Driving across Australia, What supplies/spare parts ?

Yeah I'm getting struts and springs before I go, got the weight down to 410+ SWMBO and me
 
Looks like awesome stuff! Gonna get me some!
 
Aids to Survival

The document is available as a PDF file from the WA Police Training Academy here:

www.police.wa.gov.au/Portals/11/PDFs/AidsToSurival_2007.pdf

and it has been discussed here:

https://www.offroadsubarus.com/showthread.php?t=3214

The WA Police had given out about 380,000 copies of this booklet by 2007.

It is supposed to be freely available at any WA Police station ...
It is free if you are in WA ...

It might be best to ring the WA Police Academy to find out where it is actually available.

As I said in my thread quoted above:

When on your own, always proceed with extreme caution. You are not gutless if you turn back; you are being wise. There are no medals for becoming a corpse ...
 
that rescue tape is awesome. don't have any but my mates i usually travel with do, great stuff.

Which brings up another point twinklz, when I usually do a longer trip my partner and i go with her father and sometimes brother. We split the load between the two cars, putting more of the heavy stuff in his pajero. If your traveling with a couple of people it could be worth working out what to carry together. I mean there isn't much point carrying a big donkey tool box if someone else already is, it's better just carrying the specialized tools for your car, like a few knuckles to get to the dam spark plugs without taking half the crap out of the engine bay. I still can't believe a lot of people i meet don't have any!

The little ej20 performs a great deal better with less weight in it...not great still but better haha.
 
Yeah, Will be splitting the load between a heavily modded falcon wagon and an outback, considering I'll only have the room behind my back seat (getting my cargo barrier installed so I can stack up high mind you) and the roof, I'll probably be the least laden simply due to room,but I shall be doing as many mods as possible to eke out more power from the engine
 
Loads....

If at all possible do not overload your Forester excessively.
Cracks may appear inside the rear wheel arches caused by the weight in the back of the car making the floor sink and the strut towers lean inwards.
The two halves of the rear wheel arch may start to separate under these conditions as they seem to be only spot welded.
You can make a bar to bridge from the two strut towers which will run just behind the rear seat which keeps the towers from leaning inwards and weld along the spot welded join.
Keep an eye on this area and watch for excessive dust getting into the rear of the car.
You will probably be carrying a second tyre and rim, maybe 20 or 40 litres of extra fuel, 20 litres of water, perhaps a fridge and second battery, all of which add up on top of your camping gear, any external mods you may do such as bull bar, rear bar, clothes, food, shovel etc etc etc...............
 
Gidday Ateday

A warm :welcome: to the ORS forum, and its loony crew, mate ... :rotfl:.

Good advice. One of the things Subaru did (big time) in the series I SG was to strengthen the frame. Did more of this in the series II SG, and more again in the SH.

Weight distribution and amount is one reason why trailer touring can be a better bet. That load is carried on the trailer axle (usually far stronger than the car stub axles - mine is rated at around 2 tonnes, IIRC, and the trailer can only legally weigh 750 Kgs all up). The trailer wheel bearings are also far stronger than the car bearings. So are the trailer springs. The springs on my trailer are "light weight", but are still rated at around 600 Kgs each!

The GVM for my SG II is only 1950 Kgs total, with a maximum of 1035 Kgs of that on the back axle when towing a trailer. Maximum ball weight for my car is 75 Kgs. I will try to keep that at around 40-50 Kgs.

As the unladen car weighs 1380 Kgs, it indicates a maximum added load of about 550 Kgs. Two people at 75 Kgs each is 150 Kgs of that. Each 20L steel Jerry can weighs about 21 Kgs ... etc.

Single axle trailers are generally very light, and even with a trailer tent fitted they have very little effect on the driving characteristics of the car. My 7x4 trailer with a steel lid and 6x4 trailer tent that is bigger than some bed sit flats I have been in when set up, still only weighs around 300 Kgs. Add in 60 Kgs for extra fuel and water, another 20 Kgs for gas bottles, around 100 Kgs for other crap (like my spares, tools, creeper winch, compressor, roof rack - yes, it normally travels in my trailer, not on the roof bars!), and the whole lot is still only around 500 Kgs.
Don't even notice it being there most of the time! Sure takes a lot of load off the car's springs and frame. With any box trailer, there is almost zero drag as long as it isn't empty. When empty, they act like a parachute behind the car unless one removes the rear gate ... :iconwink:.
 
Ratbag said:
Single axle trailers are generally very light, and even with a trailer tent fitted they have very little effect on the driving characteristics of the car.
Click to expand...

