Frederic

Anything Japanese with some decent maintenance history would do imho. Although i love that 7 series but you need to buy that car as a hobby-car to fix up if you have the available budget and pockets.

Even some Kia or Hyundai might do the trick. I've seen plenty with high mileage that run effortlessly.

I am so sad to hear this @Gaurav, knowing how much you love that Paj. I hope you find a solution. Since i started driving mine i have been also looking at similar models, and while i have seen the same as mine now and then (3.0 SOHC 12V), yours is definitely a rare puppy to track. I will do some online research too. 

All the best !

Thanks so much guys, Until now i never got further than BMW road. The others industrial areas are a maze for me. I'll go for an original one if possible. 

 

I managed to damage the front bumper of my '99 Pajero this morning. Considering that it might be difficult to find an original bumper for this model, i was already looking for aftermarket or custom bumpers until i came across a post that these are not allowed by RTA ? Does this depend on certain things like if there is a bullbar mounted or only a custom bumper or are both banned ?

My plan was to buy an ARB or other brand of front bumper and get it modified to fit the Pajero. Or get a custom one made (see attached). 

1 minute ago, Barry said:

I used to work for seagate manufacturing HDDs. 12 hour shifts, random drug tests, managers with no knowledge of the product, it was no fun. The day the factory got shipped off to Malaysia was one of the happiest days of my life. 

So the lesson of today is Gaurav, don't buy the Seagate drives manufactured during Barry his tenure 😂

Hahahaha yes that seems to be the case  and i thought i was the one having lots of data !

A 16 TB NAS is fantastic to have of course. Do you have experience with RAID systems ?

SSD is indeed still expensive..

 

 

Hi Gaurav,

I have always worked with external WD drives for that purpose. In my opinion there is no drive that is SUPER reliable. Especially the external ones which can come up with issues if they are not safely removed after usage. (although you click on safely remove storage, i had issues with these drives in the past).

For most of my data which i want to access regularly, i went with Dropbox and got a subscription for 10 Euro per month.That gives me 1 TB of storage and easy access and synchronization options. I use about 400 GB on the cloud now.

For my other stuff (movies, etc...) i keep it on duplicated external drives because they are cheap. One is always connected to my WD media player on the TV, while the other is safely in the drawer. I use the windows program Synctoy to synchronize them with each-other, but there are other programs for that on different platforms. 

Because SSD drives have no moving parts, they might be more reliable i would guess, see link below:

https://therevisionist.org/reviews/ssd-vs-hdd-one-reliable/

I can agree with their statement:

 

1. At least 3 copies of data.
2. On at least 2 different mediums.
3. At least one off-site.

 

I read somewhere that it's a 2.0l turbocharged engine, which is in terms of efficiency and low consumption maybe a good choice, but it makes me wonder how this engine would perform in long(er) desert trips.

The pickup looks indeed not bad, the SUV is looking like an arranged marriage between a Korean and Chinese SUV

Their website hardly works, most of it shows 404 not found error. If i would be the owner of that car brand, i'd definitely have a "friendly" chat with the IT department.

Overall, i am not impressed to say the least....
 

Oh that’s great ! Where did you get these covers ?

I installed 2 on the roof on the existing brackets from the former sunvisor unit.

Gaurav is right, the CREE leds are far superior. I've got them through Souq at around 250 each and bought the cable-loom seperately on desertcart (60dhs) which consisted of cabling, fuse, relay, and switch. That made the installation a breeze. Make sure the cabling is thick enough, because these things draw a lot of current (240 Watts total @12V = 20 Amps)

The only thing i am suffering from is the whistling noise while i am driving on the highway. I tried adjusting them, but to no avail. I resolved it by increasing the volume of the sound system

 

I've put 3M on my beemer a while back, and although it was quite expensive, i am very happy with it. The 30% is ok for RTA, and really helps keeping the car cool.

I want to get some tint for my Pajero, and was not planning to spend the same amount of money. I heard that karaj.ae is good because it enables you to get quotes from different suppliers. One of my neighbors got a German brand of tint for around 4-500dhs.

