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Dear Dune Surfers, The Drive name says it all , the idea of this drive is to practice the skill and enjoy the thrill of riding on the Sand Ridges. This drive is Part 1 of 3 Skill Drive Series which will be posted in subsequent weeks depending on the Off road Plan with Carnity to balance all leads and drives to get as best possible a balance of variety in terms of challenges, drives, leads, terrains and areas. Part 1 - Ridge Rider Republic – Al Qudra – 14th May 2022 Part 2 - Criss Cross Country – Faqa ??– TBA Part 3 - Technical Terrain Transit - Will be posted in coming weeks All three are for Fewbie Plus and above only as we believe at this level you are well aware of your car, your driving style in sync with your car for these drives to learn, challenge and improve albeit safely. Please watch out for the subsequent parts in coming weeks and join in as per your availability. As the names suggest, we would be focusing on the Different skills for Dune surfing over the next few weeks. For Part 1 we will be driving in the long range dunes as much as possible. We will be taking the longer route from Qudra towards Lisaili which means we will be driving through area near Solar park and some technical patches to traverse between long range dunes hitting every ridge in safest way possible. Drive Time is expected to be 3 hours . We will be moving in parallel to the Dirt Track connecting Qudra to Lisaili in case of any early exits. We will specifically hit the areas in these terrains which will offer us maximum dunes for doing the drive purpose. Make sure you come with a full tank, Car in good conditions, recovery gear for this level (Radio, Flag, Deflator, Compressor, Kinetic rope and Soft shackles). Recovery points should be checked and in good conditions. It is preferable for the cars to have a front bash plate (6mm or more) to keep the radiator protected, if not it is at your own risk to join. General Info This drive is organized in full compliance with the COVID19 guidelines. We expect every member that joins this drive to go through below information and and strictly follow these guidelines in order not to jeopardize someone's health, and to ensure we can keep organizing these drives safely. MUST READ AND TOTALLY AGREE: COVID19 Precautions Mandatory Safety Requirements Ban from Carnity Off-road Club Two Way Radio Guidelines Drive Details Level: Fewbie Plus and Above When: 14th May 2022 , Saturday Meeting time: 5.30 AM (SHARP - Without any exceptions). Meeting Point: https://goo.gl/maps/pzYHVDXCXpWJ17T38 Exit Point: Lisaili Fort ( Expected) Type of Car: Any proper 4x4 with front and back tow hooks and 8-10 inches of ground clearance and Bash Plates What to bring along: Loads of water, snacks (for yourself), smiles, face mask, rubber gloves, enthusiasm and willingness to learn. Approximate finish time: 9.30 AM or early P.S. Only join if you have a compressor to inflate your tires after the drive. LIMITED SPOTS AVAILABLE: Limited to 10 cars only. RSVP will close on Friday - 1 PM. If the RSVP is full and you wish to join, please mention your name on the drive thread to add on the waiting list. Latecomers will be returned back - without ANY EXCEPTIONS. Members without RSVP will be returned back - without ANY EXCEPTIONS. Please withdraw your RSVP, if you aren't joining, so your spot can be taken by others. Repeated no-show members after RSVP will have their account suspended for a month. PLEASE RSVP ON THE BELOW CALENDAR EVENT

Hi @Rizwanm2, I've heard of this other Emanuel. I'm guessing he set the bar pretty high for the rest of us Emanuel's. Here's an interesting fact for you all... my master class instructor was Vinod @Tbone and his masterclass instructor was Emanuel. So when someone at the office, who knew this, saw my name he asked Vinod if he'd like to pay it forward with me so to speak.

Congratulations @Emanuel ... He passed fewbie level longtime back... 😜... Hope Emanuel part2 become same as our beloved velociraptor.

Amazing plan Soni I just went through it …keep goin pal 👍

An honor to be driving under your lead once more @Chaitanya D. Cannot wait to see you and my good ol' pal @Gok Krish again! See you on the sand!

