My 2WD F150 adventures

[TantoTrailers]

I've been stalking you guys for a few months watching and learning from your various adventures. In the past few years I have been getting more and more into camping and back to my outdoor roots, so much so that I built a camper last summer (more to come on that in the near future). I finally decided to take the plunge into beginner level overlanding with my 2016 Ford F150 (2WD). I bought it new 3 years ago with 4 miles on it and now I'm over 77k. I recently replaced my tires and I went with Pirelli Scorpion AT Plus in the stock size. I love these damn tires, no noise on the road, .5mpg loss, excellent traction, and they look cool too. I am eyeing a suspension upgrade but I want to do my research and see what will be best for my needs. Other than that I think this rig will stay stock for my every day driver. I may or may not buy something with 4wd for fun...tbd...

In terms of gear, I have a near new Hi Lift jack that I picked up off a guy for $40, a shovel, and a set of XBull Recovery Tracks. I also picked up a near new Craftsman chainsaw off a dude for $80 today which I'm not sure if that counts as overland gear but I'm kinda excited about so I figured I would share haha! I made a rack to hold my jack and shovel in place and it held everything securely through some rough riding. I need a good tow strap!

Today I finally got out to test the truck and tires at an "off road" park. Now mind you, where I live there is NO public land to go mess around on, no cool roads, and only 2 off road parks, if you can call them that. There is a mile loop around a lake with several different lines to choose from with varying terrain and difficulty. But...it was a blast! I learned a lot and met some cool people. My first lap I got stuck in a deep mud rut because I had no idea what I was doing. A) I had full 40psi in my tires B) I had traction control ON so it stopped the wheels as soon as they started to spin and C) I went into it too slow with no momentum (but, in my defense I had no idea how deep it was so I didn't want to hit something in there too hard). I aired down and set my truck correctly and didn't get stuck for the remainder of the 3 hours we were there. Pretty much everyone there got stuck somewhere and had to get pulled out and I was the only 2WD truck there so I shouldn't feel too bad. There was only one other full size pickup there, a 4x4 Silveraydo and it too was stuck in the mud...high centered on its spare tire. I was pretty impressed with how much this truck can handle with just a bit of new skill and the right configuration. I bet it could do some amazing ******** with a pro driver. Anyway, this was fun! Here are some pics.

 

[Deleted member 9101]

Just incase you didn't know, there are two steps to turning off the traction control:

1. Press the traction control button - traction control is off.

Then

2. Press and hold the traction control button for aprox. 10 seconds - this disables "advanced track."

Now your tires will spin as much as you want.

 

[rho]

Fun times! 2wd trucks can get a lot more places than people really give them credit for. Throw a little more ground clearance in, aggressive tires, airing down and a limited slip or locker in the rear and they do REALLY well. Momentum and ground clearance are a bit more important. I'm constantly amazed at how well our 2wd GMC Sierra does and the places it'll get to, though the front bumper on ours hangs on all kinds of crap. Getting that dealt with and some better skids are next on the list to do.

 

[TantoTrailers]

Dirt Adventure #2 in the books, this time with my trailer in tow! I decided to give the Trans Wisconsin Adventure Trail (TWAT) a try. I only had time to do the lower half of the route but it was pretty awesome. Nothing off-road label worthy but it was plenty of dirt to keep me happy and got things nice and messy. I live in IL so our off-road options are quite limited.

Friday after work I set out on the road and hit the State Line Rd Route from Rockford to Apple River where I had my site booked. This was my first time solo camping and it might be my new thing. I had no time table, no distractions, and plenty of firewood! Saturday morning I set out on the trail working my way through the route into Iowa and some of the cooler sections of the journey. I stopped a lot to get video clips and pictures along the way. Rain came just shortly after I got onto Good-nuf Hallow and this made for a messy drive for a few hours. I got dumped on when I was trying to take shots of the overhanging rock road and a LOT of trees came down into the road. Nothing I couldn't go around so I didn't feel like I had adequate excuse to use my newly acquired chainsaw. I don't know how sensitive the forest department people are for those types of things and I didn't want to make an enemies on my first trip out. I did pick up a bunch of aluminum cans along the way so that critters didn't get paws stuck in them trying to get the goodies. The route was taking considerably longer than I imagined as I was not flying down the dirt roads and just enjoying the scenery quite a bit, if I had a passenger I bet they would have been annoyed haha. I decided to duck out of the route and go straight to Black River Falls where I had camp 2 booked for the night at around 6pm with about 80 miles left to go. Camp 2 was pretty much empty due to the rains that washed everything out, there was one group way off in the distance but for the most part it was me and the mosquitoes. I slept well and got back on the road heading home Sunday, but I decided to make up the 80 miles I missed the day before going south on the route. It was actually an uneventful section with a lot of pavement except for about 15 miles in the beginning near BRF.

