Krishna R

Congrats @Bravoecho on the promotion. Enjoy the faster pace from now

Congrats @Rajesh NG Enjoy the faster paced fewbie drives!

@Mario CornejoI was able to squeeze in as the last guy

My first Intermediate and yes, it was eventful. As @GauravSoni mentioned, there was a road block on the entrance to the starting point but we all figured out a way to reach the starting point. There were a couple of other convoys at the meeting point as well, we waited a bit for them to clear off and started to the massive dunes of Sweihan 😍 The convoy was doing great with high climbs and sideys and we were in a constant climb and switch mode until a ratatata convoy crossed us. we took a detour and continued the pace on some more dunes. We went on to a practice area where we had to climb a dune, switch and side slope on to the other side. I completed the maneuver and came down when I head a "creak" , looked in my rear view and @Chris Wing was following me, so i continued not thinking much about it and then we heard on the radio that the gladiator was sideways. Raced to @Gerrit Bus who was unresponsive on the radio. @Mohamad Anwer and @Santoso Marjuki were behind Gerrit and had a clear view of him from the top of the dune. Went to the gladiator and to our relief, gerrit was unhurt and was able to climb out of the gladiator by opening the roof. What followed was the smoothest of recoveries I have ever seen. It was a tricky job. The car was on its side on top of a dune with a soft deep bowl. @Mohamad Anwer and @Santoso Marjuki anchored the gladiator from the top of the dune and @Chris Wing pulled it with a winch like precision. I am sure we couldn't even hear a soft thud when the car came back down on 4 wheels. @Benjamin brought the car down the bowl with a tug from @Santoso Marjuki and @GauravSoni started scouting the exit route. The recovery was a class act from @GauravSoni who was surprisingly very composed and executed the recovery and exit perfectly. To our surprise, the gladiator started and was also drivable (Unlikely for a jeep ) and we had a slow newbie drive exit. Once out, @GauravSoni INSISTED on getting the police report which was done quite quickly and ensured peace of mind for gerrit on the way back home. We helped him clear some debris off his car so that it was drivable safely on road. @Benjamin Great SL. Need to check on your gearing while climbing buddy. It was nice driving with known peeps @Mohamad Anwer @Chris Wing You guys did great on the drive as well as during recovery as well. Great meeting @Santoso Marjuki for the first time. Great guy with a nice car and skills to boot @Mario Cornejo I kept telling you that I like your car and maybe jinxed it man. What happened at the exit was just not meant to happen But alls well that ends well. I am just thankful and proud that we were able to manage everything as a team. Shit could been worse. Until next weekend guys. Stay calm and enjoy the week!

Bead lock wheels add extra weight. Also, Bead locked tyres CAN pop out as well, albeit rarely. However, if it happens, the tyre will have to be discarded most of the time. As @Gaurav mentioned, if you are able to find the sweet spot of psi for your driving , coupled with good A/T tyres (thicker sidewall), you might not need bead locks.

Hello @CasperPL I was in the market for quite sometime to get a 4x4 that was more of an off roader than my Infiniti QX. I had wrangler, FJ and Xterra in mind. They were finalized as these cars have been tried and tested in the desert and they have huge online communities to help with mods, repairs, questions etc. My budget was 25K for the car and 5K to get it desert ready (maintenance, skid plates, bushings etc) After 3 months of researching and test driving, the below was my analysis. Please note It's my personal opinion only and not some expert recommendation based on technical research. Wrangler: Great car for the desert. Market is overloaded with used jeeps within the budget mentioned above. Finding a clean stock one was just impossible. Even the advertised "clean, lady driven" ones had leaks and overheating issues. Reliability isn't their main forte. I have seen almost new jeeps failing in the desert and we couldn't figure out the issue and fix it. Based on my research, many jeep owners complained of leaks, over heating and transmission issues. Took it off my list due to long term peace of mind. FJ: One of the best cars for the desert. It's rare to find any desert drive without an FJ in the convoy. That shows how good and reliable these cars are, for dune bashing. Hard to find GCC FJs in decent condition within 30K aed. In this budget, mostly you will find US spec, 300k+ ODO or heavily abused cars. With difflock, crawl control, a trac and 2 fuel tanks (In most of the models), you have a desert ready car in stock condition. Reliability is gold standard and you wont have any issues if its maintained periodically. Spares are aplenty and labour is cheap as well. Only con is would say is visibility from the drivers seat but that doesn't seem to put off many happy FJ owners. Took it off my list as a clean one was above my budget. Xterra: One of the few budget friendly offroad cars which is reliable with great performance as well. Market is flooded with used Xterras but finding a clean one takes time but not that hard. I test drove 20 xterras before buying mine. Again, try to get one in stock that hasn't been abused before. They are available, we need to look hard. Pros: Performance - the torquey 4.0 V6 is good for 260 HP in stock which is more than enough even for intermediate drives. Reliability - It takes a lot of work to destroy this car mechanically. Even so, spares and labour are cheap. Yes, sometimes spares aren't available in nissan spare parts but we can get genuine spares within a day. If not, sajja is loaded with xterra parts. The offroad model comes with rear difflock and a slightly better suspension. TBH, mine is an offroad model but I have hardly used the difflock twice in 20 drives. Visibility is decent. The car can be abused to a certain extent as compared to American makes. Do note that you will find models with 200K+ on the ODO under 20K aed, but as long as its maintained well, it is safe to buy them and make them roar for another 100K kms. I bought my Xterra from a marshall and it was already modified and was certainly abused, however, the engine still purrs like a cat on highways and roars when climbing dunes. Also, some pre 2009 models were affected by SMOD (Google: Xterra + SMOD) but I haven't heard this issue from Xterra owners in the GCC. As always, whichever car you buy, check for off road abuse and try to get a stock one as much as possible. The offroad season is almost over, so don't go by the price on dubizzle/fb marketplace, you can negotiate and reduce the price by ~30% from the listed price. If you need any additional info on Xterra, please share here!

