It finally happened, I got to take #6 home! Definitely a long time coming, which made it that much better. We had a few issues so far, but man the Speed is good in the rough terrain! I also think it did well on the rocks, the SXS Adventure Rally is known for guided rock crawling trails, and it was fun to put the Speed through Double Sammy a few times.

Transcription:

(0:00) All right, everybody. I'm here at Speed. You guys might recognize this guy, Daniel.
(0:04) Daniel: How's it going, guys? Very exciting day. Got the kiddos. Say hi, kiddos.
(0:09) Kiddos: Hello.
(0:10) And as you can see, number six is loaded up on my trailer. We're gonna head out and go cruise. But Jamie gave me the full walkthrough.
(0:17) I got all the new updates and everything and got the new windshield on and ready to go, huh?
(0:22) Jamie: Yeah, we just walked through the checklist, made sure we got all his ordered accessories, gave a little rundown on fluids, temperatures, and operating procedures. So, now she's all yours.
(0:36) Daniel: And Daniel did say they're gonna go ahead and email me a PDF of the owner's manual.
(0:40) Jamie: Yeah, absolutely. So, have all the basics of doing the oil fluid changes. Yeah, I did a fresh fluid change, so I should be good for a few hundred miles.
(0:47) Here's Jeff coming to shine up the windshield for you.
(0:50) Daniel: There we go. Here's the man who designed the windshield. A lot of people are excited to see this windshield. They've been asking, "What's the windshield?" "Nick, are your Chupacabra mirrors gonna fit?" We will make it happen. So, it's real automotive glass, laminated, curved, triple-pane glass, laminated.
(1:09) Jeff: Yeah, exactly.
(1:10) Daniel: Voting, so it's a real nice day here in Havasu. I think it's like 82 for the high, so I'm gonna be cruising with my kids today, just more of a break-in ride. So, I'm gonna leave it on, see how it goes.
(1:24) Chris and box installed. I went over here to the side so I can get the spare over here. I did get a rectangle box, which I might use for a Baja trip.
(1:33) Daniel: What do you guys think?
(1:37) Kiddos: Yeah!
(1:40) Daniel: All right, we couldn't leave Havasu without getting a little ride in, so got my boys. We're gonna see if we can make our way towards the cabin. Do a little break-in ride, make sure everything feels good before we head home. First ride in the Speed. Give me a "Oh yeah!"
(1:50) Kiddos: Oh yeah!
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(2:04) Made it here to the Log Cabin, about 8-20 miles from standard.
(2:07) Kiddos: Yeah, there's all kinds of cool stuff here, huh?
(2:11) Daniel: Running it with the windshield. Ran a little warm, we kind of stopped for a second to take a pee break. But all in all, really good so far. So, I think I was maybe a little harsh on it when I drove the number 18 with the 35s. The power and the brakes are noticeably better working, of course, with the stock 32s. So, we'll talk more about that later. Part of the ride, I'm gonna take out my local trails tomorrow. But so far, so good. Beautiful day out here. Stoked I got to show my kids this. We're gonna go explore and show them all the little knickknacks.
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(2:56) Daniel: So, Sunday we're out putting some more miles on the Speed. We're taking it to Utah next week, so out here with some buddies, Brent from American Engineering, you've seen him on the channel a bunch, my buddy Guy, who knows the area very well. And it's cool. We're doing some low range stuff. I had some fast washes earlier, but cool to put this thing in the locked front diff, because I'll be doing a lot of that here coming up to Utah. So, just giving it a good shakedown, making sure everything's all good and tidy. And so far, it's fun. It's very fun to drive, and I'm actually really enjoying driving the car on 32s. I think I'm going to reserve the right to change my mind. I've said a bunch of times how I can't wait to put 35s on this thing, but everything about the car seems to work better on the smaller, lighter-weight tire. So, very much enjoying it. I took the windshield off today. The temps on the car are great. We have beautiful weather today for May. It's 85 degrees out, so it's just an awesome day to be out exploring. So, enjoying everything. I think the tires have a little bit too much pressure. The tire sensors are working, which is very cool. And just exploring some stuff that's new to me, but it's not far from where I normally ride. So, we're gonna keep cruising along and go grab a burger. But all good so far. So, first couple good rides. And then here we are in Sand Hollow. As soon as we get here, I wanted to run this road section just because it's a fun clip to shoot. I think it looks awesome, wanted to post it on social right away. And one thing I learned, I thought the car was low. I called Robbie Gordon and he said, "Yeah, I mean, from the factory they're a little on the low side." He recommended 16 inches of ride height with somebody in it. So, before we left, we raised the car up with the preload rings and got this thing to about 17, 17 and a quarter static without me in it. Looking at the car, I think it looks and feels amazing right here. You have even better small bump compliance and it never feels like it sways or whatever, get up on two wheels. So, as I felt that, ever since driving all these different speeds, I just wanted to kind of lift the car up and see if it would benefit, and