Fujairah Rally 2015

The final round of the Emirates Motorsport Club’s UAE Rally Championship took place in Fujairah this weekend, and it really was something completely different for Newtrix Racing.

It comprised two mountain stages, Farfar and  Mamdouh. each run twice.  (This Farfar was not, as I expected, in the land of FarFarAway, so we did not have Lord Farquaad to flag us off, nor did we have to avoid refugee fairy-tale creatures on the track.)  The villages of Farfar and Mamdouh are close to the newish E84 highway which connects Fujairah with the Sharjah-Kalba Road, and lie on an ancient network of stony mountain tracks.  These are a far cry from the gravel plains of recent events, with many hairpin bends, sheer drops and rocks of every size and description wherever you look.  Disaster lurked in wait for the unwary around every bend.

Our Friday recce was punctuated by several incidents.  First, the Monit tripmeters would not give a reliable distance reading, which turned out to be a simple fix – the sensors were too far from the bolt-heads on the prop-shaft they were supposed to be sensing.  Then a sudden a violent shaking overcame us, unrelated to the near-death experience of close proximity to unprotected sheer drops.  This turned out to be a loose front control arm, again a simple fix.  Then the electrics died, courtesy of a loose battery connector.  So our Friday practice session ended up as only two run-throughs in the Beast, which we decided to leave on its trailer in Fujairah while we went back to Dubai for a friend’s birthday party.

The next day the shorter Farfar stage proved uneventful, and we finished in a reasonable time.  But Mamdouh saw us pass three rally cars in varying stages of disrepair, with Michel Saleh’s Impreza eventually managing to restart and finish the stage behind us.  At 18mins 14 secs we weren’t among the fastest through Mamdouh, but we kept it in one piece and no service work awaited us at the halfway point.

 

Second time round I shaved a few seconds off my time through Farfar, and felt more confident to attack Mamdouh. We finished in a very respectable 17mins 14 secs, beating Ali Al Shawi’s best time! However it was the only stage where we did beat him, and ended up 2^nd in T1 and 5^th overall.

The final event of the day was the end of season dinner and championship awards, where again we failed to feature on the rostrum.  We ended the season 2^nd in T1, 6^th overall, and Sheila came 5^th in the co-drivers standings.

With my deteriorating hearing, I was finding it impossible to hear Sheila through the crappy intercom in our new Bell helmets. So after a  bit of experimentation, I decided to remove the entire (vastly superior) speaker and mike system from my old Peltor helmet, and re-wire it into the Bell.  What a difference!  It just remains to do the same upgrade on Sheila’s helmet.

Next event will be the first round of the 2016 EMC UAE Rally Championship, on 15th-16th January.

Emirates Desert Championship R3

More of the same, but at a new location along the Al Faqa Road - right where the old Desert Challenge route used to pass en route to the Dubai finish.  Once again I was starting alongside Ali Al Ketbi, but this time I beat him off the line and headed into the dunes with the green machine in hot pursuit.  The first section ran through some easy dunes, and although I lost the lead running wide on a turn, I was straight back past him when we reached the gravel subkha .  The next section was very technical and didn't give him much chance to get back at me - until I made a dire navigational error and ended up on the moto route! 

Just passing by..

Rather than turn round and retrace my tracks, I decided to carry on, which was a mistake - the moto track continued through some challenging dunes, whereas the auto track turned back across the subkha.  I was beginning to think this nightmare would never end, but eventually I was back at the start/finish straight, but almost a lap behind Al Ketbi.  Towards the end of the race, I was hearing some unhappy noises from the rear, and getting a lot of axle tramp - one of the upper control arm bushes had died.

With a new radiator cap, the engine temperatures have reduced by around 10 deg. C. - the old one wasn't holding the pressure any more.  Even at 5000rpm in 2nd gear we were around 90 C, which is OK.

So once again Newtrix were 2nd in T1, and 3rd overall in the auto division.  Looking back, I should have stayed behind Al Ketbi till the last lap and then got past him on the subkha.  It's annoying, because I haven't been able to translate the Beast's superior speed into a win...yet.

David McBride, Nick Massey, me, Emil Khneisser, Ali Al Ketbi.

The control arm has been replaced at Nanjgel, and we only have a couple of electrical jobs to finish - the main one being re-wiring the wipers.  Then I want to get the exhaust modified to stop the back end of the Beast getting covered in soot.

Video of the event here.
 

Emirates Desert Championship R2

  

Well, it wasn’t just the front diff that needed replacing.  Having decided that we needed to get to the cause of an entirely unrelated engine oil leak, Nanjgel drained the gearbox before splitting the gearbox from the engine.  Unfortunately, it wasn’t only oil that came out of the gearbox – there were a slack handful of links previously belonging to the transfer box chain.  Since the transfer box had already been overhauled once, we decided to replace it as well.  So – long story short  – we now have no oil leaks, better oil pressure and lots of shiny new parts.

R2 was held at my favourite EDC track at Lihbab, and I started alongside Ali Al Ketbi’s green Patrol.  I made the decision to let him lead the first lap so I could learn from any mistakes he made.  After rounding  PC2 we headed across the wide plain, and I was able to use the extra grunt of the Beast to get past him quite easily.

A couple of laps later I was still comfortably ahead, but made a stupid mistake rounding PC3, pulling a front tyre off the rim.  Worse still, I’d left the rattle gun in the garage!  Fortunately help was at hand and I was able to replace the wheel – and then the damn thing wouldn’t start.  A bump start behind a marshal’s LR4 got me going again and I continued to the finish, a lap behind Al Ketbi.

