Spare Parts 2003 08 OCRS

Transcription

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Constructors Car Club
Archive COpy
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If undelivered please return to:
Constructors Car Club (Inc)
P.O. Box 38573
Wellington Mail Centre
Wellington 6332
The Magazine of the
Constructors Car Club Inc
On the Cover:
303 Willis Street, Wellington - Ph: (04) 801 5140- Fax: (04)
E-mail: [email protected]
Website: http://VWVW.maclennanperfonnance.com
•
•
•
•
Alloy Wheels, Tyres
Full range of Accessories
Spoilers, Bodykits, Seats Etc
Race Suits, Gloves, Boots Etc
•
•
•
•
Servicing. Repairs
Suspension, Exhausts
Brakes, Brake Upgrades
Momo Steering Wheels & Accessories
John Wilson's Blue Car
See page 36
Club Officials
August 2003
Opinions expressed in this
magazine are not
necessarily those of the
(Inc).
Issue 7 Volume 16
In This Issue
Coming Events ............................................ .
Monthly Quiz cars ....................................... .
Dave Clout
Secretary:
Picnic Day at Manfeild ............................... .
Brian Worboys
Club Captain:
Minutes ofJuly Meeting ........................... ...
Steve Strain
Treasurer:
For Sale
Letters received .......................................... ..
Club Meetings
New Members .............................................. .
The Constructors Car Club Inc meets at
Australian Kit is a Real Diva ...................... .
7.30pm on the second Tuesday of each month
at The Vintage Car Club, 3 Halford Place, Building a GT40 .......................................... .
Looking back at August .............................. .
Petone (Eastern end of Jackson Street).
Italy 9
................................................. .
Prospective members or others interested in Ankle Biter's Column ................................. .
building their own cars are welcome to attend.
LVVTA Newsletter ....................................... .
(The club does request a donation of $2
Technical Committee Minutes .................... .
towards running the meeting.) Meetings
"Filling in an otherwise dull weekend" ..... .
generally include a guest speaker or
demonstration followed by general discussion LastLook ................................................. .
Travel Broadens the Mind .......................... .
and supper.
Therapy
................................................. .
The Club Magazine "Spare Parts" is produced Life isfull ofsurprises ................................ .
monthly from February to December each
From the Bridge .......................................... .
year. Contributions and advertisements are
Surgery Intermarque .................................. .
welcomed. Contact the Editor on Phone
"Tip Bits" ................................................. .
(04) 904 3385.
President:
Jon Loar
Club Correspondence to:
The Secretary
Ross Bridson
Phone: (04) 904 3385
e-mail:
POBox 38 573
[email protected] Wellington Mail Centre
Wellington 6332
Editor
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4
9
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12
14
18
19
21
22
24
26
27
28
34
36
37
42
44
Typesetting, graphics
and printing by:
NSServices
Silverstream, Upper Hutt
Ph 8l. Fax: (04) 970-5056
e-mail:[email protected]
Coming Events
Picnic day at Manfeild, Sunday 21 September
Sunday 31 August _ Bruce McLaren organised similar to what Dave organised for
Trust 'Coast to
Coast
Run' the Daimler Car Club, but not quite so early in
the morning, we hope.
Full details were in last months magazine. A good
run for our northern members.
February 2004 - Starship Car Trek
Sunday 21 September - Driver's Training This will be considered as a club event this time.
Day at Manfeild Circuit, Feilding
More details closer to the date.
Next Committee Meeting:
Full details were given in an article in last months
magazine. More information on page 3.
Tues 19 August
Sunday 19 October _ Event _
186 Major Drive
Kelson
(TBC at meeting)
Date to be confirmed. A Dave Bray/Patrick
Harlow special event. A trial run is being
7.30pm
Patrick's Place
Last Month's quiz car
A Suzuki Twin Hybrid - petrol electric, two seater
Dimensions 2.735 m long by 1.475m wide, weight 730 kg,
3.6 m turning circle
Petrol 660 cc 3 cylinder petrol, 32 kW, 16 Lead acid batteries,
3 - 4 litres I 100km
This Month's quiz car
This is a great chance for you and your friends/
family to have fun in your car in a safe
environment. It's very low-key and a good
opportunity to do some fine-tuning on
suspension. I'm hoping my car won't send
showers of sparks from the sump when it goes
down the front straight this time (I've put the
spacers back on the front shocks!).
