1Sinner
Member
- 56
- 33
- 18
- Location
- Edwards, California
Phew! It was a long weekend.
Over several weeks I talked to a gentleman out of Texas about a possible trade. My M923A2 for His XM381 deuce and a half bobber. Lots of pictures and video chats back and forth to verify the driveability and suitability of the trade for the both of us, we formulated a plan. I am located in SoCal and he was located in west Texas. The Mid point being around Benson AZ. 615 Miles one way. For me, the original plan was to rent or borrow a heavy equipment trailer and drag the 5 ton to AZ in the comfort of air conditioning in my brothers F450. With a backup plan of driving the 5 ton if things went awry. Well it didn't take long as the first corner we took at the end of my block looked like it was going to roll the 5 ton off the trailer or destroy the gooseneck. So we did the only thing that made sense at 3am with a deadline to meet someone a couple hundred miles away. We would unload and load the gear in the 923 and road dog it. So we did. 14 1/2 hours later.........
The mornings ride was uneventful, cool temps, beautiful desert scenery, good tunes and comedy coming out of the bluetooth speaker. Even decent fuel mileage (8.75 miles/gal) lol. Temps increasing through the morning, and as many small grade back roads as possible, we hit the desert basin outside Phoenix on the 10 and it hit about 105 degrees. It was cooking. pounding water and having several reroutes due to major accidents, she was getting a little warm for comfort 205-215 degrees by the gauge we hit some 2 lanes to slow down and cool down. Every component on the truck was heat soaked through and through. About that point we were wondering whether this was as good of an idea as it sounded earlier that day. But we pushed on.
530pm rolled around as we rolled into Benson and met our contact. Slate was an awesome guy and we each went over our respective rigs, took test drives, familiarized each other with each ones quirks, did the paperwork and got back on the road. Nothing like a return trip in an unproven 53 year old vehicle. But she fired right up and took us on down the highway. We pushed through to the west side of Phoenix about 1130 and crashed at a friends house for a few hours because we just couldn't keep our eyes open much longer. 19 1/2 hours behind the wheel of an MV in one day is plenty. After a couple beers to pull the edge off the day we crashed til around 5am and got up to continue the drive. Again wondering if this was as fantastic of a plan as we had thought the day before. With sore backs and sore shoulders from no power steering, the deuce fired right up again urging us along. Not one hiccup on the 10 hour Sunday drive. The deuce did a little better for mainting speed and mileage with the 395's. consistently 55-60mph (gps) and averaging 11.75-12.8 mpg. Around Amboy we were chased down by a honda acting strange. Ended up being a good friend headed home from a long weekend. He recognized the truck from a snapchat we had sent of the trade. Couldn't believe it! Super nice to see him too, since I hadn't seen him for about 2 years. We hung out and shot the you know what for about 20 minutes, got some pics of him with the truck and headed back out on the road. Rolled into my driveway around 3pm exhausted and beat up, but happy that no major issues popped up in the slightly longer route home.
Lessons learned from the trip. Duece's should have been produced with power steering and better seats. The Phoenix basin still sucks temperature wise and traffic wise on a saturday in October. A good friend makes the trip go by faster, and much easier with a co-driver. You'll never forget days like this. They make the best memories to tell kids and Grandkids down the road. Will post pics later as I don't have access to them right now.
Over several weeks I talked to a gentleman out of Texas about a possible trade. My M923A2 for His XM381 deuce and a half bobber. Lots of pictures and video chats back and forth to verify the driveability and suitability of the trade for the both of us, we formulated a plan. I am located in SoCal and he was located in west Texas. The Mid point being around Benson AZ. 615 Miles one way. For me, the original plan was to rent or borrow a heavy equipment trailer and drag the 5 ton to AZ in the comfort of air conditioning in my brothers F450. With a backup plan of driving the 5 ton if things went awry. Well it didn't take long as the first corner we took at the end of my block looked like it was going to roll the 5 ton off the trailer or destroy the gooseneck. So we did the only thing that made sense at 3am with a deadline to meet someone a couple hundred miles away. We would unload and load the gear in the 923 and road dog it. So we did. 14 1/2 hours later.........
The mornings ride was uneventful, cool temps, beautiful desert scenery, good tunes and comedy coming out of the bluetooth speaker. Even decent fuel mileage (8.75 miles/gal) lol. Temps increasing through the morning, and as many small grade back roads as possible, we hit the desert basin outside Phoenix on the 10 and it hit about 105 degrees. It was cooking. pounding water and having several reroutes due to major accidents, she was getting a little warm for comfort 205-215 degrees by the gauge we hit some 2 lanes to slow down and cool down. Every component on the truck was heat soaked through and through. About that point we were wondering whether this was as good of an idea as it sounded earlier that day. But we pushed on.
530pm rolled around as we rolled into Benson and met our contact. Slate was an awesome guy and we each went over our respective rigs, took test drives, familiarized each other with each ones quirks, did the paperwork and got back on the road. Nothing like a return trip in an unproven 53 year old vehicle. But she fired right up and took us on down the highway. We pushed through to the west side of Phoenix about 1130 and crashed at a friends house for a few hours because we just couldn't keep our eyes open much longer. 19 1/2 hours behind the wheel of an MV in one day is plenty. After a couple beers to pull the edge off the day we crashed til around 5am and got up to continue the drive. Again wondering if this was as fantastic of a plan as we had thought the day before. With sore backs and sore shoulders from no power steering, the deuce fired right up again urging us along. Not one hiccup on the 10 hour Sunday drive. The deuce did a little better for mainting speed and mileage with the 395's. consistently 55-60mph (gps) and averaging 11.75-12.8 mpg. Around Amboy we were chased down by a honda acting strange. Ended up being a good friend headed home from a long weekend. He recognized the truck from a snapchat we had sent of the trade. Couldn't believe it! Super nice to see him too, since I hadn't seen him for about 2 years. We hung out and shot the you know what for about 20 minutes, got some pics of him with the truck and headed back out on the road. Rolled into my driveway around 3pm exhausted and beat up, but happy that no major issues popped up in the slightly longer route home.
Lessons learned from the trip. Duece's should have been produced with power steering and better seats. The Phoenix basin still sucks temperature wise and traffic wise on a saturday in October. A good friend makes the trip go by faster, and much easier with a co-driver. You'll never forget days like this. They make the best memories to tell kids and Grandkids down the road. Will post pics later as I don't have access to them right now.