Despite the drama, I ended up with 2^nd in T1 and 3^rd overall, so I now have points in championship.  Al Ketbi’s points don’t count at the moment, as his roll cage lacks certification, so I currently lead T1 and lie 3^rd overall.  Huzzah!

Back at Nanjgel they quickly diagnosed the starter issue – loose wire to the solenoid (again) – and replaced the handbrake pads as well.  Jason solved three electrical issues in one evening of fettling, so we’re ready for Round 3 tomorrow.

Photos courtesy of Tim Ansell (a.k.a The Phantom Blogger).

 

 

 

Emirates Desert Championship R1

The first round of the 2015-16 Emirates Desert Championship kicked off at Lusaili on Friday.  Being the first race of the season, the EMSF sensibly decided to bring the start forward to 0830hrs to make the most of the cooler morning.  Some 115 competitors – bikes, quads, buggies and 4x4s – set off in waves at 30 second intervals, bikes and quads taking the longer outer circuit while the rest of us took a shorter loop.  It consisted mainly of short, choppy dunes with very few places where you could get any speed up – I spent most of the event in 2^nd gear.



I was still moving at this point...

I started to hear some worrying noises from the front axle early on, but pressed on regardless – until I found that the acceleration of the engine was no longer matched by a corresponding increase in forward speed.  At first I thought that the clutch had given up, but then it dawned that I had no drive to the front axle – the diff had died.  And I was stuck just past PC5.  Eventually the sweep team came to the rescue, and after a bit of faffing about I was free.  With the tyres down to emergency pressure (about 8psi) I was able to get going, and almost made it to the finish.  Suddenly the car just stopped as though I’d pulled on the handbrake (although actually, the handbrake isn’t that good).  So clearly something that had died in the diff was now trapped between moving parts.

Chasing a buggy

We tried towing it.  Forwards, backwards – no chance.  Maybe with a bulldozer, but not with a 4x4. We headed back home to pick up more tools, drinks, shade and returned along with Tim Ansell and Tom Bell to dismantle the front axle to make it mobile.  As it turned out, it needed rather less dismantling than we expected. 

After jacking up both front wheels, you could rotate one and the other would rotate in the opposite direction.  This means the crown wheel and pinion are working.  So removing drive to one hub will get the vehicle working in 2WD, and that’s surprisingly easy.  After taking off a wheel, there is a press-on cap which covers the end of the stub shaft.  Once this is off, there are 6 bolts holding the end plate to the hub, and a circlip holding it onto the splined stub shaft.  With these removed, the plate comes off and there is no longer any drive from the shaft to the hub.  This done, Tom easily towed the Beast out of the desert, so that I could drive it onto the trailer.

Due to some error in the system, EMSF decided I was 3^rd in T1, when really I should have had a DNF.  So I got a nice trophy which I didn’t deserve, and they haven’t asked for it back.  However, it’s ‘nul points’ in the T1 championship, and a new front diff required.



Undeserved trophy
 

Having thought about possibly replacing the ARB rear diff locker (for which I no longer have a working compressor), I have finally decided to give the Lokka a try.  This is a rather clever Aussie invention which by default locks the diff, and only unlocks when one wheel is required to go faster than the other, when cornering on a hard surface.  They are promising a 2 year warranty with no exceptions about race use, so one for the front axle is winging its way over from Australia, hopefully to be fitted before the next round of the EDC on 23^rd.

Big thanks to Tim and Tom for help with the recovery, Tim again for photos, and to EMSF and ATC for putting on another great event!

Down to the Wire

Well, the Painless Performance wiring loom arrived, and shortly thereafter the repaired Monit tripmeters from New Zealand.  Monit, bless them, had not only replaced the PCBs on each unit, but also clearly given me new cases for them as well.  So the only original bit was the screen – effectively they had saved me about £800.  Any company that serves their customers that well – on 7-year-old equipment – deserves a massive vote of thanks.

And so Jason and I (OK, mainly Jason) set about re-wiring the Beast.  Nanjgel had already modified the rear wings and installed a pair of Hilux rear light clusters, which look really good.  Jason did the clever stuff – like figuring out where all the wires go, and what extra bits we needed.  I fabricated and painted a couple of replacement dash panels to accommodate the new switches and indicators, mounted some relay bases in a weatherproof enclosure and generally shouted encouragement from the touchline. 

The job ended up being rather more of a challenge than Jason had anticipated.  The loom and fuse box is designed around American wiring practice, which (it turns out) is not entirely compatible with non-USA vehicles.  Being unable to persuade the ECU to come to the party cost us a couple of days which we could ill-afford, before Nanjgel’s electrician finally came to the rescue.  However, around midday on Friday we decided it was sufficiently ‘finished’ for the following day’s event, and we blatted off to Siyouh to recce the stages in Sheila’s Prado.

The Mobil 1 Rally is the 4^th round of the Emirates Rally Championship, organised by the EMC.  It comprised two gravel stages, each run three times, in an area where we’d previously competed.  Saturday was almost certainly the hottest and most humid day in the last few weeks, which made the event hard work.  Starting 16^th out of 17 cars, we completed the first two stages around midday, and on returning to service were shocked to discover that we were leading T1, by a massive one second margin from Ali Al Shawi.  (Ali, who was already leading the T1 championship, has spent the summer upgrading his Chevy Silverado to multi-link suspension and pruning back the bodywork to pickup-style to make it even more competitive, was pretty shocked as well.)

