Questions regarding the Treks section

Submitted: Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 14:37
ThreadID: 76119 Views:2823 Replies:4 FollowUps:4
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Hoping someone can answer these:

1. How have the average fuel consumption figures in the Treks been determined? Just wondering whether a specific vehicle model was used, or whether they are some sort of guess.

2. In the Driving Directions section (and in the summary at the start of each Trek) there's a total driving time for the trip listed. As an example the Anne Beadell Hwy trek lists the total time from Laverton to Coober Pedy as "1 day 1hr 34 min". Where does that number come from? I assume it is simply the total distance divided by average speed. Appears to me to be a meaningless number. Total time to cover the trek is, to me, more relevant.

3. Is there any way of telling just how up to date the information within the Trek notes is? For example, using the AB again in one part it says "in some sections it is heavily washed out and in others there it is a little corrugated". From what I've read elsewhere "a little corrugated" is not exactly correct - the corrugations are supposedly quite severe towards the eastern end. My question would also pertain to the required permits - they could change over time. So knowing when a trek was created is important.

Cheers from the Moose



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Reply By: Member - Fred B (NT) - Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 15:40

Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 15:40
1. A number of factors determine fuel consumption
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Have a look at this.... read the fine print at the bottom.

2. Driving time is the total hours driven by that person on that trek. Look at this
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What does it say above the driving time? It says min 3 days. These treks are a guide and information provided will be what that person encountered at that time. Things change, but the trek notes are a really good place to start. If you know things have changed then let David or Damien or others at EO know.
Hope this helps.
regards
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Follow Up By: Moose - Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 15:52

Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 15:52
G'day Fred - I must admit that I hadn't noticed the small print re fuel. So I had a look at it for the Anne Beadell and whilst there are figures listed for 4 and 8 cylinder petrols in the table there is no underlying information regarding how those were arrived at. There is underlying info for all the diesels and for 6 cylinder petrol.
So it appears that some info comes from elsewhere.

Yeah I know what it says about the recommended number of days. I was querying the total driving time which appears to be a totally pointless bit of info (at least to me!)
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Follow Up By: Member - Fred B (NT) - Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 16:02

Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 16:02
Moose,
as the small print says, if it is not specific to that particular trek, then the fuel is averaged for ALL treks on the EO site. OK, it's not necessarily going to be real accurate for the more difficult treks, and may not be specific to your vehicle, but at least you have a start point to plan from.
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Reply By: Member - The Bushwhackers -NSW - Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 15:45

Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 15:45
Hi Moose, how are ya?

Not sure about fuel consumption accuracy, but these treks have been driven by experienced drivers, and I would assume their figures are reasonable, probably accurate for their vehicle, and averaged for others.

The trek notes are often written by people like Mick O and Stephen L for example,(many others, too numerous to mention), intrepid outback adventurers who make us mere mortals green with envy. Among other things, they use a GPS device that logs the total distance travelled, average speed, the amount of time you are moving, the amount of time you are stopped, etc, etc.

You will notice if you look, that there is a recommended amount of time required to do the trek 'justice'.

You will also see if you look, that there is an 'updated on dd:mm:yyyy' note on each trek.

There is nothing special about their GPS units, its just not a TomTom that takes you around the city. I have a TomTom, but also asked advice from Stephen L, and bought one more suitable for off road travel.

Hope this helps you with your query,

Cheers, Dave

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Follow Up By: Moose - Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 16:05

Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 16:05
G'day Dave
I'm well thanks mate. Hope same applies to you.

Must be going blind - missed that updated thing. But in reality it is fairly useless because one doesn't know what has been updated.

Done plenty of outback travel ourselves and whilst we have a GPS unit the missus prefers real maps and a compass.

I've updated our vehicle and thus the interest in the fuel side of things - don't know how this one will go outback for consumption so I was querying the accuracy of the listed figures.

Re the time thing - just wondering why they'd even bother with actual driving time. Pretty pointless me thinks.

