News July 2002

28th July 2002

I took some pictures of the damaged items for you all to see!  

27th July 2002

Well we have unfortunately had an early bath today, 1 mile into SS1 and the drivers side disc failed and broke at just under 100mph, which in turn sheared the caliper bolts allowing the caliper to come off and puncture the inside of the alloy wheel locking the front wheel.  Part of the broken disc severed the braided brake hose allowing the brake fluid to leave the system.  Where the ball joint attached to the hub has been smashed rendering the hub useless.  With the suspension no longer being held in place the wheel has come back onto the body work and has damaged the wing.  The tyre was also slashed by something unconfirmed.  I feel pretty lucky as at a different part of the stage we could well have ended up leaving the road.

In all there has not been a huge amount of damage to the car but its not the kind of thing you expect to happen and we don't carry spare hubs with us.  This meant that our rally was over so we were allowed to leave after stage 6 had finished.

The car only needs a new hub, caliper, disc and pads to have her up and running again.

I will take some pictures of the bits that are left tomorrow so you can all see.

25th July 2002

We are now pretty much ready to go, just sort out the tools and spares and load everything up.  I believe scruitineering is open from 6pm tomorrow.  We will put the car through the noise check which is 100db at 0.5meters and then through scruitineering.  Here they check the cars paperwork and all the safety aspects on the car are in tip top condition.  Hopefully there will be no problems and we can have a relaxing evening and an early night.

Keep your fingers crossed that we have no problems on Saturday.

22nd July 2002

Yesterday's Auto show went very well indeed.  There was lots of interest in the car and we had about 100 people take a close look.  The MCAC autotest was also excellent with some close competition. See the photos of the car below.

We have the final reg's for the Fat Albert Stages and we have been seeded 43 out of 82.  Were also seeded as 5th in class.  I had better get my foot down on this one.  

11th July 2002

Well Brooklands was booked earlier in the week so we had to go this afternoon.  The testing went very well indeed with no real problems.  We set the ignition timing up properly and there is a noticeable difference in the performance of the car.  I just hope that its enough to start getting us closer to a class win.  The only problem we did have is the co-drivers side wheel arch catching the tyre over large bumps, this has been sorted with the angle grinder and should no longer touch (fingers Crossed).  So now all we need to do is give her a clean.

7th July 2002

The car is now almost ready for testing, the new rocker shaft and windscreen has been fitted, there is just the tracking to get sorted and give the carb's their tune up.  Im going to give Brooklands a call tomorrow morning to arrange for testing on Tuesday afternoon.

I have also driven the car and the new cam feels very good indeed!

5th July 2002

I've put up some more pictures on the Photo page.

The paintwork as been completed around the window surround and its ready for the new windscreen to be fitted tomorrow morning.  Tomorrow is a big day for the car as it will finally be put on the road and be ready for testing next week.

We are also trying to make the car look as nice as possible for the Uxbridge Autoshow on the 21st July 2002.  So if you come to see the car please don't expect it to be perfect, 10years of rallying on a 1976 car has taken its toll.

A Steel rocker shaft and posts have been ordered from www.vulcanengines.com we will be fitting them in the next few days.  This is needed for high revving engines as the standard parts flex and your well adjusted tappet clearances go out the window! not good.

1st July 2002

The car is now very close to being ready for the next event.  They tyres have arrived as well as the brake pads.  Many thanks to www.rallynuts.com for their help, they have impressed me so far and I can guarantee that they will be getting most of my business when the re-shell starts.

I also won the May competition with Rally Nuts so I also received a Sparco First Leisure jacket from them.  The jacket is very much appreciated with the quality of the English summers!!!

Pretty soon we will be having a shake down test so keep checking back for the details of that.