Another day, another disaster

We're up at the crack of dawn for our 100+km liaison to the start of Stage 2, which is completely different from last year's stage. A new railway blocks access to the part of the desert we used in the last two years, so it's terra incognita as far as most competitors are concerned.

We start fairly cautiously, aware of the possibility that we may have more belt-related problems. All goes well for the fisrt 10km - then, yes you guessed it, the belt comes off. And the power steering pulley. A short walk back into the stage and I retrieve both - but how to press the pulley back onto the shaft, to at least get us out of the desesrt? The Sweep Team come, look, and continue, and then the police arrive, look and hang around.

A plan evolves. I drain the p/s reservoir into a handy water bottle (the reservoir conveniently holds 500ml of ATF) and dismantle the pump from the block. Then we sandwich the pulley and the pump between the hydraulic jack and the rear tow-hitch and press it back together. This is not the standard workshop method and in fact knackers the pump (we find later), but we're pretty pleased with our bush engineering. We can't get the pulley on far enough to line up, but with the belt 2/3 on the puiley it's enough to get us out of the desert. We trundle back to the start, nursing the engine at 2200rpm, followed by our police escort.

Our journey back to Hail is slow and uneventful, and we divert to the Sinaiya to find a workshop to solve our problems. It's run by Khalid, and Arnold, a pony-tailed Filipino, is the foreman. They seem happy to stop whatever they are doing to help us out, Arnold sources a new pump and then beats the old pulley back into shape (yes, we knackered that too, and he couldn't find one the same). As well as pressing it back on, Arnold welds it to the shaft for good measure to prevent it slipping off again. We head back to rally control, just in time to put the car into parc ferme. Everyone is happy to see us and offers sympathy and encouragement.

Another 8 hours of penalties are added to our one hour from day 1, but we are assured a start on day 3. We're last (of course) but we're back in the race!

Scrutineered

Yesterday we nailed into place all the mandatory equipment and stuck the stickers. Apparently we did an adequate job because we passed scrutineering without a hitch. Saudi TV were doing an outside broadcast from there, and decided that we were sufficiently newsworthy to interview.

Today we walked the prologue, which is basically the same as last year. Richard has made notes and we're agreed when and how much he has to communicate about upcoming points of high disaster potential. Sheila has made friends with Osama, who manages the Desert Lions race team, and who has offered to chauffeur her around the stages for the next two days. This does mean that she can't take a lot of spares and kit with her, but at least she'll get to each view point and the finish.

Now we're getting ready to depart the Jebalain for the ceremonial start and prologue, so I'll leave you with a couple of photos of The Beast.

"We could be heroes...

...just for one day".

But, as my knowledgeable co-driver has pointed out, this is a three day event. So maybe we should avoid the heroics.

Yesterday, we successfully negotiated the UAE/Saudi border without any of the dramas and delays which had attended out previous excursions. In fact we were through both in under half an hour, and arrived in Riyadh in mid afternoon. Today we were re-united with the race car, and settled into our 2-bed apartment at the Jebalain, before heading out to rally HQ at Maghwat for documentation. While waiting for that to start, we were given VIP treatment at the Traditional Souk, where vendors of camel accoutrements, crafts-people and food-stalls vied unsuccessfully for our business. These were indeed 'local shops for local people'.


Back at the Jebalain, we are in the presence of greatness. Nasser Al-Attiyeh's Dakar-winning Toureg shares the same carpark and breathes the same oxygen as my humble Patrol. We are not worthy. The only question appears to be the extent of his winning margin in this event.

Tomorrow we have to install the rally GPS, Iritrak and Sentinel, apply the rally stickers and do some final tidying up before scrutineering at 1330hrs.

