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If it’s a modified car, just be careful you’re not pulling on a stick on JDM y0 towing eye

Or how bout you just leave the stupid idiots who thought they could cross soft sand in their sedans. P.S : FWD perform better in sand than RWD because all the weight is on the front wheels so better traction plus easier to pull weight than push weight in sand. Don't ask me how I know! P.S : Unless buried up to it's chassis a FWD will usually self recover in a flat patch.

Please raise hand if you dont understand this.

I agree Rahimdad on steering left and right being less effective on rear wheel drive cars, but majority of sedan cars are FWD and only handful are RWD, specially like sports or high end models. I written these steps to help everyone around and not only specific to Mustang case. Btw, super worst case scenario I didnt mentioned as it need specialize eye and patience, to tie the tow rope on axle and loop as a bridle. Its too tiring but sure shot way to recover with gentle pulls and not just one tug.

I did not take this picture, but it shows the view over the village of Hartbeespoort as seen from the top of the mountain directly behind my house. I might mention that with an age of 2.4 billion years, this mountain is among the second oldest mountains in the world.

For a second there I was like WTF! As I thought ICE was referring to In Car Entertainment. And no more bass tube and pop up LCDs for Irish folk!

@Barry, one can expect anything from the Yanks. They once accidentally dropped a couple of nuclear bombs over Italy, and while they paid for the massive cleanup, they still have not compensated the local tomato farmers for the loss of thousands of acres of tomato vines. If the mountain behind your house does turn out to be contaminated,they will probably either deny that its their fault, or they will bury the mountain and village and then make guys you pay for it. Either way, the Yanks will weasel out of their responsibilities.

Guarav it wasn't me. When i got stuck once we discovered i don`t have any tow point at back. Even tough the my back heavy we pull the car from front to recover. Once i pull a Lexus from its back rim to take him out with very very gentle move.

Hopefully next Friday, I'm in. Happy to show you all but with a big disclaimer to do it at your own risk. @AKR hope you rem why I left your jeep once I realized there is no rear tow hook? Your mind will justify that action next week. @sertac I think I have recovered your Cherokee with bridle on axle and chassis once or was it another black cherokee guy who drove with us briefly.

This i surely want to learn . Hopefully will see pajero soon in action .

There is an old dismantled army base on top of the mountain behind my house. We used to race old cars round it when we were kids because it’s quiet, nobody ever goes up there unless to make mischief. I always had an interest in the place. The yanks built it in the late 60s as a communications post to coordinate their subs in the Atlantic during the Cold War. It was dismantled in the early 80s so I never got to see it operational. The story locally was that the yanks built an underground bunker in the event that the Russians would nuke the place. I did find an entrance one day but it was filled in and appeared to be flooded, so that theory is particularly confirmed. The other story is that when the yanks left, they didn’t take any of their equipment with them. It was all buried underground. Communications, electrical, even jeeps. It’s now emerging in the media after the release of military documents that an entire storage complex was built in the mountain which is solid granite. The complex was originally built to hide conventional weapons but was modified to hold chemical and nuclear weapons. The government are now worried that when the yanks left, they left behind nukes and chemical weapons inside the mountain. There is a high possibility. Forms of rare cancers and other diseases have been high in the surrounding area. Why would they bury vehicles and equipment instead of taking it with them? Unless it was contaminated? It stands to reason they left everything else in a hurry and ran away.

I use gopro for a long time, for best results use protune option, with narrow lens setting as normal or wide is quite balloonish on edges. I use original gopro mount on center dashboard, pretty impressed with mount quality for extreme offroad actions. Ordered a bag full sticker adapter and stuck on many places so that I can toggle gopro with mount to any position I need. I have seen good views from center windscreen just below rear view mirror on my friends car, but that place is bit distracting for me while leading drives, especially at night.

