Lithgow-Trip-October-2004

Col - Baby Troupe

Darryl & Julie - Defender

Trip

The day started out as most trips do with a 6:00am start from home, so we could meet Darryl & Julie at the Hawkesbury River at 06:30.

Unfortunately, due to a change with the laptop set-up, I encountered a problem with my satellite navigation, so I was delayed by 5 minutes while I stopped at Kariong to fix it.

Once we met, we were quickly under way to Richmond for breakfast.

The facilities at Richmond have improved somewhat since our last visit where the toilets were then portaloos outside & there was major renovation work taking place. It is actually a pleasure to visit now & they have a McCafe there now too for the coffee buffs, or for those wanting a muffin or 4.

Breakfast was over pretty quick, probably due to the fact that for a change, I did not eat before leaving home, and from there we headed to Lithgow where Darryl needed fuel & I picked up the key for the Spanish Steps track (this track is now closed to all except 4WD Clubs affiliated with 4WDNSW & they need to book the track through the association website).

From Lithgow, we headed back up to the Zig Zag Railway & then down a few powerlines tracks before heading to Blackfellows Hand Rd & our new campsite.

This new campsite is a much shorter distance than where we used to stay at Newnes & as it turned out, we were the only ones to occupy it. There were no facilities for toilets or water, so everything you need, you will have to carry.

After we had finished setting up camp, we set out back up to Bungleboori picnic area & then down the track towards the Lost City. The last track on the right was the one we wanted & once there, we pulled over & walked down the track to check conditions, before deciding on which lines to take to the bottom. Getting to the bottom was not overly difficult, which is more than I can say for going up the other side. The track looked fairly straight forward, except for it was loose part of the way up & there was a complicated little cross slope near the top, which caused a few problems for my vehicle.

That last section took us probably 30 minutes to get through a 100m section of track. From there we then followed this same track further along, up and down a few hills, ruts and a small mud hole, before coming out at a electrical substation, just off Blackfellows Hand Rd, where we decided to head over to the Spanish Steps track, which is just off Sunnyside Rd.

The steps were not really much different to my last visit, but to add a little variety, we decided on a different line, down the middle, for going down them. It had a few challenges with a little scrape here & there, but nothing major before we both reached the bottom.

We then crossed the first of 3 creek crossings & paused before the second, to ensure I do not high-centre the vehicle, as I did last time we were here, earlier this year.

After this, it was to the rock face where yet again I decided to go up the centre. Unfortunately, this time, my adventurous ways did not succeed. I managed to get 1/2 way up before my progress was stopped by 2 ledges, one at the front wheels & the other at the towbar. I had a feeling, when I heard the towbar hit that it was going to stop & sure enough it did. We had to do a little road building at the rear end & from there, the vehicle happily climbed the rock face, where I waited for Darryl to make his way up. He did not quite get as far on his first attempt, with the bottom ledge stopping his rear wheels, before he decided a slightly different line was the best approach & sure enough he succeeded in climbing out.

Unfortunately that was not to be the end our problems, as while climbing back out I could smell something unusual with my vehicle as I was approaching the gate.

I decided to investigate the smell & it did not take any more than a few seconds to realize I had an oily fluid coming from under the front end of the vehicle & there was a lot of it. I decided to shut the vehicle down & when I did, I noticed the flow stopped, but their was fluid everywhere. On further investigation, I found it to be Automatic Transmission fluid & it was coming from one of the high pressure lines to the radiator, used to cool the fluid, before it returns to the transmission. This was not something I could limp home without performing some sort of repair, at least to stop the loss of this fluid & hopefully prevent damage to the transmission.

So out came the tool box & I got started, first removing the bash plate & then inspecting the hose to work out where it had failed. What had happened was that where the hose has a bend in it, it had split & as the hose is under pressure, it was happily spurting transmission fluid everywhere.

I had spares of most things, but a spare hose for this, I never thought I would need (Murphy's Law), so we had a bit of a look at what we had to make do.

