Green laning without scratching the car up?

[mjw0321]

I’d like to do some (gentle at first) green laning but given that it will be in a new car, I don’t want to be driving down narrow lanes scratching paintwork. Is it possible to do green laning across more open areas where there isn’t this risk? Apologies for the naive question; I have no experience of off roading. Any advice on where to start would be great.

[Dan_The_Man]

What new car ? my advice would be do it in something that you don't mind getting scratched and muddy.

[sociopath]

I suspect green laning may not be for you if you're worried about scratches

[mjw0321]

Dan_The_Man said:

What new car ? my advice would be do it in something that you don't mind getting scratched and muddy.

Defender. Was thinking stuff as shown in this video which is across more open terrain than tight, overgrown lanes. https://youtu.be/Qb2M_XesONs

Edited by mjw0321 on Tuesday 15th June 22:14

[JoshB68]

Only way it’s going to be possible, is with a lot of extra planning of greenlaning trips, like others have said your going to be ruling out a fair amount of lanes. But there is plenty of green lanes with wide open spaces.

You can plan ahead using things like trail wise (tw2) and read the comments of the lanes your going to be doing, people often mention if there “scratchy” in the comments of each lane. Another option is YouTube if you get the lane ID from trail wise or just type the road name and search it in YouTube there’s normally a few results for popular lanes and you can see if there’s any scratch prone parts to the lane.

Or wait till winter and hope the local flora has died down.

[mjw0321]

JoshB68 said:

Only way it’s going to be possible, is with a lot of extra planning of greenlaning trips, like others have said your going to be ruling out a fair amount of lanes. But there is plenty of green lanes with wide open spaces.

You can plan ahead using things like trail wise (tw2) and read the comments of the lanes your going to be doing, people often mention if there “scratchy” in the comments of each lane. Another option is YouTube if you get the lane ID from trail wise or just type the road name and search it in YouTube there’s normally a few results for popular lanes and you can see if there’s any scratch prone parts to the lane.

Or wait till winter and hope the local flora has died down.

Great. Thank you.

[Smint]

Might be worth going to a pay and play site and getting some practice in your new beasty before you find yourself in trouble, ie stuck, somewhere remote if you are going with no back up.
Its ages since i went pay and play but at the two places i frequented they had various courses/routes you could take depending on the vehicle and you, from fairly gentle to quite terrifying in the case of Devil's Pit.

If you're on road bias tyres its surprisingly easy to get yourself stuck on the slippery stuff, not trying to rain on your parade just a suggestion.

[mjw0321]

Smint said:

Might be worth going to a pay and play site and getting some practice in your new beasty before you find yourself in trouble, ie stuck, somewhere remote if you are going with no back up.
Its ages since i went pay and play but at the two places i frequented they had various courses/routes you could take depending on the vehicle and you, from fairly gentle to quite terrifying in the case of Devil's Pit.

If you're on road bias tyres its surprisingly easy to get yourself stuck on the slippery stuff, not trying to rain on your parade just a suggestion.

Yeah this is a good idea. Need to do a bit of investigation on what is around my area.

[JWH]

Smint said:

If you're on road bias tyres its surprisingly easy to get yourself stuck on the slippery stuff, not trying to rain on your parade just a suggestion.

If you're new to it the above is really worth noting, I embarrassed myself in a Discovery 1 learning this the hard way 15 years ago - no amount of four wheel drive and locking diffs will help once you're onto mud or wet grass with road tyres!

[FunkyNige]

mjw0321 said:

Dan_The_Man said:

What new car ? my advice would be do it in something that you don't mind getting scratched and muddy.

Defender. Was thinking stuff as shown in this video which is across more open terrain than tight, overgrown lanes. https://youtu.be/Qb2M_XesONs

Don't forget to do the free experience day you get with a new Land Rover - it's great fun And has my wife wanting to take my Disco Sport green laning...

[Mo28]

If you're worried about scratching the paint, it be might worth getting the car ppf'd. Most paint protection films have self-healing properties so after a day of green laning the scratches in the film will disappear once you apply some heat, dependant on how deep the scratches are.

[100SRV]

Mo28 said:

If you're worried about scratching the paint, it be might worth getting the car ppf'd. Most paint protection films have self-healing properties so after a day of green laning the scratches in the film will disappear once you apply some heat, dependant on how deep the scratches are.

I considered doing this to my 110" - is it the same as wrap or a slightly different process / material?

[camel_landy]

I've always wondered if wrapping the car with pallet wrap would work in situations like this??

M

[Jonny TVR]

go to salisbury plain as you can avoid scratches easily.

[blueST]

You could do a guided tour with someone like Ardventures. They do none scratchy routes in North Yorkshire.

[soad]

My old Nissan scratches easily (simply by touching the overgrown bushes - paint is unbelievably thin!!).

Then again, it’s worth fk all.

[Lesgrandepotato]

It’s a Land Rover. It’s meant to look scratched

[Ranger 6]

mjw0321 said:

Dan_The_Man said:

What new car ? my advice would be do it in something that you don't mind getting scratched and muddy.

Defender. Was thinking stuff as shown in this video which is across more open terrain than tight, overgrown lanes. https://youtu.be/Qb2M_XesONs

If you're in the south east then the moorland trails in the video may be harder to find outside Salisbury Plain. Maybe as suggested take a trip up north and do the coast to coast. The best you could do is join GLASS and get involved in organised runs.

We've had new defenders at our local Pay&Play site, as well as new Toyota/Nissan pick ups. The only damage the came about was from drivers being over ambitious.

[2 GKC]

Strata Florida in Mid Wales, and as others have said Salisbury Plain. You don’t really want to go greenlaning without another vehicle.