A snorkle will help to keep your rig from sucking in mud.

 

Roll the windows up

I like 4Xing with mine down

Actually a buddy one time took old inner tubes and closed off the gap from teh frame to the inner fenders. I don't have anything and don't have a prob though.

 

I would be worrying more about your diffs. Do you still have breathers on there? If so how long are they? If there stock and just go to the frame and stock then you probably have mud and water inside your diffs and they need to cleaned asap. Same with your tranny and t-case.

First thing I would do is run new breather hoses all the way to just under the hood on the firewall. Then make some nice rubber baffles to block mud from going in the engine compartment.

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I dunno how much I woulod worry about mud on the motor. Joe's old brown truck didn't have inner fender wells and I was completely surprised at how clean the motor stayed. Sure there was mudd and grim but not as I expected. I second the breather lines, also get it long enought to flex without ripping them.

 

If your realy serious about mud an electric fan. This way you can shut off the fan when you go in because a mechanical will through the water and much all around. This can really mess stuff up I know.

The other stuff is in my plans too. I plan to run all of my breather lines into the back wall of the cab making the tubing get bigger as I add more things in. This include the transmision, t-case, and rears. That a run your air intake some where it wont get wet.

 

Yeah, I'm not finding any breathers off of anything - diffs, tranny, tcase.... Looks like I might have some dirt and water in em. Now what do i do??

 

Drain and refill. With this you can atleast know when all the fluids were changed.

 

drain everything ..... fill everything ..... drive 10 miles and repeat

 

Will do. Thanks guys for all your help, it's greatly appreciated by kids like me who don't know too much about wheelin yet...

 

yep breathers, absolute must for diffs!, al though when i crash through a water hole going sorta fast, sometimes i get water in my front diff

. this is a reoccuring problem and i have to change it when it happens. it pisses me off too. but mud on the motor, well my engine is pretty filthy with mud and stuff, thats what i can say about that, it flakes off the intake manifold and you can pretty much pick it off. just make sure you have an air cleaner thats not open, high performance style, and if you dont run the stock air snorkal hose, guys have put womens nylons over the opening of the air intake cleaner, they say it keeps mud and $hit out off the air filter.

 

First thing is to make sure all your seals are good. Make sure your hubs have a good o-ring on them to help prevent a lot of water from getting in them.

Next is more of a chore. Breathers. Stick a piece of 5/16" hose on your differential and route it up higher. Usually I put mine on top of the fenderwell (between the outside skin and inside skin of the box) but I've been zip-tying mine to my filler neck on my truck. Make sure you keep that mushroom end on the hose. I figure if I'm that deep I'm going to have water in the fuel anyway.

Route the front axle's breather to the core support and take it up as high as you can while keeping it recessed under the edge of the core support.

The transmission breather is really small on the top of the transmission on the driver's side half. It points backwards. It breaks real easy so be careful. I either used 5/32" or 7/32" vacuum line on mine. I routed it up to firewall by the vacuum canister on the driver's side.

The transfer case has a little piece of hose (3" long perhaps?) hooked to yet another one of those mushroom things pointed forward. 5/16" hose will work here too. I ran this up by the vacuum canister.

I don't like to go in water because I have bad tie rod end boots and such but it can be fun. Oh yeah, and if you've got a bad floor mat or a hole in your floor you're going to rot out your floor. I gave up and don't have a floor no more.

I learned about waterproofing after I drove through some water that made my fenderwells disappear. I was alright until I got hung up on a rock and log in more shallow water and then I started taking on water. It took the Explorer two trucks ahead of me an hour to get running again.

Mud lines are cool... just not on the inside of your doors.

I took a picture of the horsehair mat wet. I threw most of that away. I put the vinyl floor back in. After the next time I took on water I never put the vinyl back in. It kind of sucks when you go wheelin' with guys that consider 33s to be "little" tires.

 

All the above is good stuff. One thing I will recomend is that when yu get to water dont banzi through it. It spashes water all kinds of funny places. Wrath makes a very good point about the insulation crap under your floor mat. If your truck has a habit of getting wet(I duno since you live in AZ

) take it out and leave the rubber part.

And water proofing your ignition would be a good idea.

You should try to seal you distributor cap to the housing. You might be able to score a rubber gasket or use a rubber band or just use a small bead of RTV. Having your motor missing and cutting out cuz it got water in there and trying to get it to dry out is unfun.good plug wires are a must too, nothing fancy just make sure they arnt cracked anywere. You can test the condition of the wires by starting your truck and having a unsuspecting friend wet thier hands and run on hand over the plug wire while having the other hand on a good ground like a fender. If they call you a [bleep] idiot and try to kick your arse then you need to change your wires(yes I have tried this

)

 

Yeah, I don't really have to worry about water too often, but when I do find a mudhole or a lot of water my eyes light up like it's christmas. Don't have to worry about the floor mat or anything cuz I ripped all the old insulation and carpet crap out so I have plain ol metal... None of it's rusted, thank god...

I will end up sealing up my distributor and checking the ignition system for weaknesses. I want to get a new stock snorkel hose deal (when I got the truck it didn't have it), cuz when I went muddin yesterday the air cleaner was nearly covered with mud... Not good for the cheap fram crap but oh well (I rinsed it out and let it dry). Once I get the undercarriage power cleaned I'm gonna run all those breather hoses up to hood level and make sure all my seals on everything are good (Including oil pan, etc cuz I have a couple oil leaks somewhere). Friday I get my paycheck (woo hoo, all goin to truck, g/f's gonna be pissed

) so I'll be changin the trans, tcase, and diff fluids as well...

Speaking of my g/f, do any of your wives, g/f's, etc get jealous of your truck cuz it gets all your time, money, and effort?

I doubt I'm the only one....

 

In reply to:

Speaking of my g/f, do any of your wives, g/f's, etc get jealous of your truck cuz it gets all your time, money, and effort?

[/ QUOTE ]

Aint got one, probably for all those reasons

I will say dont do the plug wire deal to a girl if you plan to keep her around, might not win points

 

i used to get the silent treatment for 3 days when i still had my trucks. 1 day of mudding = 3 days of silent treatment and pizza. it was a fair tradeoff with some budwieser.

theo

 

i get that sometimes. "oh, why do you needs that for your truck now? haven't you spent enough money on it yet? whens it's going to be done? WHAT?! you don't need another. You've already got two hunny, why do you want a third? do i do that with my car?"

 

1 day of Mudding gets you three days of pizza...and thats a bad thing

Jacks Frozen Pizza Rule, I Plan on living on them at college, them and cereal

 

don't forget ramen noodles.

i used to get the "why" questions. i had regular tires when i bought my s15, i ended up getting a/t's because i got zero traction with other tires, and as soon as the bill came i got slapped and the silent treatment. same when i came back from going to buddy's house to drink and the entire truck was covered in mud. i got the "at least u could have washed it before u came home" and the return trips, "should i call the mechanic, i'm sure u broke something now".

theo

 

i get 3 off roading magazines, game informer, and star wars insider. everytime one of these comes in the mail, i always have a comment about something on one of them and i get one of those sighs followed by a "you are such a dork" in that cute tone. but then i'll start ranting about it and i get ignored

 

Hey Drey, I remember Jack's Pizza! Used to live in Lincoln, NE about 5 years ago, then moved here to Phoenix. That stuff's awesome, I lived on it for a while too, granted I was 12. Man, when you go to college it'll be Pizza for celebration purposes! Otherwise, it IS

and ramen or death! (it's okay though, they're making new sophisticated flavors like cajun chicken and hot chili flavor).... that's my pointless $ .02