600 km, Two Summits, and a Trip Back to Where I Started

There's something about driving Highway 3 through Manning Park that puts things in perspective. Allison Pass, Sunday Summit, the long pull up from Hope — it's a real road, the kind that doesn't care what you're driving or how much you spent on it. It just asks you to keep climbing.

I put about 600 km on the Astro yesterday, out through the mountains to Princeton and into the Okanagan. I was born and raised in Princeton, so this wasn't just a shakedown run — it was a drive back through my own history, watching what's changed and what's stubbornly stayed the same.

But yeah, it was also a shakedown run. And the van passed.

The Setup, As It Sat for This Trip

• 2005 Chevy Astro Cargo Van, RWD
• JOR 5" lift
• BFG KO2 all-terrains
• Eaton Detroit Truetrac rear diff
• Front end rebuilt
• Monroe shocks

This isn't the finished build. It's the van mid-conversion, proving out the fundamentals before I bury any of it under cedar and cabinetry.

What Actually Surprised Me

I expected to be writing about how the 4.3 handled the climbs. It did fine — more on that below — but the real story was the handling.

Allison Pass sits at 4,403 ft, Sunday Summit at 4,206 ft. Long sustained grades, the kind that expose anything loose or sloppy in a suspension. With the lift and the KO2s, I figured I'd be fighting some wander, some float at speed. Instead the van tracked straight and felt planted — more like something lowered than something lifted. Cruising at 120 km/h for long stretches was relaxed, not white-knuckle.

The Truetrac had a lot to do with that. Smooth, zero noise, zero drama. You don't really notice a differential until it's wrong, and this one was never wrong.

The 4.3 Did Its Job

No complaints pulling the grades. I held highway speed, passed when I needed to, never felt like I was begging the motor for more. On most of the climbs to the summits I dropped it out of Drive into 3rd manually — keeps the trans from hunting for a gear and uses the engine to help slow things down on the way back down the other side.

One thing this trip made obvious: I've been driving this van by ear. Listening to the motor to gauge where the RPMs are sitting is fine until it isn't. Gauges are going in — RPM, transmission temp, oil pressure. I want numbers, not vibes, especially once this thing is loaded down with a camper build and doing real backcountry miles.

The Number That Mattered Most

About $100 in fuel for the whole run. Mountain passes, sustained climbs, highway speed, a lifted van on all-terrain tires — I was happy with that.

The Real Lesson From This Build So Far

It wasn't horsepower that made this trip work. It was the boring stuff, done right:

• Suspension
• Steering
• Alignment
• Tires
• Differential

Get the fundamentals sorted and the van just disappears underneath you. That's the goal with any build, camper or not — and 27 years of seeing what fails on jobsites and what doesn't has taught me the same lesson more times than I can count.

What's Going In This Week

• 10,000 lb Smittybilt winch, into the JOR hidden winch bumper
• Auxiliary driving lights
• 40" roof light bar
• Corner ditch lights

To the Other Astro and Safari Owners

Still running the 4.3? Still climbing mountain passes in something most people wrote off twenty years ago? I want to hear how it's holding up for you. This platform doesn't get enough credit.