MySwag.org The Off-road Camper Trailer Forum
General => Previous Member Trips => Trips, Tracks, Touring and Reports => 2014 Simpson Crossing => Topic started by: jetcrew on September 24, 2013, 07:30:55 PM
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Ok thought I would start a General trip prep thread where we can discuss accessories, spare parts ect
I will start..
How many spare tyres are you all taking, I Know that 2 spares is the recommended but I will loose 1/2 of my roof rack.
I will have a tyre repair kit with me and am thinking that at the lower speeds that punctures rather than high speed black top de laminations are most likely. I did cape york with only 1 spare but that is not as remote.
what are the rest of you thinking ?
Jet ;D ;D
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I'm thinking the spare on the rear door plus just a tyre only on the roof rack.
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I reckon two spares. I have 3 when I tow the CT as they are all the same wheels and tyres as the cruza. If your tyre repair kit is old, check the stringers are still moist and buy another tube of glue as it goes off. I have a socket roll and spanner roll as well as other tools in the Cruza all of the time. I also have a big kit inside the recovery bag full of hose clamps, fuses, electrical wire, fencing wire, nuts, bolts washers, tyre valves, basic electrical crimp kit. I also take spare hoses, belts and filters on bigger trips.
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I reckon two spares. I have 3 when I tow the CT as they are all the same wheels and tyres as the cruza. If your tyre repair kit is old, check the stringers are still moist and buy another tube of glue as it goes off. I have a socket roll and spanner roll as well as other tools in the Cruza all of the time. I also have a big kit inside the recovery bag full of hose clamps, fuses, electrical wire, fencing wire, nuts, bolts washers, tyre valves, basic electrical crimp kit. I also take spare hoses, belts and filters on bigger trips.
P
That's good, saves me packing up all my spares and taking same. :laugh:
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I'm a one spare person. I have a good repair kit, a spare tube incase the plugs won't do the job and 3 big levers. Those things along with the ability to use them on the side of the road and good tyres has always seen me through my past trips :)
Touch wood I don't have the need for more one day!
Mind you when I'm towing the camper it's spare is the same as the patrols spare.
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2 is always good, if you take a spare tyre only you can fill it will all sorts of things including a gas bottle.
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I'm thinking the spare on the rear door plus just a tyre only on the roof rack.
What happened to your rim mate??
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Will have 2 spare tyres, hose clamps, fuses, electrical wire, fencing wire, nuts, bolts, washers, tyre repair kit, tyre valves, electrical crimp kit, socket set, hammer, pliers, air compressor, high lift jack, long handle shovel, magic tape & putty weld.
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What happened to your rim mate??
Keep the weight down and you can always find someone to fit the tyre vs. having to find a 17 in the bush...
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Reminds me, I need a new tyre for second spare.
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2 spares for me
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if you plan on taking a tyre only i.e. not fitted to a rim and you haven't changed a tyre by hand......i suggest having a pratice at home on the front lawn
i was lucky with my old job as we had to change them by hand all the time sometimes in view of a tyre place...........
i have never considered taking just a tyre, i had to overhaul a clutch master cylinder at mt dare the less you have to work with 3 million flys helping you the better
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I did SW Qld, Cameron Corner and Western NSW from Broken Hill to Bourke with only one spare in the Subaru.
Two punctures in total, both in / around towns and easily repaired. Could've fixed either of them with a puncture repair kit myself, but preferred to have them done prefessionally.
These days the Subi has 2 spares, since I have fitted its rear rack. Was happy to have 2 at Freestone Creek a couple of Christmases ago. Puncture on the first day, but could still stay and play.
Only one spare on the Monterey, but will have 5 as soon as I put matching wheels on the Heaslip, with provision for 2 spares on the camper, by fitting a wind-up mount under the rear. ;D
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As a family of 4 (2adults 2girls 10&7) I am starting to wonder when doing a trip like this how much clothing do you allow to take. Living out of the back of the car and probably swagging it room is goîng to be minimal with 2 swags and a spare wheel on the roof, there isn't a lot of room left up there.
I'm looking at staying out for an extra 2 weeks
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We have a set of tyre pliers and did practice using them so felt comfortable taking the usual spare and one caucus. We also had two spare tubes and patches to assist with side wall stakes. As it turned out Jet, that with all we have done, I'm yet to have a puncture. I have seen many attach additional tyres to the rear spare. But we just stood our up any where.
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As a family of 4 (2adults 2girls 10&7) I am starting to wonder when doing a trip like this how much clothing do you allow to take. Living out of the back of the car and probably swagging it room is goîng to be minimal with 2 swags and a spare wheel on the roof, there isn't a lot of room left up there.
