The spring season of beach sessions, and island escapes has just about hit us in the face, we want to make sure you have the tools techniques and confidence to tackle soft sand tracks and rip along up the beach like an old salty beach comber!

Many of the tips and tricks for 4WDing are based on getting the maximum amount of traction, and stability to get your 4WD exactly where you need it regardless of the type of the terrain.

First things first, you need to know how to operate your 4WD by engaging four-wheel drive high range, and four-wheel drive low range, knowing how to use your 4WD properly will get you most of the way, so pull out your owners-manual have a flip through and learn how your vehicle works!

The next is knowing a few golden rules about 4WDing, these can be applied across the board regardless of terrain or vehicle!

1. If you cannot see through to the other side of the obstacle, jump out and have a look!
2. If you aren’t sure how soft or deep the surface is, get out and check!
3. Never drive across a hill, whether it is a sand dune or a muddy hill you risk a rollover!

When you follow these golden rules, you’ll pretty much never have trouble offroad, however sand presents some pretty unique challenges you’ll face based on two major factors, the first is applicable every time you head offroad, and that is to drop down your tyre pressures, by dropping air out of your tyres you effectively allow your sidewalls to sag whilst more contact area is exposed to the soft surface, this additional surface area decreases the “sink” by decreasing the downward PSI applied to the surface and increases your vehicles ability to “float”.

By choosing to use a purpose made tyre deflator, such is the Kwiky Tyre Deflator you enable controlled and speedy deflation ensuring you maintain the best stability in your vehicle regardless of the conditions. A Kwiky Deflator uses accurate gauging to ensure performance off road without wasting a second!

The next rule for sand driving is to maintain “momentum”, Sand is an extremely dynamic surface, which a 4WD travelling on sand must combat, whilst your first thought is that momentum means speed, however it is probably better to imagine that travelling along sand is more like if you were driving a boat on water.

From a stand-still, a boat will sit quite low in the water, however with faster and faster speed the boat will tend to plane and pick itself up off the surface of the water reducing the resistance against the engine much like your 4WD will behave on sand.

When carrying more momentum your 4WD will tend to float across the sand and reduce the effort and fuel consumption of your vehicle, which all sounds great, however there are trade-off’s, when travelling at speed is a your control over your 4WD vehicle can be compromised with decreased braking performance, and with significant lag in steering inputs that could result in damage to your vehicle, potential injury or even getting your vehicle seriously stuck. The best way to avoid this, is to keep all inputs stable, steady and smooth, without erratic movements you will maintain your control!

Starting with your 4wd locked into low range and with diff locks engaged (if your vehicle is equipped), and also making sure your freewheeling hubs are locked in you should get a reasonable feel for the surface grip and firmness, in low range you will give yourself the maximum amount of torque and minimal wheel speed meaning less wheel slippage and reducing the chances of digging your tyres deep into the sand. However, if you find that your vehicle has plenty of float, grip and enough power to drive through the sand many people find that you can easily engage your high range 4WD gears and drive successfully offroad, without getting stuck.

I listened to your rules and I still got bogged!

Statistically, the more time you spend driving on sand, the more likely it will be that you will sink in to soft stuff, either on tracks that have been chewed up by other motorists, or on untouched sand that is extremely soft, in our eyes that is part of the fun!

There are a handful of techniques you can employ to effectively “unbury” your 4WD after some lead footed revving and jerky steering got you stuck!

Act fast, act early – when traction starts waning, remove your input, that means take your foot off the accelerator and off the brakes. By trying to drive it through, you’ll end up shoveling your tyres deeper and getting your 4WD even more bogged than it was initially.

Keep calm and think through your course of action, unless you are below the high water mark, you have all the time in the world to get your 4WD free, so stop, jump out and have a look at what is holding your vehicle back.

Try reversing back out, because your 4WD has already compressed the sand behind you, it will be much firmer than trying to travel forwards, once you have your 4WD out backwards you can try a different line, or even the same line with more momentum.

Drop your pressures even more, we’ve found dropping your tyres down to around 10psi can increase your grip by around 300%, meaning your downward psi and surface area for grip would be tripled, you should reinflate them when your vehicle is free using a 12v compressor like the Thumper MKII or the Thumper MAX air compressor.

Employ the labour of a small army to dig out your vehicles underbody and cut yourself a path in the direction you’d like to travel. If you carry a Hercules Offroad Jack and jacking base, like we do, you can lift your 4WD back up to ‘road height’ and fill in underneath your tyres packing the hole with any loose sticks and twigs or seaweed that may be around, allowing you to simply drive out of the situation.

When all else fails, flag down another driver and start unrolling your snatch strap it’ll allow you to bungee your 4WD free from soft stuff! If you don’t already have a recovery kit something along the lines of the Hercules Complete Recovery Kit it includes just about anything you need to get your 4WD further offroad without breaking your camping budget.

It includes a Snatch Block, Snatch Strap, Tree Trunk Protector, Extension Strap, 2x 4.7T Bow Shackles, Winch Dampener, Folding Shovel, Kwiky Tyre Deflator, Heavy Duty gloves all neatly stashed inside a tidy recovery bag.

Depending on how busy the area you are 4WDing in is, fitting a UHF radio like the UHF380PK could be extremely handy, and will allow you to call for help when  our plans don’t go quite right.

We hope your Beach and sand dune runs will be much easier and comfier with all the right techniques, but the final thing you shouldn’t forget is to whip out your air compressor when it is time to go home driving on underinflated tyres can cause expensive damage and ruin your trip!