Left to Right - Rod and Colin Taylor of Southam Mini & Metro Centre (+44 (0) 1926 815681) handing back CRX after completing the gearbox overhaul - Thursday 23rd December.
Alastair Vines and Peter Moss are entered into the Rallye Monte-Carlo Historique (car 282) http://www.acm.mc/ which will start on Wednesday 26th January and finish on the 2nd February 2011 in Monaco. Nigel Chetwynd and Simon Wheatcroft will provide back up to the team tackling running repairs, refuelling and maintenance throughout the event. The team are attempting to raise £10k to support their entry and raise money for the charity Bliss http://www.bliss.org.uk/ which concerns itself with babies born too early, too small or too sick to fend for themselves. They have to date won the backing of sponsorship from Mini Spares http://www.minispares.com/ and Norton Insurance http://www.norton-ib.co.uk/ and continue to seek more help with funding to secure their ambition. If you would like to help please call Alastair Vines on 0776 437 7322.
After having brought the car home last weekend to fit the grille muff, and found ourselves wading about knee deep in snow, it needed to go back to SMMC in order that suspension, heat sheilds and additional engine breathing could be fitted, followed by a final setting up on the rolling road. I got the call on Wednesday to say that all the requested work had been done; the MOT was successful and the car would be ready for collection on Thursday after final set up on the rolling road.
On road test the engine ran very sweetly, was nice, crisp and responsive; cold running is less sensitive to choke setting, so it does not conk out so often; the gear changes are smooth without being too notchy, and we have a clutch that works. Handling on some well used Colways was vile, and did nothing to inspire confidence for snow driving. Steering response was soft and spongy with poor traction in the snow. Adjustment of tyre pressures did something to improve matters, but we won't be winning the Monte-Carlo on these tyres. I can't wait to get our proper snow tyres fitted and try them out.
A flat tyre on the trailer coupled with a seized spare wheel lock, which had to be cut off, put paid to doing anything else useful that afternoon.
Garage doors remained firmly closed on Christmas Day, although news arrived of the impending change in the weather forecasting the onset of a slow thaw from Monday 27th December. It was -11C here in 'sunny' Redditch on Christmas night, so great conditions for a Boxing Day assessment before everything turns to slush.
The objective of the assessment was to simply get the feel for the car on hard compacted snow mixed with sheet ice on the roads in our vicinity. The Christmas Bank Holidays mean that I don't expect to be able to mount our Monte-Carlo tyres onto rims until at least Wednesday of next week. The tyres for the Boxing Day drive were Uniroyal 145 x 10 ice compound and proved to give the car a great levels of straight line stability, and the driver good confidence in cornering, braking and acceleration without tendency to pull or snatch. Handling was fairly neutral without any tendency for twitchiness through excessive over steer at the rear or dullness in the front due to under steer. A small lift in mid corner was sufficient to gently unstick the rear and promote a mild four wheel drift through the bend. When nightfall arrived, so did the warmer weather - the thaw had begun. I popped out and focused all of the Lucas front lamps in our traditional 1964-5 works lamp layout before the 'black top' showed through again. Some improvements may be required here as the little 5 inch 576 bonnet mounted fogs even with halogen bulbs are fairly hopeless.
Overall I am very pleased with the excellent work that Southam Mini & Metro Centre (+44 (0) 1926 815681) have completed to help us get ready, and the fact that the car has not demonstrated any particular vices so far which require further attention.
Icy conditions in Love Lyne, Redditch, Worcestershire.
Handling assessment near Ham Green, Redditch.
Here some video of our initial handling trials
See below some in car video from our Boxing Day drive. John Clarke who is helping me with some of the Blog content takes up the commentary. I assure you that the screaming is excitement and not fear.
END
No comments:
Post a Comment