Departure of the Beast

Yes, it's gone. Finally drove it onto the transporter at 6pm on Wednesday after a day of frantic activity, culminating in the last minute discovery that the main fire extinguisher had been fired (by whom and when, I know not) and therefore needed to be refilled and re-armed at a cost of Dh 1000. Ouch. So...I borrowed Jason's instead! I also discovered that I had two square-ish front wheels (courtesy of the DC2010 prang) but no-one had thought to mention this to me. Funnily enough, it drove much better after I'd replaced the wheels with some round-ish ones. Stickers were stuck (rather hurriedly, by that time the transporter was waiting for me), tools and gear were loaded into every nook and cranny of the race car and now it's gone. Should have taken a photo really, but I was too stressed to remember the camera!

Looks like we could be the only Khawajas (white-faces) to participate in the rally. That'll be fun! And it's confirmed that Nasser Al Attiyeh will be competing in the Dakar-winning Toureg, so he's odd-on favourite to spoil Yazeed Al Rajhi's hopes of a hat-trick in the Hail Rally.

Tomorrow at 0730 we head off, hoping to get through the border before prayer-time (1240) and as far as Riyadh for an overnight halt. We plan to reach Hail mid-afternoon Sunday - inchallah!

Living slightly over the edge

...staring into the abyss.

Got the car back last night, and spent till 1.00am doing stuff, like improving the jack mount and making the steering wheel point straight ahead when the wheels do. But the serpentine belt (which drives pretty much everything) was knackered so the first job this morning was to find a six-rib belt 2020mm long, how hard can that be? Well, it took all morning but eventually I returned triumphant to fit the belt and finally take the car out for a blat (oops, I mean shakedown). This was around 2.00pm.

All started well. The water temperature, even in some tricky 2nd-gear dunes, was getting only up to 85c and everything felt good. Then the 16" fan stopped working and the temp started to rise. I nursed it back out of the dunes and onto a gatch track - when suddenly the rear end made a very unhealthy noise and I ground to a halt. (That was the car's rear end, by the way, not mine. Just thought I should make that clear.) After some phone calls to Gareth, I decided to remove the rear prop shaft (in the middle of a sandstorm) and see if that made any difference, which it didn't. 'It's the diff', says Gareth. Anyway, to cut a very long story short, Gareth and Katrina dragged my trailer out into the desert behind his F150 and, after a few dramas, stucks, and a shredded trailer tyre, got the Patrol back to the blacktop where it was picked up by a recovery truck about 8.00pm this evening.

So now we only have to:
- sort out the diff
- sort out the fan
- make various lights and the firex system work
- weld a 24mm 1/2" drive socket onto the nut which holds the jack down (to create my patented quick-release mechanism, using the rattle-gun)
- apply all the stickers (did I mention they arrived - and half of them were wrong? Don't ask..)
- get the carnet from ATC and the police permission for the car to go to Saudi
- pay Saeed for the transport
- change the wheels and tyres
- fix a leaking spare tyre
- fix the new air tank valve which leaks
- and shakedown the finished product? Yeah, right...in my dreams.

By my calculations we (i.e. mainly Gareth) have about 40 hours to achieve these miracles. So no pressure, then.

On the plus side, Mark and Fadi have given up the unequal struggle with Saudi beaurocracy to get visas, and will now concentrate on the DC. So that's two cars we won't be behind in Hail.

The other day, I put out a call to Al Thika Packaging's service engineers, asking if anyone was interested in joining us for the DC adventure. This involves long hours of boredom whilst camping in the desert, interspersed with periods of panic-stricken activity which can go on all night, whilst being sand-blasted and periodically deafened by the testing of other competitors' vehicles. So far only one engineer has decided that he's sufficiently desperate to escape from fixing packaging machines for a week to volunteer. So - welcome to the crew, Fred Santiago! Fred normally services our customers' machines in Oman, and clearly has no idea whatsoever what he's let himself in for. Maybe I should keep it that way...

Stay tuned for the next nail-biting instalment of 'The Race to Hail'.

