How To Prepare And Maintain A Car For A 50,000 Mile Road Trip Around The World

[FridgeFreezer]

Found this article on Jalopnik and was pleasantly surprised by the dude's all-business minimalist approach to this, some good advice in there:

https://jalopnik.com/how-to-prepare-and-maintain-a-car-for-a-50-000-mile-roa-1847090292

 

[L19MUD]

Agreed, all sensible advice. If only we were allowed to leave the country!!

[Troll Hunter]

A brilliant article, with so much good advice, and he took the trouble to respond to all the questions and comments with logical responses.  Now I have to find time to watch his Youtube vids.

Mike

[Anderzander]

Love that - thank you for sharing ! 
 

2 hours ago, Troll Hunter said:

all the questions and comments

Amazing that people are criticising his choices, saying he’s chose the wrong vehicle and should have upgraded his drive line …… as one of the other comments points out though, it’s hard to criticise success.

I've found him on Instagram now and will check out his YouTube.  Instagram highlighted that the Swiss family I linked to on here who had spent €88k on their Defender follow him. Such a different approach - but then I guess they are travelling around Europe - whereas he’s in proper wilderness countries.

[FridgeFreezer]

On 6/19/2021 at 9:09 AM, Anderzander said:

Amazing that people are criticising his choices, saying he’s chose the wrong vehicle and should have upgraded his drive line …… as one of the other comments points out though, it’s hard to criticise success.

Yeah I bet exactly 0.0% of the critics have driven anywhere either. Armchair experts are the best!

[Eightpot]

Less is more for overlanding, and parts much easier to get than even ten years ago so taking something standard then just not breaking it is a good way to go. You meet so many people overlanding who have blown thier bank open buying wildly over capable cars and then don't want to get them dirty, can't get them fixed or become robbery targets and ultimately it detracts from the reason for being there. 

Years ago I met a very interesting guy in Libya who had a battered old cruiser, just two front seats in it, no brakes (plenty of time to slow down in a desert), no lights, kit consisted of a pan, bowl, fork, rug, blanket, torch, lighter, with which he stayed out in the desert for weeks on end. I try to keep close to that though my good lady likes a few extras. 

 

[roamingyak]

KISS - Keep It Simple Stupid is a good approach to take.
I try to keep things original and then supplement them if needed and possible... Land Rover HD rear springs with 130 helper springs inside for example.

He has a good Nigerian police checkpoint video - a few will literally make up any bs to try and get money from you...

[smallfry]

Excellent read. And this nugget..........

Factory reliability can only decrease with each modification, so I never modify the driveline, engine and other key systems.

😄

[Daan]

2 hours ago, smallfry said:

Excellent read. And this nugget..........

Factory reliability can only decrease with each modification, so I never modify the driveline, engine and other key systems.

😄

I agree with most things said, but modifying the drive line is potentially going to increase reliability on a landrover.

[Troll Hunter]

1 hour ago, Daan said:

I agree with most things said, but modifying the drive line is potentially going to increase reliability on a landrover.

The downside of an upgrade is that you think that you now have indestructible gizmos and then you overload them to failure.  Not so bad if you're within striking distance of home, or a supplier of said uprated gizmos, but its the absolute sh*ts if you're in the middle of nowhere - Africa?  Also, of course, if you are off the beaten track and one of a pair fails, at best you may have to reverse engineer your upgrade to re-install whatever standard gizmos are available locally.

The other consideration is that by installing uprated components you are shifting the perhaps deigned weak link, which now doesn't fail, but a far more serious/expensive failure occurs elsewhere while taking advantage of the uprated = stronger components.

Dan Grec is talking a lot of practical good sense.

Mike

[smallfry]

9 hours ago, Troll Hunter said:

The downside of an upgrade is that you think that you now have indestructible gizmos and then you overload them to failure.  Not so bad if you're within striking distance of home, or a supplier of said uprated gizmos, but its the absolute sh*ts if you're in the middle of nowhere - Africa?  Also, of course, if you are off the beaten track and one of a pair fails, at best you may have to reverse engineer your upgrade to re-install whatever standard gizmos are available locally.

The other consideration is that by installing uprated components you are shifting the perhaps deigned weak link, which now doesn't fail, but a far more serious/expensive failure occurs elsewhere while taking advantage of the uprated = stronger components.

Dan Grec is talking a lot of practical good sense.

Mike

To be fair, he also goes on to mention vehicle preservation. Surely no one in their right mind would try to climb every mountain and ford every stream if they were attempting this type of trip ? That would be madness. I know it would make the trip more interesting, but apart from having to abandon your vehicle, you could actually die in some of these places.

[Eightpot]

There are different challenges with overlanding through say Africa - its more of a careful longevity test than trial of strength.  Totally worth buying the best quality parts but upgrades and mods aren't necessarily an advantage.

