Australian Millard producing Truck campers for 40yrs

jimh425 wrote:

Please explain. At 0:52, the speedometer shows he/she is going 115 kph. My conversion says 71 mph. Is that not fast anywhere in an RV on dirt?

71 MPH is too fast in my TC on a smooth highway. Dirt road? Hell no.

jimh425 wrote:

RobertRyan wrote:
If you had actually listened to and saw the Video you would have seen " the way too fast"You mention is the only way to dtive miles of dirt washboard roads in Australia.

Please explain. At 0:52, the speedometer shows he/she is going 115 kph. My conversion says 71 mph. Is that not fast anywhere in an RV on dirt?

On washboard roads no. See the Mythbusters episode on dtiving effectively an washboard roads. The high speeds actually overcome the oscillating effect of the washboard road. He mentions( father/ driver / owner of RV Company) going at 90kph to overcome the effect of the corrugations. What PNichols is stating is very dangerous in places like Western Australia. His doing 7mph and having Pickups pass him.at 40mph in the US does not inspire confidence in the first place. I suggest he avoid dirt graded roads

RobertRyan wrote:
If you had actually listened to and saw the Video you would have seen " the way too fast"You mention is the only way to dtive miles of dirt washboard roads in Australia.

Please explain. At 0:52, the speedometer shows he/she is going 115 kph. My conversion says 71 mph. Is that not fast anywhere in an RV on dirt?

Enough of the rant on the previous post. Here is a Millard on the Global Colorado. It is not a great base a s it ranks 17th in general cars sales compared tp the Ford Ranger at
No.3

PNichols wrote:
Note that the Class B in Robert Ryan's video post above is indeed traveling carefully and slow in the places where it's wise to do so. However - even though it can be misleading in a video - in some places they appear to be traveling way too fast regardless of their RV type. What's the reason for fast travel on dirt roads out in the middle of beautiful nowhere in an RV during lifestyle episodes that are supposed to be for relaxing?

If you had actually listened to and saw the Video you would have seen " the way too fast"You mention is the only way to dtive miles of dirt washboard roads in Australia. Your somewhat ignorant and silly comments can lead to people's deaths. Your photos show what is basically a slightly graded road
Your comments are what road safety authorities here DO NOT WANT visitors to emulate for their own. safety.:M

One can't confuse roads with teeth rattling "washboarding" with just plain rough outback roads. This is an example photo that doesn't do it justice, but here's what washboarding is and what we have had to drive slow on for miles with our short-but-full-sized Class C:


I wish I had a picture of the very nasty approach to this - the DW and I were too busy navigating down that steep and rough slope - but here's the "RV's Not Recommended" loop road we wound up on and toured on the Monument Valley floor:


Here's another photo of a road we took on the way to boondock camping - again very slow so as to carefully pick our RV's path:


Here's us traveling on another rough remote road - note the 15 MPH speed limit sign way to the left in the photo:

I wouldn't recommend traveling this way in some "regular" RV's. Good ground clearance with no low hanging plumbing or other equipment is a given. Short length and and a low rear differential ratio also helps. However, the camping comfort once you get there can be priceless.

P.S. Note that the Class B in Robert Ryan's video post above is indeed traveling carefully and slow in the places where it's wise to do so. However - even though it can be misleading in a video - in some places they appear to be traveling way too fast regardless of their RV type. What's the reason for fast travel on dirt roads out in the middle of beautiful nowhere in an RV during lifestyle episodes that are supposed to be for relaxing?

pnichols wrote:

Grit dog wrote:
Not sure who told you washboard roads are from the original dozer tracks that pioneered in a road, but that couldn't be further from the truth. Makes no difference rough is rough, but it's just a function of vehicles suspension loading and unloading and drive tires.

Washboard dirt road surface comes from the physics of powered rotating round things pushing vehicles along on that loose surface over time - probably at too-fast rates.

It doesn't take an Australian RV or an expedition RV to travel on extreme washboard.

