Skoda Rally Blog

Is it a monster? No, it’s Wales Rally GB. And there are changes afoot:

First up, a new engine. Last summer I bought an ex-works engine from Tony Simpson that needed rebuilding, but getting pistons took too long. This year, I have a reasonable amount of time to do it in, so the pistons have been machined to suit the cam/engine setup, and the rest of the build is progressing slowly but surely; annoyingly no-one does pattern engine bearings for the 136 engine so I’ve had to order them from Skoda! I already have most of the bits I need to build it, and then it should just be a case of get it mapped properly and it will be spot on… simple, eh?

Secondly, I’m still trying to get my near-mythical close-ratio gearbox from Chris Bennett – this has been over 18 months coming, and was a source of much wailing and gnashing of teeth last October when it turned up and didn’t work. However, I’m not banking on that happening – I’m going to fit a standard box with no LSD to get the new engine up and running and see what turns up….

Thirdly, things that are the same – we’ve managed to rent the same house as last year, so that will make things very pleasant, and we should also have the same van. I’ve promised the trailer that I’ll rebuild it, so hopefully it should be a little less shonky than last year (although it does the job perfectly well, it does look like it should have a bangered Mk4 Cortina on it, not a rally car!).

So, hopefully this year’s preparation will be less fraught than last year’s, the car should be fast and reliable, and it should be fun. Although the homologation doesn’t run out until 2010, the FIA in their infinite wisdom have said that HANS devices have to be worn by all competitors in International events as of 2009, and that would mean a minimum of ?1500 spent between me and Paul (?500 per “sport” HANS, ?250 per helmet), and possibly new seats as well. Unless I win the lottery this seems unlikely. Which is annoying.

This weekend was a bit odd. As you may know, Canford Arena (the place used for servicing on the Rallye Sunseeker) is just down the road from my house (just over a mile away), and this weekend it was host to the Outdoor Lifestyle Show which featured a variety of activities, including Rally Car Rides. Gary from Ebblake was organising that side of things, and the promise of being able to get a bit of time in on gravel was tempting, so I said I’d do it.

It meant firstly sorting out the exhaust on the car, which wasn’t too painful – a bit of TIG work on the new stainless pipe I’d had made up (one of the angles was wrong) and about a day’s work meant I had a running car once more, and sounding sweeter than ever. Even looks shiny!

Friday was the first day of the show, but I was working, so I went on Saturday morning to see a neat course set out in what it usually the service area, and as well as Gary’s Impreza there were a couple of BMW E30 cars there, a Mk.2 and Kev Rowledge’s lovely N4 Impreza, which he’d never driven on gravel before. You’d never know from the way he was driving it though, for sure. I had a few laps as practice, and then spent the rest of the day taking people round – I even made pace notes up for some to read if they fancied it, but few did. One girl who did was excellent, she read it spot on all the way round, all 4 laps!

When people get fat, they do so slowly, without noticing, and it’s only when people who haven’t seen them for 5 years see the sudden change that what’s happened becomes clear. And I had that sort of thing happen this weekend. When I first started out on gravel (Newton Abbot Audi stages, 2004), I was terrible, hence falling off the road at zero mph. But I’ve stuck at it (thanks Steve), and although I may not be quick, I’m OK now. But when you get someone sat in the passenger’s seat who’s never done this sort of thing before it becomes clear just how out-of-the-ordinary what you do for fun is – I’d expected people to say “that was slow. You’re rubbish”, but everyone who got out of the car loved it, and there were several comments (including from one woman who said she was a ‘speed demon’) about my driving, being able to control the car like that (i.e. a bit sideways), and after a while I was thinking that maybe I had got it together. Not great, but not rubbish. What was funny was seeing people’s reactions – one woman was constantly reaching for the navigator’s footrest, trying to push an imaginary brake pedal – it was great watching her down the back straight, as we got to the end I could see in the corner of my eye her right leg extending involuntarily, trying to stop the car! One girl videoed the whole lot, and chuckled, and one man asked questions for most of the time, meaning my answers were punctuated wherever a tight corner came up.

What was funny was the Skoda actually went round the course quite quickly. Gary’s Impreza was running on tarmac tyres (to avoid wear to the gravel and also to avoid tyre wear, ‘cos he only has soft tyres that wear quick and cost a lot), but he was lapping in 24 seconds. I did it in 22 consistently, which is something he’ll never hear the end of!

