What factors make Off Road Ability?

Some years ago there was a series of single car accidents here involving inexperienced drivers - mostly in Dad's V8 sedan. My guess is that on a slippery surface (eg after fresh rain) the LSD caused both rears to spin up and the inexperience driver lost control. One kid (a teenage girl?) was out practicing with Dad.

I was a passenger in a V8 Kingswood many years ago when the driver (experienced and generally careful) pulled out to overtake on a damp but sealed road. Both rears spun, the car went a bit sideways, but the driver held it continued on. If he did not have an LSD maybe only one wheel would have broken traction.
 
on snow specially on deep snow where you can sink down and never get off yourself from there, you need to take it slow, thats why low gearing will help you a lot there as you dont need to spin wheels most times but take it slow , still with enough torque that all car could move forward, and i think exactly that subaru no matter what engine is missing, maybe those lowest gearing gearboxes on subarus would help some.
as we can see in this video all stock cars, not that old car with proper traction control and some even with rear factory lockers shows in this video what is more important there. you just need that low gearing low gear to move that slow in snow.
i think all those cars here kinda shows those best qualitys on stock 4x4 that are still enough oldschool same time inside they proper new tech
subaru might have no problems on ground there but up hills i dont think it c ould climb those at slow speed , without much momentum, but we never know for sure as there is no direct comparison between those cars and subarus, but im sure i would like to be inside that Prado or Pajero in that weather .
i mean i saw enough videos subarus in snow , proper deep snow and there they can do just 2 things , they can stand stuck or they can spin wheels, but they cant do slow driving in snow, slowly turning wheels not spinning them. maybe 4.44 gearing could do more of that , needs to be proven.

and as subaru and some of you guys here made their forester with 4.44 low gear geraboxes, then question would be like with what engine that gearbox could work then? i saw that on 2005 outbacks 4.44 came with 2.5 NA autos and 2.5xt manuals so mean only those models ECU could handle those gearboxes, or they could be used in theory with other models ECU somehow ? but its still need to be seen more invideos what 4.44 gearing can do versus other subaru higher gearing .
 
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I like the balance my OEM gearing gives behind the EJ253 engine.

However, there's not a lot of snow in Australia ...
 
MiddleAgeSubie said:
The Outback would never slide in similar situations, it would just spin in place...
...I guess the idea is that when you loose traction you have two spinning wheels and so instead of just getting stopped, you start sliding in whatever direction it happens to be.
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Ohhh, I see what you mean now.
 
@scalman
I watched the last portion, the last 10 minutes or so. That "1-wheel drive" Land Rover and its driver are sure made for each other ;)
 
cutting or choping as some say bumpers must be pretty good upgrade for off road there specially for those longer cars like outbacks, but that will work for everyone for sure. and having nice bumper lines as in new crosstrek could make that chop even look good and stylish, just i duno would i leave that front area there, but it looks good for sure, some ppl just cut it straight line up higher and some cut it as bumper goes maybe , still is cheap and easy way to get you fast upgrade to go to more places then maybe you couldnt just drive before because it was not possible because your front bumper , i know i had just massive upgrade on mine 2001 obk from that

many ways you can cut that front bumper on crosstreks
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or something custom with added tubes
IMG_5040_800x.jpg


or just go straight line
DSC08148_2000x.jpg

but in there i would cover that front lip as it will dig everything inside there just terribly,imagine all that mud will collect just there and it will be so hard to remove, so why not just cover that make it some slide style cover
and then again you need to know what is legal on your streets and what is not.
 
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scalman said:
and then again you need to know what is legal on your streets and what is not.
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There's the rub. I'd love to have a tube bumper (I made one for my '76 beetle), but we can't and still be legal in Australia.
Not that I'm that fussed about it now as I've got the SubaXtreme Bar.
 
@scalman I haven't offroaded in the snow with my Foz yet. I've only tried getting it stuck on days there wasn't much snow(maybe 15-18cm) and it was easy to get out but on flat ground. But the gearing definitely bothers me on steep downhills. My boss' gravel driveway hits a 16-21 degree angle for about 150m and the car loses traction descending in first gear with decent snow tires. My FWD Toyota Matrix didn't even do that with only 2 wheels slowing the car down through gearing, with crappy all season tires. This is a pretty bad road. A friend of mine slid off a switchback(30 seconds after I drove down) with his Chevy Colorado in 4H with snow tires. He definitely should have been fine in 4L but he wasn't thinking. I can imagine his first gear on 4H is still far lower than mine but his truck is a good 50% heavier than my Foz.
 
I don't have a whole lot of snow experience but I find when on steep slippery wet clay /mud descents that a little application of the E / handbrake helps keep control. Also the "driving through the brakes" technique works well too.
 
Kevin said:
Also the "driving through the brakes" technique works well too.
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It's extremely important in modern cars to prevent the ABS from activating. Rapid impulse braking can prevent the ABS from acting.
 
I usually remove the ABS fuse when off-roading; you're right @Ratbag ABS can activate at the most inconvenient time on a steep slippery slope!

PS I think some of the later models won't allow "driving through brakes" because the computer says "No"
 
Yes ABS doesnt help on snow icy or muddy hills its better without it. Tried couple times removing abs fuse too. If would do more often things like that maybe would make abs switch , but i do it so rare and with car working good i would want to use vdc here and abs must work for that. But options are allways better.
 
who has better AWD , couple outbacks , couple quatro audis, volvo ,porsche macan, VW touraeg
first outback overheated gearbox oil,dropped error, so they didint pushed second outback so hard.
volvo didint had traction control there or it was off so it used all revs it could there, why outback didint tried TC off then ? they still have that button yes ?
outback tried it one last time from 24:00 . but that whining engine without revs going up just sound so bad there.
 
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Thanks for that video. Pretty awful performance across the board.
 
Yh its good that before i bought my first subaru i looked at videos how classic impreza does off road or older foresters. If i would see this video before deciding i wouldnt want that car, not that year with that engine at least. And that poor engine whining and gearbox overheats in minutes it looks just bad. How they evolve to this? If they would put there some older obk with just auto and old vdc style it would at least try raise revs, Spin wheels ,
 
Driving any modern car is more akin to driving an unfamiliar computer than it is like driving a car!

I drove a 2019 Liberty, and, to be perfectly frank and honest, I prefer my 2006 SG Forester with its old fashioned 5MT and its "crappy" 1.196:1 dual range box.

I would get rid of the ABS if I could, but it's an integral part of the entire car. Anyway, I know how to prevent it working, and that mode of driving is second nature to me. I've used impulse braking since around the mid 1960s ...
 
Sure but those other modern cars performed just much better there being in same class. Yes its easy turn abs off with fuse at least for some time when it needed not on road. I like systems too like vdc when car works good then system can do some good stuff, and could be turned off, looks like with CVT it just went worse. So those 3rd gen outbacks are last good ones still with auto gearboxes, though maybe 2nd gen could be even better, simplier ,less sensors, bulletproof 4eat gearbox.
Last good foresters must be those SH ones with old auto gearbox and allready with vdc and even x mode later ones. Think that would perform there much better then those CVT models.
There is good reason why most of you here and my local subaru clubs drive old imprezas and foresters into off road. I seeing that more and more clear now .
 
Disabling the ABS throws a code, forcing the car into limp mode, with all that this entails ...
 
^ mine doesn't when I remove the fuse ;-)
 
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