Technical > Four Wheel Finesse
Point of View
by Jim Allen
There’s a big drop-off (a thousand-plus feet) to the right, but there are two feet more than the Bronco actually needs. This driver is cutting it close to the side where he can see well, driving slowly and making it fine. He also has a spotter for safety.
What you see outside your 4x4 and how you see it are important to good trail performance. Anyone who target shoots is familiar with the term “sight picture.” When the top of the foresight is lined up perfectly in the notch of the rear sight, and you’re centered on the target, you hit it. That doesn’t always take into account windage, elevation, and variations in ammunition — sometimes, to compensate, the sights or the sight picture need adjusting. The same thing happens, more or less, behind the wheel of a 4x4.
Set up artificial obstacles for even more elaborate practice situations. Lay out empty boxes to make a tight obstacle course.
The major point-of-view aspect is what you can and cannot see from the driver’s seat. The representative illustration here shows a situation with the restricted and partially restricted areas shown in black and yellow (see page 44). After a while, drivers develop a sixth sense and can almost feel where the obstacles are in relation to the vehicle — even in those blind spots.
How you acquire this sixth sense comes mostly from practice. The general technique is fairly simple. You scan well ahead, noting the terrain, memorizing it. By the time the obstacle goes out of view in the blind spots, you should be on a line to clear it. In fact, you should already be scanning ahead and picking more lines. The sense of the physical dimensions of a rig and its high or low clearances helps you automatically judge the best line to pick.
Know your low clearance areas and be able to judge at a glance whether a particular obstacle is a go or a no-go. It takes practice, but it’s not a foolproof skill.
P-O-V Homework
If you’re new to wheeling or to a particular vehicle, some homework before hitting the obstacles (pun intended) is helpful. This starts with a walk around and a look underneath the vehicle. Underneath, make a mental map of the high and low clearances and vulnerable parts. From the outside, get a rough idea of outside clearances, such as approach, departure, and ramp breakover angles as well as low body panels, such as the rockers and rear lower quarter panels. Approach and departure angles can be easily visualized, but plywood can be used to measure them.
Visibility is enhanced in open-topped and doorless rigs. A “duhhh” concept but worth mentioning if you’re buying a trail rig and worth doing if you’re going to be in harm’s way and have the opportunity to go topless or doorless.
Test yourself by observation on the trail or by placing objects of different heights on the ground and driving by or up to them, stopping when they’re out of view. Climb out to observe exactly how far away the object was when it went out of sight. This helps plant another map in your head to improve that sixth sense.
Set up artificial obstacles for even more elaborate practice situations. Lay out empty boxes to make a tight obstacle course. Once you can get through without hitting the boxes, Grasshopper, it’s time for you to go wheeling. Another fun game is to cut three or four lengths of 4x4 timber. Make one just low enough to clear the undercarriage when stood on end and the others tall enough to get knocked over. The taller ones should be about one-half to one-inch taller — it’s hard to read microscopically longer pieces. Have a buddy mix them up, set them up in a row, and you pick the one to drive over. Eventually, you’ll be able to pick the right one, but it isn’t easy.
Common Mistakes
There are several common mistakes in this area of discussion. The first is what I call the “E.T. Syndrome,” where the driver reads the terrain just in front of the vehicle by stretching his neck like E.T. and frantically reacts before the terrain goes out of sight. The cure: read the trail well ahead (20-30 feet), memorize the terrain, and plan your moves as far in advance as possible. Driving too fast for the terrain may cause a similar E.T. effect because the driver doesn’t give himself enough time to read and react. The more complex the terrain, the slower the pace.
Unless you have four-wheel steering, rear tires run a path inside your front tires. In a tight clearance turn, maintain a fairly straight course, wait until the rear wheel is near or at the pivot point, and then crank in full-lock steering (or as necessary) to pivot rapidly around.
The second mistake is the “Eye Patch Syndrome,” where the driver studiously gives himself plenty of room on the side he sees best and just as studiously ignores the other side, as if he has a patch on his right eye. You can guess the eventual results. Because the driver’s side is the most accurately judged side, and cutting it close, assuming overall clearance is good, results in plenty of clearance on the less visible side. This happens to novices who, fearful of the obstacle closest to them, a drop-off perhaps, forgets that the other side exists. Another ouch moment may result.
A third common syndrome is “Out-of-Sight-Out-of-Mind.” When the obstacle passes out of forward and peripheral vision, the pedal goes to the metal. This can be an especially unhappy situation in a tight turning maneuver. The rear wheels cut inside the front in a turn (see illustration). If you’re cutting tight around a tree or rock and cut the wheel too soon, your rig hits somewhere between the wheels. The safe time to start the turn is when the rear tire is even with or just past the obstacle. Look backwards occasionally as you move forward to judge the right moment when to crank the wheel. Novice drivers have to learn that wheeling involves extremes in steering inputs from just a touch to going to full-lock from one second to the next.
The cure-all for tight quarters is to use a spotter. Even the person riding in the passenger seat should earn his or her passage by observing and making regular reports from the far side. If that person sees an impending bad situation, he should bring it to the driver’s attention ASAP.
Sit at Attention, Soldier!
The green area shows best visibility. The area is green at the side of the vehicle, where you can stick your head out to observe. The yellow area, vision may be obstructed by various things like roof pillars, headrests, and difficulty gauging distance. The black areas, you can’t see at all.
When operating in off-camber terrain, it’s often best to stay square in the seat. The tendency in a sidehill is to lean into the hill as if your weight is going to keep you from a rollover. That’s doubtful, but there’s good reason not to bother in most cases: you have a better connection to the severity of the angle. With the vehicle tilted one way and the driver tilted another, the sight picture gets screwy. When staying square in the seat, two things can be accomplished. The least important of which is the upgrade to your cool factor: “Say, look at the cool devil-may-care guy that’s totally unconcerned about the 40-degree side-hill.” The other is that you’re connected to the angle of the vehicle along with your sight picture.