Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

[PaulAlex]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

Well, the Escort finally appears to be playing ball and is almost how I want it to be (for now)

We're off to SBD on Thursday for some suspension and flat-shift setup work, plus hopefully one or two small detail changes. If that goes to plan, the weekend should see it looking pretty again and then consider its next event

[PaulAlex]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

Well the week has gone something like this:

More head-scratching
More swearing
More money(!) spent
A few more smiles
And a job list that has 27 items on it still!?

CossieMatt and I got the car down to SBD nice and early, including a pile of sausage and bacon baps on the way We made a good start to the day, by shortening the tension struts to allow more castor, and milling away a block of ally into the next upgrade........can you guess what it is?



While we were working the ally, we left Craig from SBD wiring a new flat-shift loom into the car. The idea being to remove the dedicated Geartronics GCU from the car and replace it with a close-loop system integrated with the Engine ECU. The reason for doing this was that I've been getting resonance on the gearlever causing phantom engine-cuts when I least expect it.

All was going well until we went to fire her up - only to find (after much head-scratching) that the dry cell battery had just fallen off the cliff and couldn't even power the rev counter up! Thanks to the time lost, we only had time to lash a single seater battery into it and do a basic systems check before it was time to head home, but we were happy that the basics were right.

Saturday saw another head-scratching session when the system that had been working on Thursday evening was found to be dead as a do-do again?! This was eventually traced to a dodgy Earth, but its fair to say I think the car still has a little attitude about her! I spent the weekend making some more detail changes that Matt said ware totally unnecessary (fuel sample valve plumbing - needed to be neater in my opinion), and generally fettling it ready for a rally at Snetterton next weekend. The snagging list still has 27 items on it, but they're generally small detail things......

All being well, this time next week I can report on how much better it is to drive without the engine briefly being cut every few hundred yards.

Oh yes, the piece of ally is a mount to fit the new SBD gear-knob (with integrated micro-switch) onto the gear lever, and also to move it back a couple of inches so that I can now reach it properly



I must say a special thanks to CossieMatt and Craig for their efforts at SBD, and to the boys at CAM Auto who yet again had all the parts on hand to get me out of the sh*t!

More soon!

Cheers,

Paul.

[GavinR]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

Good luck on Sunday

[Markp]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

He is doing really well top drive paul

[GavinR]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

Some very impressive times there

[PaulAlex]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

Thanks ever so much guys ^^^^

Having been seeded at 15, with all but two of the cars ahead of us being 2.5 litre or 4WD, we arrived at Snetterton looking for a steady shakedown of the car, and perhaps to hopefully sneak into the top 10 after the usual attrition at these events.

I think "novice-like" would have been how I'd have politely described my driving on stage one, but apparently everyone else was in the same boat - just feeling their way around, finding the correct breaking points, seeing which chicanes were tight/open, and risking nothing in the tight paddock area where all you could do was make a fool of yourself in front of your service crew. To say I was surprised when co-driver Tom said we were lying joint 3rd overall after two stages would have been an understatement!

Stage 3 was going fine until we entered a 1st gear chicane, and I could suddenly see that the bottom tyre of a pile of 4-5 was just sticking out slightly. I thought we'd miss it, but our front left tyre touched it and we instantly had a puncture. It really was the lightest of touches, but after driving off the stage and taking a maximum, we found that the valve had been ripped out of the wheel. All of the new tyres we had fitted before the event had short valves fitted, but we'd started the early stages on old wheels/tyres just to get warmed up, and they had regular valves that protrude past the wheel rim. If we'd have had a short valve - or the wheel had been half a revolution further around - all we would have suffered would be a rubber mark on the rim. Instead, we were left in service looking at an 8 minute+ stage time

After reminding myself that we were only there to check the car out, we entered SS4 wondering how far we could climb from our now 27th overall position. We managed top 3 times on the next three stages despite being slightly baulked on one, and then missed out on a fastest stage time by 1 second on SS8. Stage 9 was a little better, with us matching the WRC Impreza for fastest overall, so I told Tom we'd go for a tidy final stage and bring the car home. I may have also mentioned that I wanted my own fastest stage time The stage passed quickly, and we both agreed it felt good. When the times came through, we'd beaten the WRC Impreza by two seconds, and WRC Focus by 3. Fastest overall on our own was a great way to sign-off a really enjoyable event.

It has been pointed out that if it wasn't for the Maximum time on SS3 that we'd probably have won the event outright based on those that finished - but as I replied, if my auntie had b*llocks she'd be my uncle

I have to thank Tom for being good company and calling the notes, and to Lee and Matt not just for servicing yesterday, but for all the efforts in building it We appear to have a fair weapon now, so its time to stop building it and start using it more

Having said that, the last thing Matt said to me last night was - "I bet you email us a list of upgrades you have planned tomorrow!"

[turbospud]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

well done,who needs a wrc

[PaulAlex]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

well done,who needs a wrc

Me please!!

[Graham]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

fantastic, well done

[PaulAlex]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

fantastic, well done

Thanks ever so much Graham. Without wanting to tempt fate, I'm hoping we've reached the point where we can refine the finer details on the car rather than be replacing breakages or making big spec changes. Certainly at the weekend I was thinking that it feels quite "together" now.....

[doughman]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

If you didn't have bad luck you wouldn't have any. Hopefully on the up now though. Some cracking stage times.

What tyres were you on?

[PaulAlex]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

We started on some Dunlops that we had left over from a previous event, R08's on the back and R12's on the front. When these started to feel past their best we moved the R08's to the front and put new R02's on the back. As the temp rose, we eventually ended up with R02's all round. I'm not sure if it was the surface, the new WRC modular suspension, or the fact that I've always been light on tyres but we came home on four R02's that look very fresh still, despite doing half the event.

Cheers,

Paul.

[Zakspeed_TV]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

Just wow, stunning motor

[PaulAlex]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

Here are a few shots from the weekend. There isn't much to add to them other than you can maybe notice the slightly wider front track provided by the modular WRC suspension, and the lamp pod fixings on the bonnet.....









Cheers,

Paul.

[Paul C]

Re: Paul Alex's character building, pain-in-the-ar5e, bufty money pit

Looking great Paul. I was going to ask how you made the track wider. Now I know.

We're you old lower arms wide track?