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Topic: DRW with TC in sand
Posted By: FireGuard on 03/09/17 07:37pm

I'm curious how a DRW with a large TC towing an ATV trailer with a weight around 3k lbs compares to an empty truck towing a large toy hauler weighing 12k lbs plus?
I know the wheels don't track as well as a SRW but I would think with the weight on the truck and having to drag less weight through the sand would be better.
What are the best techniques to make a DRW perform in the sand?
Is it possible to air down enough to drive 3-4 miles without damaging the tires or maybe use spacers to create more space to air down?

13Jeep Wrangler
07 Ragen 21FB
12 Yamaha Super Tenere
14 Suzuki DR 650

Posted By: Namlehse on 03/09/17 07:49pm

I use Maxtracx, but I didn't pay nearly this price for them. https://us.maxtrax.com.au/

I use them pulling an 18k trailer through mud/sand/other when needed. Sand isn't so bad as long as you stick to the packed stuff.

Posted By: fpoole on 03/09/17 07:58pm

".... Packed stuff"...
Yah, I echo that one...

I got stuck... Luckily a nice TC was near by and offered to pull me out.
Lessons learned...

[image]


[image]

Frank Poole
Roam'n ROG (Full Timer since Oct '15)
2016 RAM 5500, C/c, 6.7 Diesel, AISIN HD 6-spd, 19.5 DRW, 72 Gal fuel, 4x4, 10’ Alum FB, 440 Amps, 4.10 Axle
2016 AF 990 640-Solar/10-6v Batts
GlowStep Stow N’ Go, E-Bike
RS1 Buggy
frank

Pooles website


Posted By: Johno02 on 03/09/17 08:04pm

live and learn... Some do, some don't. Don't can be expensive.

Noel and Betty Johnson (and Harry)
2005 GulfStream Ultra Supreme, 1 Old grouch, 1 wonderful wife, and two silly poodles.


Posted By: FireGuard on 03/09/17 08:06pm

Fpoole
I assume you didn't air down with your 19.5 tires?
Hard sand would be good, but there are times when you need to drive through the soft stuff.

Posted By: fpoole on 03/09/17 08:17pm

FireGuard wrote:

Fpoole
I assume you didn't air down with your 19.5 tires?
Hard sand would be good, but there are times when you need to drive through the soft stuff.


You are correct, I didn't.

I mistakenly thought it was "hard Sand" and just left for 5 min to check out a site.. came back and found it this way. Too late to deflate and I'm thinking wouldn't have worked anyway, too far in. Axle was keeping it from going down any further..

I had no idea it would have been soft as the road, hard was right next to it. I just pulled off the road, wrong side, to get out of the way of traffic while I went to walk it..

Sigh..

Posted By: Bedlam on 03/09/17 10:15pm

Driving on sand is all about flotation. As long as you can put out enough tire surface, the ground does not care how many tires you use. Once you get to the rigid 19.5's, airing down does not help you - You need to stay on harder surfaces or build pathways with some other material. Aggressive tread is worse in sand because it will encourage the tires to dig. You would be surprised how well big slicks work in sand.

Chevy Sonic 1.8-Honda Passport C70B-Host Mammoth 11.5-Interstate Car Carrier 20-Joyner SandViper 250-Kawasaki Concours ZG1000-Paros 8' flatbed-Pelican Decker DLX 8.75-Ram 5500 HD


Posted By: kohldad on 03/10/17 04:38am

The TC with a light trailer will be easier than the heavy trailer. Reason is with the TC, the majority of the weight is on the driving tires. When tires have power, they not only are trying to move you forward, but also trying to climb the sand in front the tire.

With the FW, you are trying to drag 4 heavy trailer tires through the sand. These 4 tires would be like trying to put a plow behind the truck.

2015 Ram 3500 4x4 Crew Cab SRW 6.4 Hemi LB 3.73 (12.4 hand calc avg mpg after 92,000 miles with camper)
2004 Lance 815 (prev: 2004 FW 35'; 1994 TT 30'; Tents)


Posted By: Ivylog on 03/10/17 05:39am

Best thing in sand is a super single which you can air down. Just look at cement trucks in areas with sandy soils. Many years ago we put smooth airplane tires on the drive axle of a machine working in soft sand letting it go where a tire with lugs would get stuck.

