Sorry this has taken 6 months to get together, but here it is finally
So this is it I guess, a full rundown
PREPARATION began October 2002, for departure July 2003, Interior had to be modified from dodgy bed to seat 5 legally, full width bed sleep 3, reconstruct everything out of lighter materials, get everything working & increase storage capacity to hold everything for 4 people,
Mechanically everything was finely scrutinised, the 1800 replaced with a reco 2L the whole front suspension assembly replaced, brakes stuffed around with until better than most & all electricals working perfectly. A 12v Flourolight was permanently fitted in the engine bay. I never did get round to getting the heater demistor working, no time,
Gauges to monitor everything were fitted, fire extinguisher, electric fuel pump, & solenoid fuel cutoff , an invertor to run phone chargers Video camera Gameboy etc.
& a small 1000watt fan heater was purchased for the desert nights.
Water supply consisted of 22 litres in clear plastic jerry can in cupboard behind driver connected to sink tap, clean - & level constantly able to be monitored.
With one month to go, my only concern was a lower than normal engine vacuum reading, but it was not at critical level & I could find nothing wrong, it was also stable & unchanged on a few high speed, long distance test runs.
Tools were carefully selected, the minimum required to completely dismantle anything, except pullers. Added to this was tune up/diagnosis stuff such as timing light, multimeter etc
The only Kombi spares carried were a complete distributor & alternator.
A starter motor (our Kombi is Auto) was going to go but was removed at
The last moment due to size & weight & the fact that our starter was perfect…..In view of the slightly suss vacuum readings I was going to take my one useable 1800 head for emergency but did not have time to remove it from motor.
All other spares consisted of patch it type stuff like wire, rope, ducting tape, bluetack, epoxy etc until the spare tyre wheel well was full. I also took about 4 litres of HPR5 15-30 oil stashed everywhere in 600ml softdrink bottles. Tyres selected were 185 x 14 light truck due to the high gearing, narrow cross section & increased puncture resistance.
A lightweight bullbar was constructed out of bits.
By the time 4 people, food, liquids clothes spares tools & assorted junk was packed, the extra weight carried (as opposed to drive round daily) was about 500kg.

