Pocono 400 Trip Report

[Jim Stoltz]

Today's Pocono 400 race was the first trip out this season with the old Allegro. I am the world's worst procrastinator. I didn't get to half of the work that I wanted to do on the rig before I left. And I had to leave the race early because I have school work due at midnight (that I am not doing right now - I'm typing up this post instead :) )

I mentioned in another post that I discovered a broken shock mount last week that had definitely been broken the entire time I owned the thing. I simply can't believe the difference in the way the thing handles now that the shock is repaired. It is so much nicer to drive. It was pretty windy coming and going, which is no fun, but overall it rides so much better.

I also previously mentioned that early into last year's Pocono trip, I broke the pilot tube on the fridge and had to resort to running the generator to keep the fridge on. Well the generator quit working on that trip too. This was my first trip out with everything fixed. The fridge gets so much colder on propane. The fridge hung out at around 35 degrees and the freezer was about 10-15 below zero.

It was 3 days, 2 nights of dry camping. Despite my lack of preparation, everything went really well and the 33-year-old rig performed flawlessly. I had the tanks pumped out before I left, which I had never done before. I don't know why I've been torturing myself by finding places to dump at home all these years. The $25 we paid was well worth not having the hassle of dumping when we get home.

Saturday night we saw some 20-somethings circling the area and finally settle down near us. We noticed that they were looking over and waving so we went over to introduce ourselves. Let me say at this point that I have a terrible memory with names and faces. It turns out that they look for our Allegro and set up near us every year because we're "fun." I honestly don't remember them, but was kind of flattered anyway. As per usual, it was the oldest rig there and lots of people asked about it.

I've often complained about my steep driveway here. Today I was able to climb up it without scraping for the first time. Curiously, it really did not want to climb the first 100 feet or so, which is the steepest part. I had the pedal to the metal and it was barely moving. Thankfully when we got to a less steep part it perked up. Slight moment of panic there though.

The $800 radiator I put in it last year continued to perform well. It was in the low-90s today and it barely got to 200 degrees climbing the hills and got below 180 degrees while coasting down.

We brought home a few billion ants that I will have to address. Before our next trip out, I really want to get to the front air bags (yeah, yeah - 4 years now and I still haven't replaced them).

All in all a great time with the old Allegro. There is some serious hardware out there, which does look appealing, but the old girl has a certain charm that people really seem to like.

[Tina]

Nice story! It's a pretty rig for sure.
Maybe the ants just wanted to move into something nicer for a change. LOL

Glad to read it went well for you too.

:)