2019 Siberia and Central Asia overland thread

[kiwi1973]

Mr Funnel

Here's a short 2 minute video of the very useful looking Mr Funnel. Whilst I don't think it eliminates the need for a good secondary fuel filter with water trap, it would be highly beneficial to be able to avoid getting water in the fuel tank in the first place.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvWdKHK8WjQ

[kiwi1973]

Road of Bones

My researching of our intended Siberian route has revealed a problem, being that May is not at all a good month to be heading to Magadan on the Road of Bones. That part of Siberia, including the remote biggish city of Yakutsk, requires crossing very big rivers. In the brief Siberian summer barges operate to transport vehicles over the rivers. In the winter, at minus 50 to minus 60 degrees celsius, these big rivers freeze over and become 'ice roads'. But, it seems that by around April these 'ice roads' are thawing to the point of being unsafe, and in May there are big ice chunks flowing in the rivers preventing boats/barges from operating. And thus it would appear that in the months of April, May and October the route is impassable. The alternatives include waiting to summer, or doing it in March. March is still winter, though temps likely to have warmed slightly to around -35 degrees. Still this is certainly too dangerous to go alone on. A breakdown out there could be fatal, and apparently such deaths are not uncommon out there. June should be quite doable, though likely to be very muddy after spring rains and snow thaw (I understand that initially there is a lot of flooding because the ground is still frozen a short distance beneath the surface ('permafrost'). And this explains why so many adventurers going into these particularly remote parts of Siberia tend to do so between July/August and September at latest. This is much easier to time well for those departing from Europe and heading West to East. We are still minded to go East to West.

We will have to give thought to how we will resolve this with our itinerary. It's a bit of an issue because our planned timings for every other part of our intended route work perfectly in harmony with the expected climates at the time we will go through.

Researching some of these routes is not straight-forward and is a bit time consuming. I'm pretty sure there is no such thing as a prepared 4wd guide book dedicated to this region, so it's a matter of referring to as much as is available from regular travel books like Lonely Planet, Googling and reading blogs written by other people. YouTube has plenty of videos, though much of the language spoken in the videos is foreign and I can't glean all the information I would like. Some of the best written material available online is also in Russian or other foreign languages, so I am restricted to English resources. Sylwia is Polish however and the Poles seem to be fairly keen 4wd adventurers, so I may have to get her reading some Polish blogs, or watching YouTube videos by Polish adventurers.

[Morville]

Here's a short 2 minute video of the very useful looking Mr Funnel. Whilst I don't think it eliminates the need for a good secondary fuel filter with water trap, it would be highly beneficial to be able to avoid getting water in the fuel tank in the first place.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvWdKHK8WjQ

Hi Kiwi1973, we have the 14 litre/minute Mr Funnel for filling our 2 ATV's and small engines from jerry cans. It does an excellent job for that purpose but would be frustratingly slow for filling a vehicle from a servo pump. I would recommend paying extra for one of their higher flow models.
What an amazing journey you are planning, We look forward to following your progress.
Peter

[kiwi1973]

Hi Kiwi1973, we have the 14 litre/minute Mr Funnel for filling our 2 ATV's and small engines from jerry cans. It does an excellent job for that purpose but would be frustratingly slow for filling a vehicle from a servo pump. I would recommend paying extra for one of their higher flow models.
What an amazing journey you are planning, We look forward to following your progress.
Peter

I see they have one that claims to do 45 litres per minute. It's a shame that it appears so bulky, but I suppose we can store it on the roof easy enough.

[cooperplace]

Good luck with this. I went overland by rail from Hong Kong to Moscow many years ago, over 4 weeks. I could tell you a funny story about the restaurant in the Intourist hotel in Irkutsk. I'm not normally a Glenfiddich drinker but I was offered some in the middle of the Gobi and it tasted great. Make absolutely sure that all visas are in place well in advance. Keep copies of your passports and visas. Take lots of small denomination $US bills for bribes. Watch out for drunken Russians: I'm serious about this: I was nearly killed by one. Definitely avoid the ladies of the night, no matter how pleasant and attractive they seem. Get fat travel insurance. From what I saw, long-range tanks are a must. I would avoid China too. Keep us posted about your plans, and please post photos.



I'm jealous.