WE GO NOW
7.00am SATURDAY & we were off to Bourke sitting easily on 100 – 105kmh
5.15pm arrived no problems
21 mpg, saw no other Kombi’s or beetles
& managed to overtake a few cars & trucks
DAY 2
Off again 7.am 100 –105kmh again petrol at Cunnamulla 21mpg no problems 4.00pm, pull in to fuel up at Blackall before going to Caravan Park, oh-ohh idle sounds fluffy- longer it idled, the slower it got. & 18mpg only. 8.30pm after checking all the optimistic things I checked the valve clearances #1 exhaust had closed up & #4 almost. Bumbumbum
adjusted them & started getting stressed out
Saw no other Kombis or beetles
DAY 3
This was going to be a long day. Had to get to Mt Isa 860kms
Reduced speed to 90-95kmh first stop Longreach, running perfect
23mpg GREAT.
Next stop Winton still running OK, filled up with petrol but the starter motor was dead, pushed it out of the servo & checked all the connections – OK – but not even a click – get the HAMMER out – get under car, tell Jenny to turn key, BASH!! Started. This two people procedure became the norm for the next 11 days & approximately 80 or so starts.
Finally reached Mount Isa at 7.30pm engine was running bad again & I could not turn off while Jenny booked in, in case the starter motor did not work..
Checked valve clearances & #1 & #4 exhaust had closed again, #4 not quite. We were now 2400km from home with a confirmed dying motor.Turn round & go home, no holiday & maybe not get home anyway, or cut 3 days out not go to Katherine, turning left at Three Ways instead & risk the extra coupla thousand k’s home & have a holiday? We opted to keep going, saw no Kombis, no Beetles
Sitting on 90kmh had reduced fuel consumption to 24mpg, hmmmm.
DAY 4
640 k’s to cover at the now decided on 80 to 85kmh & I was getting paranoid about leaving the hammer under the car after starting, & driving off. Arrived at Three Ways Roadhouse for the night at 5.30pm .
27mpg – wow, wind resistance has a lot to answer for! Still saw no other aircooled VWs – where the hell are they! We want to wave to somebody before ours is deceased!!
Checked valve clearances, had only lost 3 0r 4 thou on each dying valve, thing were looking up. Three Ways Roadhouse was great, & only $11 for the night.The engine bay now had fine red dust in it.
DAY 5
Travelling through Tennant Creek saw a Kombi Camper filling up with petrol, wave, beep beep, great, we are not the only one in N.T. then, 40ks south, I could see lights flashing from an oncoming vehicle YES YES another Kombi. Much beeping & flashing of lights & waving & they were gone. Spent a few hours at Devils Marbles which were fantastic, out with the hammer & on our way again. Overtaking anything besides a bicycle was now a distant memory Next stop was our weirdest stop for petrol, Barrow Creek roadhouse in absolute nowhere and a sign on the 2 pumps “no ULP” which left only premium at $1.35 a litre and that pump was padlocked, I wandered into the bar “here is the key-fill it up & tell me how much it is!” OK – this place was so odd, that deep in thought, I nearly left the fuel cap behind. Next stop for the night was Aileron roadhouse - $34 including power & washing machine & everything & fantastic food. Arrived ther4.30pm
28 mpg for the day & the valves had only receded another 3 thou.
DAY 6
Alice Springs was strange after so much isolation, the town Centre was much like Surfers Paradise without the beach, totally tourist orientated with lots of white people selling aboriginal stuff at ridiculous prices, even parking places were at a premium & unbelievably the only parking spot was next to a Kombi from SA!!! Unfortunately no owner in sight to talk to.
Went out to Simpson’s Gap for a look & then slowly proceeded to Erlunda Roadhouse, the turnoff to Ayers Rock & our next stop for the night. Reached there 5.20pm 28mpg for the day & valve clearances down another 3 thou . Friggin freezing at night now, mostly 2 to 4 degrees. & petrol about $1.20 a litre average. About $40 for the night.
DAY 7
Fuel stop at last roadhouse before Ayers Rock/ Yulara complex called Curtin Springs, a bit ruff & has free camping, I was just about ready to do the hammer-start thing & a British person run’s up to me & says “do you know much about Kombi’s”?
I gave a mumbled answer.............
Turned out that after a freezing night there, their Kombi would not start, & if they called a mechanic it would be 5 hours before he got there, another Kombi was in the process of tow-starting it ‘round the camping area, which eventually worked.
I wandered over to have a look at it & the smell of petrol was all pervading, I pulled the dipstick & the oil was like black mollases with lumps, I suggested he might change it one year & found out the reason he could not start it “pump the accelarator” syndrome . I hate to think how much fuel was in with the mollases after 3 hours of pumping the pedal!. I taught him how to start it, & left.
Ayers Rock Yeah baby – made it, climbed it much harder than when I was 14. Went back to Yulara resort for accommodation- Tourist overkill again, Megabuck apartments, Shopping Centre with prices organised tosuck you dry etc- and camping? You go over there away from everything, $54.oo for the night & the Kombi has to go on the dirt & the tent has to go on the grass – 100 mtrs away, bum bum - food too far away & too expensive, use rations
Do valve adjustment another 4 thou gone.
DAY 8
Off to the Olga’s then back to Ayers Rock for another look before saying goodbye at 2.PM and off to Mt Ebenezer Roadhouse, a 1960s time capsule unspoilt unlike Erlunda & Yulara.
$8.00 for a powered site for the night shared only with 2 guys on pushbikes & a Hi-ace. FANTASTIC dinner – fresh Kangaroo – probably tenderised by Roadtrains & Tourist Coaches.
Valves gone another 3 or 4 thou 26mpg
DAY 9
Coober Pedy
A long, long drive , no problems & arrived about 3.30pm wandered around the town to have a look at what we were going to spend our time doing on day 10, found a dead 75 Kombi in a side street, windows down, keys in the ignition & the inside & outside covered in dust, there was another Kombi camper in town with ACT rego, never found the owner though. There was one Opal shop that had a nice Baja parked out the front & a bug body at the top of a huge pipe “legs” structure, a HUGE bug.
That night I did the usual valve adjustment, surprisingly they had not stopped receding & number 4 was the most depressing.
About 7.30pm the 240 volt light in the kombi started “pulsing” – growing brighter & then dim, the fridge compressor noise also varying in sympathy, later when I went to have a shower I saw that every light in town was doing the same thing – after I had my shower & walking back all the lights were pulsing like something out of Star Trek & then everything went BLACK , after a few minutes you could hear generators starting up all over town & lights coming on here & there, The power was off all night, apparently this is a regular weekly occurrence.
Fuel consumption still around 25mpg & was to remain unchanged over the rest of the trip.
DAY 10
Coober Pedy
Wandered round doing all the usual touristy things & bought a VERY cold sparkplug for number 4 to see if that would slow the recession, it still ran fine but I found out over a few days that it did not slow down the destruction.
DAY 11
Off we went on the Long haul to Port Augusta, through the most “desert” desert we had seen – the area around Woomera being the most desolate
Stopped off at a beautiful salt lake, quite a walk from the road , saw the usual warning signs, but walked well out on it to take photos, read the sign on the way back which explained that basically it was a weapons range & that there were quite a number of unfound, unexploded shells around, I suppose that the corrosive action of the salt would not be an issue, as we are all still here & I haven’t heard of anybody being actually blown up on that lake.
Much further south the scrub gradually became heavier, until emus & cattle wandering straight out onto the road became a rather stressful issue.
The Caravan Park at Port Augusta was nice , the cold spark plug had made no difference, in fact the recession was accelerating, & the available thread on the adjustors fast disappearing
DAY 12
We decided to make a “run” for home, & eliminate a day somehow by driving as far as possible, before stopping, it was great driving (albeit for only 4 hours or so) through lush green hills & valleys.
Broken Hill came & went with a fuel stop at 4.00pm, we were aiming for Wilcannia for the night, another 200km
Stopped at Little Topar Roadhouse to get the kids some dinner & when asked where we were heading – as soon as we said “Wilcannia” horror showed in their faces & they said we could camp on their grounds for the night, but we needed to get further that day if we were to make Sydney in 2 days.
Got to Wilcannia well after dark, stopped at a petrol station barred up like a prison, there was groups of drunken people & brawls right down the main road, we were the only other moving thing not behind bars (either type) & the lady behind the double grid at the servo looked out at my family peering nervously from the locked up Kombi & said knowingly, “Scared are they?”
We decided we would keep going & risk the kangaroos & wombats, eventually stopping at the roadside about 10pm & camping there, well short of Cobar - it was actually beautiful, a sky full of endless stars & galaxies in the pitch black until the moon made an appearance.
I adjusted the valve clearances & then slept like a log.

