GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

[GavinR]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

Thanks for the comments

Some in car from this year's event - all 11 stages are on Youtube, these 2 are the last ones from each day

Good long stages this year, mostly 10 miles but Clogagh was 12 miles

Saturday - SS6 - Ardfield

Sunday - SS11 - Clogagh

[mexicotait]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

Are you going to do a write up gav ?
Just watched the event on the telly
Hoped to see you but no good

[GavinR]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

Yes, write up coming soon
It seems the only way to get on telly is to win your class or do something really stupid in front of the cameras

[Huxley]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

Some pics from Longcross courtesy of Andy at M&H Photography

Just spotted your Longcross action I remember that event as I was course car 0 was rather wet on that one lol

[GavinR]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

West Cork Rally 16-17th March 2013

After last year’s event ended abruptly when the engine let go on the first day, we were hoping for a better run this year. George was co-driving as usual with Carrie and Guy servicing - Carrie was also in charge of catering as we had booked a self-catering cottage for the week, located on Sunday’s Ring stage. This year the rally was more compact with 12 stages covering 125 miles run in groups of 3 with very little road mileage in between. We took the recce slowly as George had a cold and was starting to lose her voice so we finished early on Thursday and headed to the beach for an hour even though it was freezing cold. On Friday we spent an hour finishing the recce then relaxed for a few hours going to the Farmers Market in Clonakilty before heading off to scrutineering mid afternoon. The scrutineer was very thorough, which is good and the only thing he mentioned was the steering rack was moving slightly as the bushes were worn, but nothing to worry about. After signing on we parked her in Parc Ferme for the night.

Saturday, and day 1 of the rally, but with the compact route Car 1 was away at 1pm, so a quiet morning with just the Drivers Briefing to attend. We were seeded 99 out of 140, but when the start list was published we were behind Cars 100-103, which was a bit strange. The weather was good and the roads pretty dry despite some overnight rain, so we headed out to Stage 1 Glandore on the new slicks I bought the week before. The stage went well, we passed Car 102 broken down early on, then caught 103 a few miles from the end and 101 was parked up near the stage finish, also having problems. DVY was running well and George was managing to read the notes clearly, after plenty of cough sweets her voice was recovering.

A short road section then Stage 2 Sam’s Cross which went very smoothly. Next was Stage 3 Ardfield which is one of my favourites but this year it had a different start and finish. We had a good run through and just caught the Civic in front on the flying finish. Back to service at Owenahincha caravan park, there was nothing needed on DVY, so Guy just checked everything was tight, refuelled and we had a late lunch. The sun was still out so no need to worry about tyre choice either.

After service we did the previous 3 stages for a second time. Glandore was good, I’d been having trouble getting DVY off the line but this time got it right and we caught a 106 after 3 miles and finished with a time 28s quicker than the first time over the 11 mile stage. Sam’s Cross even better, 31s quicker although George’s stopwatch showed us only 1s quicker so the timing might have been 30s out. Ardfield, last one of the day and I nearly stalled it on the line, much to George’s amusement, but got going well after that and overtook Car 100 a few miles before the finish and we were 10s quicker. In service we had plenty of time so Guy spanner checked all the suspension front and back and we topped up with fuel before heading back to Parc Ferme in Clonakilty for the night. As we left service we were given some results which showed us 48th but when we checked later that night we had dropped to 66th - as various cars had been held up by accidents and when the notional times were applied they moved ahead of us – but we were very happy to have had a trouble free first day, the only slight cause for concern was some clonking from the diff at slow speeds.

Sunday was bright and sunny but some more overnight rain had left a few damp patches on the stages. After a quick run through service it was on to the first stage of the day, Ring, this year with a slightly different start very close to service and extended to 10 miles, but using a lot of the usual roads. A good run through with a time of just over 10 minutes. Next stage was Clogagh, the longest of the rally at 12 miles and a good mixture of fast and slow, open and twisty roads and a couple of rough sections by a forest. There were quite a few cars off, including a Civic at the end of a long straight parked halfway up a breeze block wall, both crew members stood nearby cheering everyone else! No dramas for us although we were going a bit quicker than day 1, just a bit closer to the hedges. The final stage of the loop was Ballinscarthy, a stage I’d done many times over the years, and we were 44th quickest. Back to service for a final check over, the tyres were holding up well and the clonking diff wasn’t getting any worse. As it was the last service of the rally, once we were ready to go, Carrie and Guy headed off in the van to spectate.