Any idea on the prices for LLumar ? I remember a long time back in Europe we used to get the Foliatec brand that was very good stuff, but one roll would be around 300dhs and a full car would cost easily 600dhs without installation cost, and i'm talking about 18 years back. So i can imagine that a hightech window film really is a complex thing and can cost a bit.

 

 

 

I had lovely times with my French Cars, especially the 205 GTI 1.9 which was a small rocket on wheels. The fact that it had many flaws was easily forgotten once i revved it to the red line

If you want a good design, a car that has some life in it, go for a French one. I agree that the reliability is not on the level of the Japs or Germans but that shows in the price too. 

Some hot hatchbacks:

- Renault Clio Williams

- Peugeot GTI and XSI or Rallye models

- Renault Megane RS

- Citroen VTS

And the Bugatti is still built in Molsheim, France

 

3 minutes ago, Gaurav said:

Seems a good buy, with lil love this can be off-road and daily driver

Yes, absolutely. I am doing 100km per day with mine as daily driver and it never lets me down. The 6g72 is however a bit sluggish. I am not sure if that's only with my car or if they are just slow as they are.

 

Fantastic initiative. Unfortunately i'm booked for a camping trip. 

Hey Gaurav,

Of course opinions are like onions, they can make you cry, but i will try to give mine:

* The Range Rover is a very capable car and if you can find a well-maintained one, you could be lucky. However i hear many technical issues with these cars, and very very high maintenance costs involved. So finding a decent workshop which has some knowledge of these cars will be required.

* The Escalade is a fantastic and indeed roomy SUV but again on terms of maintenance cost and reliability they are notoriously bad.

I am sure that there are tons of people driving these cars and are very happy with it. So it comes down on some experiences and maybe having a chat with some workshops and car mechanics to see how they feel about it.

I'd definitely go for the Range Rover, but try to find a very good model from a private owner (used a transport from and to school)  

 

 

 

 

My grandfather had to sell his mint condition VW beetle when I was 15. I wanted to buy it and keep it until I was old enough to get my permit but I didn't. He sold it to a young guy that was flabbergasted to find a car in that condition. 

Hi there 

As you will be connecting 4 speakers to a 2 channel, the Amp will run in 2ohm. According to the specs of the Amp it is giving 4x95 watts nominal at that impedance. It's difficult to say exactly how much the amp will be able to deliver exactly. That's not so important anyway because your front speakers are 60watts rms only. The best to do is set the amp to its minimum sensitivity while testing, then put the volume to around 80% on the head unit, and than slowly increase the sensitivity on your Amp until your front speakers are starting to distort. The reduce again a little bit. 

 

There is no need to match the 2ohm on the speakers with the subwoofer on the other channel.

The good 'ol days of F1

I was a big Senna fan, and stopped watching for a while after he passed away, but i always remembered Mansell to be a brilliant driver with a particular character. Never a dull day with this bloke...

 

 

https://dubai.dubizzle.com/classified/electronics/car-electronics/car-audio-systems/2018/1/30/diamond-audio-d7152-2/?back=L2NsYXNzaWZpZWQvZWxlY3Ryb25pY3MvY2FyLWVsZWN0cm9uaWNzLz9wcmljZV9fZ3RlPSZwcmljZV9fbHRlPSZrZXl3b3Jkcz1hbXBsaWZpZXImaXNfYmFzaWNfc2VhcmNoX3dpZGdldD0wJmlzX3NlYXJjaD0xJnBsYWNlc19faWRfX2luPS0tJmFkZGVkX19ndGU9JmFnZV9fbHRlPSZjb25kaXRpb25fX2d0ZT0mdXNhZ2VfX2x0ZT0%3D&pos=8

 

Very nice amp. I know the guy who's selling it as i bought other equipment from him. He's a collector/hobby/audio fanatic and has lots of vintage and high-end equipment. 