Low flying

On the second go-round we extended our lead on SS3, before losing it all on SS4 where he went quicker and I pushed too hard and made a few errors.  So after four stages we were 5 seconds adrift from Al Shawi.  We pulled back a second of that on SS5, and did our fastest lap of SS6 – but it wasn’t enough to catch Al Shawi who was a massive 14 seconds quicker on the final stage.  We ended up 18 seconds behind him, 2^nd in T1 and 6^th overall – which coincides exactly with our overall standings in the championship.  17 cars started, 11 finished.  Shk. Abdullah Al Qassimi won the event in his Ford Fiesta, and Sheila once again took home a ‘special trophy’ for being the top lady finisher!

There is still work to do on the wiring.  Despite the repairs to the Monits, Sheila still found them unreliable, with both the trip meters and timers randomly re-setting.  However, the next couple of events are the opening rounds of the Emirates Desert Championship, which I can manage without a co-driver.  The amount of oil the engine consumes is also a concern – I got through at least half a gallon in two top-ups.

Summer Update

Summer is not the time for rallying.  It is the time for repairing, upgrading, and regrouping, which tends to make uninteresting reading.  However, there have been a couple of highlights.

 

30^th April was the annual awards dinner for EMSF, and marshals’ party.  I received the winner's trophy for theT1 Championship for the 2^nd year running, which is very nice, as well as one for 2^nd place in the team awards.  Much alcohol was consumed, I seem to recall.  And there’s a video compilation of the 2014-15 Championship here.

 

6^th May saw Newtrix on set at a desert video shoot for a commercial.  Mobily, the Saudi Telco, sponsor Yazeed Al Rajhi, the well-known rally driver, and the storyline needed a second rally car and driver – which was me.  It was one of those rare occasions when the Beast actually earns money, and as such I seized it with both hands.  But bloody hell, it was hot, and a worse day to be wrapped in a rally duvet in the middle of the desert would be hard to imagine.  But the crew got the shots they needed, I ended up towing Yazeed’s Robby Gordon Hummer out of the desert, and I got paid.  Hurrah.  Of course, to get to this point we really needed some power steering, which (if you’ve been following the plot) you’ll recall was notably absent in Ras Al Khaimah.   So finally, Mebar got to fit the GM power steering pump (which Kate and Rick travelled about 800km to fetch).

The Ras Al Khaimah Rally video is now on YouTube, and it does contain glimpses of the Beast – as well as Sheila getting her trophy!

We happened to be in Spain in July while the Baja Aragon was on, so we headed up to Teruel to spectate.  What a brilliant event!  Some 200 competitors (bikes, quads, cars, trucks) and crowds of spectators at every viewpoint.  Our main focus was our mate Emil Kneisser in his Y62 Patrol, who is currently lying 2^nd in T2 in the Cross Country World Championships.  He ended up 3^rd in Spain, but we also got to see Harry Hunt (who we’d previously met at Goodwood), Marek Dobrowski, Khalid Al Qassimi, Nani Roma (who won), Denis Berezhovkiy, and Nasser Al Attiyeh (who DNF’d).  Great event, and great atmosphere.

 

A certain amount of fettling has been done, and more is in process.   I replaced  a smashed headlight and bodged together the damaged front wing (a legacy of the ADDC), with a rather excellent adhesive called Weicon Fast-Bond.  I fitted a heatshield for the clutch cylinder, and new high-temperature ceramic coated spark plug leads are awaiting fitment.  Nanjgel have been tasked with overhauling the front axle and brakes, and finding out why the starter doesn’t always start. 

Both of the Monit rally tripmeters have been misbehaving, and I finally traced the problem.  Monit used a surface mounted socket for a short time, before realizing that this was a Bad Idea and reverting to the pin-type mounting.  And of course, the law of Sod dictates that mine have the unreliable surface mounted ones.  Well, actually Monit have them at the moment, and will hopefully either fix or replace them - watch this space.

But the Big Job is re-wiring the Beast.  I’ve taken the plunge – egged on by Jason – and ordered a Painless Performance wiring loom, which he reckons will take us two weekends to install.  The wiring is a mess, and getting it right will give us reliability and traceability, because all the wires are pre-printed with their function.  A second (scratch-built) loom will supply all the various in-dash electrics for tripmeters, GPS etc.

 

Apart from that, I have completed the documentation now required by ATCUAE for all race cars, and the Beast has the sticker to prove it. Hurrah again.

 

We have a calendar of EMSF rallies for the coming season, and dates for the EMC events till the end of the year – as follows. 

EMC: Emirates Motorsport Club

EDC: Emirates Desert Championship (EMSF)

2-3 October:       R4 EMC (Night Rally)

9 October:           R1 EDC

23 October:        R2 EDC

13 November:   R3 EDC

20-21 November: Dubai Int’l Rally (R5 EMC)

11-12 December: R6 EMC (Fujairah)

29 January:         EDC Single Day Rally

12 February:       R4 EDC

4 March:              R5 EDC

So October will be a busy month – watch this space!

UAE Rally Championship R3

Now we're off to Ras Al Khaimah for the 3rd round of this championship, to compete over three gravel stages, each run three times with service halts after each repeat.  Friday morning practice, Friday afternoon stickers and scutineering, back home for a nights kip and then back up to RAK on Saturday morning.

