Thomas Varghese

Thank you @Islam Soliman for a wonderful Newbie drive. I never expected the Newbie drive to be so exciting when I joined late yesterday. It would have been a loss missing this drive. 

Everybody was at the meeting place on time and we could move at the scheduled time with ease. @DP1011 , Deepak wrangler as 2nd lead was perfect for the role. He could sense when to stop, when to drive even before the lead could announce on the radio. Perfecto. @Brett Eicher in his Jeep drove effortlessly considering he hasn't driven much in the sands. Couple of refusals and a crest but that is all part of the game. @george charbel was also good in handling his Jeep. Small fine tuning on throttle control and he would be a good offroader soon. I was enjoying my position as sweep watching the jeeps tackle all the challenges Islam threw at the convoy. @Islam Soliman had really made a good track selection and for sure the pace, the challenges was a notch above and everybody performed very well. Made me go back to my Newbie days when I would announce I have a refusal, I have a stuck, please I need assistance. This convoy fortunately had not much stops and we exited the drive uneventfully at the scheduled time in Qudra Lakes. Uneventful I said because considering the terrain of soft patches here and there and really good climbs, crisscross & ridge riding the convoy performed very well. No mechanical issues, no pop outs and Islam had to give us breaks occasionally as there was no stoppage due to any of the causes mentioned above. 

It was my honor and pleasure to meet new faces and get to know each other and drive on challenging terrain. The advantage with a short convoy is very soon the drivers get accustomed with each others style and adjust very fast. 

See you all soon for another drive in the sands. 

Really sorry I overslept and didn't hear the alarm going off. Too late to start from here. Please carry on..

14 minutes ago, GauravSoni said:

Dear Dune surfers!

@Tom B @Ranjan Das @Simon Dawood @Chinthaka Ruwan @Daniel Rodas @Chris Wing @Looper

thanks for joining the drive! Please let me know if there are any change of plans and confirm.

I will be posting convoy order later tonight..

Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy I'm back

@GauravSoni I had to leave the drive due to work commitments. Sorry

Congrats @Mike M.. Well deserved. 

1 hour ago, Joji varghese said:

 

New drive rule just announced 😊

Its upto the club to change rules for the benefit of the majority but not right to apply the rules for a drive announced earlier before the change was enforced. 

4 minutes ago, Wrangeld said:

One of the reasons I do so few drives in AD is that almost every time that I drive there I also find myself contributing more than expected to the AD economy. So, finding that we ended up deep into AD territory (... I thought we were headed for Solar Park, by the way!) I made sure to remain carefully 2kph below the stated limit.

I guess this is the (literal) price we pay for the opportunity to drive in the beautiful dunes AD has to offer. 

I made my contribution last week after @Ale Vallecchi's drive. We got to support Abu Dhabi for providing us roads in such remote areas. 

@Ale Vallecchi sorry i can't join. Just now my youngest daughter informed me that she has her ACCA exams on 10th and I have to pick and drop her

Calender is not open

4 minutes ago, Sunil Mathew said:

Hope this is not going to be included in weekend drives, with the one drive limit 🤞🤞🙏

I think the weekend drives for one drive will be Saturday & Sunday. 

I'm in

1 minute ago, DP1011 , Deepak wrangler said:

Yes @Thomas Varghese! In @Ale Vallecchi's drive

But Later I was told that Ale did announce it on radio just before concluding drive, to be careful as we would be driving back from Abu Dhabi, but guess interference and I missed the MOST imp message of the drive😂😂

Yes @Ale Vallecchi did announce but unfortunately I didn't find any speed signs on the way and realized I crossed the speed limit when the camera took a picture of my car. 

19 minutes ago, DP1011 , Deepak wrangler said:

I had one last week😕😕, realised only after flast that the exit was from Abu Dhabi, Only good part is discount offered, making it 195😂😂

U mean after @Ale Vallecchi's drive? Welcome my friend, I got too and immediately paid 195 AED

Dear @Gaurav I have to sign out of the drive as I need to give the car to workshop now after noticing abnormal vibration from the suspension. Really sorry.

3 hours ago, munkybizness said:

 

And finally, @Thomas Varghese, with more than double the number of drives, your experience is evident in spaces beyond just the driving, from clearing live codes with electronics, to getting a limping car to leap to the top of hills. You made it look super easy. And of course, I'm looking forward to what you caught in your frame.

 

[ 🐵  ]

Dear Mayank, I got fed up of all the lies the garages thrust upon me to make money. The guys who know the job lie a lot and the guys who don't lie don't know how to operate an OBD scan tool to diagnose. The fact is when you find your car is underperforming you take it to a garage to solve it. The max they do is scan your car for fault codes and clear them if its a minor fault and the car comes back to normal operation. This the maximum a garage does to repair your car as they also don't have time to observe the car readings in live view while driving. I got fed up of this and the amount of money I kept spending to scan the car and repair it. Most of the times the car throws a code to the ECM when something upsets the electrical connections. The mechanic reads the code and asks you to replace that sensor, this connector. 90% of the time this solves the problem temporarily but the problem comes back. I decided to take matters into my own hands by having a professional scanner as I got extremely fed up. Bought an Autel Maxicheck MX808Ts for 1800 AED from a shop in Sharjah with 2 years update subscription. My car has been seen at a different perspective from day 1 I bought this scanner. Started viewing the live data from the ECM and understood many things which I was not aware of before. Most of the times we do offroading, the ECM throws a code and it remains in the system affecting all other parameters of the ECM software. Especially the old vehicles like my XTERRA 2008. You saw how my car climbed all the way to the top of the Big Red without much effort and was ready to do a criss cross over Big Red. It was not possible before I bought the scanner and the car was struggling to even climb 3/4 of what I did today. I understood it was because the earlier fault codes are stored in the ECM as past codes and the ECM cuts power when the same situation arises to protect the components of the car from breaking apart. 

