Subarus Take on Bornholm Beach - Australia's Most Difficult Beach Exit

Bornholm is widely considered the most difficult 4wd beach access in Australia with the local farmer offering a $1000+ recovery service for anyone who can get off the beach. With one way in and out it's not for the faint at heart. Perfect terrain for a pair of old Subarus. Unfortunately the strain proved to much for the old head gaskets on the SubaruOffRoad forester.
See the below link for project write-up of the diff lock.
drive.google.com/file/d/1zd4i...

[@BOGGEDACTION]

Very impressive, well down boys, that was awesome. Respect!!!

[@SubaruOffRoad]

Cheers!

[@subieliftoz4274]

Awesome effort by both Subies! Great video

[@SubaruOffRoad]

Cheers!

[@G1itzik]

Pleasure to view, thanks

[@hughh106]

Would be cool to see your driving from behind the wheel too! Glad you got the HGs fixed, just got the engine back in on mine.

[@personlikeu]

I love it lads!

[@theSam91]

That was epic 🤣How did the first Forrester make it look so easy? Was it just a difference in weight?

[@SubaruOffRoad]

I think a few things made the difference. The second car had light truck all terrains which do not bag out as well in sand where as the first car has road tyres which are the best for sand. The first forester also had 1.6:1 low range vs 1.44:1 on the second. This allowed for more speed in 1st low. Also the lower weight of the second forester meant less of the engine power was used just lifting the weight of the vehicle. On the first climb the heavier car did better as it has a limited slip front diff making better suited to the undulating sand.

[@morosis82]

I used to have a lifted MY03 XS with all terrains and the cast alloy skid plate. That thing was a weapon, was very sad when it drowned in a carpark. I did own a MY06 Turbo which was fun but was never modified for real offroad use. Probably have some video of that first one on some gnarly tracks on Fraser Island around somewhere driving past bogged 'cruisers :D

[@istp1967]

Have Forester, will travel

[@SubaruOffRoad]

Nice! Just go with someone as it's an expensive exercise if something goes wrong!

[@terryc47]

Thanks for the video, great demonstration. Was wondering if you altered tyre pressure while in the dunes, and if so what were they set at?

[@SubaruOffRoad]

Most of the video I was around 8-10psi for the final climb after the radiator hose came off I was down to under 5psi.

[@destnations5588]

Great Video Alex, How would compare this beach climb to Calcup hill, both done in summer?

[@SubaruOffRoad]

Similar but different. I had more trouble on calcup than the main climb at Bornholm but Josh had far more trouble on the bonrholm main climb. The second climb at Bornholm I had a huge amount of difficulty but Josh just sailed up it, was harder than Calcup for both vehicles though. Both locations change a lot but overall I would say Bornholm is more difficult by a reasonable amount.

[@user-mf4xq9kv1n]

Great video! Do you have any idea how the SH manual diesels go in sand? Thanks for posting!

[@SubaruOffRoad]

I have never driven one but I would imagine they would do reasonably for the most part. The gearing might be a little challenging and depending on the tyre/rim size you have you may not have a heap of side wall to play with for deflating tyres. The most important thing for the sand is to let your tyres down until the driving becomes easy. If the engine is really struggling or wheels are spinning you need to go lower on the pressures. Best option is to head to the beach with another vehicle which knows what they are doing and a set of Maxtrax or similar and have a crack.

[@R00RAL]

Colin McRea goes camping.

[@salimalhinai3034]

What is the best model for a Subaru Forester?!!

[@SubaruOffRoad]

From factory the Turbo auto SG or Turbo auto SH onwards with traction control are the most capable. If you get into the modified world then You would be hard pushed to find something more capable overall than my manual SG.

[@oldfashionedwrx3574]

epic video did you have the n/a gaskets before, the turbo gasket fixes the issue

[@SubaruOffRoad]

As far as I am aware they were the original gaskets in there so would have been OEM NA ones. They certainly were not the MLS turbo ones.

[@oldfashionedwrx3574]

@@SubaruOffRoad thats why they went, i noticed theres a breather in your timing cover, must be for your air pump to stop water going in there

[@SubaruOffRoad]

@@oldfashionedwrx3574 the NA engines and stock gaskets do not normally fail from combustion chamber leaks, so this was a little unusual. They had been externally weeping a tiny bit of coolant and oil for 100k km before this failure.

[@noahsmith7333]

I've got a turbo manual sg, what would be your advice for first mods for basic sand drving? For now looking at a 2' lift and bigger tyres

[@SubaruOffRoad]

Best mod for sand 100% is tyre pressures. No other mod will even come close for improvement in sand driving. Second best mod is driver experience, particularly in knowing what tyre pressure to drop to and shortly followed by knowing how to drive around holes in the track that will lift diagonal wheels. A 2" lift will help with less bottoming out but given you have a single range manual increasing tyre size will probably reduce off-road performance in almost every terrain as the gearing will be too tall. I would only consider increasing tyre size if you swap a dual range transmission in.

[@noahsmith7333]

Oh okay I get what you mean. Car currently has 215 45 r17 on so not a lot of sidewall to play with 😅

[@kiwizookoffroad2040]

Grab a set of 16s and some 215/65r16

[@SubaruOffRoad]

@@kiwizookoffroad2040 Agreed. Get some 16s or even 15s if you can find something that fits to get some more sidewall rather than get bigger diameter tyres.

[@subasurf]

What tyres you guys running?

[@SubaruOffRoad]

The car without the roof top tent had road tyres and the other had BFG ATs. Road tyres are all you need for sand.

[@faradey8522]

Привет из России ! У меня тоже subaru forester sf5

[@seventystix6964]

only SOHC... wow 😂

[@SubaruOffRoad]

Australia only got SOHC NA EJs. Only the turbos got DOHC.

[@user-mf4xq9kv1n]

Great video! Do you have any idea how the SH manual diesels go in sand? Thanks for posting!

[@SubaruOffRoad]

I don't have any experience with the Diesel SH but your limitations will be gearing and how much you can deflate your tyres depending on your rim tyre combo. For this beach you would also struggle with articulation on the first exit we took.