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Mud n' Water - Research for Major Project

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trautmann:
Okay.  So, first thing first.  My name is Richard and I'm a student at Coventry University.  How very boring.

However, I've come here on a hunt for the most valuable of resources, information.  After looking through your forums, it seems that you're pretty damn well informed and could well help me out.

The short of it is this:  I'm on a Transport Design course and am starting a major project, of which the focal point is a collaboration with students in Colombia.  The Colombian students have proposed that we create an emergency assistance vehicle, to cope with all terrains.

My part in this research phase is to gather information about MUD AND WATER.  Oh yes, it all sound very delicious, does it not?  So, I'm here to see what sort of information I can gather about the modifications needed for driving through copious amounts of mud and water.  I'm not sure what questions to ask, so basically, I'd very appreciate your opinions and experiences of wading through water, and dealing with very thick mud.   :cool:

If at all possible, I'd like to know about how a vehicle is modified to deal with these on a day to day basis.  I know that water requires a snorkel of some kind....but that's about it for my knowledge  :?

As for thick mud...apart from it being damn annoying to clean off...?  Any suspension issues, heavy duty CV boots, protected damper stanchions...I'm grabbing at straws, really : /

So any info I can get would be pretty awesome.  There's a chance that a prototype of this vehicle will be built in Colombia to deal with natural disasters if it all works out....so, here's hoping!

So!  Cheers for reading this arduous post!

 :afro: ....wanted to use that one at least once...

lee celtic:
I'll Kick off then shall I... :lol:

Looking at the rest of the world I'd say landrover 110 . mods limited to snorkle , and maybe a steering guard and diff guards. and 750/16 mud tyres.

the reason for the lack of extream mods is that all the parts would be standard and easy to source cheaply and quickly  :D

next..... :lol:

Skibum346:
Not much more to add than what was said above. I would suggest however that whilst I understand the approach the cart is well and truly before the horse here.

There is umptyhundred different mods that could be done to have some effect on the ability of a vehicle to transit mud and water, each one will have a downside and indeed taken together could make the ve4hicle dangerous.

I feel that rather than research mods WE use for mud and water... research the locality where this vehicle will operate. This will provide you with an understanding of the typical situations it will experience and this understanding can be translated into a set of requirements that could be paired with requirements for the kind of emergency equipment it would need to carry and the whole drive an engineered solution.

the engineered solution could be an almost stock set up Defender as mentioned above... or it could be something larger, unimog, Zil, BV202 etc. It could even be a completely new vehicle engineered to suit.

Hope I'm not teaching you to suck eggs, and I'm local to Cov so happy to meeet and discuss over a pint of something if you'd like.

Skibum

JIMBOBLY:
you will also bennifit from wading plugs,they fit in the bottom of the timing cover,bell housing,if you are using a 110 tdi that is,they basically stop water getting into the timing casing and getting onto the timing belt,it could brake it if water and grit got in,and the other to stop water getting onto the clutch,and extented breather hoses for the axles,and gearbox and transfer box,they go up high,to stop water getting into these components,because a hot casing will create a vacum and draw water in,hope this helps,jim :D

MudPlugger:
Wouldn't a wider track and fatter tyres be of a benefit to that sort of thing as the footprint of the tyres on the mud will help it keep up the momentum, enabling it to get better traction on the sticky stuff. There is also the added advantage where the wider lugs would help it to "bite" into the sides of a rut in the event of becoming stuck.

As for what would help it out the usual things really winch (added advantage that you can add one on back too), bigger more aggressive tyres for getting through the mud, usual recovery equipment such as waffles etc, plenty of underbody armour, bush wires so that your windscreen doesn't get harmed in the event of annoying branch smacking it, bull bar to protect the front or light guards all round at the very least, roof rack, how about beadlockers to stop the tyre coming off the rim?

All these are just a general pointer and most of them actually come from the shopping list of everything I want to put on my motor.

One vital thing I did forget though...Communications equipment CB Radio etc and probably a satellite phone.

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