Australia Aug-Oct 2008

Julimar State Forest northeast of Perth, time for a BBQ

Julimar State Forest, same spot.

Julimar State Forest again, a different day, with a mate, so more food...

After running crossplies (Toyo) for many years, I figured it was time to give radials a try again. So, off to the local tyre place and picked up some Cooper STT's in 235/85/16 size and they just happened to have 5 land cruiser rims that they had had the offset changed. The original guy that ordered didn't want them so they had been sitting there. Perfect opportunity to move to a 6" (versus my old 5.5") rims and retain the split rim construction that I so much love. The offset rims increased the track of the old MQ by several inches overall. Much better stability on the road, bit better offroad stability when not on the level any more. Combined with the new tyres the old MQ rides real nice on the pavement - much improved stability at speed.

Julimar State Forest again, just playing around.

Julimar State Forest still, a few creek crosses to enjoy.

Video clip of driving through the 'puddle':

Julimar State Forest - checking out the awesome articulation. Amazing that the thing can articulate at all given the heavy duty spring packs that are on there.

Reasonably tucked in driver's side wheel. Nice to know that even with the offset rims the tyre doesn't scrub the fender.

And the passenger side wheel at full droop - the tyre is not touching the ground...

Julimar State Forest - a few tiny termite mounds.

Julimar State Forest - can't resist cracking one open :)

State Forest south of The Lakes and east of Mundaring. Bit of a swamp crossing. Got a couple of metres in and tried reversing - stuck. Locked both the front & rear and I could reverse easily, so figured what the heck, give it a go. I had packed shorts and sandals in case I would have to go 'walking' to find something to winch against. No idea how far the other side was since the track wound its way through the scrub, so just drove in.

Fortunately the bottom wasn't bottomless and the tyres seemed happy to grab and I got to the other side - nearly...

After driving through the water/mud I got to this side and this is where I got stuck for a bit. Really amusing since the ground wasn't boggy (well not much), but it was slick as... A few back & forths to get some momentum and off I went again.

The path left after escaping from this part of the swamp. Without difflocks f/r this would have been a very messy extrication process!

So, I'm with 10 metres of being through and on HARD LEVEL ground and all I can claim here is temporary insanity and some large magnetic influence because the old MQ decided to get off the hard stuff and slide gently into the mud. I tried to reverse and it dug/slid some more. Tried to go forward and it dug/slid some more. Hmm... time to hook up the winch to a tree to keep it sliding any further.

Winch hooked up and a bit of tension applied. As you can see I have to enter/exit the vehicle from the passenger side. I stuck a stick in where the driver's side wheel was and that mud was bottomless/deep. Enough to roll the vehicle if it wasn't sitting on the diffs, see next picture.

The right scrape is the passenger side tyres (f/r diffs locked) pulling the vehicle forward along with the winch. The left scrape mark is from the front & rear diff housings scraping along the ground. Just lucked out here that the MQ has both front & rear diff housing offset to the driver's side.

Safely out of the swamp and found a nice spot to have a BBQ. Can't go out on a day trip without a BBQ!