Driving off-road is a very interesting and entertaining experience but there are a few basic things you need to check first before heading for your first off-road drive with Carnity Off-road Club. Every driver should know when to join for an offroad drive and when to pass until all below things are checked. VEHICLE Ground clearance: Minimum 8 inches under front and rear bumper is must. You will need to be careful while driving and slow down while descent and approach to avoid any minor bumper damage. If your 4x4 have EAS (electronic suspension), lift it to the max height and then measure it. Also read the manual to know what is the max speed you can drive with off-road height, as many manufacturer limit up to 60 Kmph with off-road height, which is plenty in most cases. Knowing that limit is better in case you go above that speed, so you can lift it again once you slow down. Tow hook: Your 4x4 should have at least 1 tow hook in the front and 1 tow hook at the back, more the better. Also you should check the integrity of all tow hooks and its appearance, if they are shaking or rusted or missing a bolt, then get them fixed before joining any off-road drive. Engine: Your engine should be in perfect working condition without any check engine light or any warning lights on dashboard or leaking oil or coolant. Engine takes more stress while off-roading so well serviced 4x4 performs better on off-road. If you recently bought the car and have no idea of last service, then it's highly advisable to get the engine service before your first off-road drive. Gear / Transmission: Your 4x4 should have 4L and 4H gearing option. AWD or SUV without LO/HI gearing option are not advisable for sand off-roading. Suspension: Your 4x4 vehicle suspension should be in reasonable and drivable condition. You can drive with stock suspension perfectly fine and then you can decide to modify it, if really needed. Any suspension lifted up to 2-3 inches are accepted, anything above 3 inches lift need trip leader approval before joining any drive to make sure if you have widened the wheelbase to lower the center of gravity in an orderly manner. Tires: Your 4x4 tires should be in good condition with enough tread and more than half life left. Tires nearing their end usually fail while off-roading, so check for date of manufacturing shouldn't be more than 3-4 years. No visible cuts or lost tread chunks or cracking sidewall should be there. Fuel Tank: You should always join the off-road drive with full fuel tank, as all vehicles consume double or triple the amount of fuel while off-roading. You don't need to change the fuel type from special to super for off-road purpose, continue with your fuel type as per manufacturers recommendation. Sign up: Once you have checked all these above points then RSVP the drive calendar and post an introductory message on the drive post - sharing your 4x4 details, previous off-road experience (if any), so that trip lead can acknowledge and plan the drive accordingly. OFF-ROAD GEAR You don't need any off-road gear or recovery gears for your first off-road drive, but if you have a shovel, flag and a radio (walkie talkie) then please carry it with you. Rest all the off-road gears and recovery tools will be shown to you once you attend the briefing and you can read more about them here: https://carnity.com/advice/offroad/most-comprehensive-list-of-off-road-gears-and-recovery-tools-r81 OFF-ROAD DRIVE Always wear long pants and closed shoes (no slippers) to avoid any injury or sun burn. Carry hat/cap/scarf, in case you need to spend long time under the sun. Carry plenty of water and soft drinks of your choice to keep you hydrated. Carry your camera mounts if you like to record the drive (no hand held). No carrying or consumption of any type of alcoholic drinks on the drive.