I thought about just shortening the hose, but realized that by doing that, it would not reach without being in the way of something else, so figured that as well as shortening it by the couple of inches to the split, I had to extend the hose by the same amount somehow. As it turned out, part of the handle to Darryl's jack was 10.5mm in diameter & was hollow steel tubing. What we did was to cut a section off that & cut the hose in half & use that section to extend the hose. Although the hose was a little small, we managed to get it to fit by using some hot water & kept it in place by using the hose clamps I removed from the suction line on my shower install. After nearly 2 hours of messing around, we were finally back on the track, ready to limp the lil' troopie to camp.

We managed to get to camp with no further problems & decided that as Lithgow as not too far away, we would go there in Darryl's vehicle to try to source a hose from one of the service stations, which unfortunately was a wasted trip.

On return to camp, I decided I could not take the fact I was so filthy from being covered in fluid (as well as being half frozen due to only wearing a short sleeve shirt in 5 degree temperatures, not wanting to damage any more clothes with oil stains), I had to have a hot shower, so hooked that up & used 20 litres of water from my in car tanks. Now that was a sensational feeling, to have a nice hot shower, to get all of that oil & so on off me & also warm up, so after that, I was ready to settle into camp with a hot meal & some drinks.

Unfortunately it was getting late, so a meal (Tortellini in a Tomato, Garlic & Basil Sauce) and only one drink was all I could muster before calling it a night around 10:30pm.

The next morning, we were all pretty relaxed about when to hit the tracks, as we still had to perform a proper repair on my vehicle & the Auto Parts suppliers would not be open until 09:00, so we had a nice hardy breakfast & tidied the camping area before heading into town.

IN Lithgow, there was a Auto One store on the Main Street & he had all of the parts I needed to fix the vehicle & the total cost (including some more transmission fluid, which as it turned out, it did not need) was around $20.00.

We then headed back to camp & fitted the new hose & clamp, which this time around only took about 1/2 hour, after which I got cleaned up & we decided, as the clouds were looking ominous, we would pack up camp before hitting the trails.

First stop was again the Spanish Steps & I must say, doing this track in the opposite direction to what we do normally is a real eye opener. You do not realize how steep the track is & the amount of cross slope we deal with on this track, until done in the opposite direction, with me actually chickening out on going down the rock section, until I had seen Darryl go down it & see what angles his Defender gets to. Once he was through, I had my go & as it turned out, it was not quite as scary as I originally thought, even though I had no hesitation in locking the rear differential first.

Once at the bottom, we crossed the 2 creeks & met up with another convoy of 7 vehicles from Out & About 4WD club who had just come down the steps.

We decided to have our morning tea break while they finished conquering the steps & making their way past our convoy.

After this, it was our turn to play on the steps & again this time in a different direction, going up them.

Darryl was still the lead vehicle, so we decided on a good line & up he went, fairly easily up the right hand side of the track.

Then was my turn & I thought that I would take the same line for most of the track, but at the top, try to go over the big step, rather than around it. Problem was, once I was in the car & heading up the track, I realized the step is probably a touch large to be tackled in my vehicle, especially with me being still on a steep incline, so at the last second, changed my mind & in the process of trying to go around it, slipped off the edge into a tree.

The damage was zero, as yet again the bullbar took the impact & the tree was small, so I reversed back a little & changed my line slightly before this time successfully negotiating the obstacle.

Once up the steps, I took over again as the convoy leader & decided to have a go at the largish step above the above mentioned track, this time using the rear dif lock. This time, I did it easily, with no wheel spin & apart from both approach & departure angle scraping, there were no difficulties.

From there we headed over to the Powerlines track, which I had done parts of before, so the track was fairly straight forward, even though it is now getting quite dug up by the large number of unregistered motorcycles using it (several passing us while we were using this track). While on this track, I had a little surprise, that being my Optus mobile phone had received a message. I was surprised, due to the remoteness of the area & in that message, my wife (Stella) had called to let me know of a small problem at home. On that note, we decided that as we had already covered all of the other tracks at other times, we would call it a day & head back to Lithgow to return the keys to the Spanish Steps track, where we stopped for lunch & then headed home.

Overall, the weekend was quite challenging & although there were a few minor problems, I had a good time & enjoyed the company of my travelling companions, Darryl & Julie.

Col (BT)