Wrangeld

I recently bought a light bar for the TJ - knowing that the night drives are on the way and we needed something to replace the cute, but not so effective round spots that were on the car. I bought through Banggood (Chinese website). Not too expensive. Additional charge for the lighting loom, which in the end I did not use because we wired them up to the existing aux light switch in the cabin. Having tried them once or twice in the dark since then (a challenge because the curfew means we were not out after 8pm) they seem adequate. Like most things 4x4. You can go for expensive straight away and buy the 'best' but sometimes the best is not the best for your vehicle. The compromises we made here were that it needed to fit into the car in a way that did not spoil the looks, block the radiator or cause a lot of attention from the police because we are not running with them covered. And, of course, price. If in truth we are only going to have 4 - 5 night drives, an AED 6000 investment in lights felt too much.

Congratulations @Najeeb Mohammed great news. Enjoy the new experiences.

Congrats @asifk great to see this promotion. Enjoy the new challenges.

Congrats @Jolly Abraham deserved and I am delighted for you. Onwards and upwards.

Congrats @Matti Brockman looking to see you with that amazing jeep again soon

Congrats @Nacho enjoy your well deserved promotion

Congrats @Anish S nice to see you progress.

@Ale Vallecchi so, so deserved a promotion. I am delighted for you with this totally deserved moment. It's been a privilege to drive with you since we started on our journey. You've always been an example and so supportive. And.. once again. Thanks for the rescue this weekend.

@Xaf I am truly delighted and not a bit surprised by this deserved promotion. You've been such a help and supporter since day one and by your example make it easy to learn how this game is played and how this team works. Fantastic news for you.

It's a strange old world. Just when you think it's safe to get back out and do the tings we enjoy the most, a spanner in the works sort of slows you down. Arrving at the staging post for the drive, everyone kept the Covid 19 rules and stayed the car. Everyone arrived on time and we hit the deflaton point with the prospect of a long morning's drive until the sun would make it too hot to handle. @Srikumar led us off with @Jun Zamora in second lead. With a great assortment of fewbies and experienced newbies, the plan was to start slowly and let us all get back ito the groove - after all, it's ben quite some time since a few of us were out in the sand and the sand has changed a lot since the Winter days when there was still a lot of moisture under the top layers. It was great to see (if not be able to properly say hi to) @Jolly Abraham and @Shiju Manuel and of course @Tbone again after such a long break as well as a few others with whom we have not ahd the chance to drive so often. The convoy set off with @Ale Vallecchi as Centre Forward and with @Jeepie at the wheel of the TJ in sweep. Riding at the back of a convoy especially as a passenger allows you to see just how incredibly well the drivers' skills devlop. Experience shows, and with @Kalahari and @luwaimn there's more than enough to expect that there will be very few places where anything will go wrong. @paolo dassi has great control of his little Pajero and seemed totally unphased to be back. At the front, there were a few more challenges. Soft sand, maybe not seeing the lay of the land and we had a few refusals, but nothing serious. Then came the first real stuck of the day. As @Srikumar and @Ale Vallecchi braved the heat to help dig out @Jun Zamora, first his Jeep and then a few of the engines idling by as we waited, started to overheat. It's not uncommon - after all this is a Desert! Holding our Covid positions, and with nothing showing on the gauges we really did not expect the next thing to ba catastophic heating system blowout that deposited 7 litres of coolant into the desert and (unfortunately) onto Ale's foot. All credit to @Jeepie for making sure there were emergency spares in the car [many years of driving classic motorbikes has developed a sense in you that understands stuff will go wrong] so that we could carry out a desert repair that was enough to get us to a mechanic in Al Madam that put the radiator pipe back in place. Many thanks to @Ale Vallecchi for leading us out an sticking with us to make sure we were mobile again. To all the pther drivers on this drive ( @RohanH, @asifk) I am pleased that you could reform the convoy and enjoy the rest of the drive with Sri. From what he says, that went off without incident. Well done guys. There's learnigns from every trip to the desert. This week it's 'expect the unexpected'. There was zero expectation that a pipe might blow from the bottom of the radiator. All it took was one clip failing. The second is don't panic. Your Carnity friends will do everythig they can to get you moving and out of the desert. I personally did not get a chance to drive at all on Friday (which may have had an effect on my state of mind Saturday), but that's OK. I was in the incredibly safe hands (at the wheel) of @Jeepie and got the chance to observe. Frankly, it's a totally under estimated learning tool that we seem to ignore because it's not as exceiting as driving. I recommend to everyone to try sitting as a passenger in a car in the desert. You'll be astonished at how much you can learn from that. As the TJ is up and running again, I am pleased to be able to say ... See you soon in the sand.