DAY13
First stop Cobar, & then Nyngan, where I did a HOT HOT valve adjustment, we were getting closer to making it home & adjustment was fast running out. Made it to Gilgandra, a total of 500km for the day & decided to stay in luxury at a motel for our last night, another valve adjustment. By this time I was actually starting to get used to 80kmh & oil temp usually stayed under 200f

LAST DAY 14
Put the L plates on & Owen drove the first stretch to Mendooran, wher my mother grew up, we were going to make it home,,, the car even started without using the hammer. Pulled into the main street & could smell burning , told Owen to turn the engine off – the ignition key would not budge so I jumped out & pulled the wire off the coil the switch had cooked, welding solid & taking a lot of wiring with it…….
Studying the devastation & hopelessness of it iall I told everybody to take a LONG walk, & set about rewiring & making up something to hotwire it. An hour & 45 mins later we were on our way again, the starting procedure changing to connect up the ignition wires climb under with the hammer & yell OK whereupon person number 2 touched starter wire to ignition wire & I bashed the starter with the hammer.
Mudgee was the last stop, another very hot valve clearance adjustment in the main street. After this, there were two very long steep climbs to get over the Blue Mountains this had been worrying me for over a week. The first climb, Cherrytree Hill, we scraped over at about 40kmh & only 220f oil temp, the final hurdle was Mount Victoria Pass, on the main Great Western Highway, very long & very steep, the steepest point being a narrow one lane each way embankment with no where to pull over, if you die there it would make the evening news as it would block the road for ages if there was a truck behind you.
In perfect condition & unladen an auto Kombi crawls up there in second gear at about 45kmh – chockers in weight & on 2 & 2 halves cylinders it was another matter & if it went under about 2500 revs in 1st that would be the end. It was terrible, you could feel the engine had no guts & all I could do was watch the tacho slowly dropping & there was a Semi behind us. Somehow we just made it at not a lot faster than walking pace & a smell of burning oil.
It was now all down hill to home, when we hit the freeway at the bottom of the Mountains I sat on 100 kmh for the final 35k’s home, how excitng to travel at such high speed again!
Home at 5pm in Sydney 7,500 km later opened the front door to be greeted by 3 cats & the all pervading smell of Cat piss wafting through the air.
Total cost of fuel used was $888 , the cold sparkplug purchased at Coober Pedy was $3.00, this was the total cost expended on the vehicle during the trip, & it used about 2 ½ litres of the oil stash.
It cost me about $600 to fix the motor after we got back, so all in all it was a very cheap 2 weeks, the only regret being that losing 20kmh of cruising speed, we could not go up to see Katherine etc
Including the 2 motels accommodation averaged out at about $27 a night.

“
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what turned out tot be the problem with the motor it was new wasn't it

twas new reco, 2L, I was learner dubber & stupid enough to assume it had 2L heads & was not told otherwise, it had a 1.7 head on one side & 1.8 on other, - while waitng for 1st service the valve clearence rattle got to me & one of the exhaust valves was 32 thou clearence, which I adjusted before I took back for compulsary warranty service , this worried me for the future as did the fact that he told me there were carbie problems, there were not, after the first 700ks of crawling around running in I discovered that lack of go over about 1800 revs was the distributor advance virtually non functional, when I mentioned this he said that that was checked thoroughly, but I know it was not, I would say that during this period of gross timing retardation the heads were overheating somewhat, I had not yet fitted oil temp gauge. The valve seats seem original but a few may have been refaced & lost their lead "memory" making them softer that they shoulld have been.

sounds like you had a blast.....the moral would be to always carry the universal tools of the trade....a HAMMER!!!!! Where are you off to next???:bounce

YES - funny isn't it a hammer can be used for many things, I was actually terrified of the implications of leaving it behind under vehicle after starting-
Off to next?
have since been to Snowy Mountains Kanangra Walls, Wombeyan Caves , going to Melbourne for Aust Open Karate championships in April , & next big big should be Kakadu, all trips now tackled with some confidence

That was a fantastic story for a no doubt fantastic trip kombikim! Im glad you had a great time and the kombi didnt die!

*gets all starry eyed thinking about her trip to the outback* Wilcannia is damn scary isnt it! have you gotten all the red dust out of the kombi? hehehe (we scraped all the red dust off the volvo after our trip, its in a little baggy marked with "Lyndhurst, 1/12/02 - 5/12/02" and theres still dust on the volvo!)
I hope you took a jerry can of fuel with you, id hate to get stuck out on those roads with no fuel in the middle of the night!

I think it is very sad about Wilcannia,

the red dust was actually fairly easy to remove after I took motor out:o
took no spare fuel , refueling was very carefully calculated The fuel tank is a bit too small for my liking, never came close to running out though

Thanks for the trip report; read with delight.

One curiosity, in the setup section you said "an invertor to run phone chargers..."... was this better than running them off the cigarette lighter or am I missing something?

Regards

i do 2 or 3 long trips a year (approx 3000ks) and it suprises me how many new vehicles i see pulled up on the side of the road, bonnet up,waiting for the nrma etc as i drive by in a 30yr old kombi cruising on 90 - 100kph, i guess thats why so many people love old vee dubs they just keep on keeping on especially if you have a hammer and feeler guage in the tool kit. I figure the difference between a new car and a kombi is like the difference between Yularu resort and Aileron roadhouse! Personally when the last vee dub leaves for the great sims metal crusher in the sky life will never be the same.

