Looper

I hate hot weather I can’t bear it at all. Continuing with @varunmehndiratta’s post; summer drives made me invested in quite a few stuff. Since I wanted to experience driving in the nights, I installed lights. But night drives drain you a lot. They take up so much energy and concentration, it’s ridiculous. Many might enjoy, but I personally like to limit my night drives to to early morning darkness or late evening darkness. Since I had fast deflator valves, deflation was not a issue like he had but inflation was. It was exhausting to hold on to the inflators for each tire. After inquiring a bit bought a 4 tire inflator, which made the job easier. Leaving the preparation issues sorted out, yes mornings are better time to drive than afternoon during Summer, for Sand in the afternoon is super soft and less experienced drivers see themselves having greater chance of facing refusals. Believe me, unless self recovered, digging sand or fixing pop outs in the afternoon is extremely unpleasant. Reason why I haven’t had many afternoon drives. In the winter seasons all that I did was mostly afternoon drives. In winter, another reason to afternoon drives is not to be bothered with fog situations. I wasn’t in town mid Feb till end March. In April tried everything a bit.

Congratulations @Chris Wing, well done 👍

Congratulations @Ishraque, glad to be driving with you on your first fewbie drive. You drove quite well today.

One thing for sure @ @Carnity we don’t see any vested interest of any kind whatsoever. The degree to which we remain neutral amazes me.

We drove for around 4 hours covering 57.46 km of which moving time was approximately 3 hours with a moving average of 83%. I did not stop the tracking app in time so the times are approximates. Gaia Maps recording for your review.

What a great drive we had today. Warmed up a bit in the early morning without any hiccups and as the day progressed @Kailas increased the level and everyone just went with it. We saw an excellent tutorial on ridge riding and crisscrossing with step by step increase in the difficulty making sure everyone was comfortably made it to the other side. I had an opportunity to brush up many of the necessary off-road skills including recoveries. Thanks to you @Kailas for this wonderful drive. @Darren Brooke, you were great in the sweep, you kept a keen eye on the convoy, and mostly it was you guiding others when they faced refusals. For the beast of a car that you drive, you are a superior driver, yes. Good to see you @Gaurav Soni, it was some time since I drove with you. It was wonderful of you to give relevant advices to other members. Your experience in overwhelming numbers of drives shows obviously. I learn a lot from you. @Anoop Nair Your ridge-riding was impeccable. I had driven with you on a couple of newbie drives in Tawi Nazwa, 2nd Dec Cafe area you have definitely have come a long way since then and were able to self recover both your refusals with guidance from @Darren Brooke. A piece of advice from is to go reverse as far as you can on a level to moderately inclined plane when you face refusals. I find reverseing is easier than trying to move forward. @Luc Khaldoun, this is our 2nd drive together and definitely you shown you are a lot more comfortable with your car. @Rawad & @Ishraque this was our first drive together and I had the privilege of towing you both today. You both had driven quite well today. @Adhir Saxena this was our 2nd drive. You seemed to be in an excited state at the back. I had my kid and his friends come along to give company. Back of my jeep is quite cramped, and makes someone new and not used to claustrophobic and sick due to the tinted glasses as well as a small bench. But unlike previous occasions we managed the issues quite well and they had good fun on this drive.

100% fact. Almost every Jeep gets upgrades. It’s just matter of time. And times comes for all.

We should have some rock crawling drives this winter.

“Your focus determines your reality.” —Qui-Gon Jinn, Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace Today I observed one of the longest time in Radio Silence, which only indicated that everyone was really focused and was enjoying the drive. A great drive @Wrangeld, thanks a lot. @Niki was fantastic in the sweep as well as @varunmehndiratta was phenomenal in the 2nd lead, great job buddy. I had a 3 refusals, which were on account of me missing the line while crossing over the ridges, which were all obviously taking a one full circle back to the line and crossing over. @Watteau you were behind me, do you have any observations as to what I might have been doing wrong. I must confess that somehow still I don’t like criss-crossing the ridges. I think its weird to have such a dislike - who does that?

