So my last Sidekick was destroyed when a driver ran a red light, the day after Christmas.  I was going to head another direction for a replacement 4x4, but I saw a good deal on a Sidekick Sport and picked it up instead.  Now I have to get the new rig from the Seattle, WA area to Galveston, TX.  I could have shipped it for less than the cost of fuel to drive it back, but that didn't sound like much fun.  So I made the ridiculous decision to pull the parts from my wrecked rig and ship them to DuPont, WA, so I can install them on the new rig for the drive back.

The red Sidekick is the new one.  I have added a pre-wreck picture of old rig also (white).

I only had a few days at home, but I was able to pull and pack all of the lift components and the wheels / tires in a day.  I also packed some recovery gear, portable air compressor, tools, and some other gear. 

I ran out of time to pack and ship, so I checked a 69 pound bag for my trip to Phoenix.  I have a week of work in Phoenix, then I will fly to Seattle to install all the gear. I wanted to make the drive back be more than an extremely long highway drive.

This is the makings of a great story!

Good luck with your trip..

-Eric

Sou d's like a good adventure.

Keep posting updates on your trip back

Thanks for interest everyone. I was going to fly from Phoenix to Seattle today, but I have to fly home to deal with family and house issues. 
Some of my gear hasn't made it there anyway.

My younger sister is back in the hospital after an emergency surgery and my house has water damage from the recent storm.
 

The wheels and tires should be there Monday. Some of the other parts may arrive tomorrow and Tuesday.  Since I need to make another trip to TX, I may grab the roof rack and a few other parts. 

There are several mods I will do when the rig gets back to TX. The Sony head unit will not help me much on this drive, because I don't think the built in TomTom GPS will have all the dirt roads and I can't load way points.

I have downloaded BackCountry Navigator to my Android tablet.  I will try to experiment with it to make sure I don't have any issues on the way back.

Hope all goes well on the Family and Home fronts

Looking forward to your trek and pics

Most of the parts have arrived in WA. I head back to Seattle tomorrow. 

I haven't shipped the roof rack. It won't make it there in time now and it ships as oversized.  I may pack the Thule roof rack to use for the trip home and then switch to the factory rack later.

I will be making the drive back alone, so there should be enough room for the camping gear, without the rack.

I made it to Seattle and then to a friend's place south of there.  My tools arrived late, so it went a little slower than planned.

The parts are installed, but I have some rubbing behind the front driver's side tire and I still need to seat the c clip on the driver's side axle at the wheel hub. The axle isn't cooperating much. I set the vehicle down on its own weight and took it around the block. The axle still has is not far enough to seat the the c clip.

I will take it for an alignment in the morning. I hope that helps the rubbing during turns.

Here is a pic from "Last One Over Adventure - 2017"  My rig is the red one.  The spare is in inside the rig, since it won't fit until I install the modified tire holder from my old rig.



My first drive after the lift was a drive through Seattle to have dinner with some old friends.  The car handles well on the road and gets similar gas mileage as my old Sport, 20 mpg on the highway.  I had a vibration that I thought was either alignment or a a wheel balance issue.  I took it in for both of these on the 29th. 

The vibration persisted and I thought it may be a driveline hop.  My previous rig would bounce up and down at 35 mph.  The driveshafts on my old rig were balanced, but it would get in a harmonic and start to bounce higher and higher if I kept doing 35 mph.  This rig was vibrating at 45-55 mph and never had that smooth hop feeling.  The guys on the trail pointed out that i had a small bend in my rear passenger side wheel (aluminum).  So much for the tire shop that stated they balanced and rotated my tires.  I was able to swap the bent wheel for factory steel rim.  I kept one of the steel wheels from this rig to use as a spare.  The .  The wreck destroyed the front driver side wheel and it must have bent the lip on the driver rear as well.

I also had a problem two issues with incorrectly torqued nuts on the trip.  A few thousand miles of most off road driving and I lost the upper nut on the driver side rear shock.  Later I lost the nut on the passenger side front strut.  This was while playing in the snow and it caused a ball joint failure Sewerzuk jumped in and helped me get it back together and on the trail.  The Sport uses a different lower control arm and ball joint assembly.  The ball joint is only available with the lower control arm.  I will replace it, when I get back to the rig.

Picked the rig up in Salt Lake City this morning. I made a quick stop at Low Range, before driving south. Today was almost all pavement, until I got to Moab. The rain had just started and it was getting late. No playing on the rocks today.

Glad to see you're on the road again!

Where are you now?

-Eric

Hey, this is a big trip!!  Stop and take a few photo's, then post them.  How was Moab?

Eric and Mr. Anderson,

Thank you both.  It has been an interesting trip for sure.  I made it into Colorado on the trail, but diverted up to Denver to fly out again.  My Sidekick is currently in the Denver Airport parking lot.  It has actually spent more time in airport parking lots than it has been on he road, since the lift.  It will probably stay in Denver for at least a week.

I had to replace a brake line when I got into Moab.  I had the longer, braided stainless brake lines from Low Range in the truck.  I swapped out the front passenger line and was able to get help from  UTV rider to pump the brakes and I was back on my way.

I will make a separate post as a trip report, with many more pictures.