Clump
Well-Known Member
- First Name
- Charlie
- Joined
- Mar 24, 2020
- Threads
- 8
- Messages
- 267
- Reaction score
- 936
- Location
- Felton, DE
- Vehicle(s)
- 2022 Explorer ST former 2021 Ranger Lariat Tremor
- Thread starter
- #1
We spent last week in the North Carolina Outer Banks. Rented an ocean front house in Nags Head with another couple. It's 260 miles from slower lower Delaware. Put on a total of 1237 miles and indicated 22.1 MPG. It's about 1 MPG optimistic, so call it 21. This includes about 8 hours of off road in the sand.
The truck was great for the trip. On road manners are excellent, very comfortable and hauled all my partner's crap. She does NOT travel light! No FX4 bounce at all. The only thing I miss from my Grand Cherokee is the 26 gallon fuel tank.
I don't have the NPS Hatteras off road permit this year, so all of the off road was on the north beach above Corolla, split across 2 sessions. I aired down to about 20PSI and used sand mode most of the time. The truck was fantastic in the sand. It dug in a few times in the really loose stuff, but never even began to get stuck. I used low range and the rear locker just because I could - they were not needed at all. Fun to play with though! 4H worked fine, but it's just like 2WD on the road and wants to get to the highest possible gear immediately, which had the engine lugging. Sand mode holds each gear longer and lets the RPMs go much higher before shifting.
The first session there was a lot of loose sand. We had some storms the day before the 2nd session and there were some decent size puddles and some pretty pronounced ruts. The truck took it all in stride. I was really impressed with how well the suspension did crossing deep ruts. Way better than the '19 FX4 I had. It didn't take long to get completely confident in the truck's capabilities.
Each evening it took the 4 of us to dinner comfortably. We also drove to the south end of Hatteras Island with 4 adults very comfortably.
I've thought about getting rid of the Tremor steps. They gathered slush in the winter and mud off road. My partner is 5"3" and she uses the steps. The other woman in our group is under 5' and there's no way she can get in the truck without them. They are actually pretty perfect for short people access.
The truck was great for the trip. On road manners are excellent, very comfortable and hauled all my partner's crap. She does NOT travel light! No FX4 bounce at all. The only thing I miss from my Grand Cherokee is the 26 gallon fuel tank.
I don't have the NPS Hatteras off road permit this year, so all of the off road was on the north beach above Corolla, split across 2 sessions. I aired down to about 20PSI and used sand mode most of the time. The truck was fantastic in the sand. It dug in a few times in the really loose stuff, but never even began to get stuck. I used low range and the rear locker just because I could - they were not needed at all. Fun to play with though! 4H worked fine, but it's just like 2WD on the road and wants to get to the highest possible gear immediately, which had the engine lugging. Sand mode holds each gear longer and lets the RPMs go much higher before shifting.
The first session there was a lot of loose sand. We had some storms the day before the 2nd session and there were some decent size puddles and some pretty pronounced ruts. The truck took it all in stride. I was really impressed with how well the suspension did crossing deep ruts. Way better than the '19 FX4 I had. It didn't take long to get completely confident in the truck's capabilities.
Each evening it took the 4 of us to dinner comfortably. We also drove to the south end of Hatteras Island with 4 adults very comfortably.
I've thought about getting rid of the Tremor steps. They gathered slush in the winter and mud off road. My partner is 5"3" and she uses the steps. The other woman in our group is under 5' and there's no way she can get in the truck without them. They are actually pretty perfect for short people access.
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