I also got a chance to drive Gary’s Subaru – I’ve never even driven one on the road before (never even sat in one), and once I’d done a lap to warm things up a bit, gave it some. It was a revelation – having that much power is wonderful, being able to steer the car predictably on the throttle, and have it do exactly what you tell it to was just fantastic. The car felt far more competent and smooth than the Felicia (no offence, Skoda!), and I think I could really have some fun in one of them. But given that Gary’s gearbox alone cost more than building my car AND entering Rally GB then I think it’ll have to wait until at least hell freezes over, alas. Nice to know I could drive a 4WD car OK though.

On Sunday it was more of the same, but overnight rain and the day’s use left the track very cut up and we’d moved it as many times as possible, so the last runs were a bit more ‘improvised’ than before – nothing dodgy, just making your own lines. The last few people loved it (one woman said she couldn’t walk!), but then the old bugbear of the left front strut-top coming loose reared its ugly head, and given how rough it was getting I thought discretion was better than destruction; We didn’t get paid anything significant for doing it, so the money I did get wouldn’t have covered even slight damage, so I quit around lunchtime.

The show was hit by bad weather and therefore poor attendance, and I think it was a real pity as those who did come had a great time, and for ?15 got a chance to go in some real rally cars – everyone was surprised at how rough and visceral an experience it was (and we were hamming it up a bit, getting over-sideways for fun), so hopefully when they watch rallying on the TV in future, they’ll see it in a different light…

Ages ago (when I started getting R477 KRU into shape) I had the pipes bent up for a stainless 2″ exhaust system, and also bought a nice shiny 2″ stainless tailpipe from Jetex. I didn’t use them as I got a ready-made system with all the other stuff I bought (including the brand new shell), but as the tailpipe did a lemming on day one of WRGB and we ‘bodged’ it using a standard (1.5″) tailpipe to keep the noise at a legal(ish) level, it was time to put these bits into service.

Amazingly, this actually all worked out fairly well. I had to make some mods to the existing pipe to get the new section to fit into it, and also cut the over-axle section, but that was to be expected. The rest of it went according to plan – the whole thing took about 3 hours to get right, but that did include two trips to the MDC to get some clamps, and then to get the right size ones! And now, instead of sounding like a rattly, noisy, leaky old shed, it sounds like a rally car – loud, but not really loud, and with a lovely full tone. I am a happy camper!

Re-fitted all the door stuff after re-tinting the driver’s window (for safety, not image), and went for a fairly long shakedown drive and fixed the few issues that arose – a few things needing tightening, the steering wheel putting on straight, etc. Overall, good stuff.

Changed over to the tarmac tyres (which are needed for scrutineering as you’re supposed to turn up with what you’re running on Friday night), and even have a matching spare for once (remembering that in 2006 a flat occurred just before going to MTC1) and put the green parts of the Skoda stickers onto the car – it went much better than the red bits did, probably ‘cos it’s not freezing and windy. The car will need a good clean tomorrow before scrutineering as I want it to look its best, but overall it’s all OK. Fitted the GPS, can’t find the lead for the Palm (which gives me a speedo which is handy as the LSD has no provision for one), which is a pain.

I cannot express how much I am looking forward to this. When I drove past the service area this afternoon I was like a kid. When the Echo turned up today I read it, thinking “I’m doing that”, etc…. And in 24 hours, I’ll be waiting to enter the time control for SS1. Magic.

So, the car is looking…. well, car-like. I’ve had a few days of “intermittent” work (it being Half Term means I don’t have teaching to do, but I have other things instead), but still managed to get the car all cleaned up, and do a few jobs that have needed fixing since WRGB.

Strut tops – these have been a constant problem since fitting them -the top nuts just come undone no matter how much impact gun work goes into their tightening. So i’ve cross-drilled and tapped them and fitted grub screws into them which I’ve tightened. I hope this will stop them working loose.

Bumpers – my first attempt at painting meant the paint flaked off in places, but for under ?5 it’s not all bad. So I took ’em off and re-painted them. Job done!

Steering wheel – the cheap allen bolts that came with the wheel were rubbish – they came loose on SS8 and nearly led to an untimely end. So they’ve been replaced with something that can actually be torqued up, and with locknuts on the back, no less.

Exhaust -this is a job for tomorrow, but replacing the tailpipe is a priority as it’s “a bit loud” at the moment…

There are lots of other things – cleanup from WRGB etc, but they’re mundane and boring, aside from getting the WRGB stickers off intact again, so I have another set to stick somewhere!

There was a bit of a surprise in store though – I decided to change the rocker cover to one I’d painted black (I know, it’s only looks) and to take a quick look at the top end. And to my surprise when I removed the old one…. two pieces of metal fell out. The original “splash guard”, and they’d been hammering into the valve gear for some time by the rounded-off look of them. They don’t seem to have done any serious damage, so I’ll have to go with them – this engine will be being removed and rebuilt after the Sunseeker, so it only has to do 230 miles or so…. hopefully it’ll do it OK!

