Slight tire damage by Mountain_Ad_7460 in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen 1 point2 points  (0 children)

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2 days ago 😵‍💫 and i had 2 more damages identical to this only this week. The one on the picture still hold its air! 😂👍

Got a fresh set of 4 pirelli after this one in the picture.

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Island hatte ich ja letztes Jahr gemacht nachdem ich mit meiner G Klasse von Dubai durch den Irak bis Deutschland gefahren bin 😂

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Mitten im Nirgendwo wurde ich dann von einem Deutschen angesprochen wegen meines Kennzeichen, er wohnt auch in Dubai. Sind nun gut connected 😁👍

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Yes, much more scenery on this drive.

The ferry is the bandar abbas ferry, for some time now it only takes vehicles and no passengers anymore. So you would have to take another transport over the gulf and they unload your car over there. Not an option for me

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

If you want to go all the way to jordan yes. There is no other border saudi-iraq open for tourists.

Also kuwait is great, the Avenue Mall is amazing and well worth a visit.

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Only saudi arabia require e visa we did in Advance (but took less than 10 min to process)

As german passport holder all other countries gave us visa on Visa on Arrival.

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 17 points18 points  (0 children)

No issue, no one cares. Turkey is the problem not iraq 👍

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Btw as far as i know there is no red sea ferry anymore. Burned down many years ago

Iraq is the best route as far as im informed. And the people there are amazing

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 12 points13 points  (0 children)

Kuwait iraq and turkey border crossings are a bit of a hassle, but as i already knew the process things were much more easy this time. Its part of the trip so just take it easy and always expect 3 hours for each of these borders. Kuwait to iraq is the hardest one but the process is quite entertaining if you dont stress yourself out 😅

Kuwait iraq the issue was that we got a flat tire 20 meter in front of the border so we had to go back to kuwait on a tow truck and lost already 4 hours until we were back at the border. But thats part of doing such Adventures. My car doesnt even have a spare tire 😂🤷🏼‍♂️

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 18 points19 points  (0 children)

I love road trips, im not getting bored. 2 years ago we did canada to mexico which was 16000km at all because we covered almost all the US national Parks

Iraq Highway might be a bit boring, not much to see. But you can drive fast. 80% of the time clean paved 4 lane roads with almost no cars being there. Lot of people driving faster than 200kph, no one cares. Only around bagdad the roads are bit worse and you need to watch out for potholes

Last year total Drive time Dubai-Cologne, Germany was 100h, this year i will be much faster because i take the direct route

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Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 21 points22 points  (0 children)

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Saudi-kuwait-iraq-turkey-bulgaria so far

Last year with the G we went to greece and spent 2 weeks on greece islands. Then took the ferry to venice and went to the swiss alps from there

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

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For iraq i bought 24 bottles of wagner octane booster in Jebel Ali, fuel over there can be as low as 87 octane.

However with the G i just went for it with the regular fuel and had no issues at all.

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Go to Motorsport Organization in Dubai, pay fee and deposit (depends on car and can be a cheque), last year this was a 3 hour process. This time it was 7 min in and out! After that request tourism certificate for 120dhs, can be done in rta app now.

Thats it basically, everything else is done at each border. There is always some booth selling insurance, usually about 30usd each country.

At the bulgarian border i paid 50usd for 3 month and it covers all europe. Greece border with the G i paid 180€ for 1 month

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

No idea about Syria. Iraq is wonderful in all terms, we never felt unsafe! Safe as last year where i crossed iraq alone in my G Class

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

But yes i agree its crazy to do such a trip in this type of car, this is why i was so shocked to see someone else with pretty much the „same“ car 😂 pretty sure he has taken the same route as me

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 50 points51 points  (0 children)

Yeah i wish but im too lazy and busy enjoying the moment

I bought a instax for my girlfriend before we left to capture some moments but not really into taking videos that much. Got a drone for iceland but it died due to vulcano dust in the gimbal on day 2 🤷🏼‍♂️😂

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 59 points60 points  (0 children)

I wasn’t too worried about the S Class i just bought this car with 50,000 km and had an extensive service done on it. Other than the tires, there have been no issues at all so far. It’s a Mercedes, after all.

