Gaurav

What started as a desert driving training, ended up with offering enough training opportunity to even most experienced folks in the group. Something new I have learned after very long time. Thanks to local boys to show something brilliant that I and Rahim bhai got really impressed with. And many thanks to Basil for creating such an opportunity window for everyone to learn something new and unique. We started the drive on time and initiated with 2 theory lessons at deflation point on Engine overheating and Wild life. After an hour of driving, we went to practice the art of side sloping on long dunes range. Many perfected their skills and other learned that art for first time with Rahim bhai supervision. After few attempts by everyone, we head to more cleaner area for doing the recovery training with safety. Got one of the car stuck purposely to explain the safety items and techniques involved with doing the tow rope recovery. Explained the reasoning and best practices involved for safer tow rope recovery. As the sun started to set, we head out for the lesson of self recovery and explain the key things involved to rescue yourself in almost 80-90% of stuck by simple self recovery techniques. Unfortunately that stuck was in deep soft sand and at a very bad angle, so we got to tow the car in the end. Then we head out for the unplanned tire pop-out repair that added the actual practical in the training session. By this time, it was pitch dark just below the fossil rock so we started with night drive theory and explanation for breaking the night drive fear and myths. After 10-15 minutes everyone was ready to shoot up the fossil rock area in the night. As we reached up, none of them realize the height until they stepped out of the car and walk across the ridge. Then the challenge was to face the steep decent with rock and sand in pitch dark. With an excellent guidance from Rahim bhai, everyone reached down safely in no time. Now we head to the bbq spot on right side, just behind the Faya area and kept on looking for a cleaner place without any bushes but failed. Then we thought of heading to Camel rock area and setting up the bbq session there. While on the way to Camel rock, we encountered couple of steep dunes with soft sand and realize to back out to simpler route but it was bit late as few cars were stuck here and there. All were recovered with ease except one, which was stuck in dune pocket filled with soft sand from back side and hitting front to the dune, nose fully dug inside the dune. We wasted about two hours recovering from the front and broke two tow ropes in attempt with 3 different cars and two different angles. By now we realized that front recovery isn't possible as moving the tip of dune isn't practical and we need to change our strategy. We thought of going down the pocket and realized it is too soft sand to tow out the stuck vehicle from back and we might risk two vehicles stuck next to each other in soft sand pocket. I and Rahim bhai went down one by one and realize that it isn't very practical to have so much long run in uphill in soft sand. As we lost all our hopes and running out of idea, we came across three local boys in Suzuki samurai who offered to help us with their brilliant and genius idea. They went down in the soft sand pocket with one of our car and created a short path by flattening the sand by 5-10 attempts, once short path of 10-20 meters was created, they used the short tow rope and gave gentle tugs to the stuck vehicle from back and moved the car out from sticky spot. After seeing this idea of using short (1/4) tow rope that can be immensely useful in such tight spot, we all learned something very new and impressive. Total respect to such great thinking and careful execution and precise coordination. By now we were about 5-6 hours delayed for our bbq session, and still everyone was very excited to start the bbq night and we laid out the spread in nice and open area filled with cool breeze in the middle of May. Many thanks to Saleem and his friends for bringing heaps of bbq ready meat and chicken and continuously cooking for whole night. And Asif bhai homemade cake made the yummiest dessert in the desert. The bbq session that supposed to be for couple of hours lasted for 6-7 hours and we all kept talking and sharing stories until morning 5:00 AM (I think). Overall it was very nice training and challenging day out to demonstrate that moment we sign up for desert drive anything can happen and we all need to keep ourselves calm and composed to face the reality. It was brilliant teamwork effort demonstrated by everyone and very patiently handled situation. All in all it was great training and learning for everyone. Here are the pictures from my camera, looking forward to see others click https://carnity.com/gallery/category/19-desert-driving-training-ii-19-may-2017/

