To Corsica and back.

[syncrosimon]

Sounds a great trip Simon. Looking forward to complete mpg figures...

Kangoo Trekka.. now that sounds interesting, love the diesel kangoos.. or whatever the Bongo equivalent is which we rented whilst down on the Riviera.

The Kangoo Trekka is an unsung hero of the 4x4 world. Incidentally we saw loads of them in Corsica, they were everywhere. I of course have not got a dirty diesel one, but the nice free revving 16v 1600 petrol. Fantastic engine, and again I have only ever had a couple of situations where more torque would have been useful.
The kangoo is very similar to the T3 in that it is a workhorse with no pretensions. It does a job for me, very well, and is in no way a fashion statement.
It has been up the now illegal Penny Bridge lane near Tarr Steps, and got around the entire Land Rover Market Rasen off road site. It is another vehicle, like my 16" that I would not part with. I do hate Renault dealers though, none of them have a clue, and it is very clear that even they hate the cars they are trying to sell. When we bought our Trekka from Summercourt in Cornwall they had never heard of a Trekka.

[syncrosimon]

Several people have asked about the Sterling Battery system that I have installed. So here goes, the heart of the system is a Sterling Digital Alternator to battery charger AB1290.
http://www.sterling-power.com/products-altbatt.htm

Basically you connect this unit to the Alternator via a big fat cable and also connect the optional temp sender.
[IMG1200]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040619.jpg[/img]

The unit then by controlling the voltage that the alternator senses, contols the amount of amperage that the alternator produces. It can drop the voltage down to 12 volts which makes the alternator pump out a maximum that I have seen of 119 amps. The box then amplifies this low voltage up to the 14.8 volts that the battery needs to charge, and not suplhate the internals of the battery. This is the reason that so many leisure batteries only last a season, they are being charged at around 13 volts, which is just too low to get a good charge.

The unit then connects back to the altenator wires, and to your battery bank, which in my case is two 75a/hr amp hour leisure batteries.

[IMG1680]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040620.jpg[/img]

[IMG1680]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040621.jpg[/img]

The battery bank also has a temp sensor on the post which the unit monitors so as it can find out how much juice it can throw into the batteries without cooking them.

[syncrosimon]

[IMG1680]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040629.jpg[/img]

This shows the install

[IMG1680]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040623.jpg[/img]

And the battery charger, and inverter. The battery cahrger charges both the starter battery and the domestic battery bank.

The control panel showing that the alternator is putting out 14.1 volts, which is being amplified up to 14.8 for the domestic batteries, they are full, and so only 4 amps is going in. I have seen 100 amps going in. If you switch the headlights on, it just reduces the amps going to the domestic batteries and increases that going to the starter battery.

[IMG1680]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040628.jpg[/img]

And the control panel where I can select the source of mains voltage going to the sockets from either the inverter, or the mains hook up.
[IMG1200]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040617.jpg[/img]

this also shows the mains electric engine heater as installed by VW, I think that it is low power, and stop the engine from freezing rather than actually heating. I have not had much of a chance to test it yet.

[syncrosimon]

The only draw back with this system is that it puts a massive strain on the alternator, I do not know what the long term effect of this will be. The system dissengaged on Corsica, when after 3 days without a hookup, and no driving, we went on an off road trip, the alternator got upto 80deg celcius. This was because I was in G gear, and there was not enough airflow through the engine bay to cool the alternator, on normal roads this was not a problem, and even at tick over 60 amps could be drawn through.

I then manually turned the system off, and it reverts to a heavy duty split charge system as controled by the diodes in the alternator.

I soldered all the connections, every one, all the crimp terminals throughout the van.

[HarryMann]

Yes, I also thought Norm got this one a bit wrong

[img1680]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 030943.jpg[/img]

[HarryMann]

The fact it disengaged itself and reverted to basic functioning all sounds good to me... but could you not 'tell it', now you know, not to try to charge the main batteries, by disengaging it yourself when off-road and hot and empty.
In other words, not wait to the alt gets to 80C..

A spare alternator is pretty high on the list anyway when far away, Sterling System or not, so nothing really changes there.

[mud]

Nice blog

Dead jealous

I spent a month in Corsica once and was amazed by the diverse landscape. Because I was a guest of a local I saw loads of places the tourists don't get to. The Corsicans tend to spend one day on the beach and the next on the massive and smooth rocks on the mountain river beds where there are some epic fresh water rock pools.

[syncrosimon]

The Sterling system learns your batteries, by monitoring the temperature of the batteries to make sure it is not pumping in too many Amps. When I first installed the system It would only pump out 80 amps, in Corsica this gradually went up to 120. The system turns it'self off, or I turned it off until I was motoring, to avoid alternator overheating. On the motorway even when kicking out 100 amps the temp was around 30 deg/C, so it is an airflow and engine speed issue. The Sterling products seem to be of a very high standard, and British made.

Incidentally Sterling uses the Bosch 90ampn alternator for it's demonstation purposes, so it's a good alternator.

Just trying to find the time to write up the rest.

[syncrosimon]

Nice blog

Dead jealous

I spent a month in Corsica once and was amazed by the diverse landscape. Because I was a guest of a local I saw loads of places the tourists don't get to. The Corsicans tend to spend one day on the beach and the next on the massive and smooth rocks on the mountain river beds where there are some epic fresh water rock pools.

The rivers were spectacular, with some amazing "Canyoning oportunities" we looked at where the locals were parking, and found some great pools for swimming that way. We hardly scratched the surface in two weeks.

There were a great deal of UK landrovers over there, for off roading excursions, and the landrover and rangerover are probably the most popular 4x4 for the average Corsican, after the Kangoo Trekka. The gendarmes all having 110's.

