Mini Nat Cap

[raybak]

Well I suppose I should start as I DNF'd again. That Charade disease has struck again. WE managed to make it to stage 5 but the car lost all drive about 700m in.

Had a ball driving, some of the roads were a bit rough but we perservered. Should have backed off more for the water splash in East West as we went onto 2 cylinders for most of the stage, losing a heap of time.

Like to thank Phil and Andrew and Rob for servicing. The Barretts for all their help with car prep and James for sitting next to me.

Will be back in the car for Oberon.

Ray

[Darren]

What! What! What! Where are all the reports? Apart from waiting for hours & hours talking to myself & standing in the sun I had a great time watching you all having fun. But I did'nt see enough of you go past?....thats why I want to read all those reports.

My most exciting moment was on the way out of the stage. I missed a right hand turn & launched the old ute over a 1.5m wide & 300-400mm deep trench. It was a big impact on the other side. After rolling a few block of wood under it I got it out AND it still steered straight! Hmmm maybe I shoud Rally it instead of the Stanza? Its slow but its bl00dy strong!

BTW the Fiat and Micheal's Silva fly! Plenty of others (too many to list) were giving it a good go too! Great spectating!

[billdunn]

Well, I shouldn't really give an event report for the FIAT, as it was car 0, and JS rekonned that he probably never really pushed harder than 80 % pace, but what about PK in 00, from what I saw, 00 event report from him should be interesting.

Unless JS or Bro write a report here, contradicting me, I can say with certainty, that no problems AT ALL, occurred with the FIAT, and save for a repair to an indicator, no repairs were required. We did change to a different type of tyre mid way, and JS found the car much easier to drive after this, and was consequently quicker.
Our only other issue was a 85L of fuel we burnt off, which is a much greater rate of consumption than ever before (and JS was not pushing it hard), but some tuning work has been done by Ross Smith in the last month, making the engine more tractable and smoother, still atleast we are not having to burn Elf !

Congat's and thanks must go to the organising team,the BMSC all the volunteers.

Bill Dunn

[mickjfawcett]

gday everyone

first up id like to say a special thanks to adrian and all the officials that helped out on saturday. thanks also to all the people who offered me advise during the day as i really appreciated it

as this was my first ever rally event i was keen just to cruise through some stages just to see what this wonderful sport could offer me and get used to the car. as expected there were a few nerves at tc stage 1 but felt good going into the stage and felt i was driving okay.

unfortunely the day changed significantly at the 12.21klm mark of stage 1, with the words from the left seat. 'mick im not feeling to good" what followed hit the windscreen and pretty much everything else on the left side of the car and that was the end of the nav for the rest of the event. all poor iggy could manage after that was to sit with his eyes shut and his head downand every time i got to any race speed he got sick.

to his credit he stuck in the car for the whole event but i couldnt drive at any speed without one him getting sick but also not knowing where the road was going or where the cautions were i choose the cruise method.(it should be said that one corner on ss3 in particular on the top ridge which i read as "so over crest" (to a 100m drop) rather than vhr also affected the nerves of driving without notes. and yes i just pulled it up in time! but only just)

so all in all im pretty happy to finnish the event with no car damage and a valuable 100klm competitive under my belt. my times wernt great but that wasnt my mission for this event anyway.

i hope to see you all in narooma and hopefully i will get some notes this time!

[rwinks]

Things are said to happen in threes. That’s bull s#1t.
The morning prep, light check again and the left indicator wasn’t working at all, finally traced the fault to the glass falling of the base of the globe and shorting the circuit, that’s 1.
Then top up the washer bottle and find the water leaking through the electric motor, replaced, that’s 2.
Scruteneering and the car over heats, traced to a faulty thermal switch in the radiator, bypassed, that’s 3.
No wait there’s more. Finish stage 1 and the car dies on the transport, top up the fuel and away she goes again. Drive without an issue to the start of Champagnes. Start the stage and within 500 meters it dies again. While within the stage we re-plumbed the fuel to use the original mechanical fuel pump. We’re running again but we have drawn dirty fuel through the old lines and we suffered fuel starvation problems for the rest of the event. It didn’t effect us too much, it just meant I couldn’t hold the gears for as long and couldn’t drive with the secondaries open on the long up hill runs. Its great to have power to burn.
As for the overall event, it was bloody slippery. I couldn’t come close to Michael South and I was familiar with the roads. It was great to have Nick back in the car apart from when he fell off the notes for 15 minutes after we changes the fuel pump.
The 6 stage format was great, getting home before the family went to bed saved a leave pass.
Thanks to Adrian and all those involved we couldn’t do this without you.

