Will be going to the Outer Banks this weekend and will be driving the Ram on the beach. I have drivin on the beach before with a compact truck and it weighed about half as much as this one.

Like to hear from you guys that have taken these heavy trucks on the beach. How does it handle the sand? Letting the air pressure down to about 15-20psi should do ...right?

 

Stevenc,

I would hate to ruin your fun, but even if you are driving on a hard packed beach you will still be getting a certain amount of sand and salt in to vital parts of your brakes, engine, wheel bearings etc. which could come back to haunt you down the road. I wouldn't recommend it.

Alan

 

I drove my last truck on the beach for over 6 years and I never had any problems related to sand or salt. I just returned from a week on the Outer Banks and I never had any problems with my present truck. The important thing is to always wash your truck when you return home including underneath to get most of the salt off. Do not drive in the salt water and do not drive thru tidal pools on the beach. With a heavy CTD and stock tires, do not run over 20 psi if you are going to go thru any soft sand. I ended up running 17-18 psi because the beachs north of Corolla were very rough and rutted. I saw numerous trucks stuck on the beach during the course of the week. There are some stretches that are very hard packed and some that are extremely soft. I only aired back up 2 times during my week there because I was staying in the 4x4 area north of Corolla. Once to come back into town for groceries and once to drive home at the end of my vacation. If you ever start getting stuck, do not spin your tires, it will bury your truck and you will have to dig it out. Remember, there is no bottom to the sand, if you start digging in, you will end up resting on the axles. Drive slowly and watch out for debris on the beach that could puncture a tire. I have seen 4x4 duallys on the beach with campers. If they can make it out there, almost any 4x4 can. You just have to be careful and know what you are doing. Check out my gallery.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Stevenc
Will be going to the Outer Banks this weekend and will be driving the Ram on the beach. I have drivin on the beach before with a compact truck and it weighed about half as much as this one.

Like to hear from you guys that have taken these heavy trucks on the beach. How does it handle the sand? Letting the air pressure down to about 15-20psi should do ...right? [/QUOT

I live in Raleigh and ride down on the beach it is a lot of fun.
As long as you clean it good with soap it will do fine.
Most people just spray it off with water when they get back and then they have a big problem with rust down the road.
You need soap to break down the salts and clean it up. If you stop at one of the wash places on the way back and use the pressure wash it works great.
I had my last truck 7 years and drove all the time on the beach and you could not even tell JUST STAY OUT OF ALL THE WATER it may be away from the beach but it is still saltwater.
To your question:
Low tire presure is the key 15psi or so.
With an auto drive in 4 low works best.
The auto will heat up to much at 15mph or so.
on the 96 Dodge they were known for poping the cooler lines off at the beach and I think the new ones had the same type of problem.
When mine went Dodge had there people down and wanted to ride with me and see what was causing it to happen. The tow bill was something like 800$ dodge had to pay to get mine to the shop! HEHE
Park service had to pull it off the beach!!!
4th of July in 96 Fun trip.
At the time 6 and mine were in for the fix.
Drive easy and have fun.

Jon

 

HEY, that's why I got the 7 year extended warranty!!!



I will make sure she get a good bath when we get home!

In my younger days when I used to live in Sanford. We used to go to and drive on Carolina Beach, Outer Banks and Portsmouth Island quite a bit. I pretty aware of the sand and what it can do. Just having a truck so HEAVY, I wanted to hear from others.

Also, driving on roads with little air pressure, will it hurts the tires. I hate to have to air up a lot. I dont recall air up alot with my Jeep or Toyota.

Gotta love that surf fishing!!

 

Saltwater on the beach is no different than driving in a Michigan winter. Trucks there don't rust to fast... Did I mention sand on the roads also??

 

Stevenc Hope yall have fun on the beach this summer. Iv'e been going to bearer islands for moor than 30 years now first whith my dads truck ,my old 78 F150 high boy , 1976 E 250 Van, 1981 Pon. sunbird, 1997 2500club cab,now 2004.5 quad and none of my trucks or cars yes cars have ruted out. We always wash under bodys using soap and high pressure wand wash. But as was stated in other reply's stay out of ponds thay are slalt'ed plus you never know how deep thay are. I have puled sume drunk truks out after thay soberd up and said Im stuck can u guys help me out But also NC. finest now use radar 4 speeding and check for DUI's so have fun but be carful. Hope to see ya down ther soon As far air pressure 20F 25B PSI is what I ran On my 2004.5 last time and no problems.

 

Take it easy murray let us have our fun As a Long Islander , the beach is a common place for us.

The Ram CTD will struggle a bit more than a compact, But by all meens, go out and enjoy. I air down to about 18psi. As stated before, stay in the ruts, and DONT spin those tires. The stock tires aren`t so great in the soft sand, but i have towed my camper on the beach with no problem. The BF`s are in my future.

