Grading
Three answers, and none of them is a star rating
Terrain grade is what the track demands. Commitment band is what happens if it goes wrong. The vehicle verdict is the only one that is personal, and it needs a car in your garage before it can say anything.
Why two axes
One difficulty number hides whichever risk you were not thinking about
Terrain and the consequence of a breakdown are separate facts. A five-point scale has to average them into one number, and that number hides one of the two questions. Published routes are compared here as soon as they pass review.
The comparison will appear with the first reviewed drive route
The grading method is ready. The route table stays empty until a real drive route passes the full publication review.
Axis one, terrain grade
What the track demands, written as a requirement list
Staff do not rate a road out of five. They record grading evidence, and the grade is whichever row of the versioned requirement table matches. Every value comes from the table the app enforces, so a page here cannot claim an easier requirement.
| Grade | Drivetrain | Clearance | Tyres | Kit required |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SealedTarmac or graded murram. Any car. | Two wheel drive | Low, under 180 mm | Road tyres | None |
| EasyFormed gravel and minor gradients. No low range needed. | All wheel drive | Low, under 180 mm | Road tyres | None |
| MediumRough tracks, loose rock, shallow crossings. Low range on the steep parts. | 4x4, dual range | Medium, 180 to 220 mm | All terrain | None |
| HardWheel placement matters. Rutted climbs and real crossings. | 4x4, dual range | High, over 220 mm | All terrain | Rear locker |
| ExtremeStrands well prepared crews. Do not go alone. | 4x4, dual range | High, over 220 mm | Mud terrain | Rear locker, Front locker, Winch, Snorkel |
Nothing in that table is an opinion you have to take on trust. Every row is a thing you can check against the car parked outside, which is the whole difference between a grade and a review.
Axis two, commitment band
What happens if it goes wrong
Terrain grade assumes the drive goes to plan. This one assumes it does not. It is scored from the recorded line rather than declared by anybody, out of five measurements that decide how bad a broken driveshaft actually turns out to be.
- From either end
- The furthest you get from the nearer end of the route, as the crow flies. This is the walk. It separates a loop from an out-and-back of the same length, which total distance cannot.
- From a town
- Worst distance to a town of 2,000 people or more, anywhere on the line. Where help, a phone signal and a matatu are.
- From fuel
- Worst distance to a petrol station. Running a tank dry is the most common way a good day becomes an overnight.
- Time out
- Estimated from the line and the climb. Two hours is an outing. Ten is a whole day gone and a night that starts before you are back.
- Total climb
- Metres of ascent. Climb is what cooks a transmission and empties a tank, and it is why a 6 km track can be harder work than a 40 km one.
The worst single factor carries most of the weight and the rest is a weighted average. That is deliberate. A four hour drive that never comes back within 100 km of a town is committing even when nothing else about it is, and an average on its own would let two mild factors talk the third one down.
A factor with no reading is dropped rather than scored as zero. Off the grid, no data is not the same fact as next door to a petrol station.
Published example pending
The first commitment panel will appear after a reviewed drive route is published. No measurements are substituted while the catalogue is empty.
If something breaks, help is a short trip away.
Plan on a good part of the day. Carry water and fuel.
Hours from a town. Tell someone your plan, and go with a second car.
A trip, not an outing. Fuel, food, spares, and a second vehicle.
Axis three, the vehicle verdict
The only answer that is about your car
The first two axes describe the road. This one describes the gap between the road and the vehicle on your driveway, and it is why people install the app. It cannot appear on this website: a verdict with no vehicle behind it would be a safety claim nobody made.
You fill this in once
Five things about the car you already own. No registration number, no chassis lookup, no photograph. Two minutes, and it stays on the phone.
- Drivetrain
- Two wheel drive, all wheel drive, 4x4 high range, or 4x4 with low range. This field decides more verdicts than any other.
- Ground clearance
- Low, medium or high. You do not need the millimetre figure, you need to know which of the three your car is, and the app says what each band means.
- Tyres
- Road, all terrain, or mud terrain. Change your tyres and a dozen routes change their answer, which is exactly right.
- Lockers
- Rear, front, both or neither. A rear locker is what separates hard from beyond on most Kenyan climbs.
- Winch and snorkel
- Recovery and water. They rarely block a route on their own, and they are often what turns a with-care verdict into a comfortable one.
More than one vehicle is normal. A household with a Vitz and a Land Cruiser gets two different answers to the same road, and switching between them is one tap.
And every route answers in one of three ways
Matched field by field against the requirement list. Anything below a stated minimum blocks. Missing kit that the grade only prefers advises instead, because one of those says the route is out and the other says bring a shovel.
Your vehicle can do this
Your vehicle clears every stated minimum and carries the kit the grade requires. Nothing about the road should surprise the car.
Doable with care
Nothing blocks you, but something the grade prefers is missing: a snorkel on a route with crossings, a winch where a recovery would otherwise mean waiting for one. A route you can drive, and not one to drive alone.
Beyond this vehicle
Something the road requires, your car does not have. Two wheel drive on a low range climb, road tyres where mud terrains are the minimum, no rear locker where the grade demands one. The app names the specific gap instead of telling you it is hard.
The verdict never appears without a vehicle, and never on a walking route. A blank is the honest state, and it is the state this website is permanently in.