Can't wait to drive one of these! Good Going, Gaurav! 😉

Congratulations @Simon Dawood. Intermediate rank totally deserved !!

Congratulations @Peter Hager

I had a center diff lock issue few weeks back: after self-recovery the center diff lock remained locked and would not unlock, causing heavy steering when driving home. My mechanic was trying to solve the center diff problem by isolation: whether it was mechanical (possible fix: change center diff lock actuator), or was it electrical (possible fix: clean dirty connections). While he was doing that, I was reading the materials from my Land Cruiser Repair Manuals and some other sources. Thought I'd share my "differential enlightenment" here, and try to explain it as non-technical as possible 🙂 FYI, I've arranged it so that everyone knows the context and working background of a diff before using this knowledge to our offroad driving, so read from 1-2-3-4, but if you wanna go straight to how we use diff locks, go ahead to point #4 below: 1. The Minimum 3 Diffs required for most cars Forget if you have 3 buttons with labels: RR/Rear Lock, Center Lock, FF/Front Lock. Forget the IFS vs Solid Axle debate for front drive. Turn your 4WD car upside-down (or easier to look at the underbody diagram in your manual 😁 ), it better have 3 differentials: Rear Diff (Red Sphere), Center Diff hidden in what's known as Transfer Case that also holds the 4LO low-gearing (Purple Sphere) and Front Diff (Blue Sphere). What's that, you don't like this 3D illustration? Let's show a real example with an old Toyota Fake Jeep #whoops I meant FJ 😂 You can see I circled the 3 "pumpkins" casing showing the 3 differentials location 👇 2. Why do we need those spheres/pumpkins/diffs ? The picture below shows 2 tyres on an axle with NO DIFF. Do you think it will turn nicely without slipping? Do we want this kind of horse carriage in our modern 4WD systems? 😅 So there you go, we need Diffs to make smooth turnings without stressing the driveline. In the illustration below, when we turn the Red Curve is longer (travel more distance) than the Blue Curve (travel less distance), so how can they turn at different rates when the engine gives the same power of 1,000 rpm? The answer: the magical mechanical device called a differential 😊 General Motors made this video long long time back, even though it's in Black & White, it explains how the concept of Differential came about (also explained how the Spider Gears work!). The video is optional, only for the technically-inclined and curious ones... 3. Why do we need that Center Diff? So from point #2 above, we know Diffs are used for turning the car, so front & rear diffs make sense, but what does a center diff do? Tilt the car? Refer to sketch drawing below: The car is turning left. Each wheel follows a different curve path: the inside wheels don't need to turn so fast, so in this diagram the front inside wheel needs 50 rpm and the rear inside wheel needs 48 rpm. BUT in order to turn, the front wheels need to turn faster than the rear wheels: thus the outer front wheel needs 54 rpm and the inner outer front wheel needs 50 rpm. Both front wheels are rotating faster than the rear wheels. If you add all the power required, Total Front Drive Power Needed = 54 + 50 = 104 rpm and Total Front Rear Power Needed = 52 + 48 = 100 rpm. WITHOUT CENTER DIFF, the transmission outputs 100 rpm to both Front and Rear drive shafts. So what? Well, that 104 rpm needed to turn wheels is greater than then 100 rpm, so extra stress is created... if continous stress is accumulated, this may lead to the image below, kablooi! So the Center Diff is similar to point #2 above, but instead of allowing inside wheel & outside wheel turn at different rates, the Center Diff allows the front axle and the rear axle to get different power output. Refer to diagram below now: So by having that Sphere/Pumpkin/Diff in the middle, the front drive shaft gets more power to accelerate faster than the rear drive shaft which move slower. Don't believe this paper drawings and theories? Well let's watch how the World Rally Championship uses Center Diffs to make turnings smoother and then lock the Center Diff to distribute power in a straight-line driving: 4. Press that Center Diff Lock! Finally we can use all that theories to use. Refer to below illustration: Red Axle is the rear and Blue Axle is the front. The Front-Right wheel is slipping while the rest