Haha, all us SF owners wish we had your engine lol :rotfl:

RB has a good point, I wonder if a little 6x4' trailer is an option for you? It will make it harder to tow but perhaps the Falcon could tow it, would barely be noticed behind that lol. You could all dump your heavy stuff in it, would make it easier for all.

ateday has a point too, not just about the strut towers. By loading up the rear like that, you are risking a bent strut on ruts & bumps. Even if you get new OEM struts (OEM have a stronger sidewall than aftermarket, even though both are KYB), its still a risk. There have been a few members who suffered this & it tends to happen in the middle of nowhere :(
 
Ok, so I need to look into strut tower braces and weight distribution?
Trailer isn't an option at all, but I will try do keep the weight down, with all new struts and springs, I should be ok right?
 
The strut brace increases torsional rigidity & reduces the risk of weakening the welds on the strut towers but it wont do anything to reduce the risk of bending a strut. The only way to do that with off the shelf struts is keep the weight down & not hit bumps too hard.

The other option is coilovers or custom struts, where they pull apart your struts, weld in extra strengthening & put in inserts such as Koni, Bilstein or Monroe. This as you can imagine is expensive but the upside is strong struts that are rebuildable. Another big upside is you can use longer inserts to increase strut travel :biggrin:
 
Thanks for the welcome. I`ve been visiting a bit in the past.
Yep I`ve bent a rear strut, driver`s side.
Also need to strengthen my rear wheel arches too as the passenger`s side is showing signs of opening. Only a mm or so at present but won`t fix itself.
I guess the result of a Cape York and two Simpson crossings as well as the Old Ghan Track and 305000 kms on the clock.
Despite all this the car is still fairly tight and, almost, rattle free.
 
Gidday NL

NachaLuva said:
Haha, all us SF owners wish we had your engine lol :rotfl:
Click to expand...

Mate, I have towed this trailer behind No.1 Colt (1400 cc engine in a tiny car that weighed about 950 Kgs); No.2 Colt (1600 cc engine, but without the LR in the first Colt); Roo1 ('93 Impreza with the EJ-18 and weighing in at 1145 Kgs). All with the trailer packed to the gills, and beyond ... They all towed it OK.

Of course, Roo2 goes like the clappers (relatively speaking ... ), with or without the trailer, and whether the trailer is fully loaded, or not ... :biggrin:.

You're right, Roo2 has a ripper of an engine in it. BUT that doesn't mean that the SF is even going to notice a 6x4 trailer behind it. What will make mine 140 Kgs heavier than "normal" is the trailer tent. The existing steel framed and clad lid also weighs around 50 Kgs.

The only time that No.1 Colt had difficulty was when the trailer had around 1.5 tonnes of sand in it ... I was very glad that I only had to tow it about a kilometre, with my hazard lights flashing and at around 20-30 Km/h.

RB has a good point, I wonder if a little 6x4' trailer is an option for you? It will make it harder to tow but perhaps the Falcon could tow it, would barely be noticed behind that lol. You could all dump your heavy stuff in it, would make it easier for all.
Click to expand...

IMHO, this is the way to go. But it should not even slow an SF down towing it. Just keep the weight in both car and trailer sensible.

ateday has a point too, not just about the strut towers. By loading up the rear like that, you are risking a bent strut on ruts & bumps. Even if you get new OEM struts (OEM have a stronger sidewall than aftermarket, even though both are KYB), its still a risk. There have been a few members who suffered this & it tends to happen in the middle of nowhere :(
Click to expand...

The moral of this story is: Don't overload your car!!

Doing this kind of modification gets pretty expensive, and pretty darn quickly!
 
If you want more power for touring go with an Ej25 and do the swap I did, minus the rebuild.
I have a spare semi rebuilt EJ25 sitting in my shed.
The 2.0l will struggle load up, I know from experience! If you upgradedthe engine you could practically tow anything you wanted.
 
If you posted a list of everything that you were planning on bringing we might be able to help you decide whats not essential and save you some weight. While it is nice to have every medical supply and a spare part for everything some things can be repaired with other items and other things are so unlikely to go wrong they aren't worth considering. Hopefully we won't have too many things to add to the list.
But I don't expect you to have a complete list just yet, so only when your ready.
 
Hey Red

That's an uncommonly sensible suggestion ... :iconwink:

From my Batphone
 
I've actually bought a liberty that I'm going to be taking the EJ22 out of and getting machined out to 2.3 Litres, and rebuilding as I have time, will also be getting another gearbox and rebuilding it as well, after some deliberation I've decided that I'll keep my weight to 350+ SWMBO and myself, I think I'll be able to manage that, what do you guys think?
 
I would have thought an EJ25 would have been better and cheaper than creating EJ23?
350Kg + SWMBO Kg + Twinklz Kg sounds sensible ... to me.
 
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