The shortest Rubicon Trail Jeep Jamboree trip ever

[Ronnie]

For context, my brother, nephew, my son and I were scheduled to participate in this year’s Jeep jamboree rubicon trial run. This is a three day rock crawling/4x4 experience of the 26 miles rubicon trail which is located west of Lake Tahoe in California. It is also keep jamboree’s premier annual ($500 per person, 2 person minimum, 5 maximum, bring your own jamboree complaint Jeep, all 120 spots sold out within 4 minutes this year). We checked in yesterday and got to the starting point this morning.

Once on the trail we switched to 4 wheel drive low and heard some clicking as well as felt vibration coming out of Jeep (which we just drove 150 miles to the event with in 2 wheel drive). We had the trial guide, group leader and 2 mechanics look at it right away, before the first of 26 major obstacles / trail features. Collectively, they determined that it was a transfer case problem (E.g. stretched chain, broken or close to failure gears) and recommended that we not continue on the trail.
We heeded their recommendation and drove home in 2 wheel drive.

We will get a partial refund or credit from Jeep jamboree and my brother is deciding on whether to fix or replace his Jeep but I’m most bummed about not sharing the rubicon trail experience with my son and who starts college later this month (I have a feeling we won’t get another chance at this). I know, first world problem (No pity expected or requested by me).

Stats:
$1,000 for 2 event passes
$100 for a night in a hotel room,
$150 for take out food on check in day,
$50 for soft drinks and snacks
2 paid time off days (for me).
150 (200 including back and forth for check in) miles drive to the trail.

Total time and distance on trail: 15 minute (30 including diagnostics), maybe a quarter mile if that.

Here are the few pics I took. My son is driving in the Jeep pic.

 

[suke]

Just swap out the transfer case. It's super easy, and can be done in a few hours.

 

[Ronnie]

Agreed but they were not sure that had a transfer case with them or it it was a transfer case problem at all. The underside of the chassis is almost completely armored. If they didn’t have a spare transfer case they would air lift one to the site for the cost of the part and the helicopter delivery, labor is whatever the owner of the Jeep is willing to tip.

Even if all the planets aligned on this (that is, they had a spare and worked on replacing the bad assembly immediately we would have been delayed at least 3 hours into Rubicon springs and we were already in the last group Which is extra time spotters and an escort would need to remain on the trail. We were just one of over 100 other guest jeeps and didn’t want to be “that Jeep”.

Being that we were close to pavement instead of miles out on the trail their recommendation was to abort rather than make a bad situation worse. As is we were able to drive it home in 2 wheel drive with no issues.

note: I’ve seen these guys weld on jeeps and replace parts on them on the side of the trial before and they have a full male shift shop at Rubicon springs So I know they have the skill, maybe they just didn’t have the will this time around but wasn’t in a position to justifiably disagree with their recommendation to abort. It was a long depressing ride home.

 

[Ronnie]

As fate would have it, today could not end on a good note. I got a flat tire on the way home from dinner tonight (not great pics but a bolt punctured the tire only the Bolt’s head was sticking out of it). Thankfully I caught it early, pulled off the freeway and replaced it with a temporary spare (aka donut), so I didn’t shred the tire and it looks like it can be repaired instead of replaced.

 

[AZMark]

That all really sucks man. That sounds like an awesome trip to go on.
Those guys will weld an axle or u joint or something in an emergency to get home but I can see where they’d be legitimately worried about internal t case issues at the very start of something that tough. Recovery could take forever.
Good luck with the tire.
Maybe salvage the weekend with some boat time!

 

[Liveto99]

I have a 15 rubicon and go to events and can fix anything. You made the right move.
Being the last group out sucks because otherwise I definitely would’ve tried to split up and hop in other peoples jeeps.

 

[Ronnie]

Part II

We (my bother, my self and our Sons) just completed the Rubicon Trail with Jeepers not Jeep Jamboree in a 2000 TJ. A little less than a year after our last attempt.

Jeepers is a little different than Jeep Jamboree. For instance there was no inspection of the vehicle, no drivers meeting, no grouping of participants by experience and a lot less guides on the trial. Just check in on Thursday and show up at the trail head on Friday morning between 630 and 8a. Jeepers is also more kid/family friendly with a scavenger hunt on day one and on day two (Saturday in rubicon springs) an a rubicon trail history session and short walking tour of rubicon springs followed by an ice cream eating contest, crawdad catching contest, rc truck races (they provide the RC Truck or you bring your own), and a movie (this year a live band) and raffles.
Also Jeepers is not limited to jeeps where as jeep jamboree is limited to specific Jeep’s models and years.


The trail is 22 miles long and rubicon springs is 8 miles from the start, this is significant because that is where the participants camp on Friday and Saturday night before completing the trail on Sunday.

it took 8 hours to go the first 8 miles from the trail head at loon lake and 2.5 to complete the remaining 14 miles to McKinney (sp?) park/lake on/near the west side of Lake Tahoe. For comparison in 2017 we were put in group 4 of 4 and it took us 12 hours to do the first 8 miles and 4.5 hours to complete the trail. There were less break downs this time around but I think the additional organization in 2017 really made the trip a a lot longer.

There is no cell coverage once you get to the trail head no electricity. Overall we had a great time and didn’t have any equipment failures issues on the trail. My brother recently installed a new roof rack and one of the cross bars caught a low hanging tree branch early on but he was able to borrow a cordless grinder / cut off wheel from one of the guides/rock rollers/mechanics and he was able to cut off the long ends in just a few minutes. Once off the trail we smelled burning rubber and found that one of the rear tires was rubbing against a strut mount in hard right turns. Thankfully the rubbing was slight and we were able to drive the jeep to his home 140 miles away.

Overall it was a great trip, the lack of cell coverage promoted family time but my son and I agree that we won’t be doing this again as our preference are water sports/activities.

if you are going to drive/crawl the rubicon trail (keep in mind it’s a bucket list thing for people around the world (the keep jamboree event sold out in less than 2 minutes this year),9 Austrians were here last week after shipping their jeeps ahead of time, in 2017 a team from Korea were testing their electric jeep mods on our event). I highly recommend that you register though jeep jamboree or Jeepers because they have the support staff (cooks, guides, rock rollers and mechanics) to help when you need it. More importantly on these events they reserve the rights to use the trail so that no one else can which limits the number of participants to 120 keeps. The weekend before was open and 700 vehicles showed up. That’s a lot more time waiting in line at each major obstacle. The cost hasn’t changed much since 2017 at about $500 per adult/ driver and $100 per kid. The cost includes breakfast , lunch and dinner the first two days s breakfast and lunch on the third day.

 

[Inlikeflinn]

So awesome. I’m super jealous. Can’t wait to get up there someday.

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

Great job Ronnie!

I did the Rubicon in the mid 80’s on a Dave Chase organized trail ride on my 1982 Husqvarna… the sluce box gave me a little trouble but otherwise it was a great time!

I also went on JJ version when I was a teenager as a mechanics helper and got good at repairing spider gears!

My Dad and his friends are the ones who started the JJ after WWII, they all bought surplus military jeeps with winches and the rest is history. Ken Collins is the one name that comes up the most back in the day…

Again, glad to see you returned and made the trip!