We take our 24 foot E450 Class C on extremely rutted roads whenever needed boondock camping and rock hounding. What you merely have to do is GO SLOW to keep the RV from coming apart. We have traveled up to 25 miles each way at 7-10 MPH on nasty washboard desert roads. It can be done safely and reliably - but you must have patience - and be willing to have pickup trucks blast past you at 40+ MPH tying to touch only the tops of the ruts ... a trick that will not work with an RV.

25Miles? Try 100 miles. No 7-10 mph is far from practical.:S It would take you years to drive across Western Australia at that speed. Inexperience like that would kill you in outback WA, people have died. Most do washboard at 30-40mph or faster in this case 55mph. People have come from the US and other countries and have died on these tracks.Something you would be warned about driving on very rough roads in extreme Outback Australia:R
Driving a Class B across corrugations
Driving a Class B across Corrugations

Grit dog wrote:
Not sure who told you washboard roads are from the original dozer tracks that pioneered in a road, but that couldn't be further from the truth. Makes no difference rough is rough, but it's just a function of vehicles suspension loading and unloading and drive tires.

Washboard dirt road surface comes from the physics of powered rotating round things pushing vehicles along on that loose surface over time - probably at too-fast rates.

It doesn't take an Australian RV or an expedition RV to travel on extreme washboard.

We take our 24 foot E450 Class C on extremely rutted roads whenever needed boondock camping and rock hounding. What you merely have to do is GO SLOW to keep the RV from coming apart. We have traveled up to 25 miles each way at 7-10 MPH on nasty washboard desert roads. It can be done safely and reliably - but you must have patience - and be willing to have pickup trucks blast past you at 40+ MPH tying to touch only the tops of the ruts ... a trick that will not work with an RV.

JoeChiOhki wrote:

RobertRyan wrote:

JoeChiOhki wrote:
Ah, but will it survive a run down the Tanami Track and its well known truck busting corrugations? :p

The TC would be similar to US TC's in that case. Depends on the support vehicle. Tanami is primarily desert. Can your base vehicle and TC take the pounding?

My last camper is being replaced because it couldn't. I'd be very surprised if my old Power Wagon fared much better on that road due to its age.

I figured given a good portion of the inner roads cross Central Australia are dirt and almost always with corrugations, the local built rigs might be a fair bit tougher than our American built ones that get pissy if you take them on slightly rough bitumen.

Our dirt tracks generally are alot less corrugated due to the difference in geological make up of the soil. When you come across corrugations on a back road in the states, its generally left behind impressions from the tracks of a bulldozer that worked on the road vs natural phenomenon from rainy periods.

Not sure who told you washboard roads are from the original dozer tracks that pioneered in a road, but that couldn't be further from the truth. Makes no difference rough is rough, but it's just a function of vehicles suspension loading and unloading and drive tires.

RobertRyan wrote:

JoeChiOhki wrote:

RobertRyan wrote:

JoeChiOhki wrote:
Ah, but will it survive a run down the Tanami Track and its well known truck busting corrugations? :p

The TC would be similar to US TC's in that case. Depends on the support vehicle. Tanami is primarily desert. Can your base vehicle and TC take the pounding?

My last camper is being replaced because it couldn't. I'd be very surprised if my old Power Wagon fared much better on that road due to its age.

I figured given a good portion of the inner roads cross Central Australia are dirt and almost always with corrugations, the local built rigs might be a fair bit tougher than our American built ones that get pissy if you take them on slightly rough bitumen.

Our dirt tracks generally are alot less corrugated due to the difference in geological make up of the soil. When you come across corrugations on a back road in the states, its generally left behind impressions from the tracks of a bulldozer that worked on the road vs natural phenomenon from rainy periods.

US pickups were never really designed to take that sort of abuse.,They are more an urban vehicle, although they are used on farms in NA

Given the damage it does to something the size of a road train, shy of a unimog, I don't think there's a truck out there that can take a lot of beatings from the roads through the outback without coming away with some damage.