1997 November 09, several of us from the Northern Alberta 4-Wheel Drive Association (NA4WDA) and a few others, gathered just under the south end of the bridge over the North Saskatachewan River, at Devon, Alberta. BLACK RAT actually stayed fairly clean on this first trip, as my navigator insisted that we be careful with the company's lease vehicle :-) I would have had more (great!) photos, but our Nikon's Databack batteries gave out :-/ If you were there and have some photos I could borrow for scanning, please let me know.
Here I am airing down from 30psi to 20psi using the Quadra-Flate device. It maintains equal pressure on all four tires at the same time, and is quite fast. When we were done the ride, I left the highway pressure at 20psi, since those BFG radials looked like they had just the right amount of bulge. I guess I'll have to try 15psi on the next offroad run. (NOTE: Quadra-Flate appears to be no longer be in business. I have removed the link for that reason.)
This is my navigator, co-director of RATS!, and my wife, Corina. The sun was low and in the wrong position, but this was the only shot I was able to get at the time. I swear that she told me "You don't need a wench; you've got me!" but I'm not going to touch that one any further :-)
Here we see Mr. & Mrs. (on the bank, right) Owner of a brand new top-of-the-line Toyota 4-Runner as he tries to go through the first mud hole. Note the broken ice floating on top of the mud.
And here we see that same 4-Runner being yanked out of the same pit. This was to be a pattern, not only for this vehicle, but for several others.
This little "TOY" was able to power through nearly any obstacle, but it, and the best equipped Jeep out there, both found themselves stuck in four feet of river bank mud, quite unexpectedly.
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