Thread: Driving on Sand - Smell and high revs

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When you have a leaky oil cooler and have oil sitting in the valley then at times you are off road and running higher temps the oil can slosh due to more aggressive driving and angles. The oil sloshes over the back of the engine and hits the crossover or turbo area and produces a smell. A tiny amount makes a lot of smell.

If you take off bash plates you’ll see evidence of this oil looking up behind engine around the gearbox. It settles on the sway bar underneath.

If the daytime temperature is higher (high 30s) the car will modify its behaviour and use more fan.

In sand mode sometimes it can feel like the car has broken when you apply throttle and nothing happens for a long time.

I've noticed an increased smell after the car has needed to work harder than normal - either beach driving, or hauling a heaving trailer etc. I just put it down to more engine parts getting hotter than normal and so smelling a little.

I sympathise with the old girl, as i also smell a bit more after i've worked harder than normal on a hot day

Checked the oil cooler and surrounding area, maybe a small spill from oil filter changeover but I can't see anything down the back of the engine as suggested.

Just seems strange that it was lower revs one day and higher the next...?

Can transfer case slippage cause this?

Originally Posted by Scott_Lee

Checked the oil cooler and surrounding area, maybe a small spill from oil filter changeover but I can't see anything down the back of the engine as suggested.

Just seems strange that it was lower revs one day and higher the next...?

Can transfer case slippage cause this?

Anything that was sitting there and getting cooked off will cause a smell as long as there’s no haemorrhaging of oil under the car don’t worry too much (and if it’s not a strong diesel smell either)

TC is seen as fluctuating revs say at about 80kmh trying to maintain speed up a small hill.

Originally Posted by Scott_Lee

Can transfer case slippage cause this?

Hell no. If the transfer case clutch was slipping enough you actually noticed increased revs it'd either be tripping out on over temp or on fire. The transfer case clutch only proportions torque front<->rear. That may be an issue on sand, but the temp sensor would bring up a warning on the dash if it were from there.

Read the service manual. There are numerous things that will cause the ECUs to hold higher gears and get the fan working hard. Oil smell will become quite apparent if there is *any* oil on the outside of the motor and you are working it hard.

I find when under load in the D3, I get lower oil and coolant temps if the motor is running at or over 2000 revs. Lugging is the enemy on these and the standard transmission map seems to favor lower revs. I don't have a transmission, so it does what I tell it.

Originally Posted by PerthDisco

Anything that was sitting there and getting cooked off will cause a smell as long as there’s no haemorrhaging of oil under the car don’t worry too much (and if it’s not a strong diesel smell either)

TC is seen as fluctuating revs say at about 80kmh trying to maintain speed up a small hill.

TC - in your case is torque converter. The discussion was the Transfer Case, presume clutch - quite different.

In normal sand driving do you put it in 'Sand' mode and manually turn off Stability Control? Keeping Stability Control on will add extra stress to the drive train and heat things up. Stability Control in sand only helpful on the faster\smoother sections of beach driving