Time for a quick check under the car to make sure nothing important has come undone or fallen off.  Oh dear, the rear diff is weeping.  Not because it's feeling depressed about the caning I'm about to give it, but because several of the ring bolts are loose.  This I can cope with.  Moving forward, I give the exhaust a wiggle and it nearly falls off in my hand.  One of the flange bolts has lost both its nut and locknut, and the other one is completely loose.  A quick scratch around various competitors' toolboxes yields the requisite nuts,but and I'm still doing the business while Sheila attends driver's briefing.  Today we don't have the benefit of a service crew, so we're relying on luck to get us through the day.

The first three stages go pretty well, apart from a slight navigational error, and I feel pretty happy heading back to service.  But on checking the power steering, I find we're used a lot of fluid.  It's leaking out, but I can't find the source.  So I just fill up the reservoir and cross my fingers.

Halfway back towards stage 4, we have no power steering. At all. And no fluid.  So the next six stages are going to be hard work.  In the desert it's doable, but on a tight gravel track?  Hmmm.  But we persevere and get through all remaining six stages somehow - not quick, but, as I have pointed out before, keeping going is the main thing.  I quickly learn that I cannot change gear and steer at the same time.  I have to plan my gear changes where the track is straight, so I can use both arms to heave the Beast round the turns by brute force. My arms are still paying the price.

We end up 7th overall and 3rd in class, and Sheila gets a special trophy for being the only lady finisher. Overall, we are now second in T1 class after 3 of the 6 rounds!  Result!

Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge 2015

The dust has settled on the 2015 25^th Anniversary Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge.  And what dust there was, blotting out the landscape on Day 5.  But already I’m getting ahead of the story, so let’s start with Day 1.

DAY 1

Everything was going so well. We breezed through PC1, no problems, passed a few cars, and didn’t get passed by anyone.  But just 600m before rejoining Deadcoach Gatch, it all went horribly wrong.  The steering became heavy and almost immediately the engine temperature began to climb.  ‘That’, I said to myself, ‘will be a serpentine belt failure.  How fortunate am I that I have a spare 6PK2040 in the ‘get-out-of-jail’ bag’.  But it wasn’t the belt that had failed.  It was the power steering pump pulley, which was hanging on by the last of its 6 spokes, the remaining 5 having broken for no apparent reason.  And a spare pulley isn’t something you expect to need.  What to do?

With nothing to hold the serpentine belt on, the water pump won’t work, and neither will the alternator.  But the oil pump will, as will the fans – until the battery gives up.  So after the engine had cooled, I made a bid for freedom with only oil cooling – and escaped onto the gatch.  We short-cut the next section by heading south on the gatch, running in 5^th gear, 1500rpm, 2WD and watching the temperature gauges all the time.  By the time we reached PC2 and service, panic had already set in, and the service crew had disappeared!  Fortunately help was at hand, in the friendly shape of a non-team member (no names, no pack drill), who kindly agreed to tow us to the finish on the highway.  (Which of course is technically illegal, but only if you get caught – which we didn’t.)  But to score a finish we had to drive the correct way through the speed control and finish zone, which did rather put a strain on the temperature gauge.  But we made it, and rejoined the road where the service truck was waiting to tow us the last few km to the bivouac.

By now, half the service crew were back in Abu Dhabi, trying to pick up the trailer (locked – and no key) and to find a new power steering pump (no joy, but they’ve got one in Sharjah.)  SHARJAH???  That’s a long way from Abu Dhabi, especially in the rush hour, and they shut at 1930hrs.  But our resourceful hero (Rick) and heroine (Kate) managed to sweet-talk the nice people at Liberty Autos in taking parts home with them when they shut, so early the next morning (I kid you not) they arrived back at the bivvy with a new pump, pulley and belt.  However – events had overtaken them.

Robbie, Saluki Motorsports’ fabricator, can weld anything.  Richard had a TIG welding set.  But Robbie was deep in the desert, with the Saluki team trying (unsuccessfully) to recover their Predator.  Then Streaky mentioned that Powertec had a good welder, and Ivan was kind enough to lend him to us.  Richard cut reinforcement sections for the pulley and prepped everything, and the welder welded it back together.  And it was good.  So good that it lasted the rest of the rally.  This was truly bush engineering at its finest.

We’d missed a load of waypoints and picked up 10 hours of penalties, but at least we were ready for the start of Day 2 – even if 42nd overall isn’t much to brag about.

DAY 2

The second day was a run west from the MZ road to Ghayathi Road, then a couple of diversions to the west of Ghayathi Road ending up at Arada before heading south of the crescent to Moreeb.  After half an hour I decided that the engine would have an easier time of it if I aired down a bit, so I lost 4 minutes doing that – which is less than I’d lose if we got stuck.  After overtaking Emil, I then made a beginner’s mistake and got cross-axles on top of a dune – fortunately within sight of the sweep team, so that was quickly resolved.  The back end of the day featured some technical climbs south of the crescent, and overall not a bad day.  27^th on the day could have been a lot better without the stops, but 37^th overall is some improvement.  Local hero Yahya Bel Hilli distinguished himself by putting his pickup on its roof within sight of the start, and shortly after Raptor 227 crewed by a Slovakian couple very sadly burnt to a crisp due to a fuel leak.

A marshal leaps into action at passage control

Several of the front hub nuts had come loose, and were in fact the wrong thread – which damaged the thread on the studs.  This must have happened when Mebar rebuilt the axle.   Fortunately we have spare studs (much to Richard’s surprise!) and nuts, so it’s not a disaster.