Living on the edge

Well, Saturday came and went, A2B didn't get the power steer pump back till just short of closing time, and then found that the damned machine shop had pressed the pulley on too far - meaning it's out of line with the fanbelt. Brilliant - they only had to copy the position of the old one, but clearly that was beyond their wit. So rather than send it back to the idiots at the machine shop, Gareth is going to make up some shims to space it off the engine block and bring it back to alignment. However, they have managed to complete a list of other jobs, like making a new mounting for the trolley jack, and lock-wiring the hub bolts, so the pump is the last item. Potentially, some time tomorrow (now our weekend is over) I might have it. I'll just have to bunk off work to do a shakedown.

Meanwhile, I can leave you with some links to videos featuring NewTrix Racing!

This one shows us on the prologue for the Hail Baja 2010, at about 3min 30.

Yet another link to the same event, showing the start of Day 1, again we're about 3min 30 into the video.

Finally, this one shows us starting Day 2 at about 7min 50.

This one contains some in-car footage from DC 2010, and was kindly edited by Rick Carless, my Technical Manager. Watching this is about as close as I can get to driving a rally car at the moment, which is a bit sad!

Further news of the Hail Rally is that the Toyota Team are planning to run two Toyota FJs, including the V8-engined prototype which Abdullah Bakhashab (absent from the 2011 crew) piloted last year. They've asked for help in shipping 1200L of AvGas from Dubai to Hail - yet another team with problems!

Rumour has it that Nasser Al Attiyeh, fresh from victory in the Dakar, may compete in one of the VW Touregs. Yazeed Al Rajhi will be trying for 3rd straight victory in the event, driving an Overdrive Nissan Navara.

In the continuing absence of any worthwhile website from the Hail Rally organisers, you may be able to find updates at Neil Perkins' NDP Publicity website.

Still no car - AAARGH!

Well it's good news/bad news back at A2B garage. The best bit of good news is that they reckon they've found the cause of the overheating headers and the backfiring - seems that the camshaft position sensor was never connected. And I mean NEVER, as in it wasn't connected for Hail 2010 or DC2010! So that fact that we did as well as we did is a minor miracle. Funnily enough, Gareth reports that it 'runs much better' now it's connected - there's a surprise! Could this have been contributing to our earlier overheating problems?? I suspect so.

Bad news is that the new power steer pump wasn't a simple drop-in replacement, the fittings are wrong and the pulley needs a spcial tool to press onto the pump - so it didn't get finished yesterday. Now we're shooting for a shakedown on Saturday afternoon. Nothing beats the excitement of leaving it all till the last minute, does it?

There are still various tidying-up jobs to finish off but, if it runs tomorrow, I'll feel a whole lot happier. And by Sunday, all three of us will have Saudi visas in our passports, which is another step closer to Hail.

Some consolation is the fact that most of my fellow-competitors from the UAE are in at least as bad a state as us. Mabbsy's FJ is still not finished, Team Saluki have visa problems, and work is still in progress on the two Predator Buggies Mark and Fadi Melky plan to drive. His old Honda-powered Fast & Speed buggy has been re-engined with a Nissan 4L V6, and now belongs to Nazer Shanfari, but so far it's not been tested.

My old friend Saeed Al Hameli has decided to rent a complete car transporter, so I've bought a slot on that. I've decided that Dh4500 to save towing the race car 3500km is money well spent, although it does mean that the car has to be ready to pick up Wednesday evening, rather than next Saturday - which is when we plan to head off in Sheila's Prado.

Weather in Hail is a chilly 8 deg.c. at night and only 22 at midday, so I think we'll be needing the thermal underwear more than the sunscreen. At least the engine has no excuse to overheat this time!

Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll!

Is it really that long since I last updated the blog? Has anything worthy of note happened in the interim? Are we going to be rallying this year?

I am happy to give you the answers to these pressing questions, which are yes, yes, and inshallah.