Sunday afternoon, a few clouds were gathering by now and as we queued up to the start of the Ring stage, it began to rain gently. Luckily it wasn’t enough to make the roads wet and as the stage headed inland it stopped. Another clean run, about 10s quicker than the first time through. On to Clogagh, it was going very well, nicely round the hairpin where Carrie and Guy were watching, lost a bit of time in the middle going passed a broken down Escort and then caught a Sunbeam near the end, smoking badly with a disintegrating gearbox, so only a few seconds quicker than the first time through. Onto the final stage, Ballinascarthy, where there was a bit of a delay and as we pulled up to the start we could see everyone taking their helmets off and it was cancelled – the rally leader had rolled his Subaru and blocked the stage, by the time it was cleared it was too close to road open time so we all drove through at slow speed. So a bit of an anti-climax to finish the rally like this.

Overall we finished 42nd and 12th in Class, a very enjoyable event this year, DVY ran like a dream, thanks to Carrie and Guy for looking after everything, and many thanks to George, an excellent job on the notes all weekend.

[Graham]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

another great write up thanks gav

[exboyracer]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

Nice write up mate and congrats on a trouble free event!

[lee edwards]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

Nice one!

[GavinR]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

Having done Ireland without any problems, just a slight clonk from the diff, so I removed the axle a month ago and extracted the diff
It wasn't too bad but the friction plates were getting loose on the splines so I ordered some new ones from Gartrac
While I had the axle off the car, I thought I'd better check the studs, having sheared some on Fly recently, and all 8 of them were slightly bent

Looking at the axle, it was built for Fly when I was hillclimbing and is 1" narrower than a baby atlas, so on Dvy I run 1" spacers either side and this probably contributes to the studs bending

I looked online at hubcentric spacers, but would need to have some specially made as the Quaife flange is cone shaped, and they would be about £35 each, so I thought it would be better to make my own...

This is the shaft and flange


Take one large block of ally, 5.75" dia x 75mm, £26 delivered from Aluminium Warehouse and cut it in half


Machine the centre with an angle of 20 degrees to match the flange, taking into account the disc thickness which makes the cone smaller


Machine a 10 x 68mm spigot, turn the spacer down to 25.4mm and widen the end of the cone to clear the halfshaft nut


Drill 4 holes using a spare flange and disc as a jig and it all fits perfectly with new studs and nuts


Rear wheels are now properly supported


When I get time, I will do something similar for the front which runs 3/4" spacers but the studs aren't under as much load as the rears

Tomorrow I'm out on the Mini Epynt Stages with George, seeded 39 out of 80 entries...

[rhodrievans]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

Have a good 1 tomorrow il be there at car 80

[GavinR]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

An excellent day on Epynt Ranges today, beautiful weather but not too hot, it took a few stages to get used to the organisers notes, but once we'd modified them to our satisfaction everything came together well, we were getting quicker every stage

DVY was running well again, I used the same 4 slicks I'd bought for Ireland and never took them off, we just added some fuel and Hugh checked all the suspension was tight

A few moments during the day, landed a bit awkwardly over some jumps, locked up into a chicane but sorted it out in time and cocked up a few hairpins

As usual, there were some very twisty bits but also flat out sections, George saw 112mph on the trip in the morning and when we did the same bit backwards in the afternoon it was even faster

Very pleased to finish 21st overall, 5th in class and Best Mixed crew

Many thanks to Hugh for servicing (and getting to my house at 4:45am this morning) and to George for a great job sorting out and reading the notes, we hope to be back there for the Mewla in August

[MCURZON]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

Well done Gav, you looked quick out there.