I'm looking at staying out for an extra 2 weeks
Hey buddy we are also going to stay out an extra few weeks ;D ;D ;D ;D
Your not wrong about running out of space real quick, I keep looking at my off road box trailer and thinking HMMMM... but I think it just goes to show how much kit we get used to taking. I have promised Lara a fair few nights in cabins ect and that makes it a little easier, but I will only have the 1 child so gain alot of room in the car back seats, which are coming out to carry the 2 fridges leaving just the single seat for Demitri. ( I will have ample croissant storage ;D ;D ;D )
We are going to do the oztent and swags as JasonB suggested. Having the swag all rolled up with mattress , sleep bag ,pillow all inside it makes it easier I think and then just pop the tent up throw swags in and done , and this takes a few things out of the car that could not be carried on roof alone . like the sleep bags and mattresses/pillows, where as in a swag roll they can go up top and do not weigh that much so strapped on spare tyre is ok IMHO.
The 2nd spare certainly knocks the roof rack around hey. But I figure swags in covers can be strapped directly over the spare wheel, was even thinking of a square plyboard over the tyre to create a flat surface.
Need to start playing around with it all soon though as time will come up quick IMHO.
Jet ;D
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One of the forum members and his old man did Simpson this yer.. the conditions destroyed his old mans new tyres causing him to roll the GU writing it off... it was one of the last dozen GU 4.2's sold new in AU :(
The photos of the tyres - they were cut up quite a bit.
I've wheeled with Dan for years and years.. He is probably the most experienced traveller I know, and knows his Shit.. tyre pressures were good.. just the track conditions were poo.
So I think 1 on rim and 1 carcass is the go... or pair up with someone else with same car (this works for all spares - share the spares and costs*)
* Share the spares and share costs
You pair up with someone with exact same car make/model
One of you buys set of belts - other buys set of hoses etc
this drops costs quite a lot and saves space for both parties.
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we have two two spares so is good two gerry cans of fuel but how much water do we take ??
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we have two two spares so is good two gerry cans of fuel but how much water do we take ??
I'd be starting with 5lts per person per day give or take abit!
ymmv
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Well I had some spare time today so played around with the roof rack config, I have held off on the rear bar till now as once I had all the gear I wanted to see how the puzzle went together.
Pics are best ...
The roof rack was to small in length for the RV4 so I had to sit up on the front and back rails ..this worried me about bending the frame of the tent so I placed the 2 sets of malle tracks underneath , a perfect fit and it supports the tent along its length, just need to put some board over the top so the spikes dont rub a hole in tent bag.
My early calcs have me about 95KGs on roof for the most part of the trip and a whopping 170KG for the first day in the desert. (80ltrs fuel)
I long ago accepted that I would be over the weight on day 1 of the crossing, although this is not good it is something that I have decided to manage. This means the roof rack will not be overloaded on the corrugations or for any part of the trip except day 1 of the x-ing and after the first hour of driving the weight can start to be brought down. Given the lower speeds and soft sand I think this will be just fine.
So we have
RV4
2 x sets mallee tracks
spare wheel
tool box
3 x swags
thunderbox and shelter
4 x jerry cans
tool box is back of roof rack, and 2 x jerrys are not in the holder in pic (the black hole)
Jet ;D
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Theo.
you have no more room in your trailer after all that fire wood you took home ;D
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Theo.
you have no more room in your trailer after all that fire wood you took home ;D
I should have brought the 8 teenagers who loaded it for me home.. it took a lot longer to get it all out ...LOL ;D ;D ;D ;D
jet :D
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looks like your all set there Jet :cheers:
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Good idea to support the Oztent, I have read they bend if unsupported.
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Theo,
as an interested observer, where are you thinking of storing your water and how much do you think you will need to carry ?
MarkVS
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Theo,
as an interested observer, where are you thinking of storing your water and how much do you think you will need to carry ?
MarkVS
I have this mate
http://www.dolium.com.au/Retail_Catalogue/WTP40FW_item.html?ref_cat_id=Water_(Poly)
used it at cape york and it was perfect .
Prob 10ltrs of water in bottles also
I will enter the desert with 50ltrs of water
Jet ;D ;D
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i did the simpson solo and started with 92L.......probaly used 20L of three days 2A 1C
travelling solo you lean towards carrying a bit more i.e. 160L diesel but only used 75L
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Jet, I have a mate who like you has an Oztent, and experienced the same prob with it over hanging the end of his rack. He did a bit of looking into it, and had a fab shop cut the ends of his rack were he wanted it located, and had a boat roller fitted each end were it had been cut out, he now just places one end on the roller when putting on the rack, lifts the other end and slides it on, works awesome, and hasn't lost any space on his rack for remaining gear.
Food for thought.
Swanny
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Trying to guess how much fuel to take.
Patrol CRD that normally does 15lt/100 km. Guess 20lt/100 over 800 km (extra kms as a safety margin) so 160lt all up so I take 2 Jerries +1 to be safe = 3
What do you think?