If you haven't been to Manfeild before, there
is plenty of spectator seating, sheltered areas
to work on cars (and the BBQ), big grassy
areas for kids to run around, and toilets.
We will vary the sessions throughout the day
so you can come and go, or gain confidence
for a faster session later on. Passengers are
allowed in the more controlled sessions so you
can take family members out on the track.
The cost for the whole day is only $55 per
driver (includes lunCh). To help with catering,
please pay in advance. If you have any
questions contact Wendy (also let her know if
you can help out by being a flag marshal, lunch
is included).
Motorbikes (and karts) will be
allowed out during lunch if we
have sufficient marshals. CCC
members and friends only. No
passing on corners, full
protective clothing/helmets
required.
1 to 1.30 pm
Short tutorial session.
1.30 to 2.30pm
More advanced drivers and
speed, passengers only in
approved vehicles, helmets
required, passing on corners
permitted with safety
paramount.
2.30 to 3.30pm
Advanced drivers at higher
speeds, helmets and overalls
required. Passengers only in
approved vehicles, passing
permitted.
3.30 to 4 pm
(All times are approximate but you must attend
the briefing session to be fully aware of the
safety requirements.)
Slower drivers, not exceeding
road speed, passengers for
tutorial permitted, no passing
on corners, helmets not
mandatory.
9 to 10 am
Scrutineering of all vehicles.
10 am
Drivers briefing detailing speed,
passing and general behaviour.
10.15am
Tutorial covering car control,
braking and cornering.
10.45am ish
1st group of vehicles. These
vehicles will be controlled to
approximately road speed,
passengers may be carried. No
passing on corners, no
excessive speed on straights,
helmets and overalls not
mandatory.
Quiz question. IdentifY the vehicle and
guess how fast it was going?
2
12 noon to 1 pm
Lunch
4 to 4.30 pm
Advanced drivers, helmets and
overalls, passengers only in
approved
cars,
passing
permitted.
All aspects of safety will be under the direct
supervision of a Licensed Clerk of Course.
The track will be manned by flag points. The
flag marshals will be briefed and in contact
with the Clerk of Course by radio at all times.
There will be two intervention vehicles and a
St John's Ambulance and crew. No more than
25 vehicles will be permitted on the track at
anyone time. Safety at all times will be top
priority.
3
;;
Meeting Minutes 8 July 2003
President: Jon Loar
Secretary: Dave Clout
Apologies:
David Hanson, Grant Major, Alan Price, Justin
Wright, Matthew Cooley, Richard Kelly.
Visitors:
Howard Simpson - an ex Wellingtonian, has a
6000 square foot building which now houses a
few cars that previously had to live outside,
rebuilt several mini's in the '70's.
]
Periodicals:
Minis of Wellington Owners Group - Mini
Madness, July 2003
NZ Petrolhead - Vol 6, No.6 June 16, 2003
Sports Car Club of NZ - SCCNZ Events Calendar
Edition 24
Outward Correspondence:
Patrick's usual replies to new membership
enquires.
Letter to Ministry of Economic Development Albert Bossward - was a member a few years Annual return of Financial Statement and
ago, been down in Christchurch, but has now Minutes of AGM.
returned (and since rejoined).
Returned Information Update form to Ministry
Les Barrett - ex pat Aucklander, father built the of Economic Development
? first sand buggy (now how would you prove
that in a place like NZ ?), came along with Lesley. Previous Events:
Interested in homebuilt cars.
Saturday 14 June - 15th Anniversary Dinner.
