Rod and Mavis

Greetings Peter and Tracy We have a 2002 model TD Turbo auto cruiser (only 4 speed) that we downgraded from a 3L 2000 model Patrol through necessity. The 3l 2000 model blew the engine at 150,000 k's as they did but was a great tow vehicle. Our van was purchased in 2005 and was sold by Kedron as a van suited the 3L Nissan the Prado and the Pajaro (autos). When we picked it up it was very marginal at 2340 kg's net being that the vehicles were only rated at 2500kg's. Due to further mods later on our van (extra water tanks solar panels and other necessary weight increases) it was decided to "upgrade to a vehicle that was rated at a legal weight" (100 series auto IFS front end). The so-called upgrade was a disappointment for us. The towing ability of this machine was quite inferior to the Nissan. In fairness I think this was my fault in not getting a 5 speed later model, because the performance as stated by the owners of these later beasties is purported to be supremely better than ours. The lack luster performance was checked on the dyno at AAMS and confirmed to be at rated manufacturer output. So as you do when not happy we decided to have a 3" exhaust fitted. This mod made a massive difference to the torque and general pulling power. But as you do when not happy we decided that a chip needed to be installed as well so went ahead at a later date and had AMMS install a chip that was tuned on the DYNO for towing performance and economy. Again a big improvement. Unfortunately still not happy Jan. Waiting for the new V6/V8 Renault Nissan to come out and will take it from there due to the not great stats on the 200 Toyota. This should cause some input grin.

Greetings Carl. Without being a smarty,I would honestly suggest a good professional have a go at it. You need the correct tooling for the replacement of terminals in the leads to ensure a good job. You may even need to replace the plug and socket to get a proper connection. Regards. Mavis and Rod. :thumbsup:

Wow what a nightmare story So glad it turned out for you both. Regards. Mavis and Rod

Sue Darryl and Mitch. Sad news indeed. Llikewise we have enjoyed your company on the times that we have caught up with you all. All the best Mate, Mrs Mate and Little Mate. :thumbsup:

Greetings Ian I myself have carried out stability studys on my 16"6' cross Country and can catagorically state that all sembalance of stability is completely lost upon losing a wheel from the van. To this point, I have only experimented with the loss of the left hand rear wheel at 80 kilometers per hour in Kakadu. This resulted in an uncontrolable sway that could not be corrected with the manual activation of the brake controller. Suffice to say that all ended well,with the car and van slowed under compression. Another good point was that the brake drum did not touch the ground. Joking aside. I put this down to the lack of maintenance checking on my part (lesson learn't). I had rotated the wheels before leaving Brisbane and had not re checked them since. I come to this conclusion by the fact that all of the wheel studs had broken off flush with the drum,indicating that the wheel had been loose for some time and weakend the studs before separating. We managed to scrounge 5 old studs and nuts from the maintenance staff at Yellow water and fit them to the drum with a spare wheel. When we reached Darwin we purchased a new wheel and tyre ( the wheel was never found) and 6 spare studs and nuts. Hope this info is useful to all. Mavis and Rod :thumbsup:

Hi Bruce and Sue. Sounds like your Dometic was not installed incorrectly! The installation manual for both Dometic and Webasto states that the inlet and exhaust must be (outlet and inlet) facing downward for drainage and to prevent the accumulation of foreign bodies within the duct. This means that the whole duct must slope down from the body of the heater to the outlet and outlet with no low traps for accumulation of debris. Must say that with the Webasto that I installed I have now installed blanks for dirty conditions to the ducts since hearing of your problems. Thanks for your info guy's hope it saves some of us from expensive fixes that could have been avoided with a little knowledge. Hope to see ya on the road and Best Regards and happy travels. Mavis and Rod.

Likewise Rosco. Our switch was completely worn out at just under 3 years. A good idea to do regular complete inspections of the entire van and components. Mavis and Rod.

Gday Lea and Rick. They are great arn't they, we have a blue one. It does struggle a little up the range to Toowoomba though. Soooo glad we opted for the 1.6 liter monster donk :thumbsup: Mavis and Rod :biggrin:

NONONO don't tell anyone Rosco old buddy old pal spose you could wisper to me and dispose of all your other travelling companions that you were there with :thumbsup: . Rod oh and Mavis.

