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Re: Central Australia: Alex's excellent adventure
Hi Alex,
what a fantastic trip & a great report, I wondered where you had got to. That 3rd pic on your 2nd post, your'e tyre pressure looks very low.
Looking foreward to catching up with you at a forum trip sometime 
--- Happy Trails,
Chris & Emma,
X804(c), This is our ride.
T30 II ST,2004 Auto, Silver, Bashed Plate, LED Tail Lights |
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23/Aug/2009, 11:07 pm
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Re: Central Australia: Alex's excellent adventure
Thanks for the compliments everyone.
Scareyann, you don't need permits for the Macdonnell ranges. However if you want to do the Merenie loop from the west end of the Macdonnells down to Kings Canyon (the worst dirt road I did on the whole trip - 50% was car-shuddering corrugation) rather than take the long way around, you need a permit which costs $3 and is simple to get, but they don't give them out if you don't have a 4WD (I don't know why because the corrugations are the only hassle). I did need permits for the bigger loop into western Australia. Having said that, I got an inadequate permit from the NT council and am still waiting to hear back from my application to the WA mob!
Chris, the tyres do look low but thats the rocks - I ran 28psi (cold) on almost all the dirt roads, including in this photo, and 22psi in the desert.
---
Alex X-740(c)
2002 ST, Auto, Blue, Bash plate, Suspension spacers, Cooper ATR/Dunlop Le Mans
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24/Aug/2009, 10:18 am
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Re: Central Australia: Alex's excellent adventure
Alex... looks like fun.
Done some of that many years ago. And some Cooper tyres don't handle rocks well.... is known. But equally chipping is better than punctures.
---
Ian X-1289(c)
2009 Platinum TL Xtrail - Scanguage2, Mio Moov360 GPS, Fridge, 100AH AGM 2nd battery, cargo barrier.
1998 GU Patrol 4.5 Petrol, lifted locked, barred...... so much there.
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27/Aug/2009, 3:14 am
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Re: Central Australia: Alex's excellent adventure
For those interested here are a few stats from the trip
11150 km, 1216 litres, $1806 in fuel, $540 in tyres (one fixed, 2 replaced), windscreen yet to be costed.
Overall consumption 9.2 km/l.
Best 11.5 km/l doing 80kph on a very good dirt road (closely followed by 10.8 km/l from Dubbo to Sydney sitting near the limit).
Worst 6.8 km/l between Mt Dare and Oodnadatta. The majority of this was similar dirt to where I was getting 8 km/l elsewhere, leading me to roughly calculate that in the Simpson Desert I was getting 4 km/l (averaging 18kph over the dunes).
Average fuel price 148.5 cents/litre. Best 117.9 c/l (Sydney). Worst 189.9 c/l (Jervois homestead)
---
Alex X-740(c)
2002 ST, Auto, Blue, Bash plate, Suspension spacers, Cooper ATR/Dunlop Le Mans
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1/Sep/2009, 1:48 pm
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 Re: Central Australia: Alex's excellent adventure
Hi Alex,
Great Trip, your trip is exactly what i want to do, if only i could get time off work other than the middle of summer!
Just a question did you carry a jerry can of fuel and did you use it?
How heavy do you reckon your car was loaded up?
Were you traveling with another car or just on your own?
I love it when i've just got back from a long trip once the car is unloaded and it feels like you've just got a turbo installed! 
---
Mat - X-1358 (C)
2003 T30 Series I ST
King Spring Lift, Pedders Shock Absorbers, BFGoodrich 225/70/16, 16" CSA Platinum Edge Rims, Bash Plate, Alutec Strut Bar, UHF CB Radio, HID Fog Lights, Narva 175mm Lights, Nissan Nudge Bar
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1/Sep/2009, 5:14 pm
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Re: Central Australia: Alex's excellent adventure
Hi Mat
I carried 4 jerry cans but only had 2 of them full most of the time. I filled the other 2 at Mt Dare because I knew the Mt Dare - Oodnadatta (with the Simpson Desert in the middle) was the most demanding on fuel. Using conservative calculations I thought I would need 115 litres and wanted some in reserve. As it turned out it took only 93 litres. I carried them on the roof.
Apart from the Simpson I needed some of that extra capacity on one other section, another time having it allowed me to change my plans about where to go without having to detour to a fuel stop, and a couple of time it allowed me to avoid high fuel prices (such as $2.07/litre at Docker River).
The roof bars have a load limit of 70kg. My roof rack was 15kg and each full jerry is 20kg so it meant for the Simpson I overloaded for the first couple of hundred kms until I could drain the first jerry.
The manual says the car can carry 540kg - that includes people! I weighed most things and when my friend Di was with me the weighed things were 450kg. I did not weigh cooking gear or food or clothes and I reckon they would have added up to 100kg, so I was on the limit for those 2 weeks. The rest of the time I was over 100kg less because apart from not having Di and her clothes, I was carrying less water.
It was just my car the whole time.
Last edited by Alex70, 1/Sep/2009, 5:47 pm
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Alex X-740(c)
2002 ST, Auto, Blue, Bash plate, Suspension spacers, Cooper ATR/Dunlop Le Mans
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1/Sep/2009, 5:41 pm
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Re: Central Australia: Alex's excellent adventure
Just thought I would add a photo of the chipping of the Cooper tyres. This photo is of the replacement tyre I put on in Alice Springs. So it has done about 9000km, of which the first 6000km were Central Australian dirt. Notice the big chunks out of the center section.
I have also just posted on some brake scoring I seem to have picked up in the desert too. See page 9 of this thread
---
Alex X-740(c)
2002 ST, Auto, Blue, Bash plate, Suspension spacers, Cooper ATR/Dunlop Le Mans
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22/Oct/2009, 10:40 pm
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Re: Central Australia: Alex's excellent adventure
As stated in Alex's signature, they're the Cooper ATRs.
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23/Oct/2009, 1:53 pm
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