Well, the clutch got reassembled, but when road testing it made a horrid noise, so we had to drop the gearbox again and take it out, check it, not find anything wrong, carefully re-assemble it and it worked OK. Big sigh of relief – until it went out on the road with its new radiator. It returned from a quick trip to the traffic lights and back with the headers glowing red-hot, which is generally considered to be a Bad Thing. My first guess – subsequently borne out by my mate Kolby at Turnkey Engines – was an overly lean mixture. The big question is - why? We haven’t messed with the ECU or anything else, so maybe we’re short on fuel pressure, or the airflow sensor is under-reporting the amount of air going in. Or something.

Anyway, we needed to get the paintwork sorted and the dent in the rear door fixed, so as soon as it comes come out of the paintshop, we can concentrate on the mixture problem. Fortunately Mark Adams, Saluki Motorsport’s chief tuning guru, is about to arrive from UK, and we may need to call on his expertise. And time is running out.

And so to Hail. While marshalling at the Yas Marina F1, I had a fortuitous meeting with Richard Phillipson (photo attached), who has rallied extensively in saloon cars throughout Europe. I mentioned that I was looking for a co-driver for Hail, and (mad fool that he is) he immediately volunteered! Together we took on the job of course opening for the Dubai International Rally in the ‘00’ car last month, and managed to get through two days without coming to blows, so it’s settled. We plan to leave Dubai on 5th Feb, 8th Feb is the prologue, and the main event is Feb 9th-10th. Since the Saudis still refuse to allow Sheila to compete, the event is not part of the 2011 FIA Cross-Country World Championship, but it is still an FIA event. Sheila will once again be our indispensible Team Manager.

Now, if only we had a car…

Hail Baja - Epilogue

So – now that the dust has settled, where does that leave us? 27 vehicles passed scrutineering, and we came 15th overall out of 16 finishers, which isn’t that great. But had we avoided the problems of day one, and kept up the same pace as we achieved on day 2, we’d have been around 5th overall. If only…

Overheating was still a problem on day 2, and although I could keep up with Dave Mabbs for a while, eventually I’d be forced to slow down when the temperature hit 115c. So after some discussions with Peter at Pacet (the fan manufacturer) we’re going for their 16” Profans in place of the 13” units, which were sized to suit the old Patrol-shaped radiator. If there’s space, we’ll also use one of their PowerVent bonnet fans to help extract the hot air from the engine compartment.

New bonnet pins have been fitted and I’m looking for a couple of high-mounted brake lights – it would be nice to get another pair like the existing ones and mount them in the rear doors.

The bad news is that Carwise – the garage that’s looked after my cars – is closing down at the end of February. Fortunately, Rick is staying in Dubai, and will have no problem finding another garage to work for. Since he knows the car better than anyone, it probably makes sense to use whichever garage he ends up at to provide service for the Desert Challenge. The DC is now only 4 weeks away and the clock is ticking.

An interesting conversation took place at Hail with an FIA representative. I was asked why Sheila was not competing, to which I replied that we'd applied and been turned down (again). This came as a surprise to him as (a) SAMF had signed a letter to the FIA confirming that women competitors would be allowed, and (b) SAMF had subsequently told the FIA that no women had applied! I suspect that the FIA may not be too happy to learn that the the Saudis have been economical with the truth.

Here are a few pics of us at the Hail Baja taken by Mohd Al Sultan. Click on the thumbnails to get the larger version.

Hail Baja Day 2

Todays route featured a lot of quick sand tracks and plains, punctuated by some tricky dune sections. Overall, it's a lot fater than yesterday which is to our advantage in view of our cooling issues.

We're 19th to start and we're flying. We overtake the car ahead in the first couple of km, he's clearly over estimated his tyre pressures and gets caught out on the first soft bit. I'm running 18psi, having decided to err on the side of caution, and just hope the tyres will put up with the fast sections at that pressure. We overtake another car, and another - no sign of anyone coming at us from behind.

Temp problems still dog us, but they are manageable. Mabbsy catches us but doesn't really ever get away from us. We both pass the ailing Patrol of Bil Hili (car #1!) on a fast plain where we reach 150kph.

