... As much as I wish we had cool water crossings here, that looks spooky. I would have looked if there were any salvageable parts lol
LOL! I'm guessing maybe the spare.
No, no you don't.
Water crossings are 'cool' - with someone else's vehicle. Otherwise they're EXPENSIVE and DANGEROUS. I cracked both exhaust manifolds crossing the South Platte here in CO. Cold water and hot cast don't mix.
Changing out fluids at least once a year in the axles, t-case and tranny gets expensive when you're running full synthetic and you have to if you get water contamination. Re-greasing EVERYTHING after every trip gets expensive, too, and still doesn't get rid of the wear and tear of getting water in steering and hubs and running it like that for a couple hundred miles before you can get home and fix things.
The scary thing is 99% of the people that try stuff like this don't have any idea what their vehicle will do or even can do when immersed in water. They take their DD out on vacation and plunge right in not knowing what will happen. I don't think any that I've seen even realize that vehicles float for a good long time before they sink and while they're floating they have ZERO control.
The one really good thing I got out of the Longwater trail crossing the Platte here in CO is progressive tests of water depth with my big Sport. I know EXACTLY how deep it can go - which is right up to the windows. AND, I know how fast the water can be before I end up like the Montero guy.
Good information for an emergency, but I wouldn't make a habit out of it. There's been a a couple times I've had to make questionable crossings but at least I could do it confidently.
Southern Utah is really bad. Those pictures really don't show the typical water crossing.
That's the Dirty Devil River southeast of Hanksville on the Poison Spring Wash BLM trail to the Maze. There's probably almost as much dirt as water in that 'water'. Muddy Creek which flows into this further west off the San Rafael Swell is the same. When the water is actually flowing out there it picks up insane amounts of silt and sand. The Dead Horse Point park ranger picked up a quart of CO River water before a seminar at the station a few years ago and by the time she'd gotten to the station to show us it was half a quart of water and half a quart of silt and sand.
That stuff is SO FINE it gets into parts right along with the water. You might as well inject machine cutting slurry into your parts 'cause the effect is the same.
This is the one thing I REALLY don't like about UT. The water here in the Rockies is pretty clean. Out there, you have to make sure everything is sealed as tight as possible if you're crossing water or your life is going to suck when you get home.
Raise the water level about 4', get it running good and quick and turn those banks into 6-8' walls, make it about 30' wide and that's what Cottonwood Creek outside Lavender Canyon was like when my X, the kids and I were through after the flood in 2005 outside the Needles. We had to drop off 6-8' drops, drive across and bust through the 6-8' banks on the other side. Several times. Almost none of the 14 mile trail was left - we had to basically recreate the trail for most of the ways up the canyon, so it was a good thing we'd been there a few times before. We were the only ones that could even make it up the canyon. Park service and the people at the trading post couldn't even make it to the creek. PS guys were quizzing us on the trail status and whether anyone was stranded up there - well, after we finally convinced them we'd actually managed to make it up the canyon.
Telling them about getting stuck in the quick sand at the top finally convinced them we'd actually done what we said.
The downside is I beat the crap out of my Sport. Lost two sets of wheel bearings, a set of leaf springs, and trashed the front brake rotors and calipers. Like I said, that stuff is like grinding compound - once it gets in, it's over.
We had to turn away several people at the gate who were driving stock SUVs and thought they'd be able to go up the trail. :rolleyes: Even after we explained that I needed both front and rear lockers and every bit of my 35"s and clearance just to (barely) get into and out of the first wash which had walls 4' higher than the top of my Sport, some of them still wanted to argue.
Makes you wonder what people think sometimes ....
Edward
Water crossings are 'cool' - with someone else's vehicle. Otherwise they're EXPENSIVE and DANGEROUS. I cracked both exhaust manifolds crossing the South Platte here in CO. Cold water and hot cast don't mix.