As for ideas for the recycled trophies count this as 1 see attached image, fish tank.


I'm looking for footage so if you know someone who had a video camera out there let me know. I have footage from speccie points 1 and 2 so far.

[TKM]

Had a great rally albeit with a few dramas. Upon reviewing the start list, I figured based on the calibre of the drivers in front, and a few behind, I would be wrapped with a top 10 finish, if I managed top 5 I would be ecstatic.

Started off slow as usual, the many tight turns in Greenhills made difficult with a lack of a hydraulic handbrake. Car was running very hot in the summer heat. Got to the first service and Luke advised me I was running the wrong radiator cap, fortunately he had a spare and fitted that. The difference was noticeable on the next stage, the car running 5 – 10 degrees cooler.

Stage 2 was pretty ordinary, but we managed to scrape in to the top 10 with a 9th fastest. Dave was driving for a finish, so we were kicking his butt, but or next nearest P6 rival, Matt Thompson, already had a minute on us after the first 2 stages.

Stage 3, started to get into the groove, and pushing a little harder. Tristan was having all sorts of dramas on this stage, falling off the notes about 3 times. By the end of the stage I was pretty cranky with him, but when we got back to the service, it turned out that a number of Navs had problems in there and it appears there may have been some stuff ups in the road book. At this point I had to eat humble pie and apologise to Tristan for getting so grumpy with him. As it turned out, we got 6th fastest time and pulled nearly a minute back on Matt.

Stage 4 and we were really hooting along now, Tristan’s calls were spot on and the flowing roads really suiting the Sube and my driving style. Got to the finish of the stage and Wayne Kenny told me we had a pretty good time. Turns out it was 5th fastest and we took just over a minute off Matt. Dave was still driving like an old woman and we hammered him, at this point he started mumbling something about team orders.

In stage 5 we continued were we had left off, however I was left wondering just how faster we could have gone with more power as the little 78Kw Sube was bogging down a bit in 3rd through some of those sweeping uphill RGL and RGR’s, while 2nd gear saw us on the limiter. Drama at the end of the stage though, when we hit the (not in road book) hump just prior the timing marker flat out. The front suspension bottomed out with a very loud bang, and as we pulled up at the stop control they advised us we had coolant leaking from the car. We took it easy back to the service with the temp gauge off the clock by the time we got there. Upon inspection we discovered the impact had split the radiator core. Fortunately we had a spare, and the boys went to work immediately replacing the radiator. Turned in another 5th fastest and another 20 odd seconds off Matt.

Front tyres were well and truly shagged at this point with the edges ripped to shreds. Back ones still had a half reasonable edge so we did a swap and continued to the last stage hoping we hadn’t done anything terminal to the engine from the overheating.

Stage 6. By this point I was absolutely knackered, and worried about the car after it overheated. We backed off a little on this stage and the car felt down of power, particularly up Bullocks paddock road. But we made it to the finish and that’s what counts. Matt pulled back 30 seconds on us, but it wasn’t enough and we scraped into the top 5 and scored a P6 victory, something I wasn’t expecting at all.

The car now needs a heap of work before Narooma. Engine will come out so we can pull off the heads and check them, and do a precautionary head gasket change. Also need to change the gearbox, as we had trouble the whole event trying to get the car back into front wheel drive for the transports, and the top mounts for the rear suspension copped a pounding, so they need replacing. And not to forget getting the radiator repaired so TSS can have their spare back.

Oh and if any of the stage commanders came across a pair of yellow under body mud flaps during their cleaning up, I love to know where, as I discovered them missing when I cleaned the car today.