Suddenly the finish is in sight - 188km in 2hrs 48mins! A bonnet pin shears off within sight of the finish leaving the bonnet flapping - thank God it didn't happen before!

We're 8th on the day - another 8 mins faster asnd we'd have been 3rd. Sounds academic, but it would have been possible if we hadn't needed to slow down so often to cool the engine. Overall we're 15th, not bad considering what a crap first day we'd had, and Dave Mabbs is one place behind us.

We're happy with that!

Hail Baja Day 1

I'll make this quick as I have to get to bed.

The engine started overheating early on. The fans were OK but the top hose had chafed and was leaking, so I cut-and-shut it using a couple of spare jubilee clips and a double-ended joiner - but it didn't hold. After the third failed bodge, the service crew from another team gave us a hose which worked, the sweep team doinated extra water and we were again on our way - but much delayed.

Came aross Mabbsy with a leaking rad, stopped but couldn't help and anyway Streaky was almost there. We passed him a couple of km later. We had the option to bail out at the next 'rescue' point, but we were now going well so decided to try and make the 200km to the service point, knowing that if we got that far we would be time-barred, but permitted restart tomorrow.

We made it - but the engine temp was close to the 115c limit and went into cripple-mode a couple of times, necessitating us to take a brief 'time-out' to cool it. We also threw a tyre and got stuck once, and suffered the indignity of being towed out by a police Cruiser! Oh, and the exhaust hanger broke, which I jury-rigged with some binding wire.

Having reached the service point, we exited on a gatch track and aired up. Just 200m from the road, the power steering packed up, a sure sign that the belt had gone. It had - but so had the idler pulley, and while we had a new belt it wasn't much use without the pulley. So we ended up being towed 250km back to Hail by the sweep team's V8 Land Cruiser.

Streaky and I set to work, the main job being to fit the new idler, which fortunately was in the service vehicle. The rest of the bodged repairs will have to suffice for tomorrow.

After this stage, Yazeed Al Rajhi leads in the Mitsubishi Racing Lancer, by a narrow margin from Bakhashab in the V8 engnied FJ Cruiser, with Raed Baker third in the Mitsubishi L200 pickup.

Now - bed.

The Prologue

(Can't help thinking of Frankie Howerd when I use those two words.)

The Jabalain continues to plumb new depths of inefficiency. Breakfast, promised from 0600hrs, is still conspicuous by its absence at 0700hrs, but fortunately our Team Manager has Plan B in hand. Our wardrobe clearly has more food in it than the hotel kitchen, and we breakfast much better than yesterday. (The Jabalain has some impressive brass signs reading 'Arson Emergency Exit'. If there is an alternative egress in the event of accidental fires, we haven't found it.)

But I digress. By 0800 we are back at Maghwat, because that’s when the prologue road book is supposed to be issued. It finally makes an appearance at 0945, and we set off to walk the 6.2km route.

We’re not the quickest on the prologue – 5min 39secs gives us 15th place, 10 seconds slower than 7th-placed Mabbs. But the engine is getting very hot. We divert to fuel up before returning to service, where we find one of the fans is not getting a supply. Streaky and I rig up an alternative feed and the problem is solved, and the car goes into Parc Ferme for the night.

Monday

I'm up bright and early to I get on with some car-cleaning and rally-stickering. Breakfast at the Jabelain is not a culinary tour-de-force, with its cold scambled egg and congealing Arabic slop competing for top honours in the World's Worst Breakfast category. The fact that this establishment boasts exactly no stars is clearly no oversight.

After this uninspiring interlude, I carry on with the car while Sheila and Ian set out on a hunt for suitably-rated 12" tyres, and pick up the GPS, Sentinel and Iritrack from Rally Control. Once fitted, we proceed to Scrutineering for our 1450hrs appointment.