I felt like it did. And this is the only adjustment I did to the suspension so far. I never played with the crossover rings, I never played with the compression or rebound clickers. The more I drove it, the more I liked it, the better it felt. And all these other clips you're about to see are just with this ride height. Morning, everybody, from San Holo. You see what it is. We're lining up, it's Rally on the Rocks, taking the Speed on the Rocks. I'm a little nervous, I'm a little anxious. I've been up Double Sammy a couple times, once in the Can-Am, once in the Turbo S. Played around a little bit with this thing with the locking diff back home, some trails by my house, wasn't nearly as technical as what we're about to get into. But got the ride height correct, talked to Robbie Gordon. He talks to me almost daily, guys. He's obsessed with making sure everything's right, and it's really cool. It's not just because of my little YouTube channel or whatever, but really just wants to know and gather feedback. But what he was saying is we want the car to be 16 inches of ride height with people in it. So we jacked it up to 17, and that should get us close. I noticed it was low the other day when I was going through some rocks by my house. So it's going to come in really handy on this stuff. I'm keeping the 32s, I just aired down to 10 psi. Probably should go a little lower, but it's a heavy car. Gonna see how she works. Double Sammy is a seven-rated trail. We post some content. A lot of you guys probably heard of that show, it's very popular. And love being back in San Holo, man. It's like my home away from home, and just excited to have this opportunity, excited to have the car. A lot of people have been coming by, saying hi, saying like, you know, congrats. I got one on order, and so cool to see. So all the Speed faithful, you guys have seen shipments are starting to show up, and I think it's going to get more exciting. Can't wait for the first 500 cars to get out there. So we're gonna get to it. Wish us luck. We'll see how she goes. [Applause]
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(7:38) Thank you.
(7:39) All right, Wes's first time up the chute.
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(8:02) [Applause] Oh yeah!
(8:12) Easier than you thought? Harder than you thought?
(8:15) Honestly, easier than I thought. I think most people say that, but it's definitely steep.
(8:22) But if you don't think about it and you just go, easy throttle by 2500 RPM, 3000 RPM, and it just goes.
(8:28) You think some other obstacles we already did were more difficult than this one?
(8:31) I mean, more difficult but not as long.
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(8:44) [Applause]
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(8:58) Yeah, look at that!
(9:09) So the rock crawling went good. I was pretty excited about it after I got up the chute.
(9:24) A little nervous about doing the chute because I hadn't done it in a while, but rock crawling with a four-seater is just more enjoyable for me than a two-seater.
(9:32) Enjoyed the power modulation. You hear that clicking noise? Unfortunately, that's the wheel bearings.
(9:40) We're going to have to re-grease them.
(9:49) Most known for our mirror side mirror center mirrors. We have a cool storage solution for the Can-Am X3. We make the clothing, but that's a little bit about us. We started our brand as being a passion enthusiast, which is one of the reasons why I love this event so much because you get to come ride and you can use that idea and experiences to develop into our products. And that's what we really try to do is to differentiate. So an example would be offering mirrors you can mount any type of lights you want and adjust it independently. No one else had done that. Same thing with the storage on the Can-Am, things of that nature. So thanks, everybody. I'll be brief. We brought some swag if you want to learn more about us. We're everywhere on social. Our website is chupacabraoffroad.com.
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(12:28) Morning, everybody. It is Saturday. We're going up Double Sammy again. We sponsored this trail twice. Made it up the other day, learned a lot. It's been a fourth time tackling the trail, so I'm feeling like I got more confidence in the rocks. This thing did pretty good. I'll talk more about it when I get home, you can hear me better. But yesterday we had a leak. A lot of people were posting about it, you know, making fake accusations, but we did realize about the motor, but we realized that we had a leak with the power steering. There was an AN fitting that came loose here, it was loose. So shout out to Jacob, Wes, David, my dad, my dad's buddies, all these guys, Patrick, Grant, Mike, all of you guys, Curtis, you guys helped get this thing all dialed and buttoned up. So we are back going. Small little setback, got some power steering fluid. It takes GM power steering fluid and we're topped off and good to go. And then we noticed the other day there was a little bit of a water leak, but it was just an overflow hose clamp that we learned as well. We had the whole back end taken apart, so we're good to go. We're excited. I'm excited to do some more rock crawling and then we'll go run some fast stuff and a night ride tonight. So we'll catch up later. We'll see how this goes.
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(14:14) You're right, you're lined up. There you go.