This post is my opinion (free advice). It is not intended to influence anyone's judgment nor do I advocate anyone do what I propose.
Sold 04 Dynasty to our son after 14 great years.
Upgraded with a 08 HR Navigator 45’...
Posted By: RoyB on 03/10/17 06:21am

back in my JEEP TRAIL days we sure did alot of 'airing down' as we called it for the mud and sand trails....

Of somewhat recent time was just trucking down along the NC outer banks with standard ATX style truck tires (No Dually) and saw a bunch of trucks out on the beach trail so I jumped right into it with my 4WD on of course... Barely made it out of there haha...

Roy Ken

Posted By: brholt on 03/10/17 10:31am

As you probably know, it really depends on the sand. Hard sand is not really an issue, you probably don't even have to air down.

[image]

Posted By: av8rds on 03/10/17 10:38am

[image]

Just air down, be gentle with the turns and gentle with the throttle

I usually went to 20psi for the rears and 24 for the fronts

'06 X-cab Powerstroke Dually 4x4
'75 Ford Bronco Rockcrawler
'08 Land Cruiser Buggy

Posted By: towpro on 03/10/17 11:37am

^ holly cow the beach is steep up there. ^

2022 Ford F150
Sold: 2016 Arctic Fox 990, 2018 Ram 3500, 2011 Open Range
Sold Forest River Forester 2401R Mercedes Benz. when campsites went from $90 to $190 per night.

Posted By: Kayteg1 on 03/10/17 08:35pm

I drove 15 tons bus on sand in Mexico on tires with 90 psi. But it was grey, pretty solid sand.
Avoided the white stuff.

[image]

* This post was edited 03/10/17 10:31pm by Kayteg1 *




Posted By: cross21114 on 03/11/17 05:58am

A lot of TCs use the beach at Assateague Island in Maryland. You cannot use dual drive tires because they cannot be aired down enough.

Chris
2018 Nexus Ghost 36DS
360 Cummins, 3000 Allison
2016 Ford Expedition


Posted By: av8rds on 03/11/17 08:44am

cross21114 wrote:

A lot of TCs use the beach at Assateague Island in Maryland. You cannot use dual drive tires because they cannot be aired down enough.


They might limit drw's at that beach(and others) but the statement about not being able to air down enough is false.

Posted By: Kayteg1 on 03/11/17 09:49am

av8rds wrote:

cross21114 wrote:

A lot of TCs use the beach at Assateague Island in Maryland. You cannot use dual drive tires because they cannot be aired down enough.


They might limit drw's at that beach(and others) but the statement about not being able to air down enough is false.

OK, tell me how do you imagine air down this?
[image]

Posted By: av8rds on 03/11/17 10:40am

Kayteg1 wrote:

av8rds wrote:

cross21114 wrote:

A lot of TCs use the beach at Assateague Island in Maryland. You cannot use dual drive tires because they cannot be aired down enough.


They might limit drw's at that beach(and others) but the statement about not being able to air down enough is false.

OK, tell me how do you imagine air down this?
[image]


I dont know how you are that down. The picture you are showing shouldnt even be operated on the street if that was taken a normal pressures.

What I do know is I have had a 2001 F350 DRW and a have a 2006 F350 DRW with stock tires and can air down in the rear to 20psi and have NO touching(even when loaded with a 5000lb+ EC1160 on it) and have been doing successfully since 2003.

What I also know is other people that do something similar in all kinds of DRW drive 2WD campers and have no problems.

[image]

Posted By: ticki2 on 03/11/17 12:59pm

Kayteg1 wrote:


OK, tell me how do you imagine air down this?
[image]


First off , no stock drw truck comes that way , those are larger than stock tires . They will probably overheat at road speeds . At 10 mph on the beech it probably will not hurt them at all . That was a misleading
picture for the subject question in this thread .

'68 Avion C-11
'02 GMC DRW D/A flatbed

Posted By: ticki2 on 03/11/17 01:25pm

cross21114 wrote:

A lot of TCs use the beach at Assateague Island in Maryland. You cannot use dual drive tires because they cannot be aired down enough.


DRW's are no longer restricted at Assateague . Not being able to air down was not the issue . There is a weight restriction of 10,000# GVW which is interesting as most TC's even on SRW are over that .

Posted By: Reddog1 on 03/11/17 07:30pm

That should be very informative to folks on the east coast. It suggests previous posts on this subject was misinformation. Every post I read before said the restriction was due to DRW.

It would be great if others would post on this subject. Actually, a new Thread unique to this would be great. Especially if links were posted.

