVE driving through the desert of the Southwest. It's beautiful to me. It's so expansive, so many colors, so ancient. I could see myself picking my way through it in a jeep or dual sport motorcycle. This part of the 40 we didn't drive on our way out to CA because we dropped from Flagstaff to Phoenix and took the 10 into LA. It has been YEARS since I have seen this part of AZ. It's a big climb going east. We drove about 8 hours on Friday to our hotel outside Flagstaff. Our elevation in Aliso Viejo was 500 feet above sea level, our elevation at our hotel was about 7100 feet. We stopped for the night a few miles west of the peak elevation of the I 40 at 7200 feet. Thankfully, fuel prices became cheaper the further east we drove. I averaged about 10 miles to the gallon in the moving truck, Tina averaged about 40 mpg because she rode in my draft most of the way.
Saturday morning, I awoke early and took this picture at dawn:
The skies, landscape and forests of northern AZ are gorgeous! I had lived in OC for so long, I forgot how blue clear skies are at twilight and dawn.
We gathered up our gear, ate, fueled and started on our way by 8 am. This day we were going to drive to Amarillo, TX. This was the longest leg of the journey, just barely though at 620 miles. I had a little cooler on the ground to the right of my feet with water and ice. The truck had overhead cubbies I stored snacks, gums, cigarettes, my phone and a 2 way radio for communicating with Tina. The center stack of the dash had a large cubbie where I kept my ipod, phone charger, FM modulator for the ipod, and a three outlet 12v power station.
The seat in the truck doesn't recline and it's vinyl. This means you get monkey butt and restless sitting like that for long periods. I altered my posture when I could. When I had the accelerator matted I would use it as leverage to lift my butt off the seat to stretch. The dashboard also sits low for better viewing. I often had my left foot up on the dash with my knee at about the same height as my chin. I'm sure it looked really bizarre to the cars and trucks I passed. I used a packing blanket on the seat to make the seat cooler on my ass and to make adjustable seating supports.
The drive through northern AZ and NM is fantastic. The speed limits are 75 and I can do that in the truck by using momentum and drafting other trucks. Passing is a propostion of careful execution. It takes a long view ahead and some patience. There was a number of times I would move out to the left lane to pass a line of trucks going downhill and I would rush past them only to hit another uphill and they would power right past me before I could pass them all. Doh! I would sheepishly just keep my eyes forward as they lumbered past me. Puma would watch them pass me on the right with little interest. It took me a while to get used to passing maneuvers.I could roar down a hill at 75 before the limiter kicked in, then on steep up hills, it could creep all the way down to 35mph. Bleh. Both states are over 350 miles across, so I would try not to watch the mile markers tick past. The high speed limits and beautiful scenery helped pass the time. We had averaged 50 mph on Friday, so Saturday was much improved at about a 60-65 mph average. It was a 10 hour drive to Amarillo and by the 7th hour the last 200 miles are AGONIZING. We both wanted out of the vehicles REALLY bad.
The mesas or AZ are phenomenal!
We broke into New Mexico about 11am on Saturday.
I love the mesas in NM more...
By late afternoon, we hit Albuquerque. Very pretty! We still had to push on. In NM, Tina hit a really big retread that damaged her front and rear bumper. It also did a number on her undertray. There was no way to avoid it. Because I was leading, I couldn't move over to avoid it. I was making a pass and couldn't move to the right. I tried to run it over and let the truck and trailer take the brunt, but it didn't help. Worse things could have happened. NM starts to give was to flat, featureless landscapes. We hit the Texas border about 5pm. What we weren't paying attention to was the time change. We lost 2 hours on Saturday because of the time zone changes.
Leaving NM, entering the Texas panhandle!
Puma still don't give a fuck.
We made it to Amarillo about 8pm local time. The time change messed us up and I was still going on LA time still set on my wristwatch. The hotel was in a pretty unsavory part of town and I had reserved myself to expect some vandalism or theft to the rig and/or Tina's Miata. The hotel gave us a second floor room. Puma could hardly walk so I had to carry her up and down the stairs so she could fo her business. Also had to carry our gear up and down. Pretty aggravating. We were both so tired, we didn't care. I crashed out about an hour after we stopped.
Sunday morning came with a sudden start. I had forgotten to set my alarm correctly so we woke up late. We didn't get onto the road until 9 local time. We had some trouble getting fuel for the truck. Still, we pressed on. The roads in Texas are remarkably smooth. Trees are scarce and the landscape is pretty flat. We made up the time by running the rig flatout. There was construction in TX, but because it was Sunday, traffic was REALLY light. I was nervous running the truck through the construction zones because there were 10-15 foot slabs of concrete missing with about a 12-18" drop. If I put a wheel on the trailer off here, it would destroy it and my Miata along with it. The skies were mostly overcast so it was still a pretty easy drive. We pushed into Oklahoma about 11am. More construction met us there. The roads in OK weren't as smooth and they were doing a lot of bridge work. The bridges were narrow, made worse by the construction barriers. There were more than a few instances where I was *barely* clearing the barriers with the trailer fenders. I had maybe 6" on either side and the pavement was uneven. This was probably the most stressful driving for me at this point. I was expecting to catch the trailer on the barriers or bridge abutments as I narrowly cleared them in passing. It was also going to be another long day. We had 603 miles to our next hotel outside Little Rock, AR. It was starting to grind.
