My brother in law is into Isuzus about like Im in to VWs and their bi-annual event involves an OHV park in North Carolina. Since I have a 1999 isuzu vehicross  that was my first car and it is one of the rare ones (only about 4,000 imported and only 1012 like mine!), I decided to check it out. They do some serious off-road stuff (any you tube video search for Uwharrie will prove this) and I didn't want to take my all stock perfectly fine Isuzu off road... so I towed the baja over there.

Everyone was really excited to see how a VW would do and she did fantastic! I had put a raised beam in a few weeks back and didn't switch out the steering box...I found out the "new" one was a bad one and I wished I had the other one... oh well. I'm sure bouncing up rock walls didn't help.

There is one hill that everyone calls Daniel (many stories, from hippies attacked by wolves to something to do with Elton Johns song). Daniel is a trail the tame group avoided. We drove up the back side to watch everyone try to make it up but no one was attempting while we were there. I walked it and decided to try to make it. Since we came up the back way, I had to drive down, turn around and come back up. Gravity took care of getting down. turning around took light brakes and full throttle to spin me. Got a little traction and she was off! I shot back up part of the trail and made it a good 2/3 of the way before getting hung up on a rock. I tried to use the individual parking brake cables to stop the spinning tire and make the other tire drive, but my gearing was too tall. I couldn't get traction and tried to roll down and take it again. Same result. I kept spinning. A little isuzu p'up backed down to me, hooked a tow strap around the beam, asked me to pick up a log for firewood and then dragged me up the entire hill. It was incredible.


 There was a professional videographer in our crew who happened to video the Daniel hill climb. I'll post that eventually. And a photo of the baja taking on a different rock face! I'm gonna submit this one for my Calendar submission!

speed was the fun part! I had to keep stopping and letting the jeeps, monteros and troopers catch up. Maybe there teying to keep their windsheild intact. I bet the reduction boxes did well, but I'm not certain I wanna go that route unless I happen across one cheap.

on another note, how hard is it to replace the steering box? And if I put a solid mount transmission setup with strap, would I have to replacw the nose cone?

I will have to look at doing a 4.86 r and p set... Maybe. And I guess I'll have to replace the nost cone since it is damaged. Trying that hill climb the clutch slipped, the throttle revedand the gear popped out. All were because the engine tranny moved farther back when the nose  cone broke

it wasn't so much a slide back as a pivot back. Luckily it survived towing it 400 miles home!

I've been looking at the 4.86 r&p online and that doesn't look like an easy swap! That's a complete disassembly! It sounds like something I'd be in for but are there any tranny shops locally that'd be worth going to? What would they charge to swap a r&p?

You talking about this tool Dave?

Well, the time has come... I had the baja at BP for sale and when I drug it back home, I decided it was time to see it go and for me to move on to other things  I put it in the front yard yesterday evening with a sign on it and an old Harbor Freight driveway alarm under the unsecured hood. I came home from work and was asleep on the couch when the alarm went off. Looked out the window and a fella was checking it out. I went outside and talked to him. He made an offer, I countered, he countered and a deal was struck. He is supposed to come back this evening to pay and pick it up. Its kinda a sad day. I put a lot of work in this car to keep it on the road and I'm kinda proud of the ugly duckling that I made presentable. Maybe this means something good is in my future. we will see....

I passed the bug on to a new home and found the car of my dreams in the same day.  Tell me that wasn't supposed to happen.   

We just pulled a 2001 Isuzu Trooper home for $600. It has a bum transmission, but we're gonna try to make it work. Its pretty nice despite the fact that the drain and fill plugs were both loose... and the pan was empty... Drug it back from South Pittsburg on the interstate with 3 tow straps in line (about 50' of line between us). It was pretty interesting to say the least. The engine runs, so it had power steering and brakes. We were able to fill the transmission back up before towing it so it regained reverse, but still no forward gears... we might be finding a pull-a-part transmission for it soon!

By "we" I mean my brother in law. He bought it and I'm helping with it. Still no replacement yet 

Nick, call Carl long of Long automotive. (not the dealership) He has a trooper in his front yard he will pobably sell for parts (I think thats where he got the engine for our 99 trooper).

I'm sure he would love to see it leave his yard, and I wouldnt mind getting some parts off of it myself. I just havent confronted him yet about if thats where he got my $3,000 engine or not 

I also need an idler pulley from a doner engine if you know where I can find one. The one on our trooper whines like a supercharger when the engine is running.

Ours is a 99 with the performance package and TOD (torque on demand)

Only thing I dont like about these beasts is their insatiable thirst for oil... (reason for losing the first engine)