I have Orient Takaful, came free with the Jeep when i bought it and i have been renewing. They have honoured the claim i had last year. Haven't compared with anyone but this year added all the upgrades to my car (eg. rear bumper, lights and compressor) to the value of the car.

Yes it is sand, happened right after the drive. I was thinking I'd take it to the car wash where they have high pressure air, which might have cleaned the sand. But foolishly took it to service centre. I have to kick myself for that may be...

After last week's drive I pressed the rear defrost button unattentively and it got stuck on the "On" position because of sand. It is causing not only to AC to not work but blowing hot air inside the cabin as the front defrost is also getting activated. I tried but failed to pry it out and took it to a off-brand service centre mentally deliberating whether I should have taken it to the service centre. The off brand person advised me to take it to the official service centre, so I did. My Jeep has been at the service centre since Saturday morning, and they are trying to figure out some jugad or something to rectify it. As usual their first intention was to replace the entire switch panel, but they don't have any here and it will take months to order one here. Apart from ranting, the purpose of my post is to ask what could I have done differently.

My drives journey has hit a milestone. I have scored half century this past Friday. While my drive count shows 51 on the forum - I was absent on one afternoon drive, which was my 2nd drive of the day. These are a snapshots of my drives till date. Looking forward to many many more. Any and all criticisms are welcome.

Desert driving is always a learning process, it never ends. I had a good run at criss-crossing on Friday as was promised by @Kailas - and thanks for a wonderful drive. I too had a 2-3 minor refusals but nothing I couldn't recover myself from and @varunmehndiratta behind me was of considerable help guiding me whether I wanted or not 😁. Towards the end though the terrain became bit difficult as the sand became very loose due to the heat. A big shout out to @Dodi Syahdar for all the hard work you put in, at the Sweep end of the convoy. I got the way 4 hose from the same place you got. I had known them before but wasn't sure about them, but thanks to you I was now confident to buy one from them, it was promptly delivered COD next day.

My Rear and front defrost buttons got stuck, which is causing the AC not to work plus hot air being pumped into the car. I tried my best but I was unable to do anything about it. I have vacated the drive as it would be unbearable for me to be able to drive without ac.

@Kailas Please waitlist me for my 2nd drive of the week.

@Srikumar My tires are 245/75/17s, yes they are AT. Bridgestone Dueler A/T. I have been told by the service center that the tires have unevenly worn out, I assume it is a by product of driving in the desert.

On the way to achieving the quest of reaching 1 km in ascent, recording of the drive on my car said we did it and then did some more. 1.644 km to be precise. Thanks a lot @Lorenzo Candelpergher for the drive. It was an unrelenting drive, and towards the end the heat affecting the car and I getting a bit tired caused a couple of refusals. A big thanks to @Alexander Alcala for guiding me out of them. @Alexander Alcala you mentioned I fishtail a lot. I explained to you that due to the lower clearance of my stock car coupled with stock tires cause me to scoop sand and I loose momentum. That is my assessment, but could there be any other reasons? Also a big thanks to @Shaaz Sha and @Hisham Masaad for the support roles. @Javier Lucero, you did well as the second lead.

update: The clinic gave me an test ID number and said should call DHA to ask them to update the app. But gentleman at DHA advised me that the Turnaround time is 30 hours within which the DHA will update the App. I had my test done yesterday evening and got the negetiv test result in the morning. Did the test at a private clinic because it is near my house in walking distance.

My COVID test results are not showing up on the App, I am trying to resolve it. I am trying to call AlHosn app help line which is turning on some kind of podcast like message and also trying the clinic. Can anyone let me know what I should do?

@Kailas can you place me in waiting list ?

I am in. Thanks a lot @Islam Soliman

Please waitlist me for this drive. It will be my 2nd one.

Does anyone have Gaia GPS stats for this drive?

@Ale VallecchiThank you very much!