Rig Maintenance

[campos]

What is Rig Maintenance?

It is one of the most important factors that decide if you get to drive your rig home after a day of wheeling. Its will keep your off road machine operating smoothly and help extend the life of mechanical parts.

The two main keys in RIG Maintenance is lubrication and cleanliness...

First and foremost...

LUBRICATION! Before and after EACH off-road excursion check all fluid levels, this includes front and rear differentials, transmission, transfer case and engine oil. It is a good idea grease all zerk fittings in the front end and the U joints if applicable.

So, how often should I change the fluids?

Well, good question...

For engine oil every 3000 to 5000 miles (3k for conventional oil and 5k for synthetic) or sooner if its milked or getting black....

Differential/Transfer Case/Transmission...for something that is daily drivin and used for off-road I would say every 15k to 20k miles or sooner depending if the oil gets milked or is getting dirty faster.

Second is keeping that thing clean...

It is always a good idea to at least rinse off your RIG after each off-road adventure, this will help keeep you from costly paint and/or rust repairs...


-Campos-



Feel free to add suggestion/tips/comments

[Lenn]

If you have access to it, I would get the bottom undercoated since around here everything is petrolium based mud or salt water.

[lilindienplaya]

z-tech does body undercoating

[Jusselin]

z-tech does body undercoating

+1 that is who we do bidness with Bobby or Jim will treat you nice, and Jamie is easy on the eyes.

[campos]

where is this said z-tech place?

[trollin]

price?

[Fordtrucktexan]

Ztech... formerly Zeibart, next to Target in Beaumont. I have my cheap $35 front valance coated in their bedliner. A few years back I had a faded/scratched up bug guard coated for $20 (special they were running at the time) and it lasted for years, eventually after I wrecked the truck we tried shattering the bug guard but were unable to tear the bedliner coating, it held the broken plastic together.

[Duckslayer08]

wonder how much they would charge to do my truck

[Fordtrucktexan]

I think he said it's around $3k to do an entire vehicle.. not sure.. there's an older model Dodge reg cab 4x4 running around that they coated and it looks amazing

As far as rig maintenance the only suggestions I can contribute are the obvious... a complete top to bottom freshwater rinse and if you have to, park it in the grass with one of those rotating sprayers underneath it. Doesn't seem like it'll do much but the amount of mud that falls out will surprise you. I have a cheap garden pump sprayer I fill with soapy water to spray the door hinges (re-grease afterwards) and parts of the engine bay with.

Check those bearings... I personally have never fried a set of wheel bearings from wheeling but have heard horror stories. A set that's not sealed well will allow water in and wash out all the grease. And for what bearings cost ($5 a set on my 2wd F150) there's no reason to not check em out.

What I have experienced after offroading is replacing my busted front end parts. Ball joints, tie rods, idler arms, etc., are usually barely adequate for stock trucks driving on pavement for 100k miles. My previous suspension setup was shot after a complete day of hard offroading at Texas Hogwallow in Deweyville. I drove in there with a good alignment and everything working okay, and left out that evening with a hard right pull, loads of steering slack, and my driver's side wheel leaning in very noticably. I had pretty much wasted my Moog (they're not the greatest) lower balljoints and screwed up the threads on my camber bolts so my Trailmaster upper control arms would get loose and move position. To make things worse, the hard hits and control arms flopping around cracked the bushings, so even after I put in new bolts the arms still moved too much to align. As expected, the idler arm was also shot but they're known for failing even after 5k miles of easy driving.

Ever since then I make an effort to at least jack the truck up and test the front suspension for play and loose/worn parts every few months, and after offroading.

Also whenever I do something like a brake job, I always sand down visible frame rust and prime/paint it. Not so much for looks but whenever fluids start leaking, it's easier to spot because they'll usually eat away at the paint and be more obvious.

[lilindienplaya]

yeah Jaime is pretty hot. And theyre pretty good people, try not to deal with Bobby he gave me a quote and Jaime had to fix it because he didnt know what he was doing. She saved me money she could have easily taken the quoted price which was higher. FYI they arent open on saturdays which is the only thing I cant seem to understand