I don’t know what you really want with actual trail conditions. The reason we did not pull the groomers Thursday and Friday was the deep powder of a foot and a half or more. We were pushing snow in front of us and it was still coming over the top of the front tracks towards the bottom of the cab. It is too much for the snow cats to pull in the deep snow in addition to a drag behind. It overheats the rear ends of the CAT and then we have trouble. The rear ends on these CATS are only like what is in a one ton truck, it is not a farm tractor. We went through plenty of rear ends in the early days with previous Tucker Snow Cats trying to pull the drag and blade snow in front of us in deep powder. Our trails looked good behind us, they were compacted with the powder bar behind us. Also, we needed to blade snow parks and crossings, which had wet snow banked up and is hard to do with the drags connected. The trails were still soft from all the powder and bump out faster in these conditions. We saw a dozen snowmobiles out towards Jubilee Thursday, so they were already starting to bump the trail up before it had time to set up. I just report where we go as conditions can change rapidly depending on traffic on the trail soon after grooming and weather. When we left the mountain the trails looked good.
I did stop on our return trip home today and check the 4X4 tracks at Ruckle, Rd 31, as they were in there last night on the trail. It isn’t too bad, snowmobiles have leveled the hump out between the ruts. They went back @ 4 miles towards Ruckle. I have reported this to the Forest Service. Not much we can do about it unless someone gets a license number or photo to turn in to the FS.
I also checked the trail crossing at Lincton Mt. Road as Gary Wood reported a 4X4 stuck up the hill towards McDougal. It is gone.
Now that we have a set trail, we will be back to pulling the drags next week when it gets cold again.
Thanks,
Jess
On Sat, Jan 27, 2018 at 2:00 PM, Tammy Davenport <davenporttd@gmail.com> wrote:
Hello, jess,I have gotten lots of requests for the actual trail conditions. Can you give a report on the actual trail, and why it was groomed a certain way?BTW, Cecil and I followed the groomer yesterday and they had no groomer behind them. The trails this weekend are horrible. What do I tell our followers?Thank you,Tammy DavenportOn Jan 26, 2018 4:43 PM, “Granella Thompson” <jessgranthompson@gmail.com> wrote:This week we have groomed out to Bone Springs, Jubilee Rd, Timothy Shortcut, back 6413, Skyline Rd, Elk Trail, powerline, McIntyre loop, to the store, Ten Eyck Meadow, bladed the sides of the clubhouse, crossed the highway out to Coyote Rd and back, went to Morning Creek Snowpark, out to Spout Springs, Woodland, Andies Prairie, to Ruckle and back, Balloon Tree loop and Gordon Creek loop. We have almost 1 1/2 feet of new snow this week and cold temperatures so we had 2 good days to groom after the big snow. Tomorrow the weather is supposed to change to warmer temperatures with rain/snow on Saturday night, rain on Sunday. We still have not groomed to the Chalet as the snow along the highway is not deep enough to make a trail near Hill Camp. Other than that, all the trails are in good shape as well as snow parks and highway crossings.We have had some trouble with the track adjuster on the 08, other than that the machines are running well.ThanksJess Thompson TTF grooming chairman