Road conditions for birdsville dev road

silverperch · Newbie

Road conditions for birdsville dev road

PeterD · Guru

View this map. The first 109 km of road to the Diamantina Developmental Road is sealed, some of it is narrow bitumen. The next 270 km is mostly well formed and graded gravel. There are some stretches of newly sealed road but not too much. The surface is mostly better to travel on than some of the poor bitumen roads. I never reduce tyre pressures over those roads and have not had tyre pressures. You need to reduce your speed to 60 km/h or less to prevent overheating your tyres when you reduce tyre pressure. When travelling on those roads there are times when I am travelling up to 90 km/h towing a soft road van. I don't start early and easily get to Windorah from Birdsville by mid afternoon having made several stops along the way.

When you travel that and similar roads you just have to be vigilant. Keep a watch out for changes in road surface and slow where necessary. In particular slow for flood-ways and creeks, occasionally they can be a bit washed out and you need to slow a fair bit but mostly they are OK.

The road from Birdsville north has less gravel if you are going via Boulia. It is mostly gravel to Bedourie but is then fully sealed to Winton or Mt Isa.

You will have a pleasant trip if you follow my tips and don't get too uptight on your first long distance experience on good gravel.

Ziggy99 · Member

I air down maybe 20% on good dirt and 30% on rough dirt and do 85 kmh if the road permits. Don't get overheating. It gives you significantly better grip - which you'll be thankful for when a roo bounds across in front of you.

darjak · Senior Member

You could even take your car down the Track, I call it the Birdsville Hwy the last time we come up there it was better than most bitumen roads, a real non-event completely destroyed the adventure they might as well bitumen it too.
The ones I am sorry for are my grandchildren as they will most likely not have the enjoyment of doing the things and seeing places in their natural state as my wife and I have which is a pity.

Darrell

msg · Guru

No one has mentioned, the rocky bits, or the corrugation bits or the sandy bits. Took my van in in 2015 had a ball and was well worth the trip. However, I won't risk it again.

PeterD · Guru

Msg, which road are you talking about? The times I have travelled on the Birdsville Developmental Road there was very little corrugated surface and next to no sandy surface. The only really rocky bit was the deviation to Deon's Lookout (which is worth the deviation at walking speed.)

msg · Guru

The Birdsville development road. Went up to Deons lookout. Yes a bit rough though I really didn't notice it. . Its funny how our perceptions can be so different.

A good photo opportunity is the snake on the hillside. And the old pub.(closed) I think that was at Batoota.

We went about a week before the races and came back a week after. It rained lightly all the way there. The sandy bits got a bit boggy. Enough for my stability light to come on. The grader had just been through both ways.

The first 10k coming out of Birdsville was very corrugated. I drive a 2wd transit van. You feel every bump.

At the moment, I am 20ks off the blacktop halfway between Eromanga and Windorah. It takes about an hour going through bush to get to where we are camped. I would much prefer this track to the 300ks of the development road.

As I said, BITS. 300ks is a long way of jolting. I will say, the van held up really well, compared to a lot of 4wd's, at least I didn't get a flat tyre. lol. The tyre place in Birdsville was doing a roaring business fixing and replacing tyres.

Just saying, be prepared for a rough ride. The patches of black top were very welcome.

suengreg · Veteran Member

Last week we were going to travel Birdsville Development Road. Had been advised by other vanners and Council that the road was in a very rough state and Council would not grade it again until just before Birdsville Races.

Our van is not an off road and we did 20kms of rough dirt road before packing it in and returning to Windorah

vince56 · Senior Member

A bit of a late reply but just returned from Birdsville, the Dev road is atrocious, I have never seen rutting like it.
Many vehicles have been using the verge to drive on as the road is very wide and the only escape from the terror is on the outside of the guide posts.
I suggest avoid if possible, it really is BAD!