Thanks heaps to Adrian and his team for putting on the event, particularly all the controlies out there braving the heat. Thanks to Luke, James and the rest of the TSS service crew for getting us back out for the last stage. And last but not least, thanks to Tristan for doing another fine job as my Nav. Two events, and two trophies, not a bad start to his rallying career (and at only 13 too).

Cheers,
Mark

[msgofast]

Well thanks must go to Adrian and team and all to stood out in the bush…err dusty flats all day it was on the barmy side of things
This was my first time to ACT for any rallying, had been told “ruff roads and stay in the middle”…nothing about mowing grass on SS1, or how slippery it was going to be! SS1 and blocked Rad makes for heat limiters that stop engines, SS2, RGR before mound, (I said you sure? That can’t be a road! {Mistake 1 Julia can’t be wrong } after 10 seconds (in car got the lot ) I reversed up and took to the goat track. Somewhere ¾ way in there was a tulip that looks like a 4-5Left on crest, well it was more like a 3 tightens, and for this we went bush, took out a stump, and joined the road 150mts latter

SS3 that water splash? took out the terra trip, and no terra trip for the next 2 stages till the last service we thought we found the problem only for it to die in the middle of the last stage again, had to guess between the two of us to see what was where!

Last stage was fun, but I never went flat over them crests, there were one to many that weren’t too straight on the other side on other stages and always just left you on edge.

It was a very trying and challenging, with a landscape that I have never seen before, the way how roads stick into the hills and tuck back in…pff…give me trees any day

Good event none the less, good to finely run something down that way!

[crowleyaj]

Note to self:

"When reminding driver to eat and drink during event, don't forget to do likewise."

Event report with many a thankyou to follow once mind and body back to full strength. Haven't felt that crook in a long time, rather scary and confusing when it happens........

[Dave Ferris]

We finished and broke a few records in the process

I went to this event to finish at all costs... goal achieved.
I drove too slowly to bother with an event report, but here's some points.

*Finished, (slowly! but finished)
*Did more rally's K's in one event than the whole of 2004.
*Record*the most competitive K's ever (with Lizzy) all done in the 1st stage.
*Record* made it past stage two with Lizzy, we DNF'd stage 1 bay and stage 2 Dell.
*Record* Made it through stage three, this time.
*Record* Actually Finished a rally with Lizzy
*car undamaged and ready for ACT series events.
*F**k it was hot.
*F**k there was a lot of damage for a non series event.
*Lizzy is a good chick to have in the car.

Now to get up to speed and kick old man Kents arse! oh and that other Kent.

Thanks to Luke, Rob, Peter, Stu K (sevice crew) and Lizzy for filling in at the last minute.
also thanks Adrian and co for a great event!.

[Bogan]

NotCap for us was all about giving the car a run, doing some fuel consumption figures, trying out the new rear suspension and the driving suits. Success on all counts, and an 11th (and 1st Silver Cup ) to go with it.

Rocked up to the start and my sunnies broke. Bugger. Oh well. Decided not to do any interviews as it was too hot and the video camera had to leave early to get to 5 ways. Not to worry, maybe Narooma. Sat in the shade for a while and then it was our turn to head off, half an hour exactly behind car 1 and too far from sweep to be still in late time, a first for both of us.

Greenhills was interesting, as per what I've seen on the maps not very many bends in the roads but lots of intersections to turn at. The grass was all pretty much mown by the time we got there, so there was plenty of road to be able to see and drive along. Not much to report other than car running hotter than I'm used to (a little over 200F) and the new back suspension doing OK. A lot stiffer but driveable.

Saw Spac on the way out of the stage and saw Marla when we were on the way to Uriarra .

First service NAFF, it was interesting to hear Frinky say "Get out from under there, you're a driver" .

I never liked the big drops in Champagnes in BitB and it was the same on Saturday, I didn't have much confidence to throw it into corners up the top, but when we got down the bottom I got going pretty good. Saw Julie B at the start of the stage, I wonder what she thinks about Narooma after seeing us take off from the top of that hill ...