[erad]

I am sure that you would avoid ladies of the night, with your wife & kids with you. One good investment may be a good dashcam. In Australia there has been a plethora of TV shows about drivers in overseas countries. They seem to be mainly Russia. A dashcam may help sort out what happened when/if disaster occurred. I know that in Thailand, it is a case of who has the most money pays up, no matter who was in the wrong. And of course the foreigner is always in the wrong... You have been around yourself enough to know this anyway I am sure.

[kiwi1973]

All advice welcome and I will be sure to avoid those ladies of the night. I need to read up on the instructions, but I believe my Go Pro Session 5 can double as a dash cam - I think it has a loop recording mode. Not what I bought it for, but if it can perform as a dashcam I'll use it as such in the cities.

[stumagoo]

looks like an amazing trip - the road of bones is covered a bit in the motorcycle trip (tv series) called Long way round by Ewan Mcgregor and Charlie Boorman.... if you have not seen it its a great watch and covers some of the areas you are going.... they mention that the wnidow for the road of bones trip is pretty small as well. the interesting part is the camera/backup crew do much of the European section in a gen 3 Pajero

[kiwi1973]

looks like an amazing trip - the road of bones is covered a bit in the motorcycle trip (tv series) called Long way round by Ewan Mcgregor and Charlie Boorman.... if you have not seen it its a great watch and covers some of the areas you are going.... they mention that the wnidow for the road of bones trip is pretty small as well. the interesting part is the camera/backup crew do much of the European section in a gen 3 Pajero

I watched a few Long Way Round videos on YouTube a while back and took great interest in seeing the Gen 3 Shogun - and I think the other support vehicle was a L200/Triton from memory.

[stumagoo]

I watched a few Long Way Round videos on YouTube a while back and took great interest in seeing the Gen 3 Shogun - and I think the other support vehicle was a L200/Triton from memory.

Yep that sounds right.

[kiwi1973]

Last couple of days I've been paying quite a bit of additional attention to the issue of diesel quality in Central Asia and Siberia and trying to find out as much as I can, particularly regards the suitability of taking a common rail diesel engine through countries where diesel quality could be unknown and alternative supplies unavailable.

I know I already outlined a plan for dealing with this, but it is part (3) of my previously outlined plan that I am now questioning. The plan I previously outlined was (1) filter diesel going into my fuel tank with a Mr Funnel, (2) fit a secondary fuel filter with water trap and (3) add a lubricity enhancer to each tank fill.

I am confident the above plan will robustly defend against excess water and particle contamination in diesel. The part I'm less confident in is whether adding a lubricity enhancer (such as CRD Fuel Enhancer) will truly be sufficient to offset any chemical/petrol contamination in the diesel. This is an unknown that seems to have no means for me to practically measure.

Given the extremely cold winters (minus 65 not uncommon) I believe the local diesel is likely to contain parafin/kerosene. This would make the engine produce less power given the lower energy stored in kerosene relative to diesel, but this is not the primary concern. The issue is how much kerosene needs to be in the diesel before a common rail high pressure pump risks catastrophic failure due to lack of lubricity. An older style diesel injection pump may well do ok with the same fuel, but a common rail style pump is more sensitivity to any reduction in the fuel lubricity. As mentioned, I will use a lubricity additive equivalent to CRD Fuel Enhancer, but even the manufacturer of that product is unable to give me any definitive guidance as to what degree of fuel contamination or kerosene/paraffin content their lubricity enhancing additive is able to protect against.

Asking around on forums belonging to the overlanding community it is difficult to get straight answers. Quite a few of them seem to prefer older style diesels for overlanding in developing countries, or even petrol. That said, I would be far from the first to go through with a common rail engine. I know of someone who has been right through Africa in a modified LC200 with the common rail diesel and he had no issues - I don't know what additional filtration he might be running. I've also heard of someone who has twice filled with sufficiently contaminated fuel as to have had to twice replace all injectors - and that was a petrol vehicle! Thus it seems fuel quality is a real concern in these places, and not only for common rail diesels, though they may well be the most vulnerable if not protected as much as possible through additional filtration.

I'm still researching in this area. I am still intending to take the Shogun on this journey, so long as my further research doesn't turn up anything particularly untoward.

I should also add that as part of my research I visited the Mitsubishi Motors websites for a bunch of countries between Central Asia and Africa. I wanted to see which engines Mitsubishi is offering Pajero's with in those countries. Generally the 3.2 litre common rail is widely available, but there were some countries primarily selling the petrols (either the 3.8 litre of the 3.0 litre). I was surprised to see that in some countries (can't recall which now) the NX Pajero is being sold with the old 4m40 2.8 litre (non common rail) engine and a 4 speed transmission.

