Wheel hop in deep sand solutions

wheelhop2stuck said:

Ladies and gents,

Truck:
2018 Ram 2500 cummins "tradesmen" 4x4
stock everything

I had a great time at the beach getting my truck stuck in the sand. I've had this truck at this beach before but this time the sand was drier and deeper. By the time the wheel hop kicked in (teeth rattling hopping) i was already to far onto the beach to stop. But the hopping got bad enough that the ABS errored out disabled my 4x4... I thought maybe the ESP/ESC wasn't disabling correctly. I had to get pulled out by a deuce and a half. After driving for a few minutes in 2wd once freed the ABS error went away and 4x4 was allowed to work again. (i'm guess the disabling was to protect the truck, annoying but better than something breaking). The next day I pulled the F06 fuse to disable the ABS and took it to a small sand pit and still had the hopping issue (not as bad but the sand was only half as deep).

edit: a quick addition of something that felt off. while I still had 4x4 while i was stuck at times the wheels refused to spin. the tires were straight and when i tried to go forward the wheels wouldn't spin, even if the gas was to the floor. if i rocked it back then forward it would start to spin, then as i got to moving a little it would hop like a demon on ****. after a bit of this is when the abs errored out and the 4x4 was disabled.

I dropped air pressure to 60 from 85, maybe I should have went more. I attached a pic of my tires, just stock from the dealer.

I told that story to ask for advice on solving the wheel hop issue. If the truck wasn't hopping (rattling like that) I wouldn't have gotten stuck, i could have gotten on top of the sand more and spun through it. To me the obvious solutions are tires with a wider foot print and probably a bit more of ground clearance. But I'm wondering if there's something I can do to upgrade the suspension as well, or really any other suggestions anyone might have. I've seen some videos of people installing beefyer control arms on their 1500s but I dont' know if that'd be a solution for the 2500. I don't have much experience with off road upgrades so really any suggestions are great and also an recommendations of shops that do off road work in the Ft Bragg, NC area would be highly appreciated

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JohnnyMac said:

Granted 40 psi would be a much better ride, but the 2500 door placard shows 80 psi. Those tires are like rocks, but anything lower and the TPMS light goes off. I put new mud terrains on mine and although it rode 100 times better, they were only rated at 65psi so my TPMS light was on all the time. You can buy or rent a little device to lower the settings yourself, but the dealer won't do it anymore because for the truck to be rated as a 3/4 ton, you have to run the stock tires that high of pressure.

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Maligator said:

To dog pile on every one else definitely air to about 20psi. I would take my 1500 on the softer deep sand at Oregon inlet in the outer Banks and never had an issue. I'll be taking my power wagon down this year and planned on about 20psi. It's Alot more weight to dig in. Also if you plan on doing Alot of beach driving you should always have recovery/traction boards(maxtrax,etc) , shovel and jack(with base). These could get you out of a sticky situation before you need to resort to towing

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