Glasshouse Mountains Queensland

[Beachworm]

I have joined a group on Facebook that does day trips around the Brisbane area. A couple of them in diesel SH Foresters did a short session at the Glasshouse Mountains last weekend. I thought you might enjoy watching.
[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssllQz-vcto&fbclid=IwAR0gFrK28cO5ReUr-BlMdZctqPEVp5FbWSyUe2bg40mbiTgaXLcmLSwiOZg"]Subaru Foresters - Glasshouse Mountains - - YouTube[/ame]

 

[Kevin]

Thanks!

Some very interesting challenges there for sure! I was holding my breath at times hoping for no damage!

Good to see the traction control doing its job.

 

[jf1sf5]

They did very well knowing that they don't have low range. The torque of the diesel is very helpful there.

 

[Beachworm]

Thanks!

Some very interesting challenges there for sure! I was holding my breath at times hoping for no damage!

Good to see the traction control doing its job.

They invited me to go along with them but I've had some clunking noises in the front end that sounds like the rear bushes on the front control arms have seen better days so I piked out and now I'm glad I did. I can imagine getting my car wedged up against the side of the deep clay cutting and having to walk away and leave it there. :ebiggrin:

I was surprised that the VDC didn't work as well as I expected in the spot where the silver SH had the right front wheel and the left rear wheel off the ground. Normally, when off road in an SH, the driver would have the traction control switched off which leaves the VDC to operate without engine power being reduced to control wheelspin, and this certainly seemed to be the case but it looked as though there was no VDC and it just had open diffs like an SG.

 

[Beachworm]

They did very well knowing that they don't have low range. The torque of the diesel is very helpful there.

They encountered the big issue that faces diesel Forester drivers, how much can you feather the clutch without doing any damage. I think they exceeded that limit in the black car as the driver commented that the burnt clutch smell stayed in the car for 2 days afterwards.

What I found interesting was the fact that they left their tyres at road pressure. The terrain is all clay and we have had just enough light rain over the last week or so to make a little bit of mud and leave the surface damp, particularly in the rainforest gullies where they negotiated the rutted out, narrow cuttings. I would have expected far less traction than they experienced.

The upside of this is that they needed every last millimetre of clearance and reducing pressure would likely have resulted in some undercarriage contact with the centre hump in those places where they had no option but to drive in the wheel tracks of others.

 

[jf1sf5]

Did they have the swaybars disconnected ? Doesn't seem to but I don't know what an SH looks like when they are disconnected !

 

[Beachworm]

Sway bars were connected.

Both vehicles have a 50mm lift and bigger tyres. The black one is using BRZ rims with 245/60/17 mud tyres plus a 30mm spacer and the silver one has BFG KO2 but don't know the size. Apart from that they are both stock standard. The silver one might have a bash plate - not sure.

 

[ABFoz]

I was surprised that the VDC didn't work as well as I expected in the spot where the silver SH had the right front wheel and the left rear wheel off the ground. Normally, when off road in an SH, the driver would have the traction control switched off which leaves the VDC to operate without engine power being reduced to control wheelspin, and this certainly seemed to be the case but it looked as though there was no VDC and it just had open diffs like an SG.

I was thinking about that, as well. The silver one behaved like my SG when the one of the front wheels was off ground.

 

[Subaru Man]

That is a challenging track. I would be concerned about vehicle damage but they looked as though they stayed in one piece.

Anyone know if this is typical of the tracks at Glass House Moutains or is this one of the more difficult?

 

[scalman]

allways wondered about those newer diesels foresters and outbacks, not much videos with then lifted or such , it should have much better torque at low rpm there and with manual thats all you could need at slow speeds diesel should be better is it ? VDC its tricky to make it work well , like if you d oactions to not get stuck on open diff you need do almost opposite actions with VDC because it needs you keep pedal to metal to tell it you want go forward. VDC dont work well if you drive carefully and release gas pedal. and VDC no good at climbing hardcore hills. its just cuts too much power away.
would be cool to take diesel engine and dual range gearbox , that would be interesting project if they fit each other. shame that music too loud there. if im not mistaken i heard how diesel rumble ?? was i ?

 

[Beachworm]

That is a challenging track. I would be concerned about vehicle damage but they looked as though they stayed in one piece.

Anyone know if this is typical of the tracks at Glass House Moutains or is this one of the more difficult?

There is a wide range of difficulty levels available, from easy country road drives to vehicle destroying rutted gullies and bottomless mud pits. If we rated them on a scale of 1 to 10, the worst of the ones in these videos would come in about 6.

The Glasshouse mountains region is a combination of national park and pine forest plantation with a high voltage power line running north-south through it. There are so many tracks that some will tell you you could go there for years on day trips and never run out of new experiences.

Perhaps the most difficult is called Big Red and you don't find Subarus doing this. [ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ylRHpkIfB0"]VDJ76 on Portal Axles Tackling Little Red and Big Red Bypass @ Glasshouse Mountains Forestry - YouTube[/ame]

There are bypasses for all the really difficult sections but after heavy rain you wouldn't go near the place without winches and other vehicles.

 

[Beachworm]

allways wondered about those newer diesels foresters and outbacks, not much videos with then lifted or such , it should have much better torque at low rpm there and with manual thats all you could need at slow speeds diesel should be better is it ? VDC its tricky to make it work well , like if you d oactions to not get stuck on open diff you need do almost opposite actions with VDC because it needs you keep pedal to metal to tell it you want go forward. VDC dont work well if you drive carefully and release gas pedal. and VDC no good at climbing hardcore hills. its just cuts too much power away.
would be cool to take diesel engine and dual range gearbox , that would be interesting project if they fit each other. shame that music too loud there. if im not mistaken i heard how diesel rumble ?? was i ?

On the SH Forester, VDC can remain operating without interference from traction control so the problem of dropping power when VDC comes into play isn't an issue. The brakes apply force to the spinning wheel but the engine power isn't reduced.

 

[scalman]

yh forgot that. so why then its not used there and not perform so good.

 

[Beachworm]

yh forgot that. so why then its not used there and not perform so good.

That's a very good question. Seeing you can't simply turn VDC off, it may not be a driver choice. The only reason I can think of is that the vehicle has had a centre diff lock module fitted. Apparently, it is possible to either buy an electronic module (about $500) or build your own circuit that disables VDC and locks the centre diff. When I get to chat with the owner again I'll ask the question.

 

[scalman]

And another thing that VDC works as good as your brakes are so if lets say you have slightly stuck brake cilinders or just harder moving pads then vdc will have harder time to brake wheels too

 

[Beachworm]

I've had a conversation with the driver of the silver SH Forester and also done some research and I've discovered the following things:
1. The car has no special modifications.
2. The driver had traction control off and put his foot on the loud pedal to try to coax it over the lump.

This may be the reason for the problem with the VDC seeming to be inactive. It seems that the VDC is calibrated to switch off once 60Kph is reached with wheel spin. Perhaps this is what happened.

I also discovered why it doesn't matter that you can't easily fit a centre diff lock switch to an auto SH. The centre diff/clutch pack is effectively locked to a 50/50 split when the gear selector is moved into the sport position and first gear manually selected (by increasing hydraulic pressure in the clutch pack to maximum). The pressure is slightly reduced when steering input is detected or when ABS is activated. This makes an after-market diff lock pretty much redundant.