Darryl Cooley gave a brief report. Matthew has
Previous Minutes:
been asked to show the 'movie clips' again at
The minutes for last month are in the current the next club night.
magazine. Taken as read. Accepted. Though the
secretary did point out that he had made a Jon also gave a brief note ofthanks to our dinner
mistake in calling Dennis Rowe - David Nixon- organisers.
I mean, can you remember around 200 members
names and match them to faces?
Coming Events:
Pilkington's Glass (windscreen's) Factory visit,
possibly 18 July (it turned out to be Friday 1
Treasurers Report:
Steve, who was here again, commented that it August) Alan Stott looking at arranging. The
was hard to know what to report. We currently factory is closing on 30 September and can only
have about 190 members. It is business as do daytime visits now, since night production has
usual, advertising is rolling in (thanks to Mr ceased. Interested members to contact Alan,
might only suit retired members or shift workers.
Beazer) with a budget of about $1,500.00.
This is an unusual plant worth seeing.
Inward Correspondence:
Letter - Bruce McLaren Trust, thanking us for
our Car Show donation used for sponsorship of
M8A Steering Rack - could not locate earlier
confirmation of donation. Apology for situation.
Belated thankyou for donation and membership
renewal.
Sunday 20 July - Garage Tour. This date has
been confirmed. Brian Worboys arranging.
Contact Brian if you have an interesting project
you would like to share with other members. 5
garages arranged so far, bring a map.
MotorSport NZ had senius a survey form, most
of which was not applicable to our club.
Sunday 31 August - Bruce McLaren Trust.
"Coast to Coast Run". Full details have been
published in this issue of the magazine. A good
run for northern members.
Plenty of membership renewals, and a few
enquiries.
Sunday 21 September - Driver's Training Day
at Manfeild. This event may be run as a
4
Corporate Day. Booked but we will need to
arrange our own insurance if vehicles without
full roll cages and other conditions such as
fireproof overall's are not met. Wendy is well
organised now and this event will happen.
Saturday or Sunday, date to be announced. A
Patrick Harlow and Dave Bray combined Trial
Run similar to what Dave ran recently for the
Daimler Car Club. Dave may not even be aware
that he has been suggested to help run this and he wasn't but agreed to talk to Patrick. It
looks like it will be a goer.
Mystery Vehicle:
Jon said that he would give the chocolate fish to
Stewart Collins for his observation of the rusting
Honda Shuttle (aren't they all?) amongst the
Ferrari's.
Ron Stroud - Jelly Meat (true, that's what he said,
even with my hearing)
Patrick Harlow - Daewoo Reject (the wit was
really flowing)
Mike Boven - made by Duplo (yep, they kept on
coming. A maker of kids toys apparently)
February 2004 - yes we know it is a long way Lesley Walker - Ibiza or Matiz (typical woman,
out, but there have been murmuring about couldn't make up her mind)
making the Starship Car Trek event one of our
official club events since it will be run about the Dave Bray - Mk II Ap(palling) - get it?
same time we normally have our Tour' type run.
Also next year the Starship event will be based Technical Committee Report:
in Palmerston North. Think about it.
Roy reported, the committee has not had a
meeting in the last month.
Other interesting dates from the Sports Car Club
Technical Questions:
Events Calendar Edition 24:
Tuesday 12 August - Tech Night - GP 7 McLaren
Trust. Maybe Auckland members could get more
details off Walter Wing?
A new member, whose name I don't know, asked
: "How can I redo hubs to get a different stud
pattern if you can't fill and redrill?".
Tuesday 11 November - Tech Night _ Fuel
Injection with Phil Bradshaw, now why does that
name ring a bell?
Tim - make up wheel adaptors or make own
hubs. If you are going from 5 stud to 5 stud but
different PCD, off set and drill the new holes.
At this point Roy mentioned that you should
make sure that the spiggot in the middle of the
Nothing to report other than normal running of wheel rim will be a tight fit, to aid in locating and
the club.
supporting the wheel, rather than relying totally