of 3 tyres got some traction. Why won't the car move? Here's a little secret: Diffs are great for helping to turn, but the side-effect of a diff is that the output power from transmission will go to the wheel with the least traction. In the diagram above, that means the Front-Left Blue tyre will not turn at all! BUT we still have the 2 Rear Red tyres with traction, don't we? Yes, but from Point #3 we know an open Center Diff allows front & back axles to turn at different rates, so in this case more power is given to the Front Blue Axle because of that spinning wheel that has the least traction... thus the rear tyres spin r.e.a.l.l.y s.l.o.w.l.y , making the driver frustrated and leaving him sweating 😂 Now we hear those famous words from the radio: "Engage 4LO and (Center) Diff Lock" We'll talk about 4LO some other time, but the effect of pressing the Center Diff Lock is now this illustration: No it's not the same image... ok yes, but watch the rotational arrows at the back. You see that Front-Right Blue slipping wheel? That one is stealing all the drive power. BUT because of Center Diff Lock, we now forced the Front & Rear axles to turn at the same rate. So if the Front-Right Blue is stealing 100 rpm slipping, then now the Rear Tyres are also spinning 100 rpm, with probably 50:50, so Rear-Right is 50 rpm and Rear-Left is 50 rpm. Because the Rear Tyres have traction (those brown balls), then the rear tyres move the car forward... or down-right depending on the angle you wanna recover. 5. Press that Rear Diff Lock! So you think Center Diff Lock is enough and no need for a rope tug? Well check the illustration below: Now we have 2 wheels spinning: one in the front (Front-Right Blue) and one in the back (Rear-Left Red). You press Center Diff: nothing is moving. Why? Well the Center Diff allows front & back axles to turn the same, that bit is right... BUT because power is lost to the least wheel with traction, the transmission output will just spin both wheels (Front-Right Blue & Rear-Left Red). Calculatively: Front-Right: 50 rpm spinning Front-Left: Zero rpm not spinning (refer to disadvantage of diff in Point #4) Rear-Right: Zero rpm not spinning (refer to disadvantage of diff in Point #4) Rear-Left: 50 rpm spinning (same speed as Front-Right due to Center Diff locked) Here's what's gonna happen if your 4WD is lucky enought to have a Rear Diff Lock button: It's the same image again? Yessirree but look at the rotational arrows, especially at the rear red axle. So now Rear Differential is locked, splitting 50:50 drive power to the Rear-Right Red tyre and the Rear-Left Red tyre. Now instead of Zero RPM, that Rear-Left tyre will get 25rpm and might just nudge the car forward a bit... slowly but steadily, you might self-recover! Calculatively: Front-Right: 50 rpm spinning Front-Left: Zero rpm not spinning (refer to disadvantage of diff in Point #4) Rear-Right: 25 rpm (due to Rear Diff Lock) Rear-Left: 25 rpm spinning (due to Rear Diff Lock + Center Diff Lock) Yes you have to do Double-Locking: press Center Diff Lock first, then Rear Diff Lock. 6. Press that Front Diff Lock! That situation in Point #5? Well you have a higher chance of self-recovery if your beloved 4WD also has a Front Diff Lock. Refer to illustration below: Calculatively: Front-Right: 25 rpm spinning Front-Left: 25 rpm (due to Front Diff Lock) Rear-Right: 25 rpm (due to Rear Diff Lock) Rear-Left: 25 rpm spinning (due to Rear Diff Lock + Center Diff Lock) You can now do Triple Locking: get out of the car, assess the situation, then press the magic 3 buttons: Center Diff Lock On, Rear Diff Lock On, and Front Diff Lock On. 7. Cars with Triple Locking from Factory If you made it to this point, then you may want to now look for second-hand 4WDs that have triple-locking from the factory 😊 Here are 3 that I know of (please add if you know more): 7.1. Land Cruiser 80 Series: just look at the diff lock indicators on that dashboard. No custom aftermarket buttons to show if your car is triple-locked 😁 7.2 Mercedes Benz G-Wagon. Do you know why I said the order is Center Diff Lock then Rear Diff Lock then last is Front Diff Lock? It's because Mercedes Benz labelled it in that order too! 7.3 Land Cruiser 300: well, this one you have to wait, and there's no second-hand market yet, so this is the most expensive triple-locked currently 😅 Sources: The nice 3D Illustrations are from the Land Cruiser Cool Project.