Now a days after a drive I clean the air filter, reinflate tires and scan the car immediately for fault codes, clear the codes and drive back home. It gives me better fuel consumption and acceleration. Yesterday the Autel scanner had a major update which enabled my scanner to even code which means some functions became bi directional and I can set values for fuel systems like adjust the injector pulse, advance or retard the ignition timing, play with the VVT system etc. I still didn't alter any values as I need more research into the values to be set. I will eventually learn it. 

An OBD scanner is an essential tool to be in the tool box of an offroader as anything can happen inside the desert. If I didn't have the scanner with me today most probably all of you would have been cursing me as my car was in a weird angle and went into limp mode. Someone would have had to tow me out. The moment I located the code and cleared it the car started to perform normally. After towing me out I could have taken the car back to a garage in only a recovery. The scan tool saved me from all this. Maybe the code would have cleared if I disconnect and reconnect the battery but please understand its only a hack which may or maynot work. 

For me all the basis of offroading came from @Frederic in my Absolute Newbie drive. Every time I do slide slopes or climbs his words ring in my ears. Gain higher ground initially and you will be able to negotiate the slopes and climbs much easier. Even if I sometimes deviate a little from the laid tracks its always to gain higher ground so that I can control the fishtailing and control my exit easily. Plus a little left right motion of the steering will help the car to climb more. You already saw that today. 

Big challenge - To be or not to be an offroader after getting today's fuel prices shock

congrats @Tareq Al Turq

Congrats @RiaanJH. Will drive with you soon again

Congrats @ASAD.. It was apparent during our last drive that you will soon be promoted. 

THE MYSTERY DRIVE  by @Ale Vallecchi.

Beautiful drive as usual from @Ale Vallecchi. Started the drive by 3.15pm after waiting for @Wafi Ziadeh. The sun was blaring mercilessly at more than 44° C when we reached. Even the skin was getting burned while we deflated and put up our flags. But that was the only time we got troubled by the weather. 

As soon as we started and headed towards Crescent Lake we were greeted by a lone Oryx and some Gazelles as if they had come to watch our convoy entering the desert. As Ale' commented on the drive thread there was Oryx at the beginning and bunch of them darted out of the desert to say good bye when we were leaving. So the target of the drive was achieved. Probably Ale has some magical call to summon them. The target was to enter the desert at Qudra and exit at Ghantoot. This was also achieved in the stipulated time. To take a newbie convoy from Qudra to Ghantoot and exiting at the pre determined time is not a small feat. Even though it was a newbie convoy everybody rose up to the challenges put forward by Prof @Ale Vallecchi. The refusals & stucks were just minimal. Altogether 7 or 8 to the max which is nothing. 

The 2nd lead @Ahmed Wagdy didn't shy of his responsibilities and was following Ale's lead as instructed. @James Lovell was absolutely impeccable in his drive. Didn't see him facing any situations. @Anoop Das with his monster Ford F150 also negotiated the challenges with some advices put in by Ale. Poor @Anoop Das went back home minus his front number plate which was spotted and picked by me who was behind him. Longer trucks sometimes hit the front bumper while coming down a slope. He will master the art of negotiating such tight spots soon if he continues his passion of offroading. @Stan Hassett who was behind me drove very well. I kept him entertained with some slight upgraded offroading like climbing up higher on slide slopes and keeping both sides of the wheels while ridge riding and to my surprise he was tagging along perfectly on his Prado. He never shied from following me. Great future for him. The drivers behind him probably must have followed him but I couldn't watch their line properly in the rear camera. @Nitin Mohan, @Murad Hamed, @Farook Veettil who were at the back didn't have much issues and even if there were a couple nicely dealt with instructions from @DP1011 , Deepak wrangler the sweep of the convoy. After sometime into the drive it became apparent that @DP1011 , Deepak wrangler can deal with most situations and me as a center forward was much relieved he is competent enough to take care of the rear. I have only driven with him once which was yesterday and I can predict he will be soon in the support team. Clear and precise instructions. Watched him tug also and it was perfect from a difficult place. Well done buddy. 

Although I was apprehensive in joining a newbie drive in the afternoon and was prepared with all refreshments to keep me charged if at all there would be difficult recoveries I didn't use much as there were not much recoveries. I really enjoyed it. Kudos to all the drivers.

Ale gave a 15 min break at his favorite  Three date palm tree spot and it was perfect time to get to know each other as most were new faces to me. Will I join another Newbie drive? Absolutely yes. With new talents like all of them coming up and learning how can I be not part of the action. 

SEE YOU ALL SOON DRIVING AGAIN TO MASTER THE DESRT TERRAIN.

Some pictures will be posted to the gallery as soon as I can get it offloaded from the camera. 

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.