[syncrosimon]

The weather was very hot, but the syncro was working very well. I had installed two Fiamma Turbo Vents in the roof that have electric motors and can be switched for suck or blow. These were invaluable for in camper cooking, which mainly consisted of Corsican supermarket tinned meals which were really very tasty, especially the chilli-con-carne. The compressor fridge was working very well, and with a large freezer compartment meant we could save a fortune by buying ice-creams at the supermarket. The Turbo Vents meant that we could effectively cool the dub down before bed time, and extract unwanted cooking odours.

From Porto Vechio we headed inland to a town called Corte. Here we found an amazing campsite on the road to the Gorge Restonica. The campsite is set alongside a powerful turquoise river, amidst Corsican pines, with a Pizzeria and French Bread delivered in the mornings. At 42 euros a night it was the most expensive campsite, and the facilities were truly disgusting, but you are not in them for long, and the setting was so nice that we put up with it.

The campsite
[IMG2240]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040242.jpg[/img]


The Gorges Restonica is really a place that is unique, and a real experience to drive. The gorge starts at Corte and rises 5000ft to a car park and small restaurant made in a goat herders hut, it is a Mecca for bikers and one of the best places I have ever been. We were up amidst the snow, and walked up to Lake le Melo, including a bit of steel ladders and chains set in the rocks. A French student was living in another goat hut, and was selling Corsicola, omelette, bread and cheese, cooking on a smoky fire. This was at around 6000ft up a mountain. It was great, we bought some goat cheese, which we have just finished now. The gorge is quite unique in that it is heavily forested with Corsican pines all the way to the top, and with really craggy peaks it is spectacular. I used 4 wheel drive for the gorge, and mainly 2nd gear, the fan was going off and on about every minute, but no problem.

[IMG1680]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040321.jpg[/img]

We found a little side track that dived down the gorge to a forest area, it looked like an old part of the original track up the gorge, this was bumpy rock, and we carefully picked our way over the boulders to find a perfect place to park up for the day and chill in our chairs in perfect solitude. There looked like quite a few good off roading opportunities around Corte, and we met a group of British Land Rover owners who were having a rare old time on escorted off road excursions in their own vehicles.

[IMG1680]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040310.jpg[/img]
[IMG1680]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040306.jpg[/img]

[Mudlark]

Went to the same campsite on our second visit; spent a day lazing around and swimming in the river. the Citadel at Corte was also worth a visit; was told it had been in use until quite recently; as a military prison and later as an isolation hospital for soldiers with dodgy diseases.

I expect you also enjoyed the contrast as you climb from the coast into the mountains, first through the chestnut forests of the maquis and then higher into the pines.

I was really stunned to come across a ski lift and hotel on the highest point heading toward Bastia from the West coast; but then again by the size and formation of the river valleys you can see there is a whole lot of melt/rain water coming down off those mountains in early spring.

Where did you head after Corte Simon ?

[syncrosimon]

One disadvantage of going at that time of year was that the rivers were mainly too full for swimming in, which was a shame, but the upside was that the island was largely deserted, with the campsites only 1/4 or less full. We really like empty campsites, and Corsica appears to have a very short holiday season of July and August, and the rest of the year no one is there, which suits us. There were so many roadside, beachside, riverside pizzerias which were all but deserted.

We mainly met Germans with young pre school children, they had just had their two week spring holiday in Germany before we arrived, and were curious as to how we had arranged a holiday with our older children. They told us that it is illegal now in Germany to take your child out of school, and that in the Netherlands you have to pay 500 Euros per child, per week.

We then went on to Calvi for the last stage of our holiday.

[mud]

Question for Syncro Simon and Mudlark...

Did you try wild camping in Corsica?

I know the campsites are stupidly expensive and I also hear that wild camping is not allowed on the island but there are just so many out of the way places where you'd be very unlucky to get busted if you were stealth camping and being discrete. I did meet Germans who had done so with no problems

[syncrosimon]

We free camped for three nights, it is only illegal in the national parks. As usual for France, at every harbourside is a row of free campers, and with the Syncro you can get off the beaten track, my philosophy is that you either park somewhere very obvious where a lot of people pass by, or you park where no one can see you.

We heard of a German couple who had parked in the woods behind Calvi, which is illegal anyway as is a park, and they had a local presumably banging on their van at 0500hrs. i have only heard of this happening to Germans, who seem particularily nervous of free camping, and perhaps not so good at tucking themselves out of the way. This is the main reason why a syncro makes the ultimate camper.

This was a freecamp spot, on a track to a lighthouse near Calvi.

[IMG1680]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 040488.jpg[/img]

Free campers at Antibes near Nice.
[IMG1680]http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa28 ... 030983.jpg[/img]

[Mudlark]

I think you could get away with it as long as you did not stop in one place too long. It is frowned apon for the obvious reason; it robs money out of the local economy. If you are prepared to be disturbed, and move on if confronted then you take your chances; with a family in tow I was not prepared to take the risk; may be different if without kids.

The only place I saw people 'wild camping' quite openly was along sea front car parks in some of the bigger towns, not my thing unless waiting fo a ferry!

There are plenty of 'out the way' places, but there are also a lot of heavily armed hunters in the interior who off road into the maquis to get at the wild boar etc

The camp sites are mostly expensive next to the sea and in all the tourist spots; especially around the south east. We found a few that were very reasonable 20 minutes inland on the west coast.

I would suspect that in August some people end up wild camping through necessity rather than choice! camp sites in the popular area are full by 4pm and many do not take advance bookings.