The 1st Australian Machine Gun Section in 1916 consisted of two armoured cars, a 60 HP Mercedes (center) and a 50 HP Daimler (right), and a Belgian Minerva heavy car as a tender (left). The motorcycle was a New Hudson. The armoured cars were assembled in Australia.
Operations in the desert were always more difficult. The severe climate – heat, blazing sun, limited water – provided a dangerous arena for long-range patrols. The men traversed soft sand, broken rocks, slabs of soft gypsum and limestone, dry riverbeds (wadis), towering cliff escarpments and hundreds of miles of relatively featureless desert, requiring the skills of a ship’s navigator. The patrols stopped often to check their positions, often using a theodolite to determine their coordinates. Patrols usually involved reconnaissance and mapping, and the patrol commander or assistant would take notes and make drawings of the features discovered, for future use by other formations. On occasion they followed enemy forces to determine where they were going and to locate enemy positions. More rarely, they engaged in action and supported other groups in attacking enemy forces. Their most valuable function, though, was the extensive and accurate mapping of the unknown parts of the great Sahara Desert, information that made future military operations possible.