When i get home i set up a sprinkler under my rig to wash the underside. You should see all the sand that collects after a good rinse

Continuose(sp) driving on under aired tires will do damage. I would try to avoid this. there have been times when the line for the air commpressor was a little lengthy, and i skipped it to go a mile down the road to the first gas station

 

Adding some weight to the bed for ballast may also help. When empty, our trucks are heavy over the front axle and relatively light in the rear. This causes the front axle to work harder than the rear because it is trying to "pull" the truck throught the sand.

 

This reminds me of a trip to Pismo Beach in California. My buddie's brother just bought a new Dodge. We all hopped in and went down to the beach to check it out.
Everything was cool as we cruised down the beach until we came to a spot where a creek pours into the sea and we wanted to go farther. So we drove on in and started to cross. Well, the proud new owner proclaimed that he knew this spot well and it wasn't too deep. As it got deeper and deeper (and remember we are very close to the surf too) he said "it can't get any deeper, we're amost there". Shortly after that the water was up to the hood and we were still plowing along. I was thinking wow! this thing is cool, it's still running! About that time a wave was approaching and really got our attention. I had visions of being washed out to sea and drowning. Engine still running. Then it hit and flooded up over the windshield and top! What a view from inside the cab! In a few seconds the engine quit and there we were. At first we didn't want to open the doors because the water level was near the bottom of the windows.
Well, finally, after waiting for low tide, getting saoked, getting a tow, and draining the intake manifold, we got it started again. After some discussion about salt water and a brand new truck, we decided the best fix was to fill it up again. So we put the hose in through the window and filled it up a couple of times. Just filled it right up, opened the doors to drain and filled it up again.
That, fluid changes and a good wash, and everything returned to normal.
The memory of that wave blasting up the windshield always makes me laugh.

Wetspirit

 

I just got back from another dunes trip. We do this all the time. I pull a combined weight of 18000lbs (toy hualer full of quads) on the sand. Just air down to about 20 lbs including the trailer.

This last trip, I aired down to 18 lbs in all tires to get out (several miles) on the dunes. I then aired up to 25lbs in the truck tires - drove all around the dunes, even trying some pretty steep hill climbs, some too steep to make w/o sand paddles. Had no problems at all. I pulled the trailer back out with 25lbs in the truck tires with no problems at all. Sometimes I get stuck if the sand is really deep and soft and I am in 4HI - I just flip the switch to 4LO and off I go.

Have fun and just rinse the rig off (under) when you get home. My last rig had 150,000 miles with many, many sand trips and no rust anywhere.

 

Steve, we were on that same stretch back in March of this year with our Durango. SOOO much fun riding on the beach. We haven't had our Ram out there yet, but I doubt I'd take it in the sand---it's just too new

I read some advice once that you should not use 4LO until you're trying to get OUT of trouble. After all, if you're in 4LO and get yourself stuck, what's left?

The sands north of Corolla seem to be a little harder than the sand off Hwy 12 toward Cape Hatteras. I almost got the Durango stuck in the softer sand a few years ago in that area. I used 4LO to get the heck out of there. I was pretty relieved to get back on the pavement after that.

Have fun!
David

 

Why buy tools and never use them

 

Neat little trick I learned up in Alaska for rinsing the under side of the vehicle after the snow and road sanding ended, was put your vehicle on the lawn, buy a cheap sprinning head sprinkler, hook it up to the hose and turn it on. Move the sprinkler a couple of times during the "wash" and you will get rid of a lot of salt, sand debris underneath, and water the lawn too. Be careful and don't "water" too long and end up with a mud hole you get stuck in, that's embrassing.

L8r,.........dogger

Days on, sweatin' in the Sahara Desert!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Took my Dodge to the Outer Banks last year for a week, Stayed in Corrova 9.9 miles up the beach from the paved beach access road at the Corolla Lighthouse.

This is not my first time on this beach, Previous trips were with a Chevy Suburban which was excellent on the sand.

I always air down to 20 lbs.

I would say the Dodge did a good job on the beach, only problem I had was going across the tire ruts in the soft sugar sand high on the beach and trying to go over the dunes to get to the house.
The Dodge would bog in the soft stuff and I would experience a lot of rear wheel hop, making it nessecary to back out and get another start.
I guess its a combination of a heavy front end and a torque thing with axel wrap, and stock tires (need wider ones for the next trip at least that's what I keep telling the wife)

Along that line has anyone found off the shelf traction bars that fit the 3rd Gen Trucks?

For the return to the paved roads I carry a 12 volt to 110 volt inverter and a small 110 volt compressor, clip the inverter to the battery terminals plug in the compressor and change air pressure anytime you want.