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Jet, I have a mate who like you has an Oztent, and experienced the same prob with it over hanging the end of his rack. He did a bit of looking into it, and had a fab shop cut the ends of his rack were he wanted it located, and had a boat roller fitted each end were it had been cut out, he now just places one end on the roller when putting on the rack, lifts the other end and slides it on, works awesome, and hasn't lost any space on his rack for remaining gear.
Food for thought.
Swanny
this was Plan 1 but then when the malee trax fitted underneath I had 2 probs solved so will do that but who knows I'll change my mind 50 times before we leave LOL ;D ;D ;D ;D
Jet ;D ;D ;D
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Trying to guess how much fuel to take.
Patrol CRD that normally does 15lt/100 km. Guess 20lt/100 over 800 km (extra kms as a safety margin) so 160lt all up so I take 2 Jerries +1 to be safe = 3
What do you think?
Sounds good mate, I will take 80ltrs +140 onboard = 220ltrs I dont want to stress and just in-case we need to tow or go back ect extra capability is a must IMHO
Jet ;D ;D
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I think I will take 4 jerrys+90 on board=170 litres. Water about 80 litres.
Wayne
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I dont think Ill bother taking any fuel, ill be the person who has turned up ridiculously under prepared so you are all so shocked you all have to ration out your fuel to me ;D
Or Ill most likely have 185 ltrs all up! Im not sure how much water yet but ill have enough to not have to drink my own urine hopefully.
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May I suggest that everyone buy a hessian bag of firewood and bring it along. Say the green coffee bean bag size. That's what we did on our previous trip and worked a treat. Taswegians are exempted of course, until they get across the border. Saves looking for wood. IMO
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Just as an update for everyone I will be towing a camper trailer for this trip...WHY you ask..
We decided some months ago to make this trip 4-6 weeks seeing as we will out all that way and the amount of gear required (clothes /food ect to do that means I have been pushing the limits of the payload for my roof rack / car. ( even made lightweight jerry holders ect in an attempt to get sense of reasonableness )
So I was faced with 2 choices
1, overload the roof rack and the car badly and enjoy the freedom of not towing.
2, tow a trailer and have all the limits safely in hand plus enjoy the comfort and flexibility of a hard floor trailer.
So after lots of reading and speaking with people who have done the trip I have decided that option 2 is a clear winner. Had we only been doing the simmo x-ing then no issues but the extra 4 weeks certainly blew my payloads and amount of equip out of the park.
With correct tyre pressures , 4.7ltrs of V8 all required recovery gear and alot of common sense I am comfortable that the trip is in hand, obv I will be self sufficient in this regard as i do not believe it fair to expect others to be my personal recovery vehicle just so i can tow a trailer.
Just though i would keep you all informed. ;D ;D ;D
Jet ;D ;D ;D
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Is that your gal trailer your taking mate ???
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Is that your gal trailer your taking mate ???
No mate it will be a hard floor camper ;D ;D but not one you think I can't have that one ... :'( :'( :'(
Jet ;D ;D
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Bummer :-\
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I come back last week from an east west crossing from Melbourne, 2 cars, 5 people, 3 adults in 150 diesel prado and 2 in dual cab triton. 5000 Kay's in 13 days, dirt from swan hill back to mildura not including main streets. Swags as accommodation.
I have done heaps of 4x4ing in the past 15 years on the east coast and high country but I learnt a lot.
We did a bit of damage to both cars which I put down to bad luck rather than bad driving or bad preperation. It happens so worth being prepared.
Prado- battery isolator died at poepel corner and dent in guard after falling in a very big hole on a side slope on the WAA after going over dune with no visibility.
Triton - slab of beer fell out of tailgate on big red and was run over backing back down :-[ (most were saved due to the soft sand)broken canopy window when fridge become unlocked and slid into window, and ironman bullbar crush can fractured in half.
What would I do the same or different -
-We had 6 x 15 litre bladders for water, worked well and didn't take up any room when empty.
-Lined the full back of the car including windows with corflute to stop damage and cut down on rubbing on the plastic.
-we checked over the car each day including things like battery bolts, but still had a couple vibrate out of the bullbar wings.
- I should have taken a warmer sleeping bag even though it was 35 plus each day. Still pretty cold most nights.
- better dividers in the storage in the back even though we have drawers, everything was shaken like we had just thrown it in anyway.
Great trip and planning to go back ASAP.
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Carton of beer falling out the back
That is not meerley inconvenient that is an emergency and the RFDS should have been called to fly another one in
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We only bought the slab in Birdsville, It had been in the car less than an hour. The cans with pin holes were safely debeered :cheers:so they would not leak in the car.
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Hey guys,
I have a heap of suggestions, however will limit it to one for now.