Wayne

Posted By: towpro on 03/11/17 09:05pm

I have mine down to 30psi right now (empty, for the ride) and there is still over an inch between gap in center on road side.

that picture has to be oversize tires on a dually

Posted By: Jfet on 03/11/17 10:37pm

I can fit my arm between our duallys

Posted By: Kayteg1 on 03/11/17 11:54pm

[image]

Some truck have duallies, where people can walk between, but that does not change the fact that when you google "Dual tires touching" you will find pretty nice collection of pictures.
Just becouse it did not happen to you, doesn't have to mean whole World is like it.
On my vacations on Baja, I have seen hundreds of Mexicans driving all kind of cars over the really floating white sand.
Seems the technique is to keep the speed and correct gear.
Keeping speed with camper is not always the best option, but something to consider.
It is fun after-all.

Posted By: cross21114 on 03/12/17 12:29pm

ticki2 wrote:

cross21114 wrote:

A lot of TCs use the beach at Assateague Island in Maryland. You cannot use dual drive tires because they cannot be aired down enough.


DRW's are no longer restricted at Assateague . Not being able to air down was not the issue . There is a weight restriction of 10,000# GVW which is interesting as most TC's even on SRW are over that .


Good to know. Thanks for the correction.

Posted By: ticki2 on 03/12/17 01:50pm

cross21114 wrote:

ticki2 wrote:

cross21114 wrote:

A lot of TCs use the beach at Assateague Island in Maryland. You cannot use dual drive tires because they cannot be aired down enough.


DRW's are no longer restricted at Assateague . Not being able to air down was not the issue . There is a weight restriction of 10,000# GVW which is interesting as most TC's even on SRW are over that .


Good to know. Thanks for the correction.


It just changed in the last year or two , before that drw was not allowed . It would be interesting to hear from those that go there , how or if they enforce the the 10k# weight restriction . Hard to imagine any drw's , or many srw's with a TC being under that weight .

Posted By: Rubiranch on 03/12/17 05:08pm

Bedlam wrote:

You would be surprised how well big slicks work in sand.


I had a cousin years ago who had a built VW sand rail. He used the slicks off his super stock Nova.

People used to marvel that he ran slicks.

Sand sucks unless you're built for it.

Good luck.

Posted By: Rubiranch on 03/12/17 05:10pm

Kayteg1 wrote:


Seems the technique is to keep the speed and correct gear.


X2

Posted By: Kayteg1 on 03/12/17 05:57pm

4WD superduty supercab is about 9000 lb empty.
The aluminium models seem to be about 1000 lb lighter, but still lot of weight to start with

Posted By: kohldad on 03/12/17 07:21pm

From the way I read the regs, it is based on GVWR so doesn't matter if the camper is on or not. This will rule out any 1-ton made in the last few years regardless of SRW or DRW. Not sure about 3/4 tons because I haven't even looked at those specs in years.

Posted By: Kayteg1 on 03/12/17 08:04pm

I remember my 2001 F250 was rated at 11.XXX lb.
Empty weight over 9000 with flatbed installed.

Posted By: ticki2 on 03/12/17 09:10pm

Kayteg1 wrote:

I remember my 2001 F250 was rated at 11.XXX lb.
Empty weight over 9000 with flatbed installed.


Fords fleet pfd rates the 2001 f250 at 8800 gvwr , the f350 srw at 9900 gvwr and the f350 drw at 11200 gvwr .
these were 49 state ratings with a note that CA was 200# less across the board . Apparently you had a very special f250 .

There are some members on the forum who frequent Assateague with rigs that weigh more than 10k , perhaps it is not enforced . Hopefully they will chime in , or as Reddog suggested I'll start a new thread with the question .

Posted By: Surfrat on 03/13/17 11:12am

Ok while I drive on beaches I think the question is just about sandy areas. I do know there is sand and there is sand. The sand on most of the Long Island beaches is very soft and powdery, further up the coast the sand can be very coarse. I find the coarser sand harder to drive on? Thus needing lower air pressure in tires. I use 30 in rear and 20 in front on my F350 4x4 dually.


[image]




Posted By: cross21114 on 03/13/17 08:26pm

Great picture, Surfrat.

Posted By: AISURFFISH on 03/14/17 06:01pm

[image]



20 up front 30 or so in the rear depending on the conditions..

2017 F350 6.2L Crew Cab
Arctic Fox 990 2021 TORK-LIFT FAST GUNS AND SUPER HITCH
COOLER RACK OFF THE FRONT ALWAYS FULL OF FISHING RODS TICA TO BE EXACT


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