Everything you need to know about Off-roading in UAE from Desert, Mountain, Wadi and Camping As simple literal meaning off-roading means any terrain off the road, but it gets way too confusing as per so many people different understanding with not enough clarity. After spending 12 years in UAE off-road scene, I feel this write up will help many offroaders clear their doubts and explain a lot of intrigue details to other aspiring offroaders. Off roading is a way of life For a vast majority of UAE population venturing offroad over the weekend is a way of life, that you sneak away from your busy lifestyle and enjoy the adrenaline rush to forget all your worries and recharge yourself. Why and how do you forget your worries? While off road driving your brain has to process hundreds of instructions per seconds that you will eventually forget all you were thinking in the first 5 minutes. And this process continues for the whole offroad drives and keeping you super alert at all times to have the best experience every time. Offroading is an act of driving a standard, stock or modified vehicle on any surface other than the tarmac road. It can be on loose gravel track, beach sand, desert, dunes, mountains or in wadi's (riverbeds). There are several different ways of off-roading in UAE based on your adventure appetite from leisure drives with stock (unmodified) vehicles to slightly modified vehicles to competition level with highly modified vehicles. Off road drive Sand Driving This is the most basic and first step towards an offroading. This requires your standard road 4x4 vehicle with proper 4x4 and LO gearing or even AWD vehicle is acceptable to a certain extent, but not an SUV. All you need to do is deflate your tires to 14-15 PSI to gain more traction and increase the footprint of your tire to spread the vehicle pressure on a greater surface area. At first, learn some basics of offroading in the sand in UAE. Plan your entry and exit points carefully either by following offroad books available in UAE or by existing trails from wikiloc. This level of a drive can be done on the beach, desert or any place close to the habitat territories. In the desert, it's usually restricted to either flat tracks (sabka's) or easily passable tracks on the broad dunes. Dune Bashing This is the most common level of offroading in the UAE, where the group of offroaders get together and venture in desert dunes and explore the uncharted and uninhabited territories. This requires a proper 4x4 with minimum 8-10 inches of ground clearance and deflation of 10-15 PSI depending on the tire and vehicle load. This level of drive organizes in the desert having plenty of dunes to make your own path on virgin sand dunes. This challenge requires special skills of reading the sand and riding the 4x4 with precise control to continue moving without getting stuck. Self-recovery in the sand is the most important skill that every offroader should learn after the first few drives. If you are stuck in the sand, then listen to the instructions very carefully without getting panic. Get out of the car to analyze the situation and also to help the person who is helping you either by shoveling or by fixing the tow rope to your car in the proper recovery point (tow hook). Once you are out of the stuck, do remember to get out of the car for removing the rope and thanking the person. In dune bashing chances of getting stuck are very high and that's why most of the offroaders venture in groups to help each other with proper offroad recovery gears. You can join the like-minded offroad club freely available over Websites, Facebook, Meetups and Whatsapp groups. All you need to do is join a couple of few to find where do you fit the best, as every offroad club and groups are different and unique in their own ways. Some people do prefer private drives over the club and vice versa, check out the reasons here. Mountain Driving This is the second most common level of offroading in the UAE, where offroaders get together to explore beautiful mountains, wadis, and gorgeous camping spots. This requires a proper 4x4 with minimum 8-10 inches of ground clearance and deflation of 22-25 PSI depending on the tire and vehicle load. This level of drive organizes in scenic mountains either accessible by gravel track or by tarmac road to a partial extent. Traversing through rocky mountains or riverbed, do require a special skill that is easier to learn with capable offroaders. Similar to dune bashing, you can join any offroad club for quickly gaining the right experience with safety. These are the Top 3 off-road mistakes in Desert & Mountain that you can learn and avoid. Off road cars Depending on the level of off-road adventure you seek, you need a capable off road vehicle to make you a good offroader. Not all 4x4 and SUV are made equally capable and some are better, stronger and more reliable than others. To begin your offroading journey you can take your regular road vehicle if it's equipped with 4x4 gearing and LO gear option and also have 8-10 inches of ground clearance. Once you get a hang of this new offroading hobby it's always better to invest on a separate dedicated offroad vehicle because of several reasons: You can enjoy the best of both worlds: a comfortable vehicle for road and stronger vehicle for regular off road use An offroad vehicle will be limited to weekend bashing to prolong it's offroad usable life, as every offroad car require more frequent maintenance than the road car. If your offroad vehicle is under repair, you can still safely use your road car for daily commute. You can freely modify your offroad car by trimming bumpers, lifting the suspension, additional lights etc. You will be more comfortable in pushing the rev limiter in 20-40K dhs offroad vehicle than in 200K road car. Here is the list of best offroad 4x4 cars under 10K and 20K dhs in UAE, if you really get serious for offroading. After every offroad drive, you need to check your vehicle before hitting the road again with these post offroad drive car care checklist to make sure if your vehicle is safe for the road again or not. For more serious and regular dune basher, you should learn from other offroaders mistake to know what went wrong just before the accident. These discussions and feedback from seasoned offroaders will help you avoid the disaster and save your life and vehicle. Last but not least wherever you venture, please do not throw your trash or anything as it's a house of beautiful wildlife who get killed by eating plastic, tins, glasses and even metal threw as garbage. If you spot anyone doing it, please explain this to them as many people think that desert is an abandoned area and they can throw anything there. Due to this inconsiderate approach authorities are fencing lot of conservation area and also issuing hefty fines for offroaders littering in the desert or mountains. Feel free to ask me any question for more details or suggest me to add more valuable points for offroading in the UAE.

Is anyone using GoProes to video the drives? If that is the case what mounts are you using and where have you attached the cameras? Im trying to set my camera forward facing on the inside of the windscreen but cant find any good mounts?