Before you go, jump on eBay and buy some bulk paper plates, and even bowls.
When your out in the desert, the joy of not wasting your water on large amounts of washing, AND not having to wash (much) is very satisfying.
G
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Great idea with the paper plates, we did and even then did use them much as we planed dinners that didn't need plates like Sausage Sambos, steak Sambos. So one paper plate, butter the bread blah blah.
Get some of those high-gene wipes as well. While I know this is not every ones cup of tea, we didn't shower for five days while doing the crossing. We all stunk together. It was to much fun to care but we did wipe ourselves each day and change undies and shirts. Anyway, we only used 25ltrs of water over the 5 days.
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There was a total ban on wood fires last year in the Witjira NP, and I think it's still current(might want to check), which covers Dalhousie Springs and Purni Bore.
You could have solid fuel fires in portable firepits/braziers etc... though. Maybe one of you could take one? or you could just have group snuggle time there...for warmth of course ;D
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Jealous I'm not coming, but you guys will have a ball, having done the trip twice both times in July, in the last two years, (once successfully) I can share some info.
In my prado d4d I used 90 something litres of fuel crossing, fully loaded, taking all tracks in all the way down to the rig road.
My mate in his 06 3 l diesel navara d22 also used about 90l. He has chip and exhaust mod.
We made no effort to conserve fuel. And played on big red for a while.
We went west to east. I had a puncture only 50 k out of mt dare, and the tyre was destroyed. Finished the trip with no spares. In future I would carry a carcass.
Have fun.
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We went west to east. I had a puncture only 50 k out of mt dare, and the tyre was destroyed. Finished the trip with no spares. In future I would carry a carcass.
Have fun.
Just for clarification as I'm doing this in July. Did you only carry one spare? Would you carry one spare and a carcas next time or what. Thanks in advance.
KB
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Sorry KB, my post is a bit ambiguous.
I only carried the one spare, plus of course a repair kit.
We made it through to birdsville no problems, where I was able to purchase a new coopers. ( I think it was gold lined) which then matched none of my tyres, and on my return to Melbourne I traded it for a matching tyre. So all in all no harm done. But having a matching carcass would have saved me a lot of stuffing round.
If I'd had a spare carcass at least I could have continued on after the puncture, and if necessary changed it on the way, or even just had it fitted in birdsville. Or I'd have had the choice of returning to mt dare for fitting, knowing I had the tyre. ( no guarantee they would have had a 17 " in stock)
On top of this the drive from mt dare to Dalhousie has one of the worst roads you will find anywhere. So my feeling was that re- doing the drive was not a good option.
I also knew that my mates d22 spare would fit on the back of the prado.
I guess there's no right or wrong answer, just my thoughts on it.
Either way mate, it's just an awesome trip.
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Thanks for the info. I will be carrying two full spares plus a plug kit plus a tube so am hoping to be OK
KB
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Solar - I'll be running a 40ltr Engel with second 120AH deep cycle battery, am I right to think that I wont need a geni or solar given our vehicles are on the move daily, whether we're exploring or moving onto our next camp?
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I guess we should plan for the unexpected, we'll have solar.
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Cp,
I will have solar on board , nothing worse than being stuck without a fridge lol :cheers:
"Sorry sir 3 days till we can come get you" I would be having a good 3 days :cheers: :cheers: :cheers: :cheers: :cheers:
Jet ;D
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Ok as you can see my plans have changed yet again as Lara can't come along and Coey was in a possibly same situation so we took the radical idea to leave the wife's and kids at home an do a boys run 2 up in the crusier.
I am little worried with just how quick Lara was so approve it, there must be something i don't know about ..this normally involves a furniture purchase that will radically appear upon my return .LOL
Jet ;D ;D
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Ok as you can see my plans have changed yet again as Lara can't come along and Coey was in a possibly same situation so we took the radical idea to leave the wife's and kids at home an do a boys run 2 up in the crusier.
I am little worried with just how quick Lara was so approve it, there must be something i don't know about ..this normally involves a furniture purchase that will radically appear upon my return .LOL
Jet ;D ;D
Along with this theme Marcus73 and myself are seriously considering the same idea.
We will most likely bring Marcus's Prado so we will need to bring a trailer to carry all the necessary spares, oh and our double door fridge and genny ;)
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I am little worried with just how quick Lara was so approve it, there must be something i don't know about ..this normally involves a furniture purchase that will radically appear upon my return .LOL
This sounds a little familiar
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Along with this theme Marcus73 and myself are seriously considering the same idea.
We will most likely bring Marcus's Prado so we will need to bring a trailer to carry all the necessary spares, oh and our double door fridge and genny ;)
awesome ..this will mean coey and I will have friends to play with in the big sand pit ;D ;D ;D ;D
Jet :D