Thank you @Sunil Mathew😊

Thank you @Hisham Masaad

Man. I dare you to do the hat trick drive. Take both the LC and the jeep and keep one on standby. In case one overheats, just jump on the other and continue the drive

Thank you @Davie Chase Thank you @Mahmoud TahaBro

Thank you @Joji varghese I can join you in intermediate drives now Thank you @GauravSoniBhai. Looking forward! Thank you @Looper Thank you @Gary F Its actually the morning drive in sweihan.

Bro. start with srikumar and end with gaurav soni. I had the same plan

Thank you @DP1011Bhai Thank you @Jaro Tuzinsky Yes, This weekend in Sweihan!

@Patrick van der Loo Congrats Patrick. lets tear up the desert together!

This sat in Sweihan buddy! ellam ungalidam kuditha yaanaipal manna!

Thank you @Gaurav My hands were itching for this. Thanks to all the marshalls and support team members for teaching me to offroad safely and to have made me reach this level. The Xterra is unleashed now! Can't wait

Final Update on my leaf springs, So, after I changed one of the leaf springs after the incident, I felt the car had more lift on one side and decided to service and re-camber both the springs. The shop guys basically dismantled it and took each leaf apart, cleaned them, made adjustments to camber and put them back together. The special bonus is they aren't squeaking anymore 😃 Also, the suspension guys told me that the rubber padding is of no use and does more harm than good. I waited to post this after 5 drives and so far so good. @Asif Hussain @Srikumar

@Looperunable to join tomorrow. see you next weekend. Thankfully I did not let anyone lose their chance from the wait-list.

Way to go @Felix Obst Enjoy the new level. looking forward to driving with you soon. As you said, the last drive felt like an intermediate drive!

confirmed @Rizwanm2bro

@Ale VallecchiThank you. I am confirmed to join. I was a lil worried that you might call off the drive. I am not familiar with the route to sweihan, so if you don't mind, can you share the location pin of the fuel station as well?

Congrats @Benjamin Enjoy the new level

A better late than never drive report. A drive that taught us more than just desert driving. The convoy was bang on time excited by the fact that this drive was different. After all, we were going to have a tete-a-tete with ghosts 😅 A great start with big climbs from the get go, overlapped with fast paced technical portions. It was great to see @Fredericfly with his new heavy beast. As @Gary F mentioned, the sand has started getting softer and it surprised us at a few places. One person (@Benjamin) is surely happy with that as his weekly allowance just increased by 5X . @Joseph RajuIt was your day man. You couldn't avoid it. Your patrol throwing a tantrum reminded me of Thunder, the german shepherd that i had when i was a kid. When he didn't wanna play, he meant it. He would just sit there without eye contact and no amount of pushing and begging would make him get up to play with us kids . In hindsight, I think the coolant hose might have come off during the technical patch as it was bouncy and jouncy just before your car overheated. Do let us know what the garage says. @ZedMan. Thank you for your kind words. You are the designated recovery guy for carnity Jokes aside, Your experience and expertise in these kind of situations is much appreciated. you along with @Chris Wing and @Frederic ensured every car is out on the tarmac safe and secure which shows the true spirit of carnity drives. I think you missed your LC in this drive man Great stuff from the rest of the convoy, especially the innovative ideas when trying to cool the car down and during recovery. @Joji varghese@Patrick van der Loo @Gary F @Benjamin @Stumpy Paj @Mario Cornejo @Mohamad Anwer @Gurcharan Mehta We couldn't resist the final dune @Frederic I think the ghosts weren't happy with the fact that we were going to enter their territory with roaring 4x4s, so they summoned the dark powers and stopped us on our tracks. We will get them another day 👍 Until then, Keep calm and Eid Mubarak guys!

Thanks a ton for the wonderful drive @M.Seidam Doc. Today's drive surprised me in many ways. from the starting point to the convoy size to the amazing pace and lines. 2 xterras and 2 jeeps blasting the desert in darkness. It was too good. Thanks for the SL position, I loved every bit of it. TBH I was a bit tired and thought of bailing out, even after reaching the starting point. But now I am not able to sleep Such was the intensity of the drive. The convoy drove very well today keeping up with Doc @M.Seidam Thank you @Haitham Khattab for the sweep and the lights Great drive again @Benjamin. I saw you made slight corrections when i went off track a bit. Good thinking there. Looking forward to driving with you guys soon. Until then, Stay safe and Ramadan Kareem!

@M.Seidam Hello doc I am at this location. is this correct? https://goo.gl/maps/o1E3A9w1rj3tnu286