GavinR's Mk2 Rally Car - FLY

[Graham]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

glad the damage is easily fixable

[Retromotorsport]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

Glad your ok, and Fly's fixable ... one thing, when you repair the chassis rail, dont weld up the triangle crushzone hole, as thats saved you a lot more work,

[GavinR]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

Got Fly all done for the Gymkhana and even managed to spend a couple of hours pushing the wing back into shape, doesn't look too bad now



Shiny compression strut and mount



Didn't manage to straighten the chassis that much, when I have more time I'll chop out the bent bit, push it out and weld it up, it's quite crumbly underneath which might have contributed to how much it bent

Had a quick drive up the road as well, did about 10 miles, got the brake bias set up perfectly so the rears lock a fraction before the front and the handling was good as well (I'd measured DVY's TCA's and comp struts and set these the same)

For the Gymkhana you need a navigator and 2 people can drive the same car so I'd asked my brother Derek if he fancied a go, which he did so I spent the night at his house near Chelmsford and we set off early on Sunday for the Gymkhana near Ipswich

It was cold and wet on the airfield with a few large puddles around so we went with the new Yoko's that I'd bought for the Road Rally

3 reasonable size tests were laid out and before the start we had a gentle convoy run through all of them - as Derek hadn't driven Fly for years I let him drive while I wrote some comments on the Test Diagrams - a lot of it was among buildings or on overgrown parts of an old runway. Each Test was to be run twice forwards then once in the other direction after lunch, together with some 'Skill' Tests which comprised estimating the width of your car, trying to reverse as close as possible to a cone and a Motorsport Quiz

I was seeded Car 4 out of 70, not sure why as it's years since I've done anything like this, but with the cars running at minute intervals there was no chance of being caught up. I set off on Test 1 and it was all going well until about half way round when Derek was a bit lost on the diagram and I couldn't quite remember where we'd gone on the convoy run, but we sortesd ourselves out and made it through about 25th quickest. Tests 2 & 3 were shorter and went a lot better.

Then it was Derek's turn - he was going well, being sensible and tidy, never having done anything like this before, he's more used to Trackdays recently but I managed not to get him lost and he was 38th quickest and the next 2 were done in a similar manner

Tests 4, 5 & 6 - These went a lot better, Derek was calling the route a lot better and I could remember most of them anyway, and my times were 5th=, 1st= and 4th=
Derek's turn next, going quicker as well, 20s behind me on the longer Test but a lot closer on the shorter ones

The Skill Tests were going badly (but they have to be done to make the event) so we decided to concentrate on the tests

Tests 7, 8 & 9 - A bit trickier doing them in the other direction but we got through them without getting lost, Derek starting to get Fly going sideways a few times and using the brakes to their full potential

Final Results, I was 16th and Derek was 38th after a very enjoyable day. We hope to be out on the next one in April

Pics to follow when I've bought some - no in-car as it was at a MOD airfield

[GavinR]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

After the Gymkhana, I dropped Derek off and headed round the M25 and home, or that was the plan, it just turned out to take a lot longer than I expected

Going along the M25 in heavy traffic in the trusty Scorpio estate towing Fly, everything was going well until I felt a slight vibration coming from the back, so I pulled up on the hard shoulder and checked all the tyres were up. Couldn't find anything wrong so I carried on but decided to go into the next services to have a good look - it was only 10 miles away

So I drove on a bit more and the vibration got a bit worse but I carried on as the services was getting ever closer and I was only doing 60, I'd gone past the 100m board for the junction when all of a sudden the rear of the Scorpio shot sideways, luckily towards the hard shoulder so I pulled up very quickly and got out to have a look, and this is what I found





It was dark and I was on the hard shoulder so didn't look too hard and assumed the rear wheel bearing had collapsed, so I phoned the AA and eventually a recovery truck arrived and took me to the services. As this was a non-AA truck they couldn't take me home so I was offloaded and sat in the services waiting for the next truck to arrive. Getting slightly bored and with better lighting I decided to have a look at what had happened and it looked a bit odd as the disc and caliper were in the right place, it was just the wheel that was stuck at a funny angle. I still couldn't figure out what had happened until I took the wheel centre off and found this





3 broken studs and the 4th nut just hanging on, I don't want to think about what might have happened if it had come off completely

Then I realised what had caused it - I'd had 4 new tyres fitted by a well known tyre place the previous Thursday and 300 miles later the wheel nearly falls off - I won't say which tyre place it was but I'm amazed by what they did

