2. Overheating:

In Pyne (1984), it was considered that the cause of damage to the left piston of the Grizzly engine was a result of overheating.

After talking to Rod Vardy (1984 Base Engineer and a qualified motorcycle mechanic) who stripped the engine at Scott Base, it became obvious that the damage was caused by the wrong grade of spark plug and not the wrong fuel mixture. We would like to point out that the total spares issued to an event which was to travel 1800 km was one variator belt and one pair of Champion spark plugs, and that considerable pressure had to be used to have these allocated. R. Vardy considered the spare spark plugs were "several grades too hot and that the damage to the left-hand piston was a direct result of this" (pers. comm., 1984).

We hope these notes help clear up some misunderstanding of K5's use of the Grizzly motor toboggans in 1983.