Justin: In this episode of "The Haul," I'm getting muddy with my Raptor buddies here
at the Raptor Takeover.
All right, what's up, guys?
Justin with americantrucks.com.
And no, you didn't die and go to heaven because we're in a sea of 60 plus Raptors.
We are at the Raptor Takeover here at Rausch Creek Off-Road Park for 2019.
Really pumped to be here today.
A young man named Collins kind of sets us up all over the East Coast and of course we
wanted to bring our Gen 2 out here and test out all those modifications that you saw off
the build earlier on and of course if not, feel free to check that video out here on
the channel as well.
Rausch Creek right in the heart of Pennsylvania, Collins set up a 4.7-mile course for us today,
some long straights, some jumps, technical rock sections, some water areas, so he's got
a little bit everything planned out for us.
I'm really pumped.
americantrucks.com is proud to be part sponsor of the Raptor Takeover event here today.
Truck looks really clean now.
Believe me, it's not gonna stay that way for long.
We're gonna go get [inaudible 00:01:01] in.
We're gonna register and then time to go have some fun.
Let's do it.
All right guys, so we're in the truck.
Stan and I here, we're doing the parade lap, which is just basically a better way to get
a feel of the 4.7-mile course.
Again, 60 plus Raptors out here today.
How awesome is that?
Very rocky course so far, very slow, but we still have 3 miles to go essentially before
we get to the end of the course.
I mean, we're out in the sticks.
You can see we've got farmland and all kinds of craziness.
A lot of mud, which is fun.
The truck is definitely not clean anymore.
It's awesome being out here with all our Raptor brethren, right?
Very cool.
All right, here we go.
We're off the parade lap and we got a little bit more space to run, so we're gonna try
to open her up a little bit.
Very tight course, a lot of tight turns.
Gotta watch out for the rocks of course.
A lot of guys losing tires out here.
Oh s***!
Coming in hot!
So like I said, we gotta be careful out here.
I got to practice what I preach, but I will tell you these aFe Sway-A-Way Coilovers soaking
it up pretty good.
Got some straight here.
Let's open it up Staniel.
Like 45 or 50 or so right now.
Throw the brakes on.
Thank God for these Alcons.
So we got a little downhill section coming up here.
It's a mud section.
A lot of the mud has been kind of washed out from this morning and it gets a little slick
after awhile.
We don't want to end up in a ravine down there.
Could you imagine that?
Well, we use our head going through this stuff a little bit.
So you got a little jump up here.
Oh my God, I think I jumped it.
That felt gnarly.
Gotta get on a little bit through the whoops.
Oh yeah, buddy.
This is awesome.
Oh, here we go.
Hold on.
We've got our casualty on-road here.
Looks like we got a couple tires down.
Oh yeah, lots of mud.
These Nitto Trail Grapplers kinda digging through this mud.
Oh yeah.
Gonna full blast it up the hill here.
There we go.
Baja mode is just letting us charge this stuff 60 miles an hour.
Oh, there goes my EZ-pass.
This is the best part right here.
Well guys, since I'm out here having all this fun, I think it's only right to talk to the
man responsible for the Raptor Takeover and see how he came up with this crazy idea.
All right guys, I'm here with the man who actually started Raptor Takeover, Collins
Harper.
Collins, what's going on sir?
Collins: What's up man, glad you could make it.
Justin: Glad to be here man.
This thing is huge.
Talk a little bit more about your experience with Raptor Takeover.
Collins: Definitely.
So 2017 I bought this truck, which was dead stock.
I was like, I gotta get it off-road.
So I went to this off-road park in Georgia, bug was big.
I couldn't stop thinking about going off-road.
Got a few friends together from the forum, went back to Georgia and it's just grown ever
since to where we are now, 60 plus trucks in almost every event having an absolute blast.
I just enjoy having people having fun, just to see the smiles when people come off the
track, they've done something with their truck that they never thought of ever before.
So they come out and they're bit with the bug too.
It's just the best time.
Justin: Absolutely.
You got your Gen 1 behind us and you're no stranger to sending it.
In fact, insert the clip right here.
Yeah.
So obviously you use your truck like it's intended.
Talk about what you've done over the years of ownership.
Collins: Yeah, so we got 3.0s in the front, we got 3.5 by 16s in the rear.
There's always a nice little head turner when people look in the bed.
So running Advanced Fiberglass Concept front fenders, they're two and a half by 2-inch
rise and then plus two five bedsides as well.
So I've hacked the truck up.
I'm a full believer in a function over form.
I mean, you look at skid plates, you look at the headlights, you look at everything
else, you can tell that I don't take it too easy on it, but you know the truck's built
to have a lot of fun.
Justin: Damn right.
That is certainly not a mall crawler by any stretch.
You're certainly out here beating this thing up, looking at your massive jumps down in
Georgia.
I can't thank you enough for putting this on and thanks for having us out.
Collins: Yeah, definitely.
It's been great.
Justin: I'm here with Troy who is good buddies with Collins who started this whole thing.
Talk to us about what's going on here because we're pretty much maxed out for a full-frame
truck, correct?
Troy: Yeah.
There's a couple different ways you can go.
This particular truck has SVC podium package.
It's a dual shock set up in the front.
It's got a 3.5 and a 3.0 in the rear jack mount and that's got 17-inch, 3.5s in the
rear.
Justin: I mean I don't think people understand that like, A, on a first-gen, just a 3.0...
Troy: Is awesome.
Justin: ...is a pretty hefty upgrade but you got a 3.0 and a 3.5 up there.
I mean that's pretty radical.
Troy: Suspension is always number one for me because beef the truck up, let's reinforce
it and make it strong so that we can all come out here and have a good time because that's
what it's about really.
Justin: So yeah, we flipped the course, guys.
We're now going in the complete opposite direction and I'm glad we are because this way seems
to be a hell of a lot more fun if we're being honest.
Somebody ripped a wheel and tire off there.
Throwing some mud, yes.
Now we do have that ADD full race front mount intercooler.
Thank goodness too because it is hot as you know what out here today.
All right here comes a fun section.
We got a couple of drops here.
Bombing this hill a little bit.
A mud puddle, let's bomb it.
This might be the most fun I've had on four wheels.
Well guys, what can I say?
Raptor Takeover was a success.
The truck is officially dirty now and I got a big-ass smile on my face.
What else can I say?
We hit some fast straights.
We went through some deep mud.
We jumped this thing.
It was just awesome.
It was a great kind of playground for the Raptor and its capabilities now with all its
goodies on as well.
Can't thank Collins and the guys at Raptor Takeover enough.
They really know how to put on a good time.
We had a lot of fun here and I guarantee you we will be back to another Raptor Takeover
event possibly later this year.
Hell, who knows?
Maybe we'll go down and see him in Georgia.
I hear they have some real big jumps down there.
But in the meantime guys, I'm Justin.
Thanks for watching.
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