Monday, Sep 13, 2004 at 13:38
Jan & Lionel,
In the last twelve months we have taken our Silhouette 420 X2 into
Woods Point in very wet conditions, through the Buckland Valley and up through the centre to
Litchfield and
Kakadu via the
Oodnadatta Track (just after it re-opened). When we are
camping we tend to take our time in an endeavour to experience as many "moments in time" rather than just racing through the minutes in a day, and to this end the Coromal suits us perfectly. It takes about 15 minutes to set up and marginally less than that to prepare for the road.
We currently tow our camper behind a 3.0litre petrol Mitsubishi Triton dual cab and most of the time you can hardly tell it's there. Having hauled a full height caravan for a while many years ago there was no way I was ever going to regress to the days of needing a valium at the end of each days travel. On the bitumen the low profile and independent
suspension of the Silhouette allows us to comfortably sit on speeds above 130kmh where it was safe to do so, while on the dirt the camper has not sustained any damage from the ordeals which we have put it through thus far. As the second vehicle of two on the dustiest section of the
Oodnadatta Track we had a barely discernable layer of dust on the benchtops at the end of the day, whilst unfortunately our travelling companions were inundated with dust.
When we were in the red centre we made a conscious decision to see as much of the East MacDonnell Ranges in the limited time which we had and leave Kings Canyon and the West MaDonnell Ranges until our next central Australian trip, so I cannot comment with any experience on the two
routes which you have queried. But, having looked at Ruby Gap and crossed
Ross River into N'Dhala Gorge I would humbly suggest that the Coromal would be more than capable of either of your chosen destinations, as long as you take your time and allow for the fact that you have a lot of weight behind you. Of course your ability to cross
sand dunes will be very much determined by the capabilities of your towing vehicle.
Obviously you have done your research and have discovered the many positive aspects of the Silhouette so the motive of your post is to ascertain any negatives, so I shall try to find some:
The towball weight of the 4.2 (IMHO) is relatively excessive and we have added storage boxes to the rear bumper to compensate for this. Our accountant who has recently ordered a 420 X1 is contemplating adding his dirt bike to the rear of his Silhouette when he gets it.
Slide on end flys and annexe awnings are a PITA! We are in the process of having ours modified to fixed bags for this reason.
Storage space above bench level is non-existent, but we have solved this problem with a plastic set of four drawers which sits in the corner of
the bench top when
camping and travels on top of one of the seats.
Hopefully this information will be useful to you in your quest. If you have any further queries simply post your email address and I will try to answer them in an unbiased manner.
Good luck with your decision!
AnswerID:
76187