Off Road Racing

[Treads]

I thought I'd post some stuff about our upcoming attempt at Class honours in the Warialda 200 this coming weekend. It's the 20th anniversary of the race and should be a great event.

My mate Bevan (who is also a fellow Group Captain in the RFS) owns a 1988 Lada Niva that he built as a Class 7 4WD quite a few years ago.

Now to look at a Lada in original form, they are pretty uninspiring:
http://0.tqn.com/d/4wheeldrive/1/0/O/L/1/Alek_Ser_04LadaNiva_2RR.jpg

The car was converted to 2WD a few years, back so it could run in Class 5, and last year Bevan invited the rest of the Brigade to join him at the Warialda event, which started a new era for his team:
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/701.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/702.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/703.jpg

After the Day 1 short course heats we were running 1st in class, with the only problem being a bent panhard rod. We were doing so well, only to break a tie rod on the long course and retire on the second day. The Lada has been sitting forlornly on the trailer since :(

This year we've made a massive effort in readiness for Warialda! The Pit Crew is now made up totally of serving RFS members and the car has a new lease on life thanks to hundreds of hours of work (and LOTS of body filler :angel: ):
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/704.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/705.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/706.jpg

Painting began about two weeks ago:
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/707.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/708.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/709.jpg

Lots of electrical work was done last week to tidy up some issues and this weekend we did a few major mechanical and ancillary jobs to finish it off:
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/710.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2011/06/99.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/711.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/712.jpg

Last night we started applying sponsor decals and tonight we're working on some other minor stuff. First thing tomorrow it's getting the rest of the sponsorship stickers and going to one of the mechanical/electrical sponsors' place for a photo shoot :cool: and so they can help us fix a little temp gauge/sender issue :angel:

More photos to come tomorrow....

Oh, and did I mention that yours truly will be navigating for most of this weekends' race :twisted: :burnrubber: :lol2:

[Pedro_The_Swift]

Looks Great!:cool:

See you there!!!:banana:

[Treads]

Looks Great!:cool:

See you there!!!:banana:

Excellent! I'm towing the car up with the Deefer, so you won't miss us! :D

I think we'll probably get there mid afternoon on Friday

[Pedro_The_Swift]

yep,, us too I hope!

pretty easy day saturday,,
infact both days are,, hmm, not long?:p

[numpty]

Nice work.

It would go even better with a Fiat Twin Cam,;) which was a popular mod a number of years ago, as they are basically 60's/70's Fiat engineering.

[Treads]

Nice work.

It would go even better with a Fiat Twin Cam,;) which was a popular mod a number of years ago, as they are basically 60's/70's Fiat engineering.

There has been some talk in the garage of doing something similar for next year ;)

If we've got time we'll probably enter Dondingalong, Wittitrin & Warialda....

[Treads]

New shocks are in, a couple of new tyres and some more decals. On Wednesday we took it to The Armidale School (one of our sponsors) for their Trades boys to have a look and a fiddle. TAS offers TVET options for students who wish to complete a trade instead of uni after they finish school.

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/558.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/559.jpg

The facilities are brilliant

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/560.jpg

The boys do a lot of fabrication, welding, small motors, etc and enjoyed the opportunity to get hands on with something different

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/561.jpg

We're developing a good relationship with the new centre with the view that any boy with an interest in motor sport can be involved with the team. The centre has also offered technical assistance to the team :clap2:

A coup;e of small jobs needed doing while we were there, and so we utilised the skills of some of the students

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/562.jpg

While they were doing that we got busy applying more sponsor stickers and our car numbers

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/563.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/564.jpg

After a short test drive around the centre we then headed back to the main campus for a few more photos

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/565.jpg

Today shall be a day of rest for the team. Friday morning we get the decals applied for our last 3 sponsors and then head off to Warialda at about midday.

[Ace]

looks good mate, TVET is a good thing, it appears some schools are set up better then others. :cool:

I started teaching Primary Industries, the ag version of TVET and I got no funding at all. In the end it died due to lack of financial support. I'd kill for a set up like that, looks the goods.

matt

[LandyAndy]

Nice work.
Make sure we get to see some pics of it dirty without too many battle scars.
GOODLUCK
Andrew

[Psimpson7]

Good luck guys. The Niva looks awesome!