White Patrol, blacked out windows fake 2 letter numberplate. No-one would dare stop you.

I am with @sertac on this price. It's 10k too high.

I declare - I am a TJ owner so take your conclusions knowing that. I am presuming both are stock. My vote TJ. It's a 4 litre and does not suffer anywhere as near as many of the problems that were asscoaited with the JK. Purely from the reliability point of view, the 4L was a better tested engine (used in the Cherokee as well) that has all the power you can want. You might get some additional creature comforts in the JK - but really, why are you buying a Jeep? If you want reliability in just about any situation my vote is the TJ. Now ... just wait for all the people to tell you never go for a Jeep, never mind which model.

Hi @Zed depending on the age of your jeep and the amount you spend on mods, the more interesting your ride will be. We started with a stock jeep - which frankly is still within the limit of what I can do as a driver at the moment. In fact, I am quite sure that actually the Jeep still has a lot more to give until my driving catches up and I think about making changes. In the end, however, this is a weekend warrior vehicle. In some respects, I am with @sertac If this Jeep is damaged (and the passengers) are fine, so be it. I will mourn, but it's not going to impact my life beyond having to buy another weekend warrior. In the end, it's about why you are out in the desert. For some people, comfort is an important factor even in throwing the car around in the sand, but if you are cleaning out hte sand on Friday afternoon because you don't want it in the car, it's likely that it's not the car for driving: For sure, if you aspire to the 'heroics' in the videos you shared, your risk of damage increases exponentially and I would not want to have to worry about scratching the car instead of whether I am navigating the sand.

As a TJ owner I can tell you it's not comfortable like a patrol or xterra but it is capable in the sand and I NEVER worry about it getting a bit beaten about. Prerfable that it is not, but not the end of the world if something breaks. As you move from newbie to Fewbie you cannot be worried about what ,might happen to your precious metal. If you climb the ladder further, it's not going to be easier on your car. You need to be focused on the driving and not if the back bumper is still in place. Your daily drive will lose value by you using it in the desert. Your weekend warrior probably gains value, because anyone buying it from you wants to know it is sand trained. I look at it this way. I do not think you would encourage your wife to wear her Jimmy Choos in the desert. But taking your massively expensive car ...

Congrats JJ. Looking forward to seeing you continue to grow.

Great question Shamil, I think the biggest concern would be carbon monoxide poisoning for the passengers and anyone around the car if the engine is idling for 2 hours. For sure, I would not want to be the people walking round serving the food and drinks with 200 cars burning fuel not going anywhere - and the likelihood is you will not want to sit with the windows open because all the other cars are sitting there with their engines running and it's gonna make a terrible racket. Outdoor cinemas are for the winter here in Dubai in my view ... but until we can go inside again, it might be all there is. Having said that, once they open, every show will be like VIP because noone can sit anywhere near you!

Hi Deniz, I use a small shop called Rage Performance Garage (behind Sina Tires). They were looking after my Jeep for the previous owners and so far so good - but like Freddie says, finding a shop that is consistently good is like finding a unicorn. Ask for Ranjhod and you can mention my name. As long as you are upfront about expectations/budget/needs he will do what is required.

Congrate @Nikhil Saju Paul enjoy the new status. See you soon in the sand.

