Driving a softroader in sand article

**hippyhippy** · 04-04-2011, 11:27 AM

nice vid

may i ask some advice:

I cant imagine sand condition being any worse than the video you posted, and i definitely wouldnt be going as fast LOL, what are the differences between that track pack package which you cant get in australia to the normal model here?

After getting bogged down, was it easy to get out? that sand looked pretty soft but stockton looks pretty much the same.

Thanks

**jcubed** · 04-04-2011, 04:10 PM

Hi hippyhippy,

First off, if you go slower, you go nowhere.

Somehow, I’ve never looked at the speedo while negotiating sand. It seems to be mostly a seat-of-the-pants exercise, where sometimes, the seat of your pants works better than other times. You are else wise occupied anyway

, and don’t have time to look there.

As you quite rightly comment, the sand is particularly loose, and due to the amount of penetration allowed, would not have been passable by the Tiguan had it not been lifted to increase the ground clearance. The belly would have been solidly on the sand.

It does seems to appear faster – reckless almost – on the video clips, but on this specific occasion was nowhere near the 80 km/h required to get the Forester up the Namib dunes – I’m guessing 30 – 40 km/h.

As far as I can remember in terms of the off-road pack – perhaps NZtiguan who has the identical car, could fill in/correct my list - the following:

Externally, only the chin of the car is cut away. The ground clearance remains the same, although I’ve seen reviews claiming different. I do not know if the suspension is perhaps also stiffer.

The off-road mode starts the Tiptronic transmission in 1st (normally 2nd), keeps the car in permanent 4-wheel drive (and does not change to front wheel drive somewhere between the 2nd/3rd gear up shift). It changes the shift points (hangs on to lower gears for longer) and enables the Hill Descent Control (which cannot be disabled independently) and adjusts the traction control parameters.

If you get stuck on an incline, you can ALMOST always just drive out in the other direction. In this case we reversed down and tried again (successfully) with MORE speed. Compounding the difficulty, is that in the clip, the track curves slightly. If your front wheels are not dead straight, it EATS power.

The tyres were deflated to 1.2 bar at the time, so you could lower your speed if you deflated it some more. 0.8 bar (12 lb) works well on the 215/65 R16 tyres, with unfortunately, the resultant loss in ground clearance. I have not tried it on this car, but previously have successfully deflated 70 profile tyres to 0.6 bar.

**team_v** · 04-04-2011, 04:17 PM

Just a heads up for everyone.
I did my 4WD training course for work recently and they strongly advised against lowering the tyre pressures below 20PSI.

The certified trainer stated that they do not even lower the tyre pressures normally and it should only be done if you get stuck as a chance to get out.

**jcubed** · 04-04-2011, 05:47 PM

Originally Posted by team_v

... and they strongly advised against lowering the tyre pressures below 20PSI.

The certified trainer stated that they do not even lower the tyre pressures normally and it should only be done if you get stuck as a chance to get out.

Hi team_v

VW advises the same in their User Manual - do not deflate. I would like to know why. Also, once you're stuck and bedded down, deflating your tyres won't help one little bit. In fact, you're now effectively raising the tyres off the ground due to the reduced pressure.

The images below illustrate what you do when taking convoys into the Namib desert - 5 days a week, 52 weeks a year - as your primary source of income.

This is the start of it all. Deflation to 1 bar, even though still on the gravel road. 170km of sand ahead. Look at the bulge in the lead vehicle's rear tyre.

Same vehicle, shortly going up the dune on the left. Compare the tyre height below the rim to that above. The bulge is only partially due to the load, pressure here 0.8 bar.

Front vehicle tyre bulge due to the 0.8 bar pressure.

I don't know where your instructor did HIS training, but good luck to him, mate

.

**MGV** · 04-04-2011, 08:11 PM

Brother did a stint out at an aboriginal community (Yalata) in S.A. as a coastal ranger & the 'local' guys would deflate the tyres for sand work in the troopy for a count of 20 seconds... When they got back to the depot, they would inflate them for a count of 20! None of this psi or Kpa or bar nonsense...

He reckons they never got bogged in the 2 years he was there!

**jimbomort** · 04-04-2011, 08:40 PM

yeh we ran our tyres at 18psi on Moreton and that seemed to work well

I've never got bogged on sand, well except once. I got myself out again, and only got bogged in the first place because I wasn't paying attention. Mostly, momentum is your friend on sand, as JJJ said re video and speed, going slower can mean not going at all if sand is loose. But again as JJJ said, a seat of the pants thing, you dont want to go too much faster than you need to either.

**MGV** · 04-04-2011, 08:55 PM

Originally Posted by jcubed

Looks to me like no less than 12 passengers... (!) Plus what's in the front, gotta be 1000kg's worth of people!

**jcubed** · 04-04-2011, 09:13 PM

Originally Posted by MGV

Looks to me like no less than 12 passengers... (!) Plus what's in the front, gotta be 1000kg's worth of people!

Dead right there, mate, a round dozen. What's in front, is the driver, one passenger and a V8. Or wait!

From this photo it appears that TWO passengers could be accommodated up front if the driver can keep his left elbow tucked in.

By comparison, our Forester looks a bit puny, hiding away in its own little corner.

**hippyhippy** · 14-11-2011, 09:38 AM

time to bring up an old thread...

well i finally got the chance to take the tig to stockton on the weekend, performed ok, only problems i saw was the height of the car, it needs another 5cm, i did scrape the bottom of the car a few times but only on really soft sand. I had troubles at the start because i didnt put the tyre pressure low enough, but once i did it was fine as long as i kept the speed up on the really soft stuff. If im gonna be doing this more i would think about putting on bigger tyres and putting in them plates some of u guys have done. Overall i was pretty happy with the way the car handled in the sand.