[GavinR]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

2013 Update

George and I were out on the Mewla in August - I'd last done this event in 2010 and it is always good to do some longer stages over Epynt
Weatherwise it was one of the best days I've ever seen over there, clear blue sky all day so no concerns over tyre choice
We did the recce the day before having bought Patterson Pacenotes, and Carrie and Guy arrived in the morning to service

Having done well on the Mini Epynt, we were slightly disappointed with our seeding (Car 61) and caught the car in front after 5 miles! After that it wasn't too bad, we didn't catch any for the rest of the morning. In service it was just a question of checking everything and topping up with petrol.
At lunch there was a nasty incident in the service area which resulted in the Air Ambulance being called - a Darrian had fallen off a jack and landed on one of their service crew resulting in a head injury, so he was airlifted to hospital (and later released with just a few scars). This resulted in a half hour delay on the 4 afternoon stages

The first afternoon stage was the longest on the event at 14.25 miles and we caught the car in front after 10 miles who pulled over quickly, then caught the car in front of that with quarter of a mile to go. As it was so close to the finish he didn't pull over so we followed him over the "Black Hut" jump at some speed, luckily he didn't back off and neither did I

The last lap went well although I wasn't much quicker than the previous ones despite not catching any cars

At the finish at Builth Showground we were pleased to finish 22nd Overall and 5th in Class, thanks to George for a great job on the notes and Carrie and Guy for looking after us for the day

Picture of one of the many hairpins




My final event for 2013 in DVY was the Fat Albert Stages run by my motor club Tavern at the end of October
George was co-driving for Jamie Turner in her Dad's MG ZR so I enlisted the help of fellow club member Rich Christensen to co-drive for the day

We started off well although it was very very slippery in the nadgery bit, one of the farmers having fenced it off over the summer so his bulls could graze the undergrowth. We caught a few cars in there but could not get past so just had to sit and wait for the more open parts of the airfield. After stage 2 we were 20th, just ahead of our seeding

Disaster struck on stage 3 when both throttle cables snapped coming into the final hairpin about 1/4 mile from the finish. We pulled over and I jumped out and managed to tie-wrap the throttle open enough so we could crawl slowly to the finish, but we had lost 4 minutes...
In Service, Hugh and Andy helped me change the cables and we hoped to make up time on the next ones

Then the gearbox started playing up, on stage 4 we lost 4th and 6th, also 1st gear was sounding pretty bad
Stage 5 we lost 1st although I was getting the hang of double shifting through the non-existant 4th it did slow us down a bit
Stage 6 was ok, just 2nd, 3rd and 5th now, then halfway through the final 7th stage 2nd and 3rd went so I was left with direct drive in 5th

I nearly came in a lap early but decided as we'd come this far I wanted to complete the distance. Going into the nadgery bit for the last time the marshalls flagged us down as the route was blocked with a Mini on its roof. After waiting for a while the stage was cancelled and we all returned to the Service Area

We finished 27th and 12th in Class, not one of my best results, but thanks to Richard for sitting in with me, he was impressed by my press on regardless style - regardless of the car, or gearbox, disintegrating around you, press on

Jamie and George had a great day, comfortably winning the 1400cc class and also picking up the best Tavern crew award by finishing 22nd overall


So I did 4 events in 2013, and only had problems on the "easiest" one, a single venue

I haven't looked at the gearbox yet, instead I have bought a new Quaife Pro which cost me less than the last rebuild of the Sequential Box, and that was when I still had all the gears...

Plans are for more of the same in 2014, starting with West Cork in March

[mexicotait]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

Great write up as ever Gavin
Hope you had a good christmas and happy new year

Look forward to the next write up

[Paul C]

Re: GavinR's Mk2 Stage Car - DVY

Well done Gavin, nice write up as always. I'm with your co-driver Rich, the way you keep going with all your "issues" is a great inspiration, you never give up! Brilliant.

How much do you think an event in Ireland costs you out of interest? One day i'd love to compete over there.