Like a bunch of giddy (but caged) teenagers we arrived at our deflation point on Friday anxious to dip our feet once more into the creamy sands of Al Qudra. I will not pretend for one moment that it's a bit surreal that we cannot greet each other, chat, socialise and see how things have been for the last weeks in lockdown - that has always been one of the great pleasures and differentiators of Carnity. No doubt, because it is so deeply embedded in the DNA of the group it will return as soon as we can, but it does mean that the start to a drive has a different feel to it. Nonetheless, just about everyone rolled up on time and started to deflate their tires, set up flags and turn on their radios. It was starting to feel like we would soon be on our way. After a quick visual check on the convoy to make sure tow points were all in place (we will be making a lot more towed recoveries now due to COVID) and convoy numbering and a quick additional brief from @Srikumar we were actually on our way. Cautiously at first, as if slowly feeling the sand under our tyres again for the first time we ventured out. Our convoy was an excellent mix of experienced and less experienced drivers. @Emmanuel playing Centre Forward, @Brette sweeping and myself and @Jeepie as second lead with @Zed @Chaitanya D @Vanessa8580 @J J all delighted to be back behind the wheel of their respective rides. @Nikhil Saju Paul and @RohanH made up the rest of the convoy. And with those quiet words "OK, I am moving", we were off. As @Srikumar had promised, we started very gently, as we all got a feel of the sand again: Not only because it's been a few weeks since we had a convoy, but because in the last weeks the sand has changed. The sun is drying out the sand and it's softer, less forgiving and with the bright sun a tiny bit more challenging to read. And then, there's the dual effects of cloud seeding and mapping the shifting sands. The desert is green - there's no other way to put it. Grasses sprouting everywhere, bushes in full leaf, tree resplendent and green against the golden sands. Sounds idyllic, until you need to navigate across a dune an avoid the risks of the sand staying firmer than expected because the roots are holding the sand in place, or finding a clump of grass that throws the weight and balance of the vehicle off. In the Netherlands, the dunes at the beach are deliberately seeded with grasses to keep them in place as a barrier from the sea (as more than 40% of the Netherlands is under sea level that's quite an essential task). As @Srikumar said 'Welcome to the Al Qudra Jungle!' Thanks to excellent navigation noone had a problem due to this. As we ventured deeper into the dunes we did have our first refusals: nothing that a little bit of good avice and coaching could not handle. Confident that everyone was back into the groove, after navigating through the tecnhical dunes, we moved on to an area known for wide open spaces to allow for some nice slope sliding practice ... except, it wasn't there any more. It's easy to forget that the dunes are a living, changing environment. How they looked yesterday is not guarantee of what you'll find today. And so it ws that we had to go insearch of a new area where we could play. As we found our play area we also suffered 3 stucks in exactly the same place, with some of the longer wheelbase vehicles cresting at exactly the same point one after another. It was clear, both drivers and cars were a little 'rusty'. Too much time away has dulled our and our cars responses. The clever technology in the cars had re-learned that the speed bumps in the supermarket car park were the most challenging obstacles they needed to overcome. The drivers, well - we are only human. We had our most challenging stuck as we started the journey out of the drive. @Vanessa8580 has given a whole new meaning to the word sandblasting. It took a little bit of time and some digging to get her out, but she ws by no means the only one who found the new softer sand beguiling. Glad to say, we all made it out to reinflate safely and from our resposible distance between us wave adeiu until the next time. It's great to be back. It's great to see everyone again (even in these stranger, restricted circumtances), and it's wonderful to ahve seen the beautiful desert scenery again. I am looking forward to getting back into the weekly swing of up early on a Friday ...until it's too hot to handle in the day and we move to night drives. Have a great week ... and if anyone picked up @Zed's deflator kit for safekeeping it would be great if they are reunited. See you soon in the sand.

I love my TJ. It is indestructible. It is direct. It has phenomenal capabilities. There is bags of power. It looks cool. I would go for a Pathfinder with the right engine. What I miss in the TJ are just a few creature comforts and room for kit (mine is a 2 door). The Jeep, well, it's a Jeep. We were lucky to find one like this, but even so it needs attention ... like a favourite child. The Nissans. Reliable. String. Well made.

Combination of fugly, wierd and wonderful, pointless and "really?"

On a serious note, @Jun Zamora did demonstrate that the Murano is capable beyond all expectations off road. I personally feel that this version the Murano Cross Convertible woudl have been even more perfect. Can't wait to see the first one of these out on a drive.

Hi Arsalan, Welcome to the club. You'll be hard pressed to find a group of people more welcoming or caring about the safety aspects of and having fun in the sand. The Prado looks great - just hope you'll not mind when there is a sand shower inside all over that beautiful leather. There's plenty people around who can also help you with additional tips and tricks about how you might prepare the car for off road adventures. See you (hoefully) soon in the sand.

Get back out into nature. Feel the sand between my axles. Give friends a hug rather than a shrug. And then fly out to get to see my kids.