So a friend and I drove down to Amboy crater on Tuesday which is an extinct volcano out in the middle of the desert that you can hike up to and into which is really cool.
So we took my 300E, drove over there in the morning and went on the hike which was great, when we got back to the parking lot, we decided to take some pictures of the car with the volcano in the background and drove her out on the sand, she did excellent and I felt pretty confident because things were going well! We finished taking pictures and as I continued to rally it up, I slowed down because I thought I saw a large rock up ahead, the car came to pretty much a stop and when I hit that accelerator pedal, all you heard was the gravel but there was no motion, my friend shot me a look like O_O and I hit the accelerator again and all you could hear was it just digging in deeper.
We got out and saw the right rear wheel digging into the sand, not too bad, but it was in there. I prepared for this because I knew we'd be in the desert, so I put some rubber mats in the trunk and I have a folding shovel I keep in the car 24/7. So we put the mats in front of the wheels and got some lava rocks and put them in front of the wheel, we were like "no problem, we'll be out in no time" well when we tried moving forward it just shot out all the rocks and scrunched up the mat so we were like "okay, so plan b". So we jacked up the car and lifted the wheel off the ground, put the mat and rocks under the wheel to which at this point, we noticed only the wheel with no traction was spinning and the other, apparently had traction wasn't doing anything, which had us scratching our heads like "what the hell??" We lowered the car back down, no reason why this shouldn't work, right? Went on the accelerator and out shot the rocks again, all the while, the wheel is digging further into the sand. The pressure was on because the sun was starting to set, I knew if absolute worst came to worst, I could call AAA or a family member and have them pull us out, but we were out in the middle of nowhere, so it'd be awhile until they came, and waiting in the pitch black desert, just didn't seem appealing.
So we started digging out around the wheel, looking for larger rocks around us or anything that we could use. I came across this good sized, ramp looking rock that I grabbed and placed by the wheel, put more lava rocks and the mat, went on the accelerator and nothing but the wheel slipping off the rock. We were loosing more and more hope with each failed try, so we decided to try again and lifted the wheel, placed the rock directly under and hopped for the best. My friend went on the accelerator as I guided, nothing but slipping and slipping until it caught suddenly and then it sipped off again. Seeing this I told him "keep going, keep going, try and rock it!!!" so he began to rock it by letting it catch, slip and then as it went back down accelerate again and then all of a sudden she caught and backwards she went!
It was honestly one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen Lol, as he was backing up, he started to slow down, which I assume he was going to stop so I could get in, but I yelled "JUST GO JUST GO!!!" so he gunned her to the sweet paved road that was about 25 feet behind us. We were both yelling and laughing and just pretty proud of ourselves because after about an hour of failure, we finally got her out.
After we were back on the road, we decided to stop at the one and only gas station in Amboy to get some waters and stuff. We pulled up and walked in, the man behind the counter looked outside and saw the car covered in sand and dust, turned around, looked at us with a puzzled look and was like "what'd you guys do, off road in that thing?"
Now I didn't enjoy being stuck, but we learned a lot from the experience.. especially about differentials and that my 300E doesn't have a limited slip differential which I always thought it did and was pretty disappointed. But then while we were discussing it, if it would of had the lsd, would both wheels have gotten equally stuck OR would it have helped us pull it out? I had heard before that you're supposed to gun it when getting out of a hole when you have rocks and things next to the tire for grip, but that didn't work for us and we abandoned the idea. Then we thought about the 4matic, but the sand was so soft, in the case of the 4matic, wouldn't all the wheels of gotten stuck? Some pictures:
