4x4 Parts Shop, Colorado Springs, CO 80915

[threecol_two]P3 started without a hitch and we idled it out of the shop. After a brief pause to allow the battery to charge and the engine to come up to temp, Nate climbed in and took it for a spin. We even created a few obstacles to play on.

The test drive was a success, to a point. Although P3 ran and flexed like a champ, there were two problems that needed addressing. The first problem we ran into was that the stock torque converter (remember, P3’s sports and automatic trans) applied to much torque at idle and with P3’s insane amount of crawl, the brakes couldn’t stop it at idle. Meaning you’d have to take it out of gear to stop. And that didn’t play into the “Daily Driver” idea.

The second problem was the secondary coils were too soft, which meant that the body would pitch and roll like a roller coaster. Both are fairly easy problems to fix, but what happened next took everyone by surprise.

We’ll be honest, putting this buildup together was a chore. From the time we started P3 to this point it only took about 5-6 months. That may sound like a ton of time but remember the Dynatrac axles took 3 months to get by themselves. Take into account the 1-2 month wait for custom built, color matched seats, or the creeper box (which was actually pretty quick), etc. etc. But that was just to this point.

P3’s entire buildup took just over 2 years. Why did it take so long? Well, at this point we were so behind schedule it wasn’t even funny, but little did we know what was awaiting us next. When the brakes failed to stop P3 at idle the order was made to remove the entire power train and revamp it.

Then, the biggest delay imaginable happened. Just after pulling the engine,transmission,creeper,t-case… 9/11/01 rocked the country like…well, if you’re American, you know. Besides the emotional impact, the economy hit the floor in a rather quick hurry. Being a business owner and having 20+ men at his command Nate had to put P3 on hold until the economy picked back up again. Over the next year P3 didn’t get much attention. But slowly the economy picked back up and we were back on the job.

Back to the subject! So why is this buildup so hard to put together? Simply because we have about 1000 photos to sift through that span 2 years of building and changes. So if you notice things in one picture that aren’t in the next, its simply because we’re organizing the pictures to fit in a structured buildup. As with other buildups, some tasks were done by one person while another completely different task was done by another. So excuse us if you see something done that hasn’t been covered yet. It will.

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