After a few more AA trucks I eventually arrived home at 4am on Monday

After a few hours sleep I got up and went to work in Fly (the van had failed its MOT on a couple of patches of welding and I hadn't had time to fix it)

Tuesday I took the pics you see above and armed with 3 wheel nuts with half a stud in each, a receipt for the tyres and a set of the pics I went back to the tyre place to sort them out

When I put the first nut on the counter, the manager was amazed and said he'd never seen that before in all his years of fitting tyres, so when I added the 2nd and 3rd nuts, the pics and the receipt he knew he was in trouble. He checked with the 's out in the tyre bay who swore blind they always use a torque wrench but it was pretty obvious what had happened (I check the torque of the other wheels, all done up to 110lb ft instead of 65lb ft, the first vibration must have been when the first one snapped, then this put extra pressure on the others so the vibration got worse when the next one snapped, etc)

Still not admitting liability, the manager phoned up the local Ford dealer who had 3 studs and nuts in stock so one of the lads was despatched to get these. That night I fitted them so the Scoprio was drivable and Thursday took it back to the tyre place who changed the other 13 studs and nuts - they said this wasn't necessary but I insisted on it. I think it cost them £120 in parts alone and I saw all the old ones so I know they did every single one

Don't think I'll be going there when I need some more tyres

[mervhill]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

Good for you doing that Gav, sometimes people don't do that often enough!! Glad it didn't end in a more dangerous way too!

[mexicotait]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

bloddy hell thats lucky i just had two tyres fitted to mine
just been out and checked them glad your ok and fly is back flying

[GavinR]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

A couple of pics from Woodbridge in Feb

Myself on about the only narrow bit there was


Derek enjoying one of the sections through the buddleia bushes


We're out this weekend doing another Gymkhana

[Tazman]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

Looks like you need an out board motor there Gav

[mk2stu]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

jesus christ i cant believe that how tight must they have done them up cant believe that
just glad it wasnt any worse for you!

[GavinR]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

Honington Gymkhana Sunday 25th April 2010

After the last gymkhana I'd driven Fly a couple of times and was having some starter motor problems where it would not engage fully with the ring gear (similar to DVY) but I didn't have time to sort out a new ring gear so I dug out an old inertia starter, strapped a gel battery in the passenger footwell, a remote solenoid on the inner wing and we had 24v starting

I travelled up on Sat and stayed with Derek and we arrived early Sunday at Honington Airfield, passed scrutineering and had plenty of time to study the test diagrams before the start. There were 3 tests laid out, 2 on the main airfield and 1 in the bomb dump, all nice and flowing and some skill tests in between.

The first test went well, Derek having no trouble calling the cones, Fly was going well with Yoko's on the front and barely legal Toyo 888's on the back. Then it was the first skill test, a figure of 8 on a skid pan specially watered for us, but with more grip on the back than the front I just understeered all the way round Test 2 and 3 went without incident and then it was Derek's turn. He found it a lot easier than Woodbridge mainly because it was nice and dry and set times about 10% behind me. After this first loop, I was surprised to be lying 2nd and Derek was in 28th (out of 60)

Just before the 2nd loop we had a heavy shower and the tests were run in reverse, but I managed to set very similar times to the first run and Derek wasn't far behind on a quickly drying airfield. Trying too hard at the end of Test 6 I was aiming for a nice racing line through 2 cones near the end, only to understeer straight into the outside one The skid pan was a lot more interesting this time, sideways everywhere - the highlight was watching Ian Mepham in a BMW 325 with a welded diff spin it 3 times A quick look at the times showed I was leading by 11s but unfortunately during lunch they added the cone penalties and I'd hit one on every test (10s a cone) so this dropped me to 7th. Derek had caught up to 15th with no cones to add

3rd Loop - A slightly different Skill Test this time where the drivers side of the windscreen was covered so the navigator had to guide you round a slalom of 3 cones and back in a fixed time of 20s with penalties for being early and late. I managed to loosen my belts enough to see ok but came into the finish a bit too fast and was 1s early. Derek however had a more sensible run spot on the 20s. Out on the Tests the layout in the bomb dump had changed slightly and the 2 airfield tests were joined together to make a longer one with a few more changes. No mistakes this time and by the end of these I was back up to 2nd (5s behind 1st) with Derek 14th