This is what the TX panhandle looks like.
Pretty skies over TX in the morning.
Thankfully, Oklahoma was bright green and lush. I had forgotten what deciduous forests looked like in the spring! Oklahoma City was pretty, too. The drivers there suck and are slow. The interchanges proved to be challenging, too. Lots of decreasing radius turns that aren't well marked. These are no big deal in a car, but in a truck, it's ass-puckering. I would signla to move over to make the interchanges and I could see the other drivers look at my signal lights and just sit there next to me. Guh! Move you idiots! I moved over on a fat couple riding a trike because they blocked the lane I needed for over a half mile. Both of them were looking at my signals and made no attempt to speed up, slow down, or change lanes although they had LOTS of room to do so. Yeah the grind of the drive was definitely getting to me.Traffic picked up later that day. I realized it was people travelling for Mother's Day. It wasn't too bad, but it made passing a little more difficult. We stopped to fuel and stretch in OK. I don't know where, but is was a small town. I climbed out of the cab and was startled by a large Warmaraner greeting me. I pet him and he ran off to greet other customers there to fuel up. After I fueled, I pulled Puma out, leashed her and handed her off the Tina to give time to walk around in the soft grass. The Warmeraner ran over they sniffed each other out. Puma is leary of other dogs, but they enjoyed some water Tina poured into a dish together and he happily shared some of Puma's dog treats too. Puma could barely walk, but we could tell she was enjoying being around another friendly face. I had walked into the store to replenish my drink supplies and snacks. I bought some jerky, something I rarely eat, but I needed some protein for me and Puma. She was barely eating and I knew she would eat this. It was a pretty large bag. Apparently, the Warmaraner recognized the jerky packaging and was going NUTS jumping around me as I was organizing the cooler in the cab. I loaded Puma in the truck, open the jerky and gave her a huge piece. I turned around saw the Warmaraner anxiously and patiently waiting for a handout. I gave him a huge piece and he snatched and ran off. Services rendered for "helping" us out.
Rolling across OK
The police presence also increased as we continued east. The hills of OK roll on and I started to notice more patrols. As we crossed in to Arkansas, we passed through speed trap after speed trap. I slowed my roll and observed the speed limits more carefully in AR. We had crossed into AR after 380 miles through OK about 5pm. We still had 2 hours to go. AR was VERY green, but unimpressive.
Entering AR.
I have spent a lot of time in AR for work (as a Walmart/Sam's CLub vendor), so I knew what to expect. Our hotel was about 10 miles north east of Little Rock because it had truck parking. It would also allow us to avoid the rush hour on Monday. We finally made it and checking, ate and relaxed. The hotel manager was very accommodating and gave up a double bed room on the first floor near the truck. This made it easier to move our gear in and out of the vehicles and the dog. Puma got her own bed that night. We put some medicated lip balm on her feet to help her heal up.
Last edited by kung fu jesus; 05-26-2012 at 10:04 AM.
i need to make a nice long trip, but mexico its not safe this days.. :/
2010 NCII TR
So, I didn't shoot a lot of pictures on Sunday. Not much to see and the construction areas made for nervous driving.
We woke up Monday nice and early, on time, and headed out of Little Rock on time. We circumvented the rush our and continued on our way east on the 40. We had lost our Route 66 views in Oklahoma. The old route runs literally right along the I 40. You see it in OK, TX, NM, AZ and CA. Some portions are well-kept, some not so much. It's amazing to me that before the interstate system, thousands of people traveled that lonely two lane road from the heartlands all the way to Los Angeles. It makes me reflect on how fast our lives have become and how much flavor of the nation we miss blitzing across huge stretches of super highways. It also reminds me of the movie "Cars".
As we pushed east across AR, we started to see the huge rice fields. Very pretty with these curling harvesting paths in them. We had 503 miles to drive to get to Knoxville, TN this day, so we were looking forward to shorter seat time. We are also both familiar with Tennessee, so it's like seeing an old friend. I had to write a huge report about TN in gradeschool and I am surprised how much I remember from it. The 40 in eastern AR was really choppy when we drove out to CA 6 years ago. Fortunately, it is being repaired, unfortunately it was the westbound lanes. So, we had about an hour's worth of narrow, frost-damaged freeway to cover in the morning. We had crossed the 1/2 way point of our journey the previous day, so we were a little more upbeat today. We reached the Mississippi River about 10am and pushed into Memphis,TN!
The I 40 in TN is 455 miles across. It is sort of the reverse of New Mexico. In TN, you start out in relatively flat areas, move into rolling hills and end in the mountains. TN has these exposed cliffs and bluffs that if you look at them closely, resemble those in NM but with vegetation and trees on them. There was a heavy police presence in eastern TN. I kept the truck at 65mph as we lumbered across. The rolling hills past Nashville creates a sort of rollercoaster effect. You creep up the one side and rush down the next. I started ignoring the speed limits here because I needed the momentum to carry me up the next hill. We also started to experience the humidity of the climate. I forgot how soft humid air feels on your skin. It was a good feeling! As we neared Knoxville, we started to push into some light rain. The first on our trip. We moved in and out of light showers which was nice because it helped clean the previous 1800 miles worth of dead bugs off the windshield.
Rolling hills of TN.
Puma is giving a fuck now.
Getting closer to the mountains!
I swear it looks like NM with vegetation!
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