Thread: Anyone driven Sydney to Adelaide in a day?

Originally Posted by catch-22

I have driven Sydney to Geelong to pick up a Mazda R100 in a day and drove back the next, but Adelaide is a little further.

So can it be done with two drivers? Taking proper breaks, how long point to point (can't believe google maps)?

Cheers
Caine

Nope never Sydney to Adelaide but have done Port hedland to Perth in 17 hours, traffic not a problem on that run

More importantly do you still have the R100? what a great car,had a lot of fun in those years ago.

Originally Posted by Searover

More importantly do you still have the R100? what a great car,had a lot of fun in those years ago.

No got rid of that r100 and have owned another and an rx2 since. I am currently selling my 1 owner 1970 model r100 with original everything though And I might sell my rx7, but that's another thread

personally I would rather jump in a car and drive 1000km plus than drive 200km, with the long drive you settle in and know you are there for a while, with the 200km, I dont really settle into it.
Lonest stint I did was Melbourne to 1770 (6hrs north of brisbane), lots of coffee breaks, mate drove for 2 hrs and had 1hrs sleep in the car at toowoomba ?. That was in the disco
My brother regulaaly drives from sydney to the barrossa
cheers
blaze

Originally Posted by Brian Hjelm

Very little enforcement out there then. Most danger was from the bloody caravanners ( the terrorists) who MUST drive in the middle of the road at 80 k's. Probably doing 125K's maximum but doing it consistently for a high average speed. Not at all unsafe in the prevailing conditions. I have always had a pragmatic view of speed limits arbitrarily imposed by politicians, bureaucrats, safety nazis, and police without regard to prevailing conditions.

I always preferred to go that way rather than Hay as I found the two routes took about the same time but via Broken Hill was a much easier drive and a higher average speed was easy to maintain..

I always found it very hard on tyres, the low loader trailers I hauled weren't mine and the tyres, sometimes weren't the best, nothing worse than changing wheels on a low loader, Regards Frank.

Just came back from Brissie - one driver, 13 hrs with a wife and a 4 yo, 2 stops (Coffs for lunch and near Newcastle for fuel and dinner). Easy. But you have to be used to it.

When I used to live in Geneva (Switzerland) I'd regularly drive from Geneva to Poznan in Poland. 1400 km, 2 stops (fuel), 14 hrs. Not that lonely and quite easy.

Comfort is the key. Nowdays I have a CamelBack strapped behind my seat so I can drink lots of water while driving, good sunglasses, music (IF the family is not watching a DVD), don't eat junk food or choccies just much on fruit and nuts. Couldn't do that in a Series or my old Holden Barina - they weren't that comfortable and you get tired too quickly.

One thing I learned on long trips - is to read the signs when you're getting tired and your concentration is lapsing. Once you do and stop you recover quickly and keep driving. Overtiriring is not good for anyone...

Originally Posted by Tank

I always found it very hard on tyres, the low loader trailers I hauled weren't mine and the tyres, sometimes weren't the best, nothing worse than changing wheels on a low loader, Regards Frank.

They do get through tyres, don't they. Guy from Brambles Heavy Haulage once told me that the Comettos never wore a tyre out. They scrubbed them out or ripped them off the rims and chewed them up first, and their own design of self-steerer float always wore them out, never chewed them up, in spite of having a much tighter turn ability..

Originally Posted by Tank

I always found it very hard on tyres, the low loader trailers I hauled weren't mine and the tyres, sometimes weren't the best, nothing worse than changing wheels on a low loader, Regards Frank.

Did you ever try running with nitrogen in the tyres Frank.

We found that we were getting less blow-outs, particularly in hot weather and with heavy loads if we could get some nitrogen into the tyres. It's not easy to come by in the cities, but all the mine-sites have it for the struts in the dump trucks etc.

Unfortunately, the old 100 tonne Drake that Brambles had in Kalgoorlie was only ever running tubed tyres (Brambles were too tight to replace the rims) so we couldn't run nitrogen in them, but when I was sub-contracting to West Coast Heavy Haulage and others, their gear was a bit more modern and all running tubeless tyres, so we were always on the lookout for a bit of nitrogen during the hotter months.

A lot of the 50 tonne floats over here also have changed to larger diameter rims and tyres also to reduce the running speed, and therefore the temperature.

Often did Adelaide - Sydney.
We had retail outlet there for clothes some years ago.
Drove BMW 735 and done it 15hrs.

Take a UHF and put on Trucky channel(Forgot which one) and listen for speed traps.

Driven two up and get fuel stops sorted with plenty of coffee on the run there is no prob to do it during daylight hours.

Watch out for roos at dawn though.