Oh joy. The Toyota Service Centre is heaving with locals and their (alleged) rally cars, and chaos is in full swing. They can't fill in their scrutineering forms properly, and half of their mandatory equipment is either missing or out of date. The schedule has clearly gone out of the window some hours ago, and we finally get through about 1800hrs. We escape with only a minor admonition for the absence of high-mounted stop-lights, to be corrrected before the DC.

We decide to celebrate at a nearby Indian Restaurant, a strange place spotted by Ian. Inside are many colourful murals, fake timber beams, and in interesting menu. It features many previously unheard-of culinary delights, including 'Chicken Jal Freddie', 'American Jobsi', and my personal favourite, 'Chicken Masala Amputation'. (Quite why images of 'Nightmare on Elm Street' run through my mind I am unsure.) However the meal is excellent, and almost as enjoyable as reading the menu.

On the road again

Saturday
Our convoy of five vehicles - two of them on trailers - sets off from Seih Sheib ADNOC at 0715. By midday we're at the Saudi border and our problems begin. Of the six of us, it transpires that only one has a 'road' visa, and that's me. All the rest are 'air' visas. After a two and a half hour wait and various phone calls, they eventually allow us to enter the magic kingdom.

The short-cut to Riyadh via Haradh and Kharj takes its toll on our trailer. First a tyre delaminates, and we fit the (only) spare. Then I hit something in the dark in Kharj and knacker another tyre and bend the rim. The only available 12" tyre is Kharj is unsuitable, but we buy it anyway, and after attacking the damaged rim with a sledgehammer it is persuaded to fit. But we have little faith in it, and decide to keep it as a spare. That means re-fitting the wheel with the delaminated tyre and praying a lot. Somehow it gets us to Riyadh, where Team FJ have already located a couple of halfway decent 12" tyres for us. The next morning, we fit them and set off again.

Sheila - as Hail sees her.

With the benefit of hindsight, the Prado was probably not the ideal choice for towing a three and a half ton load 1700km. But it was either that or the Patrol, which is now in its 18th year and clearly past its prime. Even with its supercharger, we struggled to top 120kph on the flat, and any sort of incline or headwind knocked us back to around 90. But after the long haul up from Dubai to Riyadh, we reached the Al Janadriah Hotel in Hail at around 2.30pm Sunday, and had time to visit rally control and complete some of the formalities.

Most of the UAE entrants are housed at the Janadriah – Team FJ, Team Saluki, Nabeel Al Shamsi, Abdullah Al Heraiz with his beautifully prepared Patrol, as well as Miroslav Zapletal’s Czech team, fresh from their successful completion of the Dakar. Despite its removal from the FIA Baja Championship, the event has over 30 entrants, a third of whom are competing in our T2 class. Prize money is not yet confirmed, but rumoured to be over SR100,000 (₤20k). A small share of that would make our journey worthwhile!

Sheila seems to be able to get away with wearing jeans and sweater, with her head covered in an Arabic shayla or headscarf. Western women are still a rarity in Hail, almost a century after Gertrude Bell’s visit, so her appearance in any garb will hardly go unnoticed. Since she is unable to drive in Saudi, we have managed to retain a driver called Hamdan. He will take Sheila in the Prado, with its cargo of tools and spares, to and from the service point each day.

Hail is noticeably cooler than Riyadh, which was much colder than Dubai. At over 1000m altitude, its sere air dries lips and skin continually. As night falls, the mercury dips to around freezing and our rooms need heating. Hail is ringed by a mountain range which appears to have been transplanted from a ‘Lord of the Rings’ set. There’s even a wall between two mountains with a huge gateway – surely the entrance to Mordor! The city boasts interesting road features, too. The interchange behind Sheila we have christened ‘Blackbladder Roundabout’.

We’ve installed the GPS, Iritrack and Sentinel equipment, applied our lucky number 13 rally stickers, and successfully completed scrutineering, so we are all set for tomorrow’s prologue.