LR have the balance about right with the design & build.  If you're managing to break props, driveshafts and gearboxes in the middle of the bush you're trying way too hard and need to revise your technique - it's much more about driving prep & planning, honing good skills and lots of mechanical sympathy. 

That said, I do like to give it some beans if there's some action to be had, look forward to rolling round in the gravel reattaching the results and spending days mooching about the industrial estates of Africa searching for tat. Heaven. 🤤

[FridgeFreezer]

There's two different types of upgrades and the distinction is important for overland;

There's upgrades that can be directly replaced with standard parts (EG an HD spring can be replaced with stock if it breaks, an HD half-shaft can be replaced with stock if it breaks)

And there's upgrades that mean standard parts will no longer fit - lift kits that relocate the shock mounts so no standard shocks will fit, custom tuning parts that mean standard engine hoses or even a standard radiator will not fit - those sorts of mods will bite you.

It's very easy to accidentally build a vehicle that can't be fixed anywhere other than in the country you built it.

[missingsid]

Don't forget as offloaders we like taking the difficult route, but offloading to get somewhere the route choice is to avoid difficult obstacles as should be in greenlaning.

When I started to race Comp Safari with a mate in the 80s/90s some of the top drivers drove to and from events in their race cars. Pete Rowe came from Cornwall or Devon the former I think can't remember. The advice we were given by our friend another racer was to do the same as it made sure you finished every time!

[miketomcat]

1 hour ago, missingsid said:

The advice we were given by our friend another racer was to do the same as it made sure you finished every time!

It being your daily has the same effect. But I think you get a better feel for the truck too. Therefore more mechanical sympathy.

Mike

[Mo Murphy]

The thrust of it that I got is that less is more.

Mo

[Daan]

5 hours ago, missingsid said:

When I started to race Comp Safari with a mate in the 80s/90s some of the top drivers drove to and from events in their race cars. Pete Rowe came from Cornwall or Devon the former I think can't remember. The advice we were given by our friend another racer was to do the same as it made sure you finished every time!

Has worked for me, usually...

[Anderzander]

12 hours ago, FridgeFreezer said:

There's upgrades that can be directly replaced with standard parts (EG an HD spring can be replaced with stock if it breaks, an HD half-shaft can be replaced with stock if it breaks)

 

I agree - though the ‘shifting the weak spot’ is relevant on some of these.  If the gearbox will now break before the half shaft it’s a potentially a dangerous problem. 

[Daan]

But if you fit a 4 pin diff, you remove a weak spot that could stop you in your tracks. You could still break a shaft but you can usually keep going. My ideal weak point is the drive member; easy to change and carry a spare of. 

[missingsid]

Daan, do drive members fail readily? I guess the halfshaft splines are hardened so they will survive.

My choice is next best to me, as I have stronger diff and halfshafts i have the 90/110 CV as a cheap and std item. The drive members are also std 90/110 so if your view is true then I am very happy.

[Snagger]

The standard drive flanges are not so much weak as soft.  They won’t act like a fusilble link, they just wear faster than the shaft spIines, possibly sacrificially.  KAM mad fusible shafts for a while - they had a groove machined in them near the outboard splines so that excessive loads would shear them at that point, not twisting the splines and jamming parts in the diff or CV joint and being certain to shear below the torque required to break other components.  The problem was, I heard, that they would suffer fatigue and eventually shear under relatively light loads.  But the best item to have strip or fail would indeed be the drive flanges - they’re cheap and easy to replace.

[Daan]

I am not sure about them failing due to overloading, if you run the later, thin style hub, I'd say they will fail at some stage. Most challenge trucks run hardened drive members, so it surely is a problem.

I think them stripping the splines in normal use is the result of the car running grease in the bearings, rather than oil, which causes the splines to run dry and rust, similarly to the gearbox output shaft.

Once they had added oil supply holes the problem was solved.

My bearings run in oil, and the drive member splines are mint.

[Anderzander]

 

3 hours ago, Daan said:

….weak spot that could stop you in your tracks. You could still break a shaft but you can usually keep going.

That’s exactly what I was thinking about the gearbox.

So I guess the summary is that it’s about making a conscious decision of where your driveline weakness is. 

[FridgeFreezer]

If you've got a grinder you can make any halfshaft a fusible link to protect the drivetrain - no-one does it though, wonder why?

[Eightpot]

My list of mechanical failures obtained overlanding in several LRs all over Africa/Middle east over many years is as follows and in some rough order of volume;

Punctures, worn out shocks, broken UJs, Worn hub bearing, bits dropping off due to vibration (almost everything at some point), shock punching through an axle mount, chassis cracked due to HD springs, one broken layshaft (25 yr old gearbox)

Most of the list is delayed if you avoid or clean off mud & dust regularly and try to keep vibration down which is the killer.  Most of the action I think for most folks doing those routes is actually at speed on dusty corrugated  roads rather than trying to climb out of muddy ditches in difflock, which is maybe less than 1% of the time, so its more about tyres/shocks and keeping everything attached 😄