Canning Stock Route July 2013

[Mark from Brisbane Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Mark from Brisbane]

More Dune shots






Many of you reading this are probably avid hard core 4WDers and perhaps want "getting bogged shots"....well we never got bogged once...we take things easy, breeze over the dunes "tractor mode" (2nd high did it most times and only very occasionally did I have have to flick it down to 1st).....just ease up and gentle over the top....not much bouncing, nice and steady as you go.....the way I do it anyway and it works!!

[Mark from Brisbane Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Mark from Brisbane]

Oh, wow - but I have to ask the question as well, was your UHF set to scan as well?

Talking with our Car Club's UHF guru (and on my WaveLan experience) running a 6db aerial or lower (3 or 2.1db) would give better coverage, though the 3 or the 2.1db allows for hills and the like. See below for an illustration.

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That being said, I don't know what the stock UHF configs are, but our Car Club on the GME radios limits talk time to 40 Seconds with the programming.

I wasn't there so I can't judge on what happened, but that Tag Along sounds unprofessional to me - if they wanted to do UHF Talkaround and there was only one leader, then he should have 2 UHF's or at least a handheld for talkaround.

Good thing that you were quick on the reactions though, and no nasty outcomes from it!

To be honest no we were not scanning....as 40 was the "CSR UHF Channel"....everyone else was on that....I did start scanning from that moment BUT never heard another transmission for the entire trip on any other channel than 40.

Yes bloody lucky on the quick reaction (in fact one of my mates was 200 metres behind and said to me that he did not know how I missed the Patrol OR the two trees on the left hand side that I went between!!)

[Mark from Brisbane Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Mark from Brisbane]

Like most of you we loved the night time...the stars (always amazing), the moon (we did a whole cycle of the moon on our trip) and the camp fires...oh and the sunsets and sunrises.







Whilst on this firewood was never an issue BUT almost impossible to find around the popular camp spots, so collect after lunch on the track if you can.....we had many "bush camps" and usually picked an area where we could fit four in and that had wood BUT if you choose the popular wells make sure you collect earlier than your arrival.

[Mark from Brisbane Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Mark from Brisbane]

There were LOTS of these on the track



And a warning (if going early in the season) to have your Spinifex needs covered...we had done this but as we went through in July the track was pretty clear and it was uneeded.....but you can never be to careful can you!!

We did plenty of this (collect water)....never an issue although the quality was varied, the best being at Well 46



And had to get another Prado shot in didn't I??

[Mark from Brisbane Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Mark from Brisbane]

Well we did make it to the end, and Well 51 (the most dissapointing of the lot really)





And on to the Tanami (to Alice Springs) we go

[Mark from Brisbane Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Mark from Brisbane]

On the second section (Northern part) I used 122 Litres of Diesel at a rate per 100 Kms of 17.16....MUCH higher than the southern section but naturally so due to the Dunes.

Fuel at Bililuna was $2.60 a litre.

We didn't travel right to the end of the CSR (Halls Creek).....rather opted to turn right and head to Alice Springs.

****Some general stuff****

We all took two spares and never had any tyre damage on the CSR (3 Coopers were lost on the Donahue Highway between Tobermoray and Boulia later in the trip)

We all took spare front and rear shockies but never needed them (unlike many others we saw on the track).

None of us got any "damage" as such BUT three of us got LOTS and LOTS of bush pinstriping....my mate in the 100 series cruiser used "Panel Protect" and it worked a treat, he just peeled it off and his cruiser was almost scratch free.

The rest of my trip involved, the Tanami to Alice, the Plenty / Donahue to Boulia, 2 nights at the Diamantina National Park and then a relative "fast track" home (through 47 Million Roos / Emu's / Goats / Pigs / Foxes / Sheep and Cattle).

All up I did 10,238 Kms...from Brisbane to Brisbane.

We were away 6 weeks to the very day.

Total Fuel cost was a tad under $3000.

And we had about 10 nights in Cabins / Donga's and the rest bush camping.

We did have our wives with us so our best investment was to buy a "Jimmy's Thunderbox"....we have had this for three years and it's done three big trips, one of the guys who went with us in 2011 was a builder and made a frame for it to sit on......so dig a hole, put the frame over it, stick Jimmy's on, whiz up a privacy tent and bingo the girls are happy!!

Did I have fun????

YES, YES and YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSS SSSS

Would I do it again???

Probably not, if I lived in WA yes of course but it's a bloody long way to go for a 4WD trip.......but in saying that I have photo's (many of these plus all the others are yet to share theirs with me yet) and I do have several hours of Go Pro vision which I will work out how to use and post up here.....this will show you how bloody bad those corrugations are and how easy the dunes were.

I am very happy to answer any other questions and just hope some of you get some value and enjoyment from the trip report.

If you are thinking of doing the CSR don't delay just do it....I have a feeling some of the places you can visit now may soon be cut off, and it would be such a pity not to see it.

