Kremmling, CO - Day 4: Field Repair for Scarlett, Gore Pass and views from Kremmling's Cliffs

 Friday, August 14

The issue with Scarlett having a wandering steering in the face of strong headwinds yesterday caused me to wake early and check the tightness of the front and sidecar wheels.

The front wheel was fine, did another field check of the steering head bearings and it seems solid enough...I rocked so hard that Scarlett came off the jack!

The sidecar wheel was another story though.  It had quite a bit of wobble once I lifted the tire into the air and grabbed the tire at 9 and 3 O'Clock and moved it!  Could this be the cause of the wandering?  It had been feeling like the sidecar tire had been pushing the rig to the left at times yesterday and last week or so.

So, I removed the sidecar wheel, cleaned up all the dirt/gunk that had built up between the axle hub and the wheel hub, found there's a bit of play with the axle that's not associated with the u-joints.  I'm going to have to take the axle stub out when I get home and see what's damaged or worn.

In the meantime, I went into town with Yagi and got some spacers to put under the castle nut which holds the wheel onto the axle.  It applied enough pressure to correctly align the cotter pin hole with one of the slots on the castle nut.  Before, the hole was outside the rim formed by the castle nut so there's some wear somewhere.

Gearing up, Scarlett and I went for what turned out to be a 100+ mile test ride.  Everything went well, nothing fell off and she felt much better in terms of steadiness of steering!  I went both on dirt and highway and at speeds up to 60 mph.  She did fine with the wind and against it in terms of holding a steady track so I'm optimistic the field repair will "hold" till I do a closer examination of the axle stub and associated bits.

As part of the test ride, I rode the 18 miles or so to Gore Pass, northwest of Kremmling:

Gore Pass isn't much of a scenic location, in fact, I blew past the sign without even noticing it, wondering where the pass would be.  Once I backtracked, I posed Scarlett for the requisite picture of the sign and a pic of the nearby historical monument plaque:

You know, for a guy who did such wanton killing of wildlife back then, he sure got a lot of places named after him.  Gore Canyon, Gore Range of mountains, Gore Pass, Gore Flats....and I'm sure there's more that I've not ridden by yet!

More info here: LINK

I retraced my route along Colorado Highway 134 which is where Gore Pass is located, and got back on US 40 southbound.  Briefly stopped just outside the pay booth of the Wolfort Mountain Reservoir Recreation Area but decided not to go in.

It was indeed a large reservoir with campgrounds; three that I could see, with RVs jammed into tight little clusters and boats cruising the water.  Not for me.  Saw the dam as well, named Richard, but it wasn't very photogenic.

Since it was such a clear day, and this was around Noon now, I went back onto Grand County Road 227 and took pics of Scarlett:

A closer view of the part of the escarpment/cliffs where CR 227 ends

Cliff side, looking towards Gore Canyon

Looking towards part of the meandering Colorado River just

north of Kremmling

Near the spot where CR 227 ends, it's all sloping surface to 

Scarlett's right front....

Rode back towards camp, carefully hopeful that it was a worn axle stub component that had been causing Scarlett's wandering ways usually in the face of head winds.

Spent the rest of the afternoon cooling out in the shade of the URRV's awning, doing some minor fixes for Scarlett such as re-securing the basket mounted on top of the passenger step, replacing a missing sidecar tarp tie down.  I also replaced the courtesy light for the trailer's license plate which had burned out.

Lots of RVs seen going both directions in my riding today....I wonder how it'll affect the site I'm currently boondocking on?

As sunset approached, I spotted a big column of smoke to the east.  Checking the fire reports on the news, I surmised it was part of the fire near Sulphur Springs, CO.  They've mandated evacuation of the nearby campgrounds but the good news (at least for me) is that the fire is burning to the east, away from Kremmling.

The view from CR 22, just before Kremmling

Telephoto view, seems pretty bad.