(14:27) Nice job. Thanks for allowing me to sponsor. I love this event. Thanks to Rally on the Rocks trail guides for getting this all up safe. Trail, one of the sponsors of this trail, have been coming to this event for a couple years, Chupacabra Off-Road. We're based out of Phoenix, Arizona. We manufacture parts for UTVs. We have most known for our mirror side mirror center mirrors. We have a cool storage solution for the Can-Am X3. We make the clothing, but that's a little bit about us. We started our brand as being a passion enthusiast, which is one of the reasons why I love this event so much because you get to come ride and you can use that idea and experiences to develop into our products. And that's what we really try to do is to differentiate. So an example would be offering mirrors you can mount any type of lights you want and adjust it independently. No one else had done that. Same thing with the storage on the Can-Am, things of that nature. So thanks, everybody. I'll be brief. We brought some swag if you want to learn more about us. We're everywhere on social. Our website is chupacabraoffroad.com.
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(16:13) Lord here, I think first I need to get rich. Want to roll it down, you gonna try it again or you want to come out?
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(16:34) Okay, so first 262 miles on it. There is a little bit of a highlight of what we did. Notice some more about the vehicle once we took it to Sand Hollow because like I mentioned, it's a better environment with a variety of terrain to really see what makes the speed tick. I'm very excited that we went there and overall had a good trip. Definitely had a couple issues. So let's start off with what I think is good. Suspension, I've talked about this a couple times. Handling, it's phenomenal. I think it's probably the best stock UTV. We need to run it back to back with the Pro R, but I think the small bump compliance is better than anything stock on the market. I'd say that very confidently in terms of heating up big bumps when you compare it to something like a live valve Pro R. That remains to be seen or even a four-seat X3, but I think it'll take care of an X3 four-seater for sure in the rough terrain and handle better because the wheelbase is a lot shorter. In terms of it staying flat and stable as well. One thing I mentioned that I noticed as well when talking about handling is that the trailing arms being a little bit shorter than the long trailing arms of like a Can-Am is there's less teeter-totter, there's less overall of a, I'm just going to call it like a boat movement where there's excessive movement and that's mitigated in the vehicle, the way it's designed and all that. So I think the bones of this car are very good. I've said that a couple times and after going in Sand Hollow, I think that like I said, the bones, the chassis, the geometry, the suspension, the size of the shocks, the way they do the evolving and when you get the proper ride height, I thought it was phenomenal how it worked on the rocks. I was surprised. I was impressed. I think the power delivery is smooth. I made another video. We'll post a link in the description. You saw I was going up double Sammy for the second time and the power started to stall out again. I think it's like a characteristic they have built into the ECU to keep guys from burning their belts, but I'd like it removed because some of those other climbs and double Sammy, you can kind of see I'm giving it some gas. I'm trying to be smooth, but there's not a lot of torque. I almost want a little bit more power and torque there where you do have to drive in two feet in some scenarios. So I had a little bit of a moment where I learned that on the first time on double Sammy and then I just, when I drove double Sammy again, I understood what I needed to do and line up a couple little straightaways and just keep my momentum going. The car is heavy, so once it gets going, I think with what, 10 psi, the tires definitely hooked up. Again, the CG and the lack of it feeling tippy or like it's going to sway excessively in those off-camber sections, I think really makes the speed a good crawler. It's a little bit harder to see out of with the fenders. You can't see the wheels as much as other vehicles, but I was happy with it. I was stoked. So I think if we can get that ECU calibration adjusted, go back with some bigger tires, some 35-inch sticky tires, I'm going to have a lot of confidence in it. I think it's going to do good enough for me. I'm probably never going to hit nine and ten rated trails unless I really go down the rabbit hole. I want to show you a couple clips of my buddy Wes going up in his Turbo S, the Chute, as well as the KRX because I feel like the KRX is pretty much the king of rock crawling. Turbo S is also phenomenal and how this would stack up compared to the other machines, maybe again remains to be seen, but I think with the wheelbase of it and some of the attributes, it's surprisingly good. So most of us expected this car to be exceptionally good in the big bumps and the turns. It is. The rocks were, no one really had a lot of expectation. I don't know how much rock crawling they did or how much that was part of the design emphasis at the speed, but I'm pretty stoked on it and I feel confident going through trails like Double Sammy no problem in the future, maybe the maze, something that's a little bit more challenging. So maybe I'll tackle some bigger obstacles next time I go out there. Let's talk about some of the pitfalls, some of the things that we noticed. Starting off with just addressing the leaks that hit the internet last week. So I showed you the finish, the fitting that came loose and the power steering fluid. I took another UTV journalist, let's call it, out on a ride and we got done with this ride and I could feel the power steering fluid go away. We pulled into park, we see oil all over the engine bay. I don't know what it is, if it's the trans or the motor or the power steering, but it ended up being the power steering. So we spent a couple hours, took it all apart, bled it. The speed team was very helpful and responsive. One