Lets have a slight different kind of challenge in the Qudra Area. This area is famous for its white sand and will offer a good mix of playable dunes, technical dunes to test your car control. Depending on the convoy level and participation, we might have a quick fewbie level drive after the newbie drive. Level : Newbie and above When: 10 January 2020 Meeting time: 6:45 AM, convoy will move at sharp 7:00 AM Where: Al Qudra Parking GPS Coordinate: https://goo.gl/maps/Ru8v4AiVBHVVeaBU9 Type of Car: Any proper 4x4 with front and back tow hooks and 10 inches of ground clearance. Plan: Drive, train and enjoy till about 12:00 PM What to bring along: Loads of snacks, plenty of water - whatever you like with little extra to share, water, liquids, smiles, stories, enthusiasm and willingness to learn. Approximate finish time: 12:00 PM MUST READ: First off-road drive checklist Off Road Driving - Roles & Responsibilities Off road Driving Etiquette's Off-road Convoy Rules Off roading - Everything you need to know Please RSVP the below calendar event

https://www.thejournal.ie/ban-fossil-fuel-cars-4952912-Jan2020/ Ireland is planning to ban the registration new of petrol and diesel cars by 2030. The legislation has been drafted. No big deal, it’s just progress. But.... “The draft legislation aims to stop the granting of NCTs from 2045 for fossil fuel cars.” NCT is the annual safety inspection test, more or less what you call “passing” in UAE. This could mean the death of the classic car scene, leaving only the option of having trailer queens to take to shows. This will also mean the death of rallying, which is held on closed public roads, where all cars are required to be road legal. For any normal person that likes to enjoy their petrol or diesel car on a daily basis, this effectively turns their car into a piece of scrap metal to be sold off according to weight.

You know how much they cost! And what if he has those black steelies which come on barebone option models!

Err it's called a sunroof

So i wanted to share this situation i came across this weekend and i thought some of the seniors here might be able to throw some light on the situation. We were leaving global village when i spotted a Ford mustang stuck in the sand. He was trying to park the car in the sandy patch away from the main parking as many other cars have done but the spot he chose had more sand and keep in mind that the mustang is quite a low car. I switch on my 4wd and rushed to see if i could help him, perhaps give him a tug as i could see that the car is crested. Since the mustang is a low car, its easy to get crested and the tires were dug in as well. So i realized there is no point in removing sand using a shovel around the tires because the chassis is stuck to the ground. But here's the real head scratcher - his car had no visible tow points! We looked around everywhere and we just couldn't find any points. Now i am sure there probably were some points that were not visible to us but his front fancy bumper that was almost touching the floor was covering it so even if we accessed it, a tug would result in some damage to his bumper. In about half an hour, at least 4-5 more people came to the scene trying to help out but no one was able to figure it out. Since i had my family with me, i eventually left and i am not sure how he recovered but i thought i would share this topic here and see if any one has come across such a situation before and how can we recover such cases.

Yes exactly. Big dreams and aspirations but where will all the charging points be installed? How will the government cater for 4,000 people living in a stacked block of apartments? It’s a nice concept but it hasn’t been fully thought through.

No offence to these high shooters, as almost all countries are drafting similar 10-20-30 year plan on banning ICT but time will really make the history. Since over a decade now we have been hearing elctric car coming to take over the world and till date, infrastructure to support that "take over" is missing BIG TIME.

"Don't know what is scarier, losing a nuclear weapon, or that it happens so often that there is a term for it" No prizes for guessing the reference or the term

To date, there are 11 lost American nukes out there somewhere unaccounted for. That’s only the ones they have admitted to losing. 11 nukes are enough to contaminate most of the habited world. Who knows what else they have abandoned and ran away from? Ireland is 3,000 KM from Ukraine. When the Chernobyl power plant exploded in 1986, a lot of the fallout was carried on the easterly winds and a lot of it landed on the highest mountains in the north of Ireland. It’s only in the past few years that meat from animals in certain areas has been declared safe to eat. Before that, sheep used to light up Geiger counters. Some of the stuff going on in the world is insane and if you dare to bring it up, you’re dismissed as a crazy conspiracy theorist.

I put it on my roof window, as Gaurav mentioned regarding the settings I agree. Narrow gives the best footages.

Not sure about that- sometimes I feel older than the mountains.

And that mountain is just slightly older than you and way less grumpy

we were trying to spot something like this but his car didnt have any such provision and this is maybe because hes changed his bumper, see this image below which i got from google which closely resembles the kind of bumper he had and it has no such point thanks @Gauravbhai, this is very useful info indeed, i will save it in the notepad app for quick reference. thanks for the info, yes we tried to locate it but couldnt find it

You are welcome to join. See you on Friday morning

Hi @Srikumar i just got my car fixed and its all good to go now. Hope i can join this drive as absolute newbie, since my last drive was bummer.

There is usually a removable square plastic piece on the bumper in which a towing eye can be screwed in, usually found in the toolkit spare tire vicinity

I'll take Mariah over Celine Dion any day