[Pedro_The_Swift]

A nice pic here of the Lada,,:cool:

and a shot of our 245 hard at work--

Login | Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/album.php?aid=42259&id=123534077661656)

[Treads]

A nice pic here of the Lada,,:cool:

and a shot of our 245 hard at work--

Login | Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/album.php?aid=42259&id=123534077661656)

This is the only one of yours that I have found as yet:
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/279.jpg

I still have another 1000+ photos to go through

What happened to you guys anyway?? :confused:

Edit: found another one of both our cars :)
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/402.jpg

[Ace]

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/279.jpg




Is flying done to minimise the wear and tear on the suspension? :D Sure that would affect traction :D

[Pedro_The_Swift]

It also does bad things to your heart rate!:p:p

[abaddonxi]

It also does bad things to your heart rate!:p:p

Dunno, looks like you blokes are just chatting.

[Pedro_The_Swift]

I dunno what Russells looking at:eek:
theres a dirty big tree not so far ahead he should be concentrating on!:p


as for chatting, I do most of it,
but when he does talk its usually a "oops"
Thankfully not many of them;)

[Treads]

It also does bad things to your heart rate!:p:p

And the rest of your body after two days :(

I'm soooo sore! I nav'd for 3 laps of the short course & 4 laps of the long course on Sunday. My shoulders and neck are killing me :no2: I got out after lap 1 of the second long section and nearly threw up! The Lada is pretty rough :huh:

Our little excursion during prologue was the telling factor of our poor showing over the weekend :( For everyone else's benefit here's the story:

First qualifying lap going flat out over the hill into heart start :burnrubber:
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/252.jpg

Bevan pressed the middle pedal, only for it to go straight to the floor :eek: so he turned left at 80kph
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/253.jpg

Over the first contour and back onto four wheels
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/254.jpg

Only to see a log looming in front of us :o
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/255.jpg

Launch!
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/256.jpg

Landing on two wheels and still doing about 60kph
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/257.jpg

Finally hauled it to a halt with the handbrake and turning it off in gear
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/258.jpg

If we hadn't deviated left we would have done this, only ten feet further on, and endo'd the car :angel:
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/259.jpg

We got out of it with some minor damage that slowed us down for the rest of the weekend. So with a last place qualifying time and the damage we were relegated to running last in every single section afterwards. Not only that; but my driver was pretty shaken and was only doing 9 tenths for the next few heats :p

We found that the loss of brakes was caused by a damaged shock tube cutting a rear brake line :oops2:
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2010/09/260.jpg

On Sunday we retired with a broken control arm, broken trailing arm and a separated driveshaft with 700m to go :Thump: With 199.3km of the 200km race done, it's the furthest the little Lada has ever been in a long course event :banana:

[Pedro_The_Swift]

We did the recon of the long lap,, thats where the clutch failed, with the Hewland you can change gears without a clutch which is the only reason we made it back to the pits.
We both admitted that the long laps would not have been fun--:(

[Treads]

Nice work.

It would go even better with a Fiat Twin Cam,;) which was a popular mod a number of years ago, as they are basically 60's/70's Fiat engineering.

After some looking into our options we'll probably be investigating the installation of a 2.7EFi Hilux engine/gearbox & rear diff + some basic suspension mods ;)

Our main efforts will be going into the class 2 buggy that's 1/3rd complete :) We're hoping to get it done for Wittitrin in March :cool:

[Pedro_The_Swift]

oh joy!
another class 2!:p

well, there is the Toyota twin cam with variable intake cam engine, two different models , look for tappet cover colour,,

or

the mighty Honda Ba16
( or could be 16Ba:angel:)
variable inlet AND exhaust cam timing. No-one else does that and Honda only did it one one model of engine,,

got tenK?(after engine/motec purchase)
I know who to send it to:cool::cool:

where the hell is wittritinin??

[Treads]

Hey Pedro

I just found this:

YouTube - ‪warialda 2010 offroad racing NSW Australia‬‏

Watch the 8:20 mark for your buggy

and 8:53 for the end of our little 'off' in prologue

[Treads]

Work has been progressing for getting the Lada ready for this year's events at Millbrodale & Warialda. We rebuilt the rear diff and made some new high-strength mounts for the trailing arms (the parts that failed after our encounter with the log at Warialda :p ). The trailing arms have also been strengthened and we're looking at removing the original Lada angled shock mounts. We'll replace them with another set of upright jobbies just inboard of the current ones that come up through the floor and attach to the cage, as seen in this pic:

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2011/06/99.jpg

The old motor came out last week:

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2011/06/100.jpg

Followed by the gearbox, transfer case and exhaust system:

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2011/06/101.jpg

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2011/06/102.jpg

A 2.6L EFI Rodeo engine is waiting in a donor vehicle.... :twisted: