Driving on Sand

hyedipin · **Joined:** Thu May 11, 2006 10:20 am **Posts:** 1667

I am sure this was covered here, but I just cannot find the topics. There are some on the web, but I wanted to see what other fellow liberty owners were doing.
Once you post the link to that topic, this topic can be locked.

Thanks.

Christopher · **Posted:** Thu Oct 11, 2007 5:39 pm

I was recently at silver lake sand dunes and aired down to 10lbs. makes all the difference. not sure if this is what your looking for or not

Chris

Dje Ryu · **Posted:** Thu Oct 11, 2007 7:26 pm

Air down to about 18psi and stay in 4hi to keep momentum. If I start to sink, I'll air down a little more, get out using 4lo, then go back to 4hi when I can. That's all I do.

hyedipin · **Joined:** Thu May 11, 2006 10:20 am **Posts:** 1667

I thought 4LO was no go on sand, I guess when you are stuck, it is useful.
I am going to take a shovel with me based on fellow jeeper's suggestion. Should I avoid going after rain or even wait at least 2 days and avoid any problems? I am not sure.

Also I have selec trac, so would 4x4 Full Time be better than 4x4 Part Time (4HI) or is it strictly 4HI for sand driving.

QuestMan · **Posted:** Thu Oct 11, 2007 9:25 pm

Quote:

I was recently at silver lake sand dunes and aired down to 10lbs. makes all the difference. not sure if this is what your looking for or not

Chris

A: What size tires do you have?
B: Did you manage to get to the top of the BIG dune? (From what I've seen, it takes a LOT of guts). :lol:

1300ZUK · **Posted:** Fri Oct 12, 2007 12:21 am

QuestMan wrote:

Quote:

I was recently at silver lake sand dunes and aired down to 10lbs. makes all the difference. not sure if this is what your looking for or not

Chris

A: What size tires do you have?
B: Did you manage to get to the top of the BIG dune? (From what I've seen, it takes a LOT of guts). :lol:

or a stock KJ :lol:

I ran 12 psi with wrangler HP 17's, made it up the first try, the only thing is not to get stuck on the top.

1300ZUK · **Posted:** Fri Oct 12, 2007 12:24 am

hyedipin wrote:

I thought 4LO was no go on sand, I guess when you are stuck, it is useful.
I am going to take a shovel with me based on fellow jeeper's suggestion. Should I avoid going after rain or even wait at least 2 days and avoid any problems? I am not sure.

Also I have selec trac, so would 4x4 Full Time be better than 4x4 Part Time (4HI) or is it strictly 4HI for sand driving.

Rain will just make the Sand hard, so it will be easier to drive on, Just avoid puddles that you don't know how deep they are.

and Sand you can probably run 4HI all the time, If it starts to get hilly, soft, or you run out of power, then 4LO will work for slower speeds.

and just for giggles this is the "big" hill at silver lake

Rush345 · **Posted:** Fri Oct 12, 2007 2:04 am

Many many years ago my father built with me playing gopher built a dune buggy out of a '64 VW cut 15' out of the center and mounted a fiberglass body. The first year we took it to Cape Hatterus NC, using F-60/14 Goodyear bias ply's just didn't cut it in the sand. The next year when we went on vacation we carried some "sand tires". (basically a slick with a 1/2" smooth grove about an inch between each groove. we went any ware we darn wll pleased if we used the street tire we just buried in. Also the car was so light that with the F60-14's if we ran more then 8 psi the car couldn't hold a grip on the road just too light. In fact at that time I was playing football in High School , if i went to the back of the car I could bench press it. Of coarse this resulted in the tires tilting in, this would tee Dad of to no end. but back to the car with any more air in the tire it was so light it couldn't hold on to road. It was more fun you could have and still have your clothes on :twisted:

QuestMan · **Posted:** Fri Oct 12, 2007 10:12 am

Quote:

Many many years ago my father built with me playing gopher built a dune buggy out of a '64 VW cut 15' out of the center and mounted a fiberglass body. The first year we took it to Cape Hatterus NC, using F-60/14 Goodyear bias ply's just didn't cut it in the sand. The next year when we went on vacation we carried some "sand tires". (basically a slick with a 1/2" smooth grove about an inch between each groove. we went any ware we darn wll pleased if we used the street tire we just buried in. Also the car was so light that with the F60-14's if we ran more then 8 psi the car couldn't hold a grip on the road just too light. In fact at that time I was playing football in High School , if i went to the back of the car I could bench press it. Of coarse this resulted in the tires tilting in, this would tee Dad of to no end. but back to the car with any more air in the tire it was so light it couldn't hold on to road. It was more fun you could have and still have your clothes on

Are you saying, you built a 'manx'?

Cool!

QuestMan · **Posted:** Fri Oct 12, 2007 10:19 am

Quote:

Rain will just make the Sand hard, so it will be easier to drive on, Just avoid puddles that you don't know how deep they are.

and Sand you can probably run 4HI all the time, If it starts to get hilly, soft, or you run out of power, then 4LO will work for slower speeds.

and just for giggles this is the "big" hill at silver lake

When were you out there? When I was there, in October, the top of the hill had gotten very, 'sharp'. The guide at Sandy Korners told me that it 'rounds off', during the winter, due to no vehicles and lots of wind. During the summer, the more people that go over it, the more the angle steepens until, in Oct., it's brutally steep again. In any case, it was very entertaining to sit off to the side, and watch people getting stuck at the top. (Forgive me, I was too chicken to drive my Libby out there. Although, I'm gettin' the itch to try......... :wink:

)

Black_Dog · **Posted:** Fri Oct 12, 2007 11:08 am

The rule of thumb I live by is to air down until your rims are standing half as far above the road surface as they are fully inflated. This might mean different air pressure for different sized tires. You do this by measuring the distance from the bottom of your rim to the ground when your tire is fully inflated. They let air out until the rim is ½ as high as it was before. On my ’05 Liberty with Goodyear P235/70R16 SR-A’s this is acheived at about 12 psi.

The caveat is that all of the increased sidewall flexing that the tire has to do when it is that low creates a great deal of heat, so it is important not to drive at higher speeds for very long.

One of the better (and more entertaining) pieces on driving in sand by the craggy Takeo De Meter on the Land Rover Club site: http://www.landroverclub.net/Club/HTML/sand.htm

hyedipin · **Joined:** Thu May 11, 2006 10:20 am **Posts:** 1667

Thanks guys. I am going to apply for fishing permit soon, and grab me a pair of poles and go "fishing". :lol:

I am running 235/65/17 Nokian tires. They have nice pattern. http://gallery.jeepprojects.com/data/me ... iiva_6.jpg I am hoping that %50 height suggestion will work. I have a portable inflater, so I can get back up to at least 28 without problems.

Christopher · **Posted:** Fri Oct 12, 2007 7:18 pm

With enough speed just about anything can make it up test hill (the big one) im running 31x10.50s at 10lbs each. went up test hill a few times.

Chris

Rush345 · **Posted:** Fri Oct 12, 2007 7:28 pm

QuestMan wrote:

Quote:

Many many years ago my father built with me playing gopher built a dune buggy out of a '64 VW cut 15' out of the center and mounted a fiberglass body. The first year we took it to Cape Hatterus NC, using F-60/14 Goodyear bias ply's just didn't cut it in the sand. The next year when we went on vacation we carried some "sand tires". (basically a slick with a 1/2" smooth grove about an inch between each groove. we went any ware we darn wll pleased if we used the street tire we just buried in. Also the car was so light that with the F60-14's if we ran more then 8 psi the car couldn't hold a grip on the road just too light. In fact at that time I was playing football in High School , if i went to the back of the car I could bench press it. Of coarse this resulted in the tires tilting in, this would tee Dad of to no end. but back to the car with any more air in the tire it was so light it couldn't hold on to road. It was more fun you could have and still have your clothes on

Are you saying, you built a 'manx'?

Cool!

It did look a lot like the Manx and it may been a private label job for SEARS. It was a catalog oreder item from Sears with rollbar, head light, seata and rag top with sidecurtains. A good lot of the extra toys came from EMPI additionall there was a Dune Buggy shop in Fairfax Virginia with us being in Springfield it was just down the road. this took place back in 1969.

1300ZUK · **Posted:** Fri Oct 12, 2007 11:34 pm

QuestMan wrote:

Quote:

Rain will just make the Sand hard, so it will be easier to drive on, Just avoid puddles that you don't know how deep they are.

and Sand you can probably run 4HI all the time, If it starts to get hilly, soft, or you run out of power, then 4LO will work for slower speeds.

and just for giggles this is the "big" hill at silver lake

When were you out there? When I was there, in October, the top of the hill had gotten very, 'sharp'. The guide at Sandy Korners told me that it 'rounds off', during the winter, due to no vehicles and lots of wind. During the summer, the more people that go over it, the more the angle steepens until, in Oct., it's brutally steep again. In any case, it was very entertaining to sit off to the side, and watch people getting stuck at the top. (Forgive me, I was too chicken to drive my Libby out there. Although, I'm gettin' the itch to try......... :wink:

)

the peeks change throughout the year, and can change throughout the day, in the morning they might be round, then if the wind picks up they get pointier. just depends.

Northbee · **Posted:** Sat Oct 13, 2007 11:30 am

hyedipin wrote:

Also I have selec trac, so would 4x4 Full Time be better than 4x4 Part Time (4HI) or is it strictly 4HI for sand driving.

4x4 Part Time is definately better - I was at Cape Cod 3 weeks ago and "forgot" to put the Jeep in 4x4 part ... didn't make it over a dune (which I already passed many times during the year), the sand felt different for me, I aired down the tires more than usual and hardly made it over the dune. Later I realized that I was still in 4x4 full time - put it in 4x4 part time and the sand "felt" as usual. Drove back to that dune later that day and realized the difference when easily passing this obstacle.
So 4x4 Part Time offers much more grip on sand - try the difference.

Driving on Sand

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