I know that in the UK they can't be fitted to cars newer than 2007 (amongst other things)
But in Switzerland?
M
Does anyone know if Bull bars are legal in Switzerland? Are there any restrictions?
Basically illegal because of the harm they do to any pedestrians they hit. Some minor exceptions I think.
The Basel MFK department provides guidance on this issue, but it's in German.
In short, they are permitted if they are in compliance with decree Nr. 78/2009/EG.
Thanks for the laugh, I imagined a bar with an electric bull you can ride on, rodeo type thing :-)
(Comes from being a non native speaker)
Close, but the bull isn't electric but petrol/diesel powered Oh yes, and will most likely be a dacia, as in the soft-roader category it's seeming to be the most capable off road...
Thanks - that google translated quite well
May need to see what No 78/2009 / EC permits... worst case the bull bar needs to be easily removable and stays in the boot/roof until we leave Europe...
Bull bars on a Dacia ???
What you trying to do, increase the value ?
I do a lot of overland/offroad driving for fun in 2WD vehicles. So far:
Plymouth-Banjul Challenge
Bamako Challenge
Timbuktu Challenge (same as bamako, but earlier iteration)
Nouakchott Challenge
Mongol Rally
In 4WD, I spent 14 years offroading in Morocco, Mauri, Senegal & Gambia, and less than a year in Qatar... oh and and attempted the Dakar when it was still in the Sahara...failed - didn't try again, way too expensive.
I've been looking at a few cars, owned a Qashqai for a 2 years (2015 model) but it was appalling offroad. Lack of ground clearance, alloy wheels, air intake very low, the list went on. Also, no-one makes kits for them. So that's out.
Then I looked at the yeti - looks interesting, but offroad performance seems poor, especially in sand based on online reviews.
The subaru forester looks nice, but is too expensive when you consider the full cost.
The duster is cheap, has some pretty good creds offroad, and with minimal mods (raising springs/shocks, sump&tank guards, snorkel, roof tray mainly). Can do all that, and still stay under 20k CHF, which is pretty impressive.
I haven't found anything negative on the duster... it's low power (understood for a 1.5diesel), light (great for sand), and doesn't have any extra junk inside. The only car that goes remotely near appears to be the vitara...
M.
Expectations for spectacular car rising....
...and then a Qashqai, a Duster or a Vitara
The "ideal" car for offroading would be a bashed up old toyota or nissan pickup truck. Maybe a lada...
My first car was a single cab 110. Hated it. Utterly useless in the sand, was so heavy it would sink at tyre pressures so low the tyres would pop off the rims. No power steering. Handled like a lorry on the road.
Then had an opel Monterrey, (rebadged isuzu trooper). Much better on the road... butoff road was still fairly heavy. With some mods did fairly well.
Next had a shogun. Loved it. Stupidly bought the V6 petrol instead of the diesel, but still loved it. Liked it so much I brough it back to the UK when I moved there. Towed many a land-rovers our of muddy pits at pay-and-play days. Still too heavy for serious sand use, but with some fiddling (mainly ripping out the rear seats and lining) it was a bit better. Snorkel was trivial to fit. This was the first car I go serious about going off-road with.
Somewhere in there I had an old vitara and a jimny... uncomfortable as f@@@ but the light-weight of them means they jsut glide over the sand. Totally useless on roads though.
So now, my criteria is:
- light
- 4x4
- able to deal with 2-3 days on the motorway (i.e. cruise control - getting to Tarifa takes ages)
- cheap (so I don't cry when I realise I've cut a hole for the snorkel in the wrong spot Also, as I will end up cutting things, it cannot be leased... so cheap it important)
- rugged interior (no leather - it's sh!t in hot weather. Hard plastic and cloth please)
- enough static load weight to carry a roof tent (60kg ish)
- bull bars (only to fit extra lights really)
Name a new car that fits the bill better than a duster (but please do so quickly, as I'm planning to buy it next week ).
I considered second hand, but finding a second hand car in Switzerland doesn't seem to offer value for money. For 20k in the UK, I would expect a land rover that's expedition ready, with all the mods... and maybe even a recent engine rebuild. Here... hehehe...
M.
P.S. to give you an idea how my level of insanity - I've crossed the sahara in a C-class, an S-class and a Brava... because I wanted a challenge. I've done the pamir highway, entering iran, turkmenistan and afghanistan in a micra. Admittedly, a heavily modified micra (2" lift, 3mm stainless sump guard, snorkely, engine rebuild, total strip of the inside, wiring loom rebuild waterproofing everything, off-road tyres... a few more I can't remember. Can dig out a pic if you're interested. She was a beast... got her shipped back from Siberia i got so attached to her)
I've been considering the Bamako Challenge with a friend, and we were thinking to get an old cheap Forester and spend the change to prep it.
To say that our girlfriends were not happy with our plans, would be an understatement. Also, there was a whole discussion about safety in some parts of West Africa, and we chickened out...
It's still on the back of my head though. Could you give an approximate cost, to see if our estimates were anywhere near reality?
This thread is magnificent, as is the OP. However, Switzerland is the wrong country for these shenanigans I think. The used car market is not conductive to such things. Anything that is really cheap but reliable gets exported as there is almost no market here for it. It's unfortunate really.
Many years ago a mate and me signed up to the Mongol Rally, but we were just not able to procure a car that is crap enough to be admitted but also costs less than 1000 CHF.
I haven't given up though. I spent two months of the past winter in Finland, way out in the sticks. Nearest town was about an hour's drive away through ungroomed forest roads. I endured falling in to my neck in half frozen swamps and slogging 30km in knee deep snow though dense boreal forests. It was harsh, but the adventure was great. I'd still like to do one of these great driving challenges at one point. If you need a co-pilot who is about as useful as Jeremy Clarkson for mechanical things, but has some outdoors/bushcraft/survival skills, drop me a PM
I'm travellig to typing this from a phone.
Will reply properly on Monday. Both Mongol and Bamako are doable from Switzerland, had multiple teams (now friends) on both from Switzerland.
I can put you in touch in due course, Monday I'll give more info... but the summary is : buy the car in the U.K.
M
Right, so here goes.
Bamako challenge was fairly cheap. Probably around £2000 all in for a team of one-and-a-half. Plane ticket back was £500 from Bamako, car was £300 or so, and the rest was fuel, tents, bug-spray and whatnot. South of Morocco hotels are nearly pointless, so that cost is out. Registration fees took a cut, but I think they've gone up since (did it in 2010). If you email Julian (the organiser) he's a great guy, and may still remember me (the idiot who changed a wheel bearing with nothing more than a leatherman and a hammer on the 27th of December in Spain - my gratefulness still goes out to the mbclub member who opened his shop and brought me a spare bearing on his way to his mother-in-law for lunch).
So the summary is, buy the car in the UK. For the Mongol Rally, I had about 6 micras in my driveway. One was mine, the others were those bought by other teams and registered (in their name) using my home address because they lived in Canada, USA, HK, etc. You just need a UK address (even a PO BOX) to register the car.
The biggest expense on the mongol rally is the visas - AVOID the visa machine at all costs. They messed up most of the visas for the teams on the year I did it, and several teams couldn't complete the rally due to them.
As for a co-pilot, I'm always looking for victims... ehm, copilots Next challenges I;m thinking of is the rickshaw run in India... or maybe a south-america north-to-south drive. There's also the dalton highway in a smart car... Oh, ffs, I need to stop thinking about this.
M.