We got to SS3 only just in time to book in and when Winksy pulled in behind us we tried to switch in control, and the controllies rightly told us no, so we had to resort to asking rally HQ very nicely. I love East West, and it's almost getting to the point where I know what the calls are before they come, so we did pretty good through there, other than overcooking it into a RGR just before where Jem got bogged in BitB and hitting the first quadruple caution waaaay too hard. Mental note, listen to the CoC when he tells you they're very bad things. The bash plate hit pretty hard but the car was still behaving so we pushed on and got a pretty good time for the stage, only 20 seconds behind Matty T .

Second service again very uneventful.

We headed off to Tidbinbilla and I was excited, I like the roads up that way, lots of hills and crests and stuff, and some almost familiar roads. Car seemed to be struggling for power, I could slide through corners in 2nd but it would bog down when it gripped suddenly instead of gradually finding grip and maintaining speed. The stages were fun, and we hit some pretty high speeds in places, I finally got that concrete causeway area right after slipping off the outside twice in BitB. Only one stage to go, we head back for service 3 and Anna has a headache, and we have an exhaust leak (unrelated).

Service 3 a bolt has fallen out of the flange at the back of the extractors, Alex fixes that up and we're good to go. Wait, what's that bulge in the sidewall of the left front tyre? Bummer. Don't want a flat to spoil our result so we change both front tyres before heading off, God bless Alex's cordless rattle gun, changing two tyres in about two minutes is a lot of fun.

I left it in 4th down Bullock Paddock Rd but we were flat out and the car was a lot more stable than it was at Dell. Held it flat over the second last crest and then it started slowing down up the hill towards the end, must get a tune before Narooma. The back of Padovans is another place I kind of know so it was good to try backing it into a few corners, with litle to moderate success. A few drops of rain (it was Adrian's event after all) fell on the windscreen but nothing like we could have got judging by the storm we saw approaching at the start control of SS6.

11th O/R, 2nd P2 (Damn you Kagan ) and after a wash the next morning the car is pretty much ready to go for Narooma.

Originally Posted by msgofast

pff…give me trees any day

We would love to Michael but God took them all away from us two years ago .

Thanks:

Adrian and the team for having the persistence to run the event. It was well worth the wait.
Anna for doing a tops job all day and again sharing it with me.
Alex for servicing all day and fixing everything, what a champion!
Russ Battisson for all the help with the rear suspension and everything else pre-event, and the wipers pre-scrutineering. You know we love you, I'm just too shy to give you a hug .
Frinky for helping with service, it was nice to have you there.
Gwyn for the piece of colour coded tape. Thanks mate I owe you one.
Spac for polishing the front guard at the last service, we even still managed to finish.
All the other officials for being out there and allowing us to play.
Anyone I forgot.


Less than 4 weeks to Narooma .

T.

[Spac]

Car had been running really badly until the Wednesday before the event, where I got it to run half-way OK (still definitely not right though).
Drove like a fool.
Car started like crap about halfway through SS1.
I backed off for a km or four, then discovered it was running OK again.
Started 'having a go' again.
Burst a radiator hose after a few hundred metres, limped to end of stage.
DNF with dead engine.
Set respectable stage time regardless.

Spent rest of day wondering what could have been, helping salvage Tortfeaser's and Paulie's cars, and wondering where the hell I'm going to find the money to replace the RX-7's engine...

Thanks to everyone who helped make the event run, and to Trevor and Pete for doing the service type things.

Oh, and congrats to Ferret for fulfilling a year old promise to "drive down the middle of the road and get a bloody finish!".

Bog, you'll be pleased to know that I pulled a muscle in my belly doing that - hurts like buggery now...

[MadDog]

We had a good time, the aim of the day was to finish and do lots of big skids

SS1
love greenhills, thanks Spac for letting us know about the very hard to see corner .
Half way through the stage I noticed the temp guage was off the dial, uh oh, I slowed down and drove it out of stage, thanks Spac for your words of encouregement and for the advice o keeping it cool.
We got to service and there was no water left at all, Luke thinks the Radiator cap was not holding, anyway soldier on.