Lastlly a BIG thank you to "Trackcare WA" who do so much work on the CSR, your efforts are to be applauded.

[cfryback Find all posts View Profile Close cfryback]

I wasn't referring to you scanning UHF - but the other guy!

Awesome report!!

Trying to convince the Mrs to come (kids as well!) on adventure like this, as we have friends in Broome. And besides, I want to see the Red Dog Statue!

[Mark from Brisbane Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Mark from Brisbane]

I wasn't referring to you scanning UHF - but the other guy!

Awesome report!!

Trying to convince the Mrs to come (kids as well!) on adventure like this, as we have friends in Broome. And besides, I want to see the Red Dog Statue!

He reckons he was scanning!!

I reckon he had his crew on say 15 (so they could talk their heads off) and was probably scanning.....BUT was talking to them on each of the three occasions I broadcasted, after we turned back onto the CSR (after leaving a well) and before I met him at the corner.


Thats about the only reasoning I can think of why he did not hear us....it was way before the Dunes (early in the trip around Well 15-17) and in reasonably flat country (as we were going quickly to eleviate the corrugations).

I still shudder at the thought of the experience, beleive me there would have only been inches between us!!

[Mark from Brisbane Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Mark from Brisbane]

I wasn't referring to you scanning UHF - but the other guy!

Awesome report!!

Trying to convince the Mrs to come (kids as well!) on adventure like this, as we have friends in Broome. And besides, I want to see the Red Dog Statue!

The kids would love it.....we saw quite a few kids on the track, spoke to a few families and all were having a ball

[Jon Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close Jon]

Great report Mark

We also have hundreds of photos and a huge amount of GoPro footage.
The GoPro data was downloaded to a laptop every night; we then had a movie show over a few drinks which was well received.
Another member of our party made a slideshow of all the photos taken during the day, also great entertainment.
I will post some GoPro footage when I can work out how to do it...currently editing many gigs of data.

[Mark from Brisbane Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Mark from Brisbane]

Great report Mark

We also have hundreds of photos and a huge amount of GoPro footage.
The GoPro data was downloaded to a laptop every night; we then had a movie show over a few drinks which was well received.
Another member of our party made a slideshow of all the photos taken during the day, also great entertainment.
I will post some GoPro footage when I can work out how to do it...currently editing many gigs of data.

When you work out how to do it tell me and then we'll both know!!

Thanks for your pre trip tips on Go Pro.....I too have a fair bit of vision, only managed to collect about 60 Gigs of data and never had to download as I took two 32 Gig Memory Cards

My next challenge is working out how to edit it and put it into about a 5 or 6 minute clip......work in progress!!

[404pug Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close 404pug]

On the trip I was on the trip leader had, I think, 3 radios -one on 15, one on 40 and a back up so he was always able to hear 40 even if 15 was in use. In any event we were often too bloody busy to be on the radio on 15 chattering in those dodgy sections. Quite a few on the trip also had separate radios on 40- I had a hand held permanently on so plenty of us could hear oncoming. That said, I was quite happy not to be at the front in a lot of those parts. By the way , your dune technique is the same as mine-as slow as possible but in the petrol auto it had to be high range 1st. Worked well for the Simpson as well last year. Neil

[Mark from Brisbane Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Mark from Brisbane]

On the trip I was on the trip leader had, I think, 3 radios -one on 15, one on 40 and a back up so he was always able to hear 40 even if 15 was in use. In any event we were often too bloody busy to be on the radio on 15 chattering in those dodgy sections. Quite a few on the trip also had separate radios on 40- I had a hand held permanently on so plenty of us could hear oncoming. That said, I was quite happy not to be at the front in a lot of those parts. By the way , your dune technique is the same as mine-as slow as possible but in the petrol auto it had to be high range 1st. Worked well for the Simpson as well last year. Neil

Yes I would have thought as much, pretty dodgy I reckon...somewhere along the line.

We did the Simmo in 2011 and learnt a lot from that.....I think everyone thinks "charging up the hill flat strap" is the way to go, we found that way to rough and so what we call "tractor mode" works very well. My 150 Diesel has a heap of torque so I'd hold it in second high (and sometimes it shifted itself back to 1st...yes an auto) and do no more than 1500RPM......I think maybe one dune I thought "gee had better give it a bit more right foot" but for the bulk of the dunes this worked perfectly.

We went south to north so supposedly steeper than the other way.....to be honest I found the dunes easy, I think we were expecting Simmo heights and they were nothing like it.....all good fun BUT no where near as tough.

[404pug Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close 404pug]

I agree- the Simmo dunes were harder. I actually used low 3 or 2 on a few dunes there. In mine I usually used about 1800rpm in high first but the petrol has a heap of go from there for those few dunes where slow was too slow and a bit more oomph was needed.