Hi, I drive RAM TRX 2021 and I have previous experience of approx 30 drives with other clubs. I have front and back recovery points. See you on Saturday morning!

congratulations @Tom B

Congratulations @Simon Dawood

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Congratulations @Peter Hager. Well deserved !!

hi @Jessica Lambert thanks, glad you appreciate it. In that case i'll do the 4LO one this month... will tag you once posted 😊

Thanks, @M.Seidam for pointing out the FB+ error on Simon's promotion. Fixed it. It shows that all of the above who congratulated Simon (Incl. Simon) didn't read more than the title.....lololol.

Congrats @george charbel

Congratulations @Emmanuel

Congratulations @Tom B

@Simon Dawood congrats on the promotion man

Congratulations @george charbel! Enjoy the new level

Congratulations @Tom B! I've heard so many legends of the Yamato. I hope I see you on a drive soon!

Congratulations and well done @Emanuel! Enjoy the new level

Congratulations @Simon Dawood! Supremely well deserved and in spectacular fashion too. Make that Pajero flyyyy

Congratulations man @Simon Dawood well deserved 👏👏👏

Well Done @george charbel 👏

Congrats @Peter Hager 👏 Enjoy your new level

Congratulations @george charbel

Well done @Simon Dawood 👍

Awesome @Simon Dawood! Well done mate!

heartly congratulations @Simon Dawood

thank you guys, I will be out of the country for a couple of weeks but looking forward to seeing you on the sand soon!

Congratulations @Peter Hager

Congratulations @Simon Dawood

Congratulations @Simon Dawood

Well done @Imteeaz👍

Congratulations @Tom B 👏. Well done

Congratulations @Simon Dawood 👏. Well done

Congratulations @Tom B well deserved 👏👏👏👏👏

Congratulations @george charbelon the promotion

Congratulations @Emanuelon the promotion.

Congratulations @Simon Dawood. See you on Sunday

Well done @Simon Dawood, the Pajero can once again chase his smaller brother driven by @Warren Flay on the dunes!

Congratulations @Emanuel

Thanks mate. Already signed-up for Saturday drive with Gaurav Soni. Next time dude Thanks mate - looking forward to our drives together

Congrats @Tom B the monster can roar in even more exciting drives now 😆!

Congratulations @Imteeaz!, well done and good to see you soon in FB+ drives.

congratulations @Tom B, well deserved!

Thanks @Gaurav bhai for adding these extra correct points. Man how could I forget Rubicon, I almost bought that car and I did look at videos of how cool sway bar disconnect is, most will show putting the tyres on a fork-lift but as Gaurav said; when you are crested press that Electronic Sway Bar Disconnect and the front tyres will drop to touch the sand like a Long-Travel Dune Buggy would, in the hope of gaining traction to self-recover 😁

This is an amazing effort @Zed to enlighten everyone with your recent differential enlightenment. Just a small add-on on few points for better clarity. Point 4: Center differential engagement comes standard when you switch to LO gear. Second, you can use center differential in high using HLC (Hi Lock Center diff), hence in most cars, there is no button labeled as center diff, one can use center diff either in HLC or in LLC 4X4 gearing. Point 5: Rear diff-lock will only help to get unstuck if any one of the rear wheels still has traction. If both rear wheels are in the air or deep inside the sand then the rear diff-lock won't be able to help much. Point 7: Jeep Rubicon has all three diff and plus sway bar disconnect option with a flick of a button, that can work wonder even when the vehicle is crested with all 4 wheels in the air. Sway bar disconnect will drop the front wheel lower by a couple of inches and increase the chance of self-recovery if cresting is not on razor-sharp blade.