Wow!

I am amazed at the "out of the box" performance and sure footed feeling. I was a little worried about how big and heavy it is but after a couple of easy trails, I was ready to start trying some more difficult terrain.

A friend in a Nissan Hardbody Xcab 4x4 and I went to the Hungry Valley/ Gorman park this morning for a few hours. His first time really out wheeling, so we hit the training area. I decided to try the stair-climb, but about 1/3 of the way up it became apperant that I was going to be doing body work if I continued, so I exited to the right which was fun in itself. The Montero was having no problems at all traversing the stairs but the aero-flap stuff was hanging down too far, and with less than 900 miles on the odo, I whimped out.

The rest of the day, just hitting all the designated trails we could before noon, showed that the CG of the Montero is actually pretty low, a couple of times I got that "tingly belly-button" sensation <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" /> you get when you know you just blew-it, but then nothing happened. I did have on small bump going around a turn in a ridgeline where the 2 wheelers had worn a huge burm, right rearmost window met with mountain! Very scary, but no breakage.

Just one more note, this thing can flat out hall buns on the open desert with a ride like a Cadilac, but easy to control. You should have seen the look on the Cycle rider's face when I caught air going down the East Freeman trail, he actually stopped and starred at the back of my Montero as I continued down the trail.

I know this is no rock crawling, super truck, but it gives me great confidence that I will be able to mildly mod it and have a very capable rig.

First thing to change is going to be those mud flap thingy's. But they look so cool.
<img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" />

<small>[ November 28, 2002, 11:54 PM: Message edited by: Lygriek ]</small>