Oh yeah -- NT pics Threeways Roadhouse & Devils Marbles with travelling circus behind Kombi in distance

alongside mystery Kombi at Alice springs,
& Ayers Rock photos

AVD hat at Ayers Rock
Mystery Kombi at Coober Pedy
Opal Inn at Coober Pedy
camping between Wilcannia & Cobar on Roadside

Wah!!! Great road trip!!!!

So that were ya been

Love the pics Kim

Hey, that Baja is pretty cool!!!

yes the guy bought the Baja with the Opal Inn business
a few years ago, his wife had been driving it around town ( there is nowhere to go out of town) but it had been dead for a few months with electrical problems when we saw it

Hey Kim, sounds like an amazing trip, I'm jealous! :cry Any chance you could email me that pic in full resolution of Uluru out the front of the windscreen? Would make a cool desktop!

sent just now to you email, & another great pic as well

What a great experience! A real trip to remember I'm sure.
Yes, kombi's seem to be the way to go, and to think a broken arm for the clutch throw out bearing left me stranded once. Should have had you along
Be looking forward to the Melb. trip report.
Andy
:thumb

wow!...what a great read!!...All i gotta do now is find me a friendly Kombi to love

I should say that without Aussieveedubbers, in particular Andy, Blue74L & Richard at V-Force, unfortunately all found after I had my engine reconditioned, this trip would have been a disaster

Great pics Kim, we are all jealous of your trip!!

thanks Scott
I actually got video tape of us overtaking someone a coupla 100 k's north of Bourke before we were speed limited
the Hammer start was fun though I had to admit, you had to whack the starter quite hard & sharp & miss the fuel lines & electrical wires while lying underneath the vehicle in red dust or service station driveway oil & coolant or rocks & in sometimes with a torch in you mouth or other hand because it was dark , not to mention the BIG ants, what was good was the look on bystanders faces when you got under the car with hammer, yelled out "START" to Jenny to turn key, BASH & car starts & you get out from underneath & wave hammer at them smiling.- never thought o video that

Nice Photos I love the N.T

It's good to see that picture is still on the side of the Servo at 3 ways.

It Spun me out when I first seen it.
Bloody Big Steal Bull bar.

I see you made it to the Top of Ayres Rock how can you sleep at night after ignoring the warnings.

hahaha
Says me a 3 time veteran Climber of the most wonderful thing I have ever seen,
Ayres Rock.

the mural at three ways is one of the best in the world

when I was 14 I raced other kids to the top of Ayers Rock, it seemed easy in retrospect, when I was 20 I had a very bad accident and now at 47 physical movement is getting harder & harder, & more painful. I just wanted to do it one more time as it was my last chance, it was very, very, difficult & painful, but it was what I went there to do- The spirits can come & get me if they want, but so far have not bothered
as their people need the income from the tourists

My son Owen made it this far up (that is the Olgas in the Distance)
which as you can see in the second photo is only 1/2 way up the first bit
however his first drive ever of a kombi (on L plates) was driving right around Ayers Rock!

What a great epic, the envy of many...but why not remove starter, clean it out, lubricate the solenoid, or replace with one from early holden... could have saved a few stone bruises and ant bites. Might not have been the adventure you will remember for a lifetime tho..

I did not remove starter because the vehicle is an automatic, & while it was working in any way possible I did not want to dismantle it not knowing exactly what was wrong, & if a mechanical part of it was broken & fell to bits on dismantling, I was really stuck, I did not have the Impact driver necessary to remove solenoid, on pulling it apart a few months ago I found that one of the brushes had been badly soldered

Great story and a great trip. It seems to me that part of the joy of travelling in a kombi is keeping it running and being prepared to do it. I too, have spent many hours under a bus on the side of the road but you always get there. Your perserverence is to be applauded. Can't wait until my next trip to the desert - looking forward to getting off the main highways next time. Have you been keeping up with desert bus plans
Paul

thanks, I honestly haven't been keeping up with desert bus plans, primary purpose of ours is normal daily use & design has had to be highly specific to our requirements, the high gearing in the necessary auto gearbox negates any steep off the beaten track stuff, which is a shame.