Thomas Varghese

Dear all Desert Surfers, It was a pleasure to meet all of you today at Faqaa for the drive under @GauravSoni's lead. We started at 5.30 to exit at 9.30. Absolute stunner of a drive as expected from @GauravSoni. Its good to see a lead climbing on top of dunes and directing the convoy through difficult patches. Also not shying of taking out a shovel if its required and enough. So many times when I thought Gaurav would resort to using a rope he stubbornly insisted the old fashion way of shoveling. Reminded me of my early days in Carnity when Marshals like @Ale Vallecchi, @Wrangeld, @Chaitanya D, @Foxtrot Oscar, @Gaurav, @Rahimdad, @Frederic, @Vanessa8580 will climb up on the dunes and direct the convoy and shovel out a stuck. Thank you Gauravsoni for the traditional way. I can see you are on the track to be called Professor Gaurav with these actions and proper briefing with a toy car on how to criss cross, climb straight up, slide slope, ridge ride which are the essential skills demanded of an off roader. The track was good, bit bumpy but thats how offroading tracks are. Anyone shouldn't be expecting a smooth highway like the Sheikh Zayed Road in the middle of the desert. Sand was smooth and soft without any cross tracks. We achieved our target in time shows the quality of the convoy. Special thanks to Goutham @Looper, Gokul @Gok Krish & Prashanth @Pacific for the level headed and cool support extended whenever needed. Special commendations to @Tareq Al Turq for driving well in his 1st Fewbie Plus drive and to @Imteeaz, @salah2u, @DP1011 , Deepak wrangler, @Senthil Kumar, @Prakash Anoop, @KAMALIO, @ASAD. for joining the drive, driving well and exiting together at Solar Park. It was fun driving with you all and nice knowing some new faces, SEE YOU ALL SOON WROOMING IN THE SANDS. Will post some pictures in the gallery soon.

@GauravSoni please add us to the drive in website. Its still showing we are waitlisted even though you have added us in the convoy

Thank You @GauravSoni. I confirm.

Thanks for raising awareness about 1st Aid

Dear @georgestainton, The Absolute Newbie drive is like an orientation drive where you get to know the rules and regulations of the club. Once you do an Absolute newbie drive you can apply for a promotion to other levels with a self declaration stating your experience and assessment of the Marshal whom you have driven with. I personally recommend you to go through the process of completing the required number of drives for next level promotion but @Carnity gives a chance to offroaders to self declare their experience and apply for a promotion if all criteria has been met. Kindly note this process is in place to ensure the safety of all who participates in the drives. Trust me Absolute Newbie drive is fun. You get to know what the club stands for, its rules and regulations, how to keep your convoy position, how to self recover, how to follow the tracks in front of you etc. We at @Carnity goes into the desert in an orderly fashion from the start to finish. Under no circumstances you are to overtake anyone in front of you. The well experienced Marshals who take you for the drive will be briefing each and every aspect of offroading and the etiquettes we have to follow in a convoy. Once you complete that drive you will be a better offroader. Let me warn you now - once you have driven with @Carnity you will never want to join any other club. Its highly addictive once you start driving with our club. You get to meet all the wonderful offroaders and very soon they will be like family to you.

Congrats @Salim Akhtar. Well done

Congrats @Indra Ozola to be elevated to fewbie level. With each promotion the fun and responsibilities increase.

Congrats @Dr Tanveer Ahmed to be elevated to fewbie level. With each promotion the fun and responsibilities increase.

Congrats @eldose baby to be elevated to fewbie level. With each promotion the fun and responsibilities increase.

Congrats @DP1011 , Deepak wrangler to be elevated to fewbie plus level. With each promotion the fun and responsibilities increase.

Congrats @Sam K to be elevated to fewbie level. With each promotion the fun and responsibilities increase.

@georgestainton I can see that you just joined the club today and have joined for the newbie drive. As per club practice you should join an Absolute Newbie drive to get acquainted with club principles and offroading unless you have taken a masterclass. Unfortunately I cannot see any Absolute Newbie drive posted for this week. Unless @Ale Vallecchi accepts you to the convoy you cannot join this drive. I know its heartbreaking for an off road enthusiast to be dissuaded to join a drive but the club has its solid reasons to ask a fresher to join an Absolute Newbie drive prior to be included in a regular convoy. Please wait until the trip lead & marshal @Ale Vallecchi to decide and act accordingly.

Sad I couldn't be a part of this adventure.

Dear @Sunil Mathew you covered the entire drive beautifully. Now nothing more to add from my side. As usual the drive from @Ale Vallecchi accomplished all the targets set. Had a wonderful drive. My only concern was as there was not much delays for stopping in the drive I couldn't click any pictures.

After my Xterra was giving me problems after problems regarding check engine light I bought a professional Autel Scan tool. The Autel Maxicheck (Cost 1800 AED). Eliminated most of the problems by using the scan tool in live mode and observing the sensor values. Now the engine purrs like a cat. I was surprised to find out a new sensor which I didn't even know could stall an engine and affect its performance existed. The Power steering pressure sensor at the pump. The car can stall while idling because the sensor went bad and cannot tell the ECU to increase the RPM when you turn your steering at very slow speeds. OMG you have no idea how busy I got after acquiring this new toy. I need the help of @Hisham Masaad to help me acquire a bracket to permanently fix the scan tool to the dashboard like he has fixed his tab for the GPS.

Dr @M.Seidam the crack is unlikely as its a very new car. Its run only 16000km not like our Xterras which was produced a long time ago.

After speaking to @Ranjan Das and analyzing the symptoms I believe its due the the MAF sensor becoming dirty. He self services his air filter and probably one of the times didn't close the air box properly seated and maybe the MAF sensor got dirty. The symptom he described was when climbing uphill straight and when he floors the accelerator the engine RPM cuts down from 4500 and he loses power. MAF sensor tells the ECM how much air is being pulled into the intake manifold at what temperature and ECM sends the signal to the injectors to spray the fuel as per the data input from the MAF sensor. If the data is incorrect because the sensor is dirty the ECM cannot instruct the injectors to speed up the spray and its duration which results in loss of power. As per him, his garage said it maybe because of abnormal rise in engine coolant temperature while doing extreme climbing but he said there is not much difference showing in the temp gauge. Also if the engine temperature shoots up like his garage said it will take some time for the fans & the radiator to cool it down to operating temperature. Anyways I told him to clean the MAF sensor and observe the result in this drive. Let us wait and see.

Boafeng UV-9R plus is better than the UV-5R model as interference is a lot less.

@Waqas Parvez by the time I parked my car and opened the drive it was full.

Good decision by team @Carnity. Deeply saddened by the loss of UAE President. May God Almighty give him peace and heaven. I wish all the best to the next President to take the country in the right direction and make it even better than the Founder Father's dreams of in 1971. UAE is my home now. Came here in 2008 to convince my wife to return back home to the comforts of India after she came here to scout for better life. Had the best times of my life in those couple of months I was roaming around on foot. Sheikh Khalifa was the President that time. Fell in love with UAE and the life style. India maybe my homeland but UAE is my home now. Don't want to go back and settle down. I sincerely thank the leaders of UAE for welcoming millions of expats like me and making us feel at home. Long live UAE.

confirmed

I had my differential broken twice. Didn't get the time to research much into the mechanics of the differential. Thanks.

Congrats @Zixuan Huang - Charlie