Lap of Oz complete - I think the PB's run in now

[Midge]

I'm sure it's not the first PB to do a full lap, but I'm pleased to report our MY12 auto has returned us home after towing 2.5 ton of caravan. Add to that 6 passengers (albeit 4 of them are quite small) and a large roof basket.

The car performed faultlessly over the 28,000km, with the exception of a limp mode issue (turbo underboost) early on in the trip, which was resolved with some sort of a re-flash once we reached civilisation. I was pleased it didn't stop us driving altogether.

We did plenty of rough roads and tracks with stock tyres and suspension. We did lose a tyre to a tree root but I think the walls of a tougher tyre would likely have suffered the same fate. After all of the rough treatment, balance/alignment etc still appears spot on and the tyres are about 50% after 37,000km.

Some of you will be interested in the fuel economy. Some of you won't, so I'll post the figues on the fuel economy thread. However I was quite satisfied with the results considering the workload.

So if you, as I did a year ago, are wondering whether the Challenger is up to the task of pulling such a weight for a significant distance, going offroad and being a suitable family wagon, I would say YES it is. It was also quite confortable, even for the 6 of us, and if you ask me, great value for money.

Would I change anything? A larger fuel tank would be nice.

[Pickle]

Good feedback
Thankyou.
Dave

[stuartiross]

Midge,

Good to hear that the PB made the lap without too many issues ... we are planning on doing the same thing. You mentioned that you kept with stock suspension, how did that handle the load over the time?

Concerned that once ours is fully loaded with 2 kids, mum and dad, trailer and the "small" amount of gear planned to take that we'll be close to hitting the GVM and the standard suspension will feel a bit like steering a ship!

[turbopiston]

Good to hear!

I agree, it should definitely have a bigger fuel tank!

[260DET]

That's great news, no problems with the auto I assume.

[BigBloke65]

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The car performed faultlessly over the 28,000km, with the exception of a limp mode issue (turbo underboost) early on in the trip, which was resolved with some sort of a re-flash once we reached civilisation. I was pleased it didn't stop us driving altogether.

Did they just reset the error code or loaded up a software update? That turbo boost problem might get very frequent. MMA has a software fix for this which totally solved my problems with low turbo boost.

[Midge]

Midge,

Good to hear that the PB made the lap without too many issues ... we are planning on doing the same thing. You mentioned that you kept with stock suspension, how did that handle the load over the time?

Concerned that once ours is fully loaded with 2 kids, mum and dad, trailer and the "small" amount of gear planned to take that we'll be close to hitting the GVM and the standard suspension will feel a bit like steering a ship!

Stu, you're right about keeping an eye on the GVM, but I don't think the Challenger is much different to most other vehicles in that regard. I was right on the limit, but for me the main weight factor was the ball weight of the caravan. None of us weigh much and I only had fairly light gear on the roof. Lucky we only got a 70L tank, otherwise we'd have more weight problems!

It certainly never felt like steering a ship, I was quite happy with the way it felt on the road. I did wonder myself a couple of times whether I should have beefed up the suspension or got some airbags, but wasn't convinced. I had some issues with wear of my original WDH, and ended up replacing it. When the WDH was working the suspension seemed fine. I wouldn't tow anything with a heavy ball weight without a WDH due to the softness of the suspension.

I bumped into a Challenger with airbags towing a caravan and it certainly lifted the rear alot higher than mine.

[Midge]

That's great news, no problems with the auto I assume.

Nope, it performed well. I was very pleased to have the auto, it had no problems taking off with the caravan where I think a manual would have struggled.

Actually, after unloading the caravan and roof rack today I took the caravan for a drive and it went like a rocket without all the extra weight/wind blocks! We're wondering how we're going to fit all our junk in the house!

[Midge]

Did they just reset the error code or loaded up a software update? That turbo boost problem might get very frequent. MMA has a software fix for this which totally solved my problems with low turbo boost.

I beleive it was a software update. They told me it was common with the Tritons and Challengers when towing large loads. That occurred about 26,000 ago and there's no signs of the problem now.

[alan4106au]

From one that September a year ago stated that.

"If I was in your position I wouldn?t go for the Challenger!”

I would like to congratulate you again on your choice of car and also a great report.
Hope you have many more good trips with the family.
It does surprise a lot that the standard suspension and tyres are up to the job. I feel you have proven they are!
I have had a ball weight of well over 260 KG. on ours with out a WDH or any problems although I wouldn’t recommend it.
Did you find distance between fuel fills a problem and how many and where did you carry fuel cans?

Alan

[Midge]

From one that September a year ago stated that.

"If I was in your position I wouldn?t go for the Challenger!”

I would like to congratulate you again on your choice of car and also a great report.
Hope you have many more good trips with the family.
It does surprise a lot that the standard suspension and tyres are up to the job. I feel you have proven they are!
I have had a ball weight of well over 260 KG. on ours with out a WDH or any problems although I wouldn’t recommend it.
Did you find distance between fuel fills a problem and how many and where did you carry fuel cans?

Alan

Haha Alan, I'd forgotten about that advice, although I definitely took it into account at the time! Value for money won me in the end.

The fuel fills were only a bit of a problem in NT and northern WA. It wasn't a problem in that you couldn't get between servos...more so that some of the servos didn't really have a welcoming, clean-fuel type of feeling if you know what I mean. I only carried 2x10L plastic cans on the roof. Only carried them full when expecting I might use them.

Range varied from 320km to 440km and as it turned out, the winds in WA & NT meant that they were often the journeys that were closer to 320km range. I'm embarrassed to say I rocked up at a very remote NT roadhouse and filled up with 68.85L...phew. I must say, the 'Range to empty' readout is very accurate on my vehicle.

[Ballfyboy]

Well done Midge on completing the lap We averaged 17.3 l/100km for a total of 41074km so pretty close there. I agree the fuel tank is to small. I carried up to 4 full jerry's in some places, although I never had to put the 4th in.

Man we only had 2 kids so you really did it well!

Ps. I may have just beaten you for the record, however I think you would defentantly be the first to tow a caravan around on the lap

[Midge]

Ballfyboy, yes, doing it your way would require more jerrys. I mostly stuck to major roads with the caravan on, so the small tank was managable.

Can I ask how you did that map? I tried google maps but it only gives a limited number of destinations.

[Ballfyboy]

Midge,
It was the plot from our Garmin GPS.

It comes in handy as I really have to think to remember everywhere we went!

[aaron.miller]

Looks like a fantastic trip and it must have been fun with 4 rug rats in the car.
I am a little confused though.
You state that your lap around oz was 28000 km and balfyboy did 41k, I put in an around australia trip into google maps and it says its only about 14500km? So did both of you do like two laps of oz or is google maps wrong? I have always thought google maps was pretty accurate.
I put in as destinations sydney brisbane cairns darwin broome perth albany adelaide melbourne bega sydney. I even tried diverting to alice spings and back at port augusta and that made it 17000 km.

What was the section between broome and perth like, i have done the bit from Perth to Sydney before so i'm thinking i might skip Perth and head down the tanami from Broome?

Cheers

Aaron