DAY 3

I don’t have happy memories of Day 3.  We started off by getting stuck on a very innocuous dune heading from the bivouac towards Moreeb, and narrowly avoiding a collision with the car I’d just overtaken.  Then we ended up in a huge bowl just before Moreeb where three cars were already trying to extricate themselves.  We got out of that by taking an alternative route, which ended in a Patrol-sized hole.  Getting out of that involved digging, sand ladders, letting the tyres down to 8 psi, and an inordinate amount of bad language.  Then of course more time to re-inflate the tyres and load up 3 of the 4 Maxtrax  - the 4^th having disappeared into the sand.  By this timewe were flat last, be fore we’d even reached the first PC.  It was some time later when I realized that 4WD probably hadn’t  fully engaged, which was why we were suffering so much.  At some point I was persuaded to be the Good Samaritan by stopping for a biker, thereby getting hopelessly stuck for a very long time, thus proving the old adage the ‘a good turn seldom goes unpunished’.  Only after PC2 – back at the bivvy – did our day improve and the rest of the stage went off rather well.  But not well enough to reach Page 1 of the results – 32^nd on the day, 30^th overall.  Which only proves that if you keep finishing every day, your position will improve – if only due to attrition.

Under the car, Richard finds that the bush on one of the rear control arms has disintegrated.  Once again, I’m able to surprise him by having a spare control arm in one of the boxes, so another disaster is averted.

 

The bivouac: Jason lifts something heavy

 Looking for sponsorship from Oztrail!

DAY 4

Day 4 is almost a re-run of Day 2 – starting from the MZ Road heading west to Ghyathi Road, continuing west and then south to Arada before crossing the crescent road and looping back to Hameem.  We got stuck trying to avoid a climb where another vehicle was already stuck, and Yasser Saidan (215) was nice enough to give us a tow out.  West of Ghyathi we encounter a chaotic dune area with various cars stuck, and I spot an exit route.  Just before reaching the edge of a small dune, I spot the roof of a car beyond the crest, and revise my route to avoid it.  As I go over the crest, I find that there is another car in front of the one I saw, which it is now too late to avoid.  My front wing and headlight take the brunt of the impact.   It turns out that Yasser was in the process of recovering Hamad Al Thani’s Patrol, so he transfers the tow strap to my car, gets out of the way, and leaves me to recover Hamad.  

Impact imminent: Yasser's co-driver realises he's about to get run over..

At PC2 service I stop for oil (we’ve been using a lot) and head into the dunes beyond.  Then I make the worst mistake of the day, bailing out of the dunes to find an easier route, even if it means missing a waypoint or two.  But my route leads me into even more trouble, and soon we are totally stuck.  Several attempts with the jack and sandladders fail to improve the situation because now we’ve lost 4WD.  Finally the cavalry arrive in the shape of Al Shanfari’s massive International MXT truck.  Mark Powell has persuaded him to detour from his mission to recover the other Predator to help us out.  The sweep team arrive and escort us back to the road, and we decide to try ‘stamp collecting’ at PC3 and the finish.  PC3 give us the stamp – after a lengthy detour to Khis quarry – but by the time we reach Finish, the team has packed up for the day.  However our tracking proves we were there within limit time, so we ‘only’ get penalized 8hrs 30mins for missed waypoints. 

Work starts on the Beast that evening to find out why we no longer have drive to the front axle. I suspect the transfer box, but when we get the car up in the air, the front propshaft is rotating.  It turns out one front half-shaft has broken, but fortunately Emil has brought one with him in our sale-or-return stock. Then we need a couple of oil seals which Technosport trade with us for a couple of beers, and some 75/140 oil for the diff which costs us a few more beers.  It’s just as well that we brought a couple of cases of bivouac currency with us.

Richard flying the flag

But all this good work is in vain, because Day 5 dawns under a real sandstorm.  With no hope of getting helicopters airborne, the day is abandoned and we trek back to Yas on the tarmac, to put our vehicles in parc ferme for finish scrutineering.  But this is where the real drama begins.  Nasser Al Attiyeh in Mini 202 has led from start to finish, but the scrutineers pick up on the fact that his suspension travel is outside the permitted 250mm.  Despite the fact that the extra mm confers no advantage, and is due to damage sustained in the event, he is disqualified.  His protest will be heard by the Court of Appeal at a later date, so watch this space.  But for now he’s out, and that leaves us finally 24^th overall.  48 cars were on the start list, and 34 finished.

 

Day 5 sandstorm

Rick, Jason, Richard, Ian, Sheila and Kate

Medals all round

So, how do we rate our performance?  Was our glass half full or half empty? Well, after a totally unpredictable failure on Day 1 we were always going to be amongst the also-rans.  Penalties of multiple hours start around 18^th place, so even if we’d been perfect from day 2 onward, 18^th would have been the best we could hope for.  But at least we kept in the event, technically completing each day, and there are 24 competitors who did worse than us.  I was disappointed, but maybe I expect too much.

But the highlight was the spectacular performance of the team behind us – Richard, Rick, Jason and Kate.  Having three mechanics on the job divided the workload, and most nights they even got to sleep as well. Jason’s electrical expertise saved us from a potential fan relay failure, which could have ended our chances.  Richard’s enormous inventory of tools and equipment kept us in the race after day 1.  Rick’s ‘give-us-a-spanner-I-can-do-that’ attitude kept everything moving.  Kate flashed her credit card when it was needed most, and made sure everyone ate and drank enough.  Sheila didn’t put a foot wrong in the navigational department, and endured my frequent profanity and general ungentlemanly behavior without complaint.  All in all, it was a real team effort.