Greetings Guy's I have changed van wheels successfully with both the standard Nissan Jack and the standard 100 series jack. Also carry a couple of squares of thick ply as a base on soft ground. Have found that the plastic ramps that I use to level the van are handy to run the flat wheel up onto to get some height before jacking (saves a lot of winding, same with the car in soft stuff :thumbsup: Don't see a need to carry any more gear than that it works for us :smile:. Best regards. Mavis and Rod.

Thanks for the direction King. Regards to Deb from both of us oh and to your good self as well. :thumbsup: Mavis and Rod.

Greetings Bruce and Sue We have just done the first trip with our Hema and it is brilliant. The street program was invaluable navigating around the art galleries and attractions at Broken Hill. The Hema maps were easy to read and follow. If you have Ozexplorer you will find route planning easy, if not it dosn't take long to learn. It came with all hema off road maps pre loaded and was superb to use. Good luck deciding. Mavis and Rod :thumbsup:

Greetings Gordon and Chris. Mavis and I have just returned from doing part of the Darling Run on dirt from Eulo to Menindee. We ran 30psi in the van and had no problems.(our little van would be a tad lighter than yours though :smile: ) Not so successful with car tyres though. Blew two one cooper (staked) and the never used dunlop spare lasted about 50km before a major blowout staked again on the run from Comeroo Camel Station to Bourke ouch bit pricey replacing them. We did learn a valuable lesson about tyre plug kits DON'T USE CHEAP ONES. If it hadn't been for our travelling companions Ivan and Gloria one of us would have been walking to Bourke. We had a plug repair kit but a cheap version with plastic handles. The handle broke while trying to insert the plug, narrowly avoiding hand damage. Ivan and Gloria had a pearler of a kit with solid alloy handles that could handle the pressure no problem and the repair was effected to get us to Bourke. Good luck with your travels and hope to see ya soon. Mavis and Rod. P.S. anyone know where to aquire a decent plug kit :helpsmilie:

Stop bragging you two Would love to be there with you but we are drying out after the DAM trip and Killkivan grin. Mavis and Rod :biggrin:

Greetings Bruce and Sue. We lost a rear window in the west on our big trip. In trying to avoid the same again we/I purchase a polycarbonate protector for too much money only to find that the supplied mounting gear was completely inadquate requiring a lot of modification to work. I know this dosn't help you too much but please be aware that not all available products are good. Good luck and we hope someone comes up with the goods for you. Regards. Mavis and Rod

To all that have known Johns Landing on the Noosa River near Tawantin,it is now a place to avoid. Mavis and I went there on a recon trip to find a good place to do some kayaking. We had camped there many times in the past but havn't been there for years. All you read on the net is true and much more. It is infested with permenants. People living under tarps and in old tents and vans. They are living right down to the river. There have been permenants there for years but they were out of the way and camped near the amenities now there is no where left to camp. This used to be the ideal family camp with the river at the door step and access to great fishing swimming and crabbing. Seriously sad to see. :sad:

LcParkmap.pdf Greeting fellow Kedroners. Just had to drop a few lines about our last weekend on Land Cruiser Mountain Park 16/01.09. http://www.landcruisermountainpark.com.au/ For those that are not familiar LCMP is a large cattle property devoted also to the FWD enthusiast with about 200kms of off road tracks with varying degrees of difficulty from tame to insane. Check out the attached map. We were invited to have the weekend there by Rod's work colleagues and enthusiastically agreed as it was 2000 the last time that were there with a new Nissan Patrol with only 500kms on the clock and a large tent with heaps of enthusiasm. This time was with the Landcruiser with ARB suspension mods and AMMS 3" exhaust and the 16'6 XC with heaps of enthusiasm. At least now there are hot showers and flush toilets in the good camp areas. The place was all but deserted for this weekend so finding a prime camp spot was not difficult. What a great weekend although it was expensive with the park fees ($101 for Friday Saturday and check out lateish Sunday and a new tire on the van as we staked one on the way in groan). Gotta watch those tire pressures still had road pressure, which invited disaster and found it. For those of you with Dunlop AT2’s keep em rotated as they are now obsolete and we just got the last one in Queensland. Ours came with the 2005 vintage XC. We purchased a $5 bag of wood on the way there to compliment our normal drawbar stocks as we had heard that it was scarce for collection on site. Not so. On the Friday that we arrived we found logs a plenty although we had to chain drag one for a couple of K's back to camp through two creek crossings before parking it across the fire grin. It dried out just fine and lasted the whole weekend, providing coals aplenty for the extended fivesies, camp oven and the Milo and sultana dampers for the dozen or so kids that were there.(Mavis is a dab hand assisting kids with the Milo and sultana damper making). Must sign off now hope you are all well and happy with your lot. :thumbsup: Regards. Rod and Mavis.