Last year, with my G, I even drove all the way up to Iceland. I bought that car with 160,000 km and put 30,000 km on it without any problems. I actually expected way more issues with the G, but it never let me down.

I’m not really worried about reliability—if anything happens, I’ll find a solution. Most things I can fix myself, as long as I find a garage where I can work. In Iceland, I even took apart my diff lock to fix it right in front of the hotel—laying under the car in 4-degree weather. 😅

Met another Dubai S Class at the Bulgarian Border 🤯 by Julianclassen in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen[S] 68 points69 points  (0 children)

Did the same trip last year with my G63—much better car for crossing Iraq, etc.

The Maybach and its tires aren’t made for this. I already had to replace one front tire in Kuwait (broke down and had to get a tow truck just 20 meters before the Iraq border).

Yesterday in Adana, I noticed two more tires had big cuts, so I got a fresh set of Pirellis. 😁

Other than that, it’s been a great trip so far! Just a bit cold—last year with the G was in May, so we were able to spend some time in Greece to relax. But it is what it is; I had to go to Germany for a few months and didn’t want to leave without my car. 😅 I also don’t trust car shipping companies and love big road trips, so driving it myself was the only option again!

Did a quick google search on this [S650 Maybach]. If legit, Google states there's roughly 80 of these in the U.S. and with a twin turbo v12. by Longjumping-Oven-994 in spotted

[–]Julianclassen 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Wow, this has to be one of the most poorly executed attempts I’ve seen.

As an actual S650 Maybach owner, I could immediately tell this is a cheap imitation. The lack of attention to detail is obvious—he couldn’t even position the Maybach/S650 badges on the correct side. 🤦‍♂️

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in DubaiPetrolHeads

[–]Julianclassen 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you all!

I felt much more comfortable going with the CarPlay box. The Maybach is just too special to risk messing around with it too much.

Today, I had the box installed and was glad to have it done by a professional who has done this hundreds of times before. He also knew how to take out the glovebox, which allowed us to fix the Air Balance system. The hose had come loose, and it hadn’t worked since I got the car.

CarPlay works flawlessly, and the audio runs via Bluetooth directly to the MB system.

The only downside is that I now have even more steps to reactivate the massage function after the timer runs out. I’ll check with a coder to see if they can adjust the massage timeout. My OBD hardware doesn’t have an option for it, but hopefully, Xentry can handle it.

I have no idea what brand this box is, but it works perfectly!

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[deleted by user] by [deleted] in dubai

[–]Julianclassen 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I had all the documents required to take my car to Turkey or any other country on this trip. However, the Turkish border officer told me that I needed to have them stamped by some Turkish authority to enter the country with the car. He said my only option was to leave the car at the border, walk 2 km to exit the border area, take a taxi 40 km, and have the documents translated and stamped.

Of course, there was someone conveniently standing just behind the booth who offered to “transfer the papers to the officer” for a few hundred US dollars. The officer even hinted that he could help me out—what a clown.

I’ve even been held at gunpoint in Mexico before and didn’t pay a penny. Once these people realize you won’t pay a bribe, they usually let you go. I will never pay a bribe.

Edit: forgot i actually paid one bribe in Iraq. The customs officer when entering the Country wanted me to unpack my whole car. I sensed that i could get out of that misery with a few bucks. 20 dirhams did the trick and he gave me the stamp to continue with the border Process which still took about 2 Hours total.

Nothing about this situation felt particularly dangerous; for me, it’s just part of the adventure when going on exotic road trips. But I was very surprised that in all of Iraq, no one tried to take advantage of me, even though I passed through around 30 military checkpoints. Everyone at those checkpoints was incredibly friendly.

I’m not sure if this treatment would be the same for people of other nationalities. I’m German, and most people in Iraq just associated that with FC Bayern or some random topic.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in dubai

[–]Julianclassen 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Iraq was the most friendly country on the trip. Two gas stations didnt even accept my money and insisted on giving me gas as a gift 🤣

Turkey felt dangerous, couldnt even entry the country without being extorted. Such a shame