And next year, we’ll do it all again.

D-Day - Prologue!

Finally we're at Yas for the Super Special stage, which is being run around the north end of Yas Marina circuit.  Not that this is in any way representative of the terrain of the DC, but hey, it's the 25th anniversary of the event, so let's have some fun.

But before we get to that, have a look at the video Rick put together, featuring clips from the final round of the Emirates Desert Championship.

And so to the prologue.  What can I say? To the accompaniment of a great deal of tyre-squealing, we got round turn 7, up through the corkscrew, back through turns 5, 6 and 7, through the corkscrew again and that was pretty much it.   We ended up were 27th fastest, so pretty much as per our seeding.  Others were not so lucky - one car shed a tyre whilst negotiating the first turn, another spun on the first turn, and someone else put their Patrol into the wall, knackering a front drive shaft and shaving off some bodywork in the process.  (I'm sure their service team were thrilled about that.)  Thanks to Geraint Jones for these pix of the event.

But spare a though for the Powertec crew, whose Rage buggy got wiped out by a taxi on the way back from fuelling up at a nearby garage.  No injuries reported, but the buggy looks like a write-off.

For some reason the start order - apart from the top 10 - is as per the numerical listing, and not as per prologue placing, which has caused some unhappiness.  For us, it means that some slower vehicles are now ahead of us, and some faster vehicles are behind, which is not ideal.  Surely the purpose of the prologue is establish a rational start order?  Anyway, we've a 1051hrs start tomorrow and I'm off to bed.

Live tracking is available from www.abudhabidesertchallenge.com - car number 229.

D-Day minus 1 - Scrutineering

So much has happened, I scarcely know where to begin.

The Beast finally emerged from Mebar on Monday evening (D-Day minus 5) and was trailered up to Muhannad at DynoKing, where they fitted the new ECU, and set about dyno-ing and tuning.  Soon aftere Rick arrived from Manchester (Tuesday evening) the call arrived that the job was done, so we finally got our hands on it around midnight on D-Day minus 4.  Al Rostamani, who in previous years had supplied my kit of sale-or-return parts, have changed their procedures and it now seems there is no way to accommodate parts 'on consignment'.  Fortunately, Emil (who works for Al Masaood, the Abu Dhabi Nissan distributor) has come to our rescue and not only arranged the parts, but will deliver them to us at the bivouac!  What a nice bloke, and deserving of as much beer as he wants at Bar Newtrix (tent D-14).

D-Day minus 3 saw Kate arriving from London, and yours truly rushing around Dubai picking up engine oil, spare 6PK-2040 drive-belts and a couple of tyres for good measure. Meanwhile Richard collected the service truck from Al Thika and set about loading it. Rick  managed to finish a few of the jobs on the to-do list that day, including fitting the new oil pressure gauge, and the thermostat.  The following day we  had the entire crew on the job.

D-Day minus 2 is documentation, so Sheila and I drove to Abu Dhabi where ATC relieved us of an enormous wodge of cash in return for some stickers, the nav and safety equipment and a few other odds and ends.  On our return, we decided to risk the wrath of Emaar security by erecting the large Eezi-Up on the driveway outside, forming a kind of tunnel between the garage and the service truck, under which work on the Beast continued apace.  Jason went through the electrics, improving connections and identifying all the fuses and relays which are now labeled.  Richard found time to fabricate a sand rake, which fits onto our jack handle, loctited all the panel bolts, improved the bonnet location and re-fitted the grille.  I kept out of the way of hard work by doing all the stickers, and the ERTF GPS and the Iritrack system with their respective antennae were duly installed.

Temporary Garage Extension

Have you got planning permission for that?

Our ARB compressor (for the rear diff-lock) has ceased to be.  It has ingested too much sand, and despite Rick trying everything (including the kiss of life) it has sadly shuffled off this mortal coil. It is a late compressor.  By the time the last rites had been read, it was dark and despite a last-ditch effort by Richard to substitute another Bushranger unit, that was also clearly knackered and pulling far too much current and melting fuses and relays..  So we have no difflock, and will just have to manage without.  Bugger.

Ready for scrutineering

So...today was scrutineering, and we breezed through, well ahead of our 1100hrs time slot, without anything significant to trouble the scrutineers.  Job done!  For once, we are back at Newtrix HQ with nothing left to do - the Beast, trailer and service truck are all down
at Rally HQ, ready for tomorrow.

Today, Newtrix get an honourable mention in the sports pages the National, as one of the 'entries to watch in the empty quarter'.   Feast your eyes now on the reborn and re-decorated Beast.  Tomorrow we race! - well sort of.  The prologue will take place on the F1 circuit at Yas Marina, and I don't think we'll be risking any heroics.

Sorted!

D-Day minus 7

Having found out that the RTA are now licensing trailers, I decided to replace some broken lights and get it legal. The lighting socket on the car had never worked properly since being installed by my garage, but after some great help from Jason we finally sorted out the dodgy wiring.  Now we only have to find someone in the RTA who knows how to get it registered...   The road car's registration was about to expire, so that's now done.

Dropped into Mebar to check in progress with the Beast.  The air box was being installed while I was there, as was the remote reservoir for the power steering.  The front axle is in, and the oil filter reinstalled.  Word is that tomorrow I can take it to Dynoking for tuning.

Stickers are ready, so soon the Beast will sport our trademark yellow chequer once again.  There's a possible shakedown run on Tuesday, when our old friends Mike and Be hit town.

