[Hoofmann]

Well, I didn't have a warm fuzzy about driving my Jeep to Moab and back last weekend. I haven't had a garage in over a year and I've been pretty rough on the ol' gurl. Lots of unfinished projects and generally rode hard and put away wet. Well, the concerns were warranted. This was the roughest trip I have had yet.

I left late; on Friday morning instead of Thursday, as I was trying to cobble together something that would carry a spare tire. I didn't finish it and decided to leave anyway. The drive out was relatively painless. Great weather and zero traffic late in the morning on Friday. The Jeep quit on me one time outside of Grand Junction. I rolled it to the side of the road and turned the key to try and start it. It started and I continued on my way and made it to Moab.

Saturday sucked. After getting on Pritchett Canyon and getting about 20 minutes in, I shut my Jeep down to have a little chat. When I went to start it back up, it would crank but not start. The fuel pump wasn't firing and when I finally could get it running, the relay would fire on and off, making the engine sputter and die. I hot wired the relay for the pump and got it off the trail and back to camp, all the while, it was underpowered and wouldn't shift gears in the newly installed (last year) AW4.

On Sunday, I put the relay back in and it ran fine all day. I didn't do any wheeling because I had no confidence in it. Instead, we went to the watering hole near Potato Salad Hill. I drove up the hill on the way out, for fun.

I drove home yesterday and it was running fine until about halfway home and the trans stopped shifting again.

Overall, I had fun. I wish I had spent the week there, as I had originally planned. A long weekend just isn't enough. I need to get serious about trying to get that Jeep back to running correctly again. I haven't really looked into it yet, but it seems like two, or more different issues are at play here.