Got home and spent a few hours cleaning everything up, found some paint problems and apparently I lost my license plate somewhere in Iowa due to rocks hitting the plastic bracket that was holding it onto my light housing...that makes for a fun story though! I am going to try to put together a video if the clips turned out ok. Till next time!

 

[TantoTrailers]

 

[TantoTrailers]

 

[TantoTrailers]

 

[InZanity]

What kind of camera are you using? These shots look fantastic to me.
Really enjoy the set up, especially with that trailer.

 

[billiebob]

You have a fabulous setup. Love to see more of the trailer but kudos to you for all the use, travelling you are doing.
Thats what it is all about !!

and yes, fabulous pictures.I love picture threads !! Gorgeous country.
Last pic at home, looks like a very peaceful place to live.

I'd stop fer bacon too.

 

[rajacat]

Nice photos. Nice clean setup!

I'm also interested in the camera and lens you used. Those photos are very sharp.

 

[TantoTrailers]

Thanks guys!! Some of the pictures (the larger dimension pics) are shot with my cell phone; LG G6, which is a line of phones I have been on for a while due to the camera quality. It actually has 2 rear facing cameras, one wide angle and one normal which is awesome and the HDR functionality is really good. The detail high def pics (somewhat smaller dimension) are shot with a Nikon D5500 and a Sigma 17-50mm wide angle lens + polorazier filter. I learned to shoot in manual when I got this camera and it makes for some fun and sometimes frustrating shooting! I actually used the D5500 to record more video than pics this trip which I need to compile here in the next few days.

 

[Buddha.]

View attachment 528788

Good ole minimum maintenance road. When I was a kid in northern MN we were always looking for those for some wheeling.

 

[bigskypylot]

That looks familiar

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[TantoTrailers]

bigsky - were you able to drive along the route past this bridge? It took me to a court type of turnaround at the top of the hill. Immediately to drivers left in the picture was a dirt road that looked like a dead end or possibly even someone's driveway. I decided not to go that way with my trailer since turning around was "fun" enough throughout the route already. Interestingly enough, the route actually goes really close to the road right behind you (and me) in those pics and that is what I used to get around this short section and back on the route. I did see a really overgrown path that could have been the road? But it had small trees and such growing in it so I dont think anyone has used it in a while...that is the only part that I was unable to do from BRF to IL. *Side note...I ended up going on the road in Iowa which I should not have been towing my trailer through according to the posted signs...I felt bad but I was too far into it before I noticed the signs and had nowhere to turn around. My trailer is no wider than my truck and it treads lightly so I don't think it was causing any damage out there.

 

[bigskypylot]

bigsky - were you able to drive along the route past this bridge? It took me to a court type of turnaround at the top of the hill. Immediately to drivers left in the picture was a dirt road that looked like a dead end or possibly even someone's driveway. I decided not to go that way with my trailer since turning around was "fun" enough throughout the route already. Interestingly enough, the route actually goes really close to the road right behind you (and me) in those pics and that is what I used to get around this short section and back on the route. I did see a really overgrown path that could have been the road? But it had small trees and such growing in it so I dont think anyone has used it in a while...that is the only part that I was unable to do from BRF to IL. *Side note...I ended up going on the road in Iowa which I should not have been towing my trailer through according to the posted signs...I felt bad but I was too far into it before I noticed the signs and had nowhere to turn around. My trailer is no wider than my truck and it treads lightly so I don't think it was causing any damage out there.

Nope. I did the same. Just took the pic at the bridge and moved on to hook up with the route down the road that I can recall

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