Thanks for the entertaining read you guy's Grin Rod and Mavis

Sorry Webby just posted the same yummy item :sad:

Greetings all. Have this great desert that is soooo easy as long as you have power for the micky wave and a coffee mug,oh and some custard or cream if the diet allows :biggrin: . 5 Minute Chocoløte Mud Cake you'll need.... 4 Tablespoons cake flour 4 Tablespoons sugar 2 Tablespoons cocoa 1 Egg 3 Tablespoons milk 3 Tablespoons oil 3 Tablespoons chocolate drops (optional) 1 Mug here's what you do.... Add dry ingredients to the mug, and mix well. Crack an egg and add it to your mug. Be sure to mix it well to avoid any pockets of flour in the corners. Pour in the milk and oil and mix well. Add the chocolate drops if you've got them, and a splash of vanilla essence too. Pop your mug into the microwave & zap for 3 minutes on maximum power (1000watt). Wait until the cake stops rising, and sets in the mug. If necessary, run a knife around the sides of the mug, and tip the still warm cake out of the mug and onto a saucer. Sit back and enjoy with a coffee - you deserve it! this works a treat.

G-day Gordo & Chris No answers from me/us for your question soooo sorry :confused: but many thanks to Webby and Mark for the great info supplied by them :thumbsup: Regards. Rod and Mavis.

Yes know about the rebate that accounts for the $600 differance to the price of the chip. The gas cost after rebate is about $2000. Rod

Greetings. Did some serious thinking about fitting a chip,having been sorley dissapointed with the performance of the 100 series TD beasty towing our caravan. We ended up fitting a 3 inch exhaust,which made a massive difference to the performance. The next for us looks like the Diesel/Gas conversion.Its about $600 more than the chip but from my research is a much better option with far better benefits for the engine, performance wise, economy wise and for engine longevity. Have a talk to AMMS Sandgate they do Gas, chips and exhausts with a Dyno to tune whatever you decide to install. Good bunch of blokes but do your research for goodness sake.(That is if you are in Brisbane) Have a look at http://www.dieselgasaustralia.com.au/ it gives a good explanation of the conversion and benefits,with links to some good info. The jury is still out at the moment on the gas but the chip is not on the horizon for us. Regards. Rod and Mavis

G-day Ian & Robyn We also have a "Baby Q 120" this one has the fold out tables on each end (very handy) we find it perfect for us. We don't have a BBQ cupboard built into the van so we use a "Redback" Accessory table that attaches to the side of the van at front or back where we had bayonet gas fittings installed by Mark Lewis [matabeem@bigpond.com] Tel: Brisbane 3285 4664 a fellow Kedroner.It is a great set up for us and as previously stated roasts and bbq's to perfection. Good luck. Rod and Mavis.

Hi all We have done the deed and had the suspension upgrade done by ARB Southside Brisbane last Tuesday. Gotta say WOW. Took the machine for a run today with full normal load and 4 adults up to the Sunshine coast. Did about 350 kilometers through the hills. Can't believe the difference it now goes where it is pointed and sits beautifully on the road. All we now need to do is see how the 3 inch exhaust mod has effected the pulling power with the van hooked up. Will be setting up the hitch tomorrow because the car now sits at a standard height with the permanent loads that we carry. Thanks heaps to those that recommended Southside ARB.