Meanwhile, the Hail Rally is in progress. My mate Emil Kneisser is currently 7th overall, Yahya Belhilli is out with gearbox problems, leaving Yazeed Al Rajhi's Hummer way out in front after 2 days.

D-Day minus 9

Congratulations to Rashad and Mrs Faraj on the birth of a baby boy!

Which explains why he wasn't at Mebar today, and who can blame him.  Terrible planning though - having a baby the week before DC??  That's always going to be a busy week!

Anyway the guys are hard at it, the axle reinforcement and shock mounts are done, and it was being resprayed while I was there. The air box was at the powder coaters, and all the pipework was done.  The radius arms have new bushes fitted.  The new ECU was ready for fitting.  The oil filter has been re-plumbed.  So there are reasons to be cheerful, and they are working through the weekend as well.

Countdown - D-day minus 10

Only 10 days to go, ladies and gentlemen.  So the car's all prepped and ready for the off then?  Err -  actually, no. 

The Beast is poorly.  It's been putting a brave face on it and carrying on regardless, but once Mebar had it on the operating table, the extent of the required surgery became apparent.  Apart from the rear axle control arm mounts (one rebuilt, the other reinforced), new tierods, sway bar bushes, rear upper/lower arms - all need replacing.  It gets worse.  To install the snorkel means moving the oil filter.  The oil filter adaptor is broken and the pipes are now too short.  Then they discover the reason for the power steering reservoir always being oily.  We'd assumed it was just a poor seal in the cap, but no - the reservoir itself is cracked.  Their solution is to supply and fit a new external reservoir.

So the spendometer is ticking inexorably upwards, and the timescale is moving out.  And that's before it goes to Mr. DynoKing for a new ECU and a full re-map of the software.

Are we panicking?  Well, yes, but in a typically British, low-key, stiff-upper-lip sort of way. If I had any hairs left which hadn't already turned grey, they would be turning grey right now.  Welcome to lastminuterally.com

Every Picture Tells a Story

Race you to the dunes, Emil!

Spot the drop?  Me neither...

Nor did he, apparently... 

Free falling...

The ''Oh Sh!t' moment...

T-bone, anyone?

Turns out I'd broken a top control arm bracket off the rear axle, which is why the back end was misbehaving from that point on.  Mebar have fixed that, and are well on with the front axle reinforcement, with parts arriving imminently for the revised intake system.

A Newtrix Team Meeting is scheduled for Tuesday evening.  This is code for 'four people will drink beer and make lists on the back of an envelope'.  We could even go all high-tech, and Skype Rick in the UK as well.

One item has been crossed off the list - I soldered a new ciggie-lighter plug onto the Garmin.  So at least someone will know where they're going...

Emirates Desert Championship R6

The final round of the EDC was held back at Lihbab, where we'd raced a few months back. Tom 'Sabertooth' Bell and Ben came out to lend their support to Newtrix, and to get to grips with the local rally scene. The venue was a late change from Sweihan, for which permission from the authorities was not forthcoming. So the track was an exact replica of the previous visit, although the sand had changed noticeably in places.

This time out we were joined by celebrities! Marc Coma was competing as a final practice before the Desert Challenge, and our old friend Charlie Boorman was there to flag off the bikes - though he had to rush back to Dubai to take part in the Literature Festival.

Starting 30 seconds behind Emil Kneisser in his T2 Y62 Patrol,I was on his tail less than five minutes into the first 14.5km lap. As we entered the one one long flat subkha I realised that this was an opportunity not to be missed. A straight drag race across the plain saw Newtrix take the lead, just before we reached the dunes beyond. I was feeling pretty pleased with myself, and as they say, pride cometh before a fall. Most dunes give you fair warning that what's on the other side sould be given adequate respect, but not this one - there was no dune, just a sudden drop-off. As I went over it, I saw a broken white buggy lying in a three-wheeled heap beyond, and the driver frantically trying to climb the drop-off to warn oncoming traffic. The Beast landed heavily on its snout, thought about falling on its roof (oh no, not again!) and finally decided to pirouette sideways and land on its wheels. Which was good - except that it was now stalled at the foot of the drop-off, in prime position to be t-boned by Emil. Fortunately, the buggy guy had now climbed up, and was able to slow Emil down while I made my getaway

This, ladies and gentlemen, was a significantly bowel-loosening moment, and I make no apology for driving like an old man (which of course I am) from that point onward. However the car wasn't behaving as well as it had. It was tough to get the power down, the axle kept tramping as though the rear suspension was shot and I even stopped at one point, convinced that I'd broken something. As a result, my speed dropped and I was eventually re-taken by Emil, and by Mark Powell's Predator which had started 30 seconds behind me. Looking back I suspect that maybe the prang had knocked it out of 4WD, and I was unwittingly continuing in 2WD.

The final result was that Mark took the win, I was 2nd and Ammar Moukayed - a finisher in the previous week's event - came 3rd. This should mean that Newtrix retain the T1 Championship for another year.

Ian the Dog, Mark Powell, Ammar Moukayed and co-driver Ayman Soliman, Mohd Ben Sulayem

After a quick check-over, The Beast is back at Mebar for the front axle to be replaced, and for the air intake to be conmpletely remodelled. The steel airfilter canister will go, as will the short 36mm restrictor and the long 4" bend into the throttle body. Instead we will reinstall the snorkel, duct air from that into a custom air-box and filter (modelled on the one built for Emil), then to an extended restrictor and a shorter bend to the throttle. The upshot of all this should be (a) much cleaner air going into the filter (I emptied about a kilo of sand out after this event!) and (b) improved airflow efficiency from a better-designed restrictor.