But on the upside, I now have an engine bay that looks like this:

Which sounds AMAZING. It’s so different from the old engine in N158UBD it’s untrue. It really does sound great. And it goes really well too, so that’s nice!

Tomorrow, there are final things to do – stickers to apply, intercom to sort out and GPS as well as other minor issues and the exhaust which I hope won’t take the entire day, but given what I have to make up… maybe it will. Still, who wants to laze around anyway?

Having got back from Banjul and spent the rest of the time since working a lot, it’s now time to turn to preparations for the Sunseeker, which is next Friday and Saturday in Bournemouth. Fortunately there are few things to do to the Felicia, and for the first time in 3 years we’ll be running in class B9 instead of a homologated class. The reason for this? When I bought the engine and other car I also got a set of Weber Alpha throttle bodies, and it’s a chance to run the car with those on – they’ll make the car go a bit better and sound fantastic.

Aside from that there’s not much to do – just clean and check everything, sort out the loose strut top issue (which is to be done by drilling and tapping the nuts to have a grub screw fitted to lock them in place), and give the old beast a good check over. Maybe I’ll even get round to fitting the green stripes in addition to the red ones!

I see from the site stats that there are quite a few people reading this.

I won’t go on, but if you have enjoyed this or seeing us out on the stages, please, please go to my Plymouth-Banjul Rally site and check out what I’m doing at Christmas – if you feel you can sponsor us in any way or with any amount, please do so, it will be hugely appreciated by us and those who get the sponsorship donations.

…my fist down the fat cow’s throat to keep her quiet for a bit. (fat lady, previous entry)

Got up early (well, clocks and all that), and got everything bolted up and connected, put oil in the ‘box and so on, and it seems like it might be OK. All 5 gears plus reverse, all select OK and drive the wheels round. Got the Nav footrest in with Paul, bonnet, bumper and grille on, and it looks like a car. But it’s chucking it down today, and to be blunt I am so tired it’s untrue – again I didn’t sleep well because I was worried about the ‘box. That coupled with the rain meant I will only be making mistakes, and we can’t afford any, and I don’t want to get a cold back and suffer from that again!

If it goes well, then on Tuesday the car will be all in one big piece and drivable (MOT-able and nearly logbookable, only the sumpguard mount and a pull to do). If not, who knows. I’ll probably be found down Hengistbury Head.

If I pull this off, this will be legendary. I’m hoping it goes that way, ‘cos the other way doesn’t really bear thinking about at the mo!

… Nightmare.

I’ve got an engine and box in the car, but the engine isn’t running well (even on standard management), and the gearbox is knackered, so I’m reliant on Chris Bennett turning up with the C/R gearbox. Which was promised for tomorrow, and clearly isn’t going to happen as he’s gone quiet today.

I would say “on the upside”, but there doesn’t seem to be an upside. I have another 6 days left to get the car in an MOT-able state. Oh dear, oh dear.

There have been some doubts about us doing WRGB this year. Money is a bit tight for both of us, but this weekend we’ve decided we’re going to do it for sure.

Which means we’ll need a recce car. Handily the Felicia from last year has been at Paul’s since, well since we came back, so it’s been there for 6 months or so. Unloved. Unused. Unstarted. Unwashed.

But this weekend it became a bit more, er, urgent, ‘cos I had sold my Focus, and then on Saturday night, I sold the Fabia, which left me with no car to drive! So the resurrection began. Which was alarmingly simple – wash off six months of grime (which as I’d waxed the car before it got put away wasn’t too bad), change the forest tyres for something more suitable for an MOT (in this case the 048 Yokos I had as my tarmac tyres for the Sunseeker), and give it a damn good clean inside. And amazingly it passed the MOT straight off aside from needing the headlamps adjusted. It had a tiny split in the CV boot which needed superglueing up, but I’ll fix that properly soon. But I’m well impressed that a car that cost ?370, did all the WRGB stages (twice all except Crychan), and 1000 miles trolling about and then was left to die for 6 months can be as happy as larry within a day.

I just hope the rally car build goes as well – at the moment I’m STILL waiting for the tube notcher to arrive – the shell is largely welded up, so the cage is the next stage.

OK, only a bit, but in a way it’s a big one….

I phoned Custom Cages to order the weld-in cage kit, spoke to a very helpful woman who was professional and made a huge change from the miserable, unhelpful “Stuart” who I spoke to at Rollcentre. She took my details, the cage info, etc, and took my money. And then told me that delivery would be “7-10 days”, which I did a double-take at. Everyone else said around 8 weeks! So, that’ll be nice – it might be finished before WRGB 2007!