Last loop - Another Skill Test, this time the same slalom course and time of 20s but the navigator had to hold a plastic cup holidng 1/2 litre of water out the window and penalties were given for time and amount of water lost Derek was doing well holding the water until rounding the bottom cone the wind blew most of it into his face but I got the time right this time and only dropped 3 marks for water loss. Then with Derek driving I was ready for the wind and kept most of it in the cup but he was a couple of seconds slow ending with the same penalties. Out on the Tests we did the 2 airfield ones first and then a final blast round the bomb dump. I was being careful not to hit any cones but still trying to go fast, near the end of the bomb dump I cut a cone a bit too tight trying to keep away from the outside cone and ran over the base of it. Derek had another clean run through

When the results came out and all the cones were included, it was very close with the top 6 covered by 6s and I finished 4th and 2nd in Class while Derek was 14th and 3rd in Class so we both got 2 pots

So another fun day, thanks to Chelmsford Motor Club for organising the event and Derek for navigating very well

Pictures to follow

[GavinR]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

I've been busy with DVY all summer so Fly's just been sat at the back of the shed, but I've entered the Breidden Road rally in a couple of weeks so today I went to a grass autotest run by Cirencester Car Club for a play

Last night after returning from Rallyday with DVY, I swapped the petrol tank into Fly, charged both batteries and she started first time, so I had a brief trip up the road to check everything was working, apart from the 2nd fuel pump and dip beam, it was, but this morning I went to start her and she wouldn't turn over - the 2nd battery for the 24v had lost it's charge Running a bit late I just boost started and stuck a 3rd battery in the boot to be fitted when I got there

Dan Stone (stone4dr) was doing the autotest as well in his Escort (and had sorted out all the arrangements to do the event ) so I met him just outside Tetbury and we headed off to find the field. There were 11 of us competing, including Dan's brother Jason and his friend Mike, all driving the 4 door! The organiser (Mark) was driving a Nova along with a young lady who I assumed was his daughter, there were 3 chaps driving a Scimitar SS1 and 2 Astras as well

There were 2 tests laid out in the field, with 2 different routes for each and we did them 4 times, the fastest 2 to count for the results. There was plenty of grass so not much grip and it was just a question of not trying too hard, Mike got the hang of this very well but Dan and Jason had a few spins, neither of them being used to rear wheel drive

It was difficult to tell how we were doing as none of us knew what times we did (the organisers just wrote them down on a sheet as you did each test) and apart from my very first run at Test 1 when I was told I was the quickest so far, we had to wait for the results to find out

When they came out, Dan was last on 349s, Jason was 9th I think, Mike was a very good 3rd on 315s, 9 seconds behind the organiser Mark on 306s and I was surprised to be 1st on 295s

[stone4dr]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY









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[azz259]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

how did you get on last night at breidden? you out on sarn helen rally?

[GavinR]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

Breidden Road Rally 2nd-3rd October

I'd never done this one before, and neither had Cath, but WBCC always put on a good event

Seeded in the middle of the Experts at Car 49, I was just hoping to get round without any trouble, we got everything plotted in plenty of time and headed out to the first Regularity, a 2 mile 4 minute section over 4 hump back bridges, all cautioned!
A bit of rain before the start meant everything was very slippery and my Yokohama 539's did not have much grip at all (should have bought some 21's ) so I started off very cautiously and we dropped 3m 52s on this section (the top crew dropped 1m 21s)

After that we got quicker throughout the night, I remembered how to drive in the dark and got used to the lack of grip, we had a few big moments braking into corners that turned out to be tighter than expected but got away with them all, found all the slots apart from one farmyard where I couldn't see the gap between the buildings for a while, so it was an enjoyable night

Cath did a good job on the maps but was feeling a bit strange by the end, a combination of the engine leaking oil, the noisy gearbox (also leaking oil) and exhaust fumes not helping so by the finish I had a list of jobs to do before the next outing!

Overall we dropped 36m 44s and finished 31st and 14th in Class, the winners Phil Turner / Wyn Roberts dropped 12m 59s in their hired Mk2 Escort

Not sure when the next Road Rally will be, but I haven't any more planned for this year

[GavinR]

Re: GavinRs Mk2 Rally Car FLY

I'm a bit out of date with this, but after the Breidden I did Course Car on the Exmoor Endurance Night Route, another Gymkhana at Woodbridge (3rd Overall which was good enough for 2nd in the CMC Gymkhana Championship ), 2 Cirencester Car Club Autotests (1st on one and 3rd on the other) and last Friday a Cirencester Car Club 12 Car which was a great laugh

I haven't made any changes to Fly over the winter, just tried to tidy up the front end a bit and replace the paint that's flaked off the front panel, and she passed the MOT this week without any problems

I'm out on the Bro Caron next weekend with Cath, hopefully it won't snow this year and I'll get a finish
We're seeded 41 in the middle of the Experts