What a difference a day makes

Rod certainly doesn't hang about, does he?  Saluki Motorsport could be on course for a new world record in pick-up conversions!  We now have a pre-loved white roof ready to replace the cab section, so I guess that's the next part to come off.  The existing bulkhead behind the cab is now redundant, and has gone.  The rear 'D' pillar frame from the new roof will be installed in its place, immediately behind the 'B' pillar, which is also part of the new roof.  The new cab back panel will have a window(hurrah!) so finally I'll have half-decent rear visibility.

 



Revenge of the Spider

It’s been a while, but there is much to report. The car came back from A2B with the refurbished shocks and shiny front and rear bumpers, and went straight into Skyline for the exhaust system to be repaired. They have replaced the broken Y-section and the silencer box, and added a flexible section as well.
From there it went into Saluki Motorsport, for stainless steel top and bottom radiator hoses, and a revamp of the intake system which was seemingly letting dust through the filter. The new system includes a complete new air-cleaner box, leading to a long section of 3” aluminium pipe which exits towards the bulkhead, through a new restrictor (36mm for 2012), over the back of the engine, and then forwards to connect with the plenum at the front. This circuitous route gives us additional post-restrictor air volume, which is a Good Thing.
Then Rick at Saluki found various other things, which had either not been completed or not noticed before. The fuse and relay boxes weren’t anchored to the new inner wing, the compressor wasn’t working, two bolts were missing from one engine mount, and there was a nasty noise coming from the thrust bearing of the clutch.
Now, those of you who have been paying attention will recall that last year we replaced the clutch, thrust bearing and the adaptor plate, because its integral spider (which supports the thrust bearing) had fractured. Well, guess what – it’s déjà vu all over again. Thrust bearing has seized due to dust ingress, and the spider is broken.
The whole thing came from Marks 4x4 in Oz. It’s cast in aluminium, which is fine for the adaptor plate, but not so clever for the spider. The casting is horribly porous and brittle, and clearly not man enough for the job. So Robbie, Saluki’s brilliant fabricator, has managed somehow to weld it back together, and four additional steel legs will be bolted to the adaptor and welded to a new steel ring which will support the new bearing. It’s not the most elegant solution, but should hold together until we can fabricate a complete new all-steel spider. All of this should be complete tomorrow (Sunday).
Plan A had been to send the race car by car transporter to Doha, and fly down to meet it. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get the minimum 6 cars to make this viable, so we have reverted to Plan B – trailer the race car to Doha. The trailer now has four new boots, and a new jockey wheel assembly to replace the one which got twatted some time ago. I’m in the process of getting a transit visa for Saudi Arabia, which inconveniently lies between the UAE and Qatar. Leaving Wednesday (23rd) morning, I should be there by evening, while Sheila and Richard will fly, getting there in time to complete documentation. We’ll only need to sticker the car before scrutineering on Thursday.
It’s all ended up being another last-minute panic, but assuming the Saudi Embassy and Saluki Motorsport do ‘the needful’, we’ll be racing next weekend.

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!

Go fourth and qualify...

Just so you know, the Newtrix page has been blog-napped. A certain Mr. Tim Ansell, whose decline into notoriety began when he first accepted Ian Barker’s job offer over a pizza in Tehran High Street, has taken over the page for the duration of the Desert Challenge. This is simply because internet connections can be hard to come by in the desert, and since Newtrix does not as yet take its own team of PR luvvies with access to the media centre’s Broadband LAN WAP Bluetooth dongles darling, he (I) will be putting pen to pixel for the benefit of Newtrix Racing, from the comfort of a single malt whisky soaked desk in air conditioned Dubai. Slainté

And it gives me great pleasure on this, my first Faux Dog Blog, to tell you that the Barkers ‘kicked bottom’ this afternoon at the prologue. Having eventually found my way to the derelict, well hidden and un-advertised building site the organisers deemed a fit location to hold the “Super Special” (what’s so special about a heavily camoflauged sand pit?) I and all the competitors were at least suitably impressed with the layout of the stage, which allowed two cars / bikes / quads to run simultaneously on the same ‘circuit’, in a similar manner to many of the WRC’s Super Specials. Since it was over 40 degrees out there and I was stood in the middle of said sand pit with two heavy cameras slung round my neck, I for one was very happy that it meant the duration of the running of the prologue could be considerably reduced.

Where the routes crossed, a large bridge / jump had been built and I’m happy to say that like most competitors, Ian decided that discretion was more important than a sports page lead photo (I rather suspect Sheila may have had some say in this :-) and he took the jump cautiously, with the Patrol’s wheels leaving Mother Earth only briefly. Even so, I’ll bet he still got a flea in his ear for that. (It’s great being able to write Ian’s blog knowing he gets to read it and say “ooh that bugger Ansell….!”) Hee hee.

Anyway, as an (almost) independent witness I can honestly say that Ian did not APPEAR to be driving the stage particularly manically, in his own words, he was simply concentrating on “keeping it tidy” which was not easy given the amount of dust in the air and litter on the ground. But I digress.

He did indeed “keep it tidy” and by doing so, was able to keep his pedal to the proverbial metal, with the result that he finished the stage with the fourth fastest time of all the auto competitors. Oh yes, FOURTH fastest overall. Which means he beat Dave “To hell with the suspension, gearbox, engine and environment, I’m going to cane this thing into oblivion to get a fast finish” Mabbs in his FJ Cruiser, Mark “I’ll take it easy in the prologue thanks, it’s a five day race you know” Powell in the always sexy looking Saluki buggy, Raed “It doesn’t matter if I break it, quite frankly, I can afford to” Baker and a host of other local and international competitors. The Boy’s done well. And so did the Girl. As everyone knows, in rallying it’s co-drivers who do all the work and make the decisions, drivers just claim all the glory. So well done Shelia. Now take your hands off the roll cage please…

There’s a link here to the Special Stage results in case you don’t believe me (having seen some of the stuff I’ve published in the past, I can understand if you don’t believe me) and above, a selection of incredibly good photos taken by a photographer whom Ian will I’m sure go on to describe as “possibly the most important photographer to emerge from Arabian Ranches in the new Millenium”. At least he will if he wants any more free photos from me of the Patrol.


Finally we welcome back to Dubai / Liwa a man who needs no introduction, so he’s not getting one. Rick Carless, Team Newtrix Racing’s Technical Support Manager. Chief Bottle Washer and G.D.B. I mean, would you trust your rally vehicle to a bloke called “Carless”. For heavens sake. Joining Rick is Cesar “Ian I really should be at work in Al Thika you know” Marquez, whom Ian has once again purloined temporarily from the staff at our office. We’ll cope, we always do. THANKS GUYS. And remember, righty tighty, lefty loosey.

Until tomorrow………………………..Woof, I’m outa here!

And keep the damn Patrol running all day tomorrow, no ‘issues’ please folks.