DJ Says: After Finke, These Are the Five Things That Need Checking on Your 4WD

Finke 2026 is done. The bikes and buggies have crossed the line, the crowds have gone home, and somewhere in your driveway is a 4WD that just spent a long weekend getting absolutely hammered. If you were running support crew, chasing between checkpoints, or camping out near the track, your vehicle has been through conditions that would qualify as severe service in anyone book.

Corrugations, bulldust, heat, and hours of idling in the pits — it is a combination that exposes every weak point. Here are the five things you need to check before you drive that 4WD anywhere else.

 1. Suspension bushes and mounts

Hours of corrugations generate immense heat in rubber bushes. They soften, deform, and in extreme cases, tear. Check your lower control arm bushes, sway bar link bushes, and shock absorber mounts. The corrugations on tracks like the Finke access roads are the fastest way to expose suspension weakness. If you hear clunks over bumps that were not there before race weekend, you have found the culprit.

 2. Shock absorbers

Corrugations are the fastest way to cook a set of shocks. The high-frequency cycling overheats the oil, which thins out and loses damping performance. After Finke, push down hard on each corner of the vehicle — it should rebound once and settle. If it bounces more than that, your shocks are on the way out.

 3. Air filter and intake

Every vehicle that ran the Finke track or the access roads breathed in dust. Pull your air filter and check both sides — the clean side of the housing should be spotless. Any dust on the clean side means your filter media has been compromised and your engine has been eating silica.

 4. Tyres and tyre pressures

Sharp rocks, hot tyres, and rapid pressure changes all take their toll. Inspect every tyre for sidewall cuts, tread chunking, and embedded objects. If you aired down for the sand, make sure you have aired back up before hitting the highway.

 5. Undercarriage and driveline

Get underneath with a torch. Look for fresh dents in crossmembers, loose bash plate bolts, and fluid weeping from diffs and transfer case. Check CV boots for splits — bulldust inside a CV joint will destroy it within a few hundred kilometres.

 Do not wait for the noise

Most Finke damage does not show up immediately. The cracked shock seal weeps slowly. The loose bolt rattles for weeks before falling out on the highway. By the time you hear it, the repair bill has already doubled.

Book a post-Finke inspection at our workshop while it is fresh. If you missed the pre-Finke preparation tips , do not skip the post-race check. And if you are already thinking about next year, check out what to check before Finke 2027.