Cheers from the Moose

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Follow Up By: Member - The Bushwhackers -NSW - Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 17:41

Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 17:41
I'm good thanks

If an update has been posted on such and such a date, only info that needs changing or correcting to reflect current conditions will have been changed, so the sum total of the trek notes will be as accurate as can be expected.

You have to remember that the trek note writers do not travel these routes every week, so use them as a guide only, if the 'last updated on' time frame is a bit old. Sure as hell beats not having a guide at all.

I have only used one set of trek notes so far, found an error in it, and will fully log the trek and submit it to the website for consideration, in the near future. Thats how these notes are kept as up to date as could reasonably considered possible, we all do what we can to help our fellow travellers, rather than just looking at the notes, disregarding info we don't personally want, then stating that the info is pointless.

The trek notes are provided in good faith for all users, experienced or otherwise, they are a guide to the area and track you would be following, fuel consumption, distance, driving time, things to see, historical sites etc, side trips, camp sites, contact names and numbers, fuel supply points, consumable and service centres, safety suggestions depending on isolation status, roadhouse contacts, station names and phone numbers, pretty much everything you need,,,the list goes on and on, and a suggested time you should allow to do the trek, not a hard and fast set of rules that you follow to the letter.

Dunno what more you want

Cheers, Dave
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Reply By: Member - John (Vic) - Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 16:20

Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 16:20
The driving time is the sum of the driving time between various way points.
Its an indication of the time taken to do the section from example way Point No 1 to way point No 2 is 45 minutes, way point No 2 to 3 is 60 minutes the sum is now 105 minutes travel time and on it goes.
When you add up all these times and distances between the way points it will provide you with the totals.

Any updates would mean notable changes by the last poster to what has been noted previously in the notes.

Example, the Fred Blog Creek is now washed away and may be more difficult than previously listed.

The notes are not definitive but a very good guide in my view and I use them as the first point of call when researching and proposed trip.
Mostly I have found them to actually be quite accurate and very good to use.

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Reply By: ExplorOz - David & Michelle - Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 18:36

Thursday, Feb 18, 2010 at 18:36
As the others have said the information was imported and written once - it is then updated as we re-travel or get information from you (everyone). The base of the data is generated from GPS data derived whilst actually travelling the track so should be as accurate as the GPS was on the day (minus any new road modifications or storm damage). We do update the driving route sections as new GPS data is uploaded into the plot swap system using a programmed updater that looks for file accuracy and most recent date, this may update just a small section of a trek but will reflect the most accurate, most recent data we have for each section.

If there is an error simply use the Trek Feedback system at the bottom of the page - this is also something you should read in order to determine if there are any additional factors that have been supplied via feedback since the last note update. There is also a link to other travel journals (blog entries) that would be relevant to the trek note itself.

Your point three is so subjective in terms of the road conditions as vehicle destroying corrugations for one are a patch of corrugations for another. I have been on a road and thought those were ok corrugations and got to camp to have others tell me I was mad and that their dash board fell out and their suspension fell apart over that section - So what is bad for one is impossible for another. Corrugations are a part of outback travel personally I do not really care about them just drive to the conditions at the time. So it is impossible to supply a detailed answer to this question in the treknotes or even the camp site at the end of the road. We are about to link the official road conditions system into the trek notes so that the mapping system and driving notes will also supply the historical road conditions status and current status + notes. This will help link these two parts together and provide you with more information.

Permit information is updated all the time and is accurate. We are called and advised by the various agencies and bodies around the country when these need to be addressed. Plus we get a lot of feedback from you guys when things are not right (the feedback system).

So when the note was created is very meaningless as we update various parts of these notes all the time - in fact it would take me some work to pull out the dates and times of every update (we have this but it is a massive amount of data that is linked together to create a trek).

Is there something else you think we need to add, is missing or needs to be looked at? I am really asking this as I am working on the treks and mapping routing systems over the next few weeks so any feedback is welcome.

I hope this helps answer some of your questions please feel free to ask anything else about the information.

David
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