I had something similar issue in past when I was driving with cooper tires and cooper dealer renaissance trading in deira 04 2669166 sent me to some specialize 3D lazer wheel balancing workshop to adjust the toe, camber and bla bla's like barry mentioned. It was about 5-6 years back and all I remember that they were using the John Beam balancing system. Either you find some dedicated specialize tire balancing guys to cure this peculiar problem or call renaissance guys and get the name and number of their trusted workshop where I been, as I don't have their contact detail. For the offroad tires, there are few tires I can suggest and recommend based on my 10+ year own experience in offroad. Listed below based on my preferences: Yokohama Geolander A/T-S Awesome for offroad in sand, wadi and mountain. Reasonably comfortable on road Reasonably acceptable on fuel mileage Reasonable tire life of 30,000 - 40,000 kms Michellin LTX M/S-2 Awesome for sand but not great for wadi and mountain. Super comfortable on road Good for fuel mileage Awesome tire life of 60,000 kms Cooper ATR Good for offroad in sand, wadi and mountain. Reasonably comfortable on road Looses tire chunks at half life Reasonable tire life of 30,000 - 40,000 kms BF Goodrich Very good if your car engine has power modification as they are very heavy for hill climb otherwise Awesome for self recovery in sand and great in mountain traction Tooooooo noisy on road - similar to Cooper STT having aggressive tire tread Bad for fuel mileage Dunlop / Bridgestone - Stay away for offroad usage as far as possible. Instead of Michelin LTX has best of all, but still I rate them second because best tire term should be as an overall factors. I think Yokohama Geolandar has crack that formula very well to strike a balance in offering Good + acceptable without any bad aspect. Secondly while shopping stick to denomination of A/T-S or M/S-2 or ATR specifically as all company slightly different variation comes in same tire name but for road usage like Yokohama Geolandar H/T (highway tread) - NO NO for off road.

It's a very interesting question and quiet valid curiosity and concern. Based on my few car ownership, I can share my experience and reasoning to best of my thinking and hope that satisfy your curiosity. Range Rover: Super comfortable, that I have never driven that level of comfortable car / suv yet. First time my wife sat in it and reacted this car has cotton wheels or it's flying above the tarmac. I know it's EAS (electronic Air Suspension) is awesome, but there a lot of other things, engineering and efforts required to achieve that level of comfort from seats, chassis balancing, engine and other component weight distribution, viewing angles, ergonomic cabin design to reach almost everything within one hand reach, very high quality and durable stuff used (leather, plastic, rubber, door seals, sound proofing etc.) Mercedes ML 500: Not as comfy Range rover for sure, but cabin inside is extremely beautiful and elegant to keep the Mercedes standard alive. Meticulously crafted details from leather finishes, stitches, bezels, dials, etc is just too pretty and inviting you to stay inside as long as you need. Instead of being 5.0 NA engine still it gave awesome fuel mileage than all my other full size SUV's I have owned. That's engineering marvel and it cost big money on R&D any day. Porsche Cayenne Turbo: Slightly uncomfortable, due to more sporty suspension and cornering ability but amazing accurately response to transfer 3 ton metal into a beast when need arise with a just a tad harder push of a gas pedal. I was totally impressive with Porsche engineering more than anything else. Designing engine, gearbox, 4x4, and torque management band were just absolute brilliant that comes with endless hours of research, patience, knowledge and practice. All this cost a fortune to perfect every mili-second delay or cornering perfection at over 100 kmph without skidding the 3 ton beast. In a nut shell, what I feel that every premium luxury car has something or the other thing to offer as per your taste as a main component (USP) and then followed by overall higher grade of material used, hand crafted (in some cases), carefully appointed sound system, head lights and tail lights and with endless introduction of newer technology.

Here is the last week Desert Driving Training Video

I guess 2 Kg should be enough, if people increase will see how we can pitch in together. I am confirming that i'll be staying for BBQ now.

Totally agree on this Barry. I thanks Al Futtaim service advisor, for letting me do my phd on brake disc when I drove my Lexus GS430 for minor service and ended up with brake pad change and then brake disc change as it's less than 8 mm thick and cost 4000 dhs in agency workshop insteda of 600 dhs normal service. Their service advisor must be trained very well to how to sell a boat to man who come for buying a fishing hook.