Well, I took my 77 G60 flat tray on the trip. I went with a mate, Howard. He hadn't driven a manual for years but it all came back to him
I'm not sure if Howard knew what he as letting himself in for.... he really had been in the old Patrol for a few minutes some years ago.
Well for the last few months before the trip I put in a major effort to get all those things on my to-do list ticked off. I had hoped to get it ready a month or so before but I got COVID (really a non event) and problems finding a clutch. So I was still working on it right up to our departure time. Ideally you need to prove the vehicle's reliability for a few weeks before you go and not make any changes.
Well Day minus One. Driving from the farm where I store the Patrol to my house (to load up all our camping gear) all of a sudden it wouldn't idle! I've had this before so knew what to do. I pulled the carby apart an cleaned the idle jet. It 'sort of' fixed it but wouldn't idle properly. I ended up, out of desperation, screwed the idle screw in all the way had had it idling at 1,000 RPM. I left it like that for the entire trip.
Next day we headed off. I drove the first hour down a main highway. We turned into a secondary road and swapped drivers. Howard started driving and after about 5 complained something was wrong. I looked up and could see one of our wheels going ahead of us!! We pulled over. The wheel rolled slowly down the wrong side of road and went up an embankment. I was terrified that a car would come toward us and the wheel would injured/killed someone. I was lucky.
Within minutes three cars had pulled over (all from the Land Rover club), and the wheel was back on in no time
In reflection, I was messing around with the front brakes the day before. I pulled the wheel off, and the drum etc and must have put the wheel back on and taken it for a test but didn't remember to come back and tighten the wheel nuts!!
This is what a brake drum looks like after scraping along the road at 70kph. The free wheeling hub was destroyed. Lucky we didn't need 4WD for the trip!
IMG_9170.jpg
IMG_9171.jpg
The rest of the trip was uneventful
The car performed perfectly.
This is where we went.
IMG_9130.jpg
The first few day were wet and cold! After that it was just cold. My Patrol doesn't have a heater but just the engine heat meant the cab was warm enough.
A few shots of the trip.
IMG_9074.jpg
IMG_9080.jpg
IMG_9085.jpg
Most of the dirt roads were closed due to flooding and/or flood damage, so we ended up staying on sealed roads, which was a shame. There were a couple of places we couldn't get to.
IMG_9100.jpg
This is a shot of some of the 4WD that went on the trip. There were 50 cars and 70 people (ages 2 thru to 80).
IMG_9107.jpg
This was at a town called Hebel, just over the Queensland boarder. Population 60!
While there were so many cars, we didn't all go together in a convoy. You left when you wanted to, stopped when you needed and went at your own speed.
This is a shot of the flat landscape. You can see other 4WD in the background.
PART_1654390313574.JPEG
We visited a place just outside Lightning Ridge to have lunch. It was called Club in the Scrub. An interesting and rustic place.
IMG_9117.jpg
And finally a couple of shots of dirt roads.
PART_1654667774791.JPEG
IMG_9125.jpg
One last shot of a sunrise
Sunrise.jpg
Overall in the 12 days the G60 did 2500 kms, used about 400 lts of petrol (costing about $800) and used about 16lts/100kms. I didn't use any oil:)
We sat on about 80kms an hour in 5 gear (Marks gear box) and about 2000rpm.
Overall a great trip. I will definitely go on the next trip in two years time.
You do not have the required permissions to view the files attached to this post.
Not sure if I will get there.
Not sure if I will get back.
But I usually do!!!