SS2
Hate Champagnes, took it nice and easy making up time where we could. We actually enjoyed this stage alot it was not as scary as it was in the BIB, temperature doing ok, although we had to run the heater in the cabin and generally keep the revs down, only one spin.

SS3
East West is always great, marty and I were sufferring from and heat stress, especially when we went through the water crossing, the humidity inside the cabin must have taken the temperature up to almost 60 deg, time for a roof vent. We had a couple of spins on this stage, tyres had gone off and was getting a bit slipery

SS4
Loved this stage, we drove on some tracks that we have never ventured on before, it was great, had a few overshoots on some turns but generally did ok, we were really hot now and had finished all of our dinking water.

SS5
This is another favorite stage, all we could think about was getting a steak sandwich and a drink. The car started hadling really badly toward the middle of the stage, was really understeering, I didnt worry about it, just drove, turned out that we had a flat front hand right tyre

SS6
Phew last stage, just wanted to finish, at least it was cooling down. Marty and I were both stuffed and wanted some beer badly. Drove like a wus through the stage, lifting on the crests pulling a whopping 120k onlong bullock paddock road. It is very strange driving this stage backwards.

We got to the end with no damage or scratches to the paint and even the little frog on the back survived.

Thanks Bog for the cold beer at the end, I didnt taste it though.

Thanks Marty for navigating.

Thanks to Stu K, Peter V, John Leahy JNR, Mark Flint, Luke and Rob for serviceing. We didnt have to touch the car it was great.

Thanks Adrian and co for a great event.

Cheers


Tim

[jamar]

Yeah well...

Mini Nat Cap was meant to be the rally where I put everything aside and had a real go..

But, as usual I decided to play around with the suspension in the car - Bede was kind enough to lend me a set of rear springs (900lb) to try out..

as usual testing consisted of driving to the first stage .. I made a bad tyre choice which contributed to the car being mega taily - dropped rear tyre pressures a heap to try and get some grip in the rear end

came in to a crest - dip crest - road goes (very slightly) left, the car got light and the back stepped out big time - i consciously corrected and kept the boot in - the car snapped back rather violently & we hit a bank on the drivers side front flat in 3rd gear - which snapped the tie rod adjuster, sheared off one (on pulling it apart - pretty much both) of the castor rod bolts and bent the crap out of the lower control arm.. we rode along the bank for a little while & went very close to tipping over, then came to a halt up against the bank..

Thats about it - game over

Thanks to:

- Marla, Chris, Lyn, Terry, Jess and Ben for servicing / recovery - and wozza for navving all of 3.97 k's

- Adrian and all the officials for making the event happen..

Could have been a lot worse I guess..

Cheers

Jason

[Kagan]

The goal for the day was to learn to drive front wheel drive, and after driving that car I am converted. It is incredible to have the power to accelerate UP hills as well as having rear bias in the breaks (slight upgrade from the corona).

We had a ball, Adam missed maybe two calls all day which was a great effort on his first ever rally outing in any capacity.

The car behaved and we ended up with a very respectable time which both of us were pretty happy about.

Managed to stuff both speccy points which was great (Marty, that was the spin you had been wanting to see all day!!!!!)

All in all both had a great time and decided that night we were running Narooma for sure!!!!!

Thanks to Adrian and all the officals who allowed us to get out and have fun!!!!!

[mattj]

What a good event to watch! i had heaps of fun (apart from the fact that dad and i had absolutley no idea were we were going!)

went to the start to check out all the cars and had a chat to a few guys. russel gave us a few ideas of were to stop and check out the action and he wasnt wrong about being able to see heaps on greenhills that was awesome! traffic didnt really know what was goin on though with a few cars parked on the side of the road watching the cars go by.

after that we tryed (unsuccessfully) finding any spectator instructions so we guts it and went out west and eventually found a finish control which helped us finding the one on east west (thanks guys), and had an awesome view of all the cars coming along and hitting some big dips, were there was a lot of bottoming out goin on! then into a tight turn left which was fun to watch, with some guys doin it awesome and some not as good, all havin a go though which is the main thing.

great event can't wait to get out there amungst it this year!