other issue that we had was we tore a CV boot. So I happened to have my extra rear axle. We ended up just replacing the axle. One of the guys in our group, shout out to Grant, he has an XX and he knew the process. I mean, I called Daniel when he walked us through it, but it was pretty simple and it's pretty cool the way they allow you to kind of set the circlip in and out so you're not dealing, fighting, yanking it out of the transmission and it was fairly simple too. So those are a couple of the issues that we had. You know, we just didn't want to have a mess with the CV as it started to kind of get oil all over the place or excuse me, grease. And then we do have a little bit of the front diff leak. The front diff, they kind of overfilled it and there's an overflow. I think they need to adjust the catch can on that. So not sure exactly where the leak is coming from, but it did leak some fluid and we did refill it towards the right before the last day. We did a lot of the working on the car there Friday night so we could run Double Sammy again on Saturday. So those are the things that happened. You heard the clicking noise. Well, when I'm going up some of the rock sections, that wasn't that audible in the first couple rides, but it got really annoying by the time we got to San Holo and played around on the rocks. So I talked about it, I heard it a little bit. I talked to the team and they said, "You know, go ahead and run it." But what it is, are the bearings are light on the grease. So I ended up buying some big circlip pliers. I'll show you guys how to do it, but I'm going to go ahead and get into the wheel bearings and grease those up and see if we can get rid of some of that noise. I don't know if it's that or the CVs. I'm pretty sure Robbie and all those guys at the team think that it is just the wheel bearings and I just don't want loud noises on my new car. I don't want to feel nice and quiet and not sound like something's coming apart or could cause some excessive wear. So as a whole, that's pretty much all that we encountered in terms of issues. Temperatures, I just want to mention the temperatures. In San Holo, were not that hot. I think it barely got to 80 degrees. Temperatures are driving the car got pretty warm, particularly with the belt. So it seems like when you go, let's say, do a run up to the top of Top of the World, we did it with two guys in the car at 75 degrees, that the belt would get warm, but then it wouldn't really cool down like a Razor or a Can-Am when you put it in neutral and you just give it gas and then you go ahead and get some of the temperature out of it. So we saw some higher belt temperatures around 240. I talked to Robbie about it and he did say that where they've got the sensor located, the temperatures are pretty high where I think a belt breakage is around 265 degrees. So close, but something that I just want to notice and be transparent about, we didn't have any belt issues. I'll pull my belt cover off and check it and just see, I don't know if I glazed anything over anything, it didn't really feel like it. There weren't any scenarios where I felt like there was belt slippage. Again, on the rocks, it just kind of felt like there's a calibration to prevent you from driving with two feet. So you guys know if you spend some time on the rocks, driving on two feet is mandatory and then having some nice smooth power to help you get halfway up a section or you start to clam something on you and you don't make it, you need to have that ability to control the car in that regard. So that was my biggest takeaway or ask that I'd like to see improved and I think it's probably pretty simple. I think we saw some bolts that came loose on the tailgate, some of the things that we tightened. So, I think it's kind of what I expected. This is a brand new car. I think the bones of it are really good, but there's a couple teething issues. So I hope all of us firsthand are, you know, we're all kind of working to make sure that they can get through these issues because as you could imagine, you know, building this vehicle, you've got a lot of processes and humans touching certain parts and assembling things. And that's what I think happened with the AN fitting that came loose. We noticed another little screw came loose, which held a sensor on also on the motor when we pulled it apart. And the same thing with the little hose clamp. Here's the photo of it, which was the overflow for the coolant. So we ended up not losing hardly any coolant, but these are all just, I think, really simple things that, you know, then you see a leak and then it looks bad. And then honestly, to do the power steering was a real pain in the neck. And it holds, I mean, almost a quart and a half or two quarts of fluid and having to bleed it. And I think we might have to bleed it again. I'm not sure if it had enough fluid. We got it all topped off, so it starts whining a little bit, you know, when the fluids, you know, when there are air pockets in it. So, you know, just some things that I'm more mechanically inclined, but I think the average UTV user, you know, could maybe cost them to throw it on the trailer and ruin their weekend because there was no power steering. So, you know, I'm more of one of those guys, you know, I built a race car. I've been around racing. I've had with my race car, I've had a lot of issues and challenges I had to overcome. So, luckily I had a lot of friends there and support a lot of guys that love helping. And like my buddy Wes, he just dug in and really like knew, you know, not knew, but we figured out how to solve everything and get it all fixed and, you know, not being that big of a deal. Had some good fun bonding time in my dad's garage. So, thanks, Dad. Thanks to everybody for helping out and keeping our weekend going and keeping the car running because it would have been really hard to drive a Double Sammy without power steering. So, I hope you guys like the content here. Of course, we're going to keep running it in a bunch of different environments. Comment below, let us know what you think, let them know, let me know if there's any questions I might not have answered, and we'll see you on the next one.