Hey,

The component speakers will indeed have their own filter on board, but the lowest frequencies are anyway sent to the door speakers. A high pass crossover on your Amp will allow you to filter out everything below 80hertz so your subwoofer can take these on instead of the 5.25" front speakers. Its not a must but more a "nice to have" on your Amp.

Pertaining the secondhand stuff; you might find some on dubizzle if you keep a close eye on it, but be careful when buying secondhand speakers: it's difficult to test them when you buy them, and they might have been abused heavily. Check on souq for deals and good prices. I have bad experiences with sharjah and find it more convenient to get everything delivered. 

Hi there,

It goes without saying that your car's alternator, battery, and wiring should be in good and working condition, with or without installing additional equipment.

Basically, you will need to run another power wire straight from your battery's + towards your amp(s). Choosing the right size of cable is based on how powerful your amps are:

https://www.crutchfield.com/S-1TnffuYRpSC/learn/learningcenter/car/cable_gauge_chart.html

I'm not good with gauge sizes, i used 10mm2 cable if i'm not mistaken (7 AWG). You can buy the complete cable sets on s o u q or downtown which will contain the following:

1) Power Cable (red) with fuse and fuse holder:

Avoid drilling holes in your firewall (metal wall between your engine bay and the inside of your car). Just look at which location the cabling from your engine bay goes towards the dashboard. This will normally pass through some kind of rubber. Through this rubber you should be able to pinch a small hole and then put your power cable through it. Now guide your power cable to the back of the car where your amp will be located. You'll need to remove the upholstery/carpets/sidepanels and look for the shortest way possible. 

2) (Ground cable) Black:

This will be a short piece of black cable of the same thickness as your power cable. Connect this one to a GOOD grounded chassis point nearest to your amp. with GOOD ground i mean it has to be a bolt going into the metal frame of your car. Use an ohm meter to be sure that the grounding is actually in touch with the frame. In many cars, the bolts that are used to mount the seat-belts to your car frame are good for this. If nothing is available then you could drill a hole in the metal panel, remove the paint, and bolt it to the frame. But use this as last resort to avoid corrosion or hitting something which you did not intend to hit like your gas tank. 

3) RCA Cable:

This is the cable that sends the audio signal from your head-unit to the amp. DO NOT put this wire together with your power cable in the same cable trunking. In some cases it will result in humming or noise when you accelerate the car. Just try to find a different route. Normally the power cable goes through the left side of the car (the side where your battery is), while the speaker cable and signal cables go through the right side.

4) Remote Cable:

This is a simple wire that you'll need to connect to the headunit's "remote" connector. It sends 12 Volts to the amplifier to switch it on when the headunit is switched on. Most RCA signal cables have a small third extra wire along the core that you can use, but any wire (or some extra speaker wire) will do.

5) Speaker Wire:

Regular audio speaker wire 2,5mm2 will do to cable the speakers all the way up to the amp. You can choose to tap into them through the original connector behind the head-unit, or you can pull new cables all the way up to the speaker itself (not so easy to do with front speakers as you'll need to pass through the original rubber door cabling).

You'll need the following equipment:

-Soldering iron (if you decide to solder instead of using crimping lugs). I prefer soldering any time.

-Crimping lugs (forks, male and female).

-Electrical tape.

-Multimeter.

To identify which speaker is which in your cabling, you can use a 1.5 AA volt battery . Just hold the speaker wire on the + and - for a second and the popping sound will get you to identify which speaker is which.

Try to take into account the correct + and - connections of your speakers. If wired incorrectly it will result in a phase cancellation fault which you cannot hear easily, but results in far less bass coming through the speaker because one speaker moves outwards while the other moves inwards during pumping out sound, resulting in a cancellation. If you are not sure which is the + or -, just wire up everything and when you play a song with some good bass, try shifting the balance from L to R on your head-unit. You will notice that suddenly you will have more bass out of 1 speaker instead of 2. That means your + and - are reversed .

Most-probably you WILL break some of these side-panel plastic thingys that pop into the holes and keep your doorpanels and sidepanels in their place. The older the car, the more likelier because they are detoriorated and will break off very easily. But that's a small pain compared with the joy of having a good sound system.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hi, 

The 4x50 Watts on your head-unit are in reality hardly 4x22 Watts RMS. Upgrading with an amp will surely result in a big improvement in terms of sound quality. The fact that your original speaker size is a bit on the small side, will not result in a lot of power on the low frequencies. So adding a subwoofer will come in handy. Unless you are able to put bigger speakers in all your doors, then you might be happy to go without a subwoofer.

Full range speakers for your doors are fine. Better results will be achieved with component speakers on the front. Mainly you want to be able to point to separate tweeter directly towards yourself, which is not possible if the tweeter is in your door. 

Dampening the noise is surely possible. We used to put asphalt bitumen on the insides of the doors  

Pertaining your question on the wattage:

- For door-speakers: 50W RMS onwards is more than loud enough. Many speaker brands use wattages like max or PMPO (peak music power output) which are very very overrated and unrealistic. If you go for the big brands, just look at the RMS rating because this is at least a realistic value. 

- For subwoofers: Anything from 200W RMS up to a few thousands of W RMS is possible  a good starter set is a 12" subwoofer for 200W RMS. Take into account the space it will need in the back of your car. If you want to go offroading and camping, it becomes a bit of a hassle imho. You can put plugs on it so it becomes removable, but also comes with some limitations. 

- For Amplifiers: Always make sure that your amp can deliver/match the RMS wattage of your speakers. There are many options available: 4 channel amps, 2 channel amps, amps which can be bridged, amps with onboard crossovers, etc.. etc... 

Chronologically in your case i would take the following route:

1) Look for a good component front speaker set in either the original size that fits, or if possible go for a bigger size. Pioneer, Sony, JBL are good entry level brands. Rockford Fosgate, Kicker, Polk Audio, JL Audio, Focal, Hertz, are more high-end but will set you back a decent buck and are more difficult to find here. 

2) Buy a decent 2 channel amp that can power the front speakers. Again Sony, Pioneer, JBL, Alpine, etc will give a good bang for the bucks. If possible go for an amp that has built-in crossovers. You can enable the highpass filter for your front speaker so you can make sure they only play stuff above 80hz. It will result in less rattling in your doors, and anything under 80 hertz will be for your sub anyway

3) Rear speakers: Less important imho. Buy some entry level ones and keep them on the headunit amp.

4) Subwoofer: 10 to 12" is the most chosen option due to power vs size. You can buy an additional amp to power it (2 channel amp that is bridged), or go for these active sub tubes with built-in amp.

I found a shop on SZ that sells Ground Zero stuff. Unfortunately they charge a bit too much like most shops here.

 

You didn't mention if you want to do this by yourselves or not. It is a nice hobby and if you have some basic knowledge about electricity and removing door panels, it is rather easy to do by yourselves. I made it my hobby many years back and the joy of installing, listening, and fine-tuning it is much higher than getting everything installed by a pro. But that is your choice of course and installing cost here in UAE is not that high.

Good luck !

 

Hi Guys,

I am up for installing some LED bars on the roof of my Pajero. When i search online, i come across a broad price range. I see similar looking models for either 200 AED up to 1,200AED. Of course i can imagine this is partly branding, party quality, etc..

Does anybody know a decent brand that's affordable or has good or bad experiences with the cheaper ones ? With the climate here i don't want the things to fall off after one summer

No issues with RTA or should i cover them up before the inspection ?

I went to have a look in Sharjah already but the moment they see my face (westerner), the price goes up to a level that i would prefer ordering them online and fitting them myself.

Thanks

 

Great video and initiative ! We went camping with a few friends near the Akoya project but had to stay near the road because my buddy had issues with the 4WD activation on his Avalanche. Unfortunately this area is flooded with garbage and muppets on quads who are racing through the whole night. Nowadays we need to go pretty deep in the desert to find a really quiet spot i am afraid.

I saw a chinese car om MBZ this morning, The brand was Trumpchi. Need i say more ?