While this is going on, we're off to Cyprus for a week of intensive de-stress therapy, involving large volumes of Keo beer and mountains of Greek food. As soon as we're back the final preparation for the 2015 Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge will commence. We have the Dream Team to support us: Rick Carless, Richard Bailey, Jason Lyness and Kate Stedman - so what could possibly go wrong? Join us again soon for answers to this and many other questions!

UAE Rally Championship R2

After a few dramas in the build-up to this event, I’m happy to report that The Beast acquitted itself well in the second round of the Emirates Motorsport Club’s UAE Rally Championship.

Since the rebuild, we’ve been promising to get the Beast back to Mebar for Rashad to work his magic on the suspension.  Having shed some 250kg, mainly from the back end, the settings were now far too hard.  Rashad changed to softer springs and tweaked the dampers to give a much better ride.  However, in the process the front diff started to disintegrate – the end result of the front axle tube being bent long ago.  So on Thursday night, they worked till gone midnight to cannibalise parts from an existing axle they had, to get the Beast back on its feet.  That is customer service!

Friday morning we were out with the latest conscript to Newtrix Racing, Tom Bell, to recce the gravel stages out near Shawka, where two stages were run either side of the Kalba Road.

Saturday morning, the three of us headed out to Sharjah Corniche for the ceremonial start, from which Tom took the trailer to the service park at Shawka.  At the invitation of Sk Abdullah Al Qassimi, Mohd Ben Sulayem took to the wheel of his 20-year old Ford Escort with Ronan Morgan as co-driver.  Neither had competed for over 13 years, but despite a few problems with the car, they came in a close 2^nd to Abdullah, and actually beat him on 4 of the 6 stages!

So while they were battling it out at the top of the field with two Omani Subarus, the T1 4x4s occupied the next five places, from 5^th to 9^th.  Our time for the first (fast) stage came down progressively from 8:09 to 8:00 over the three repeats, and on the 2^nd (more technical) stage from 9:43 to 9:27, before making two errors on the final stage to end up at 9:38.

In T1, we were beaten into 3^rd place by both Ibrahim Al Mohana and Ali Al Ketbi.  However, we were happy to be ahead of Ali Al Shawi (4^th) and Nooh Buhumaid (5^th), both of whom beat us in the previous round.  Overall this leaves us still 3^rd in the T1 championship after two rounds.  

There is a persistent backfire on the over-run which we need to investigate, and the axle needs to be replaced to avoid further problems.  I’d also like to upgrade the intake system to incorporate a superior restrictor design which I now have, so we’ll see if Mebar can fit this in before the DC – which is now only 26 days away!

Once again, many thanks to Tim Ansell for some excellent pix of the event, and to Tom for all his help - and a short video of us in action!

 

Emirates Desert Championship R5

Another evening in the garage, and we now have a pair of very funky adjustable rubber buffers, attached to the turret brace, which stop the bonnet flapping around.   And the Heath-Robinson blower bracket has been replaced with a proper aluminium plate.
So Friday morning we're up at Lusaili - the scene of our previous debacle in R3 - for another round of the EDC.  The steering seems to have a lot of backlash, and the fluid level is a bit low so I top that up.  But as I'm waiting on the grid, I realize that the backlash isn't in the hydraulics - it's because the 6 countersunk bolts that hold the steering wheel onto the column are all loose!  Aaaargh, one minute to start time, no chance to get the tools out, so I use my allen-headed index finger to tighten them as much as I can and hope that's enough.  (One more thing to add to the pre-flight check list!)
And we're off, second car out, 30 seconds behind Emil in his Y62 Patrol - which I catch and pass within the first three minutes.  It pays to be cautious on the first lap and I take no chances - although bizarrely enough this turns out to be my fastest lap.
Soon after starting lap 2 I pass Mark's Predator, a sorry sight parked beside the track and lacking its full quota of wheels.  The following lap I pass Emil, not far away from Mark, and also one wheel short of a full set.  What are they doing?
Eventually I manage to pass a vehicle that's actually moving, which is always more fun.  It's Graeme Rose in his Polaris, and I do the business on the approach to the pit straight for maximum effect.  Of course, by now the fastest Polaris guys are lapping me, and Vadym Prytuliak in his very quick Pathfinder finally gets past me as well.
Two hours in medium sized dunes has taken a disproportionate toll on the autos - 15 started, only 8 finished.  The top three places go to the National-class Polaris buggies as usual, Vadym is 4th, and I'm 5th - and 2nd in T1 class.  But since Vadym holds a Ukrainian rally licence his points don't count towards the Championship, so I'm still leading T1 with one race to go.
The best news is that I have no issues with the gear-change.  Last time out we were doing three 17-20km stages with road liaisons between, and by the third stage it was getting cranky.  Today I've done six 17km laps on the trot, two hours of continual 2nd/3rd gear work, and no problems. So maybe the DOT5.1 fluid has worked its magic.  The engine was pulling really well, water temp settled at 100c and oil at 120c, which is OK.  There's no water-wetter in the rad yet, and that will pull down the temp another 10 degrees or so.
Next job is to get the suspension re-tuned to take account of the lighter back-end.  It's a bit too bouncy at present, and maybe needs lighter springs.  Then I need to decide how we're going to incorporate my new improved 36mm restrictor into the intake system.
We have two more events before the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge - EMC R2 in two weeks time, and EDC R6 the week after.  The DC is only 40 days away!