[kiwi1973]

After researching quite extensively the risks of fuel contamination for a common rail diesel engine in Central Asia, I have gained comfort that we should be ok with the 3 stage risk mitigation plan I outlined in posts above. I am particularly sensitive to the issue of fuel contamination owing to the serious breakdown we had in NZ in March - as detailed in another thread on the forum, we have first hand experience of just how much damage bad fuel can cause. I have concluded that fuel contamination in Central Asia and Russia is a real issue that every overland traveller should be acutely aware of, regardless whether your engine is diesel (common rail or older style) or petrol. Watching a video on YouTube the other night of a pair of KTM motorcycles going across Russia, both bikes suffered fuel pump failures due to dirty fuel - but from the point at which the riders began to filter every fill of petrol going into the bikes they were fine from then on. Still was a major headache for them awaiting fuel pumps to arrive and things like that can seriously interfere with your planned timescales and/or leave you stranded somewhere remote.

I've also just ordered components to make a portable diesel heater - 4kw should be ample to keep the tent toasty even when its pretty bitter outside. I'm going to have to go and do a bit of winter camping in the cold South Island winter to test the thing out when it's all assembled in a few weeks time.

[kiwi1973]

New piece of equipment

With next year's trip in mind I recently bought a new camp cooker that I think will be much more suitable for the places we're headed than our existing gas bottle powered cooker. It's a Coleman Dual Fuel liquid fuel stove, imported from the USA. Although this is a brand new stove it's far from new tech - stoves like this have been sold since around war time because of their simplicity, repairability and very long service life.

I know from past international trips that trying to get a gas bottle filled or swapped is very difficult when you're going from country to country. Through most of Europe there is an accepted standard, but once beyond Europe it differs in each country. On previous trips we ended up unable to swap our bottle or get it refilled beyond the borders of Europe. I bought my first Waeco frig for a similar reason - we were unable to buy ice for our otherwise very effective Coleman chilly-bin in some countries. We'd go from say France, where ice is commonly sold, to Italy where ice is not sold, and then the food would go off. Even worse my beer would warm up!

I've used the new stove a couple of times now and I really like it, even though there are some compromises vs the simplicity of just firing up a gas cooker. There's a small learning curve. It's very powerful and can run on unleaded petrol in need, which means we'll always find fuel for it - this being the primary advantage. It will operate in sub zero temperatures when needed, which gas won't do, and it should operate at the nearly 5,000 metre altitudes we'll be driving over, which I'm not sure gas can do very well. Apparently (untested by me yet) liquid fuel stoves are also less affected by wind than gas cookers - we'll see.

Looks bulky in the photos perhaps, but it is the biggest family size model with a huge cooking area and of course there is no bulky gas bottle to cart with it. For transporting the grey fuel tank stores neatly inside the stove.

[erad]

Kiwi:
Regarding cold temperatures, they operate diesel equipment in the Antarctic. From memory, they used straight kerosene (not sure if it was aviation kero or domestic heating kero). It may be worthwhile contacting NZ Antarctic division or at least the Australian Antarctic division in Hobart Tas to get their comments about diesel in cold conditions. Also, kerosene and cold conditions may be mutually acceptable - certainly for older type diesel engines. Not sure about the CRD case though...

Pajeros meant for cold conditions have a diesel heater included in their specification. Not sure if yours has a fuel line heater fitted, but it may be worth checking.

Antifreeze is another consideration. In the Antarctic, they used 50% antifreeze/50% water. Apparently this gives a lower freeze point that straight antifreeze.

Regarding lubricity of the fuel, I suggest that you contact Cost Effective Maintenance and ask them directly what they recommend for the places you intend to visit. I have previously sent you a PM regarding travel in Mongolia. In the clip referenced they talked about quality of diesel early in the clip but then waffled on elsewhere about the country.

[Scouter1]

With next year's trip in mind I recently bought a new camp cooker that I think will be much more suitable for the places we're headed than our existing gas bottle powered cooker. It's a Coleman Dual Fuel liquid fuel stove, imported from the USA. Although this is a brand new stove it's far from new tech - stoves like this have been sold since around war time because of their simplicity, repairability and very long service life.

Good choice - I am on my 2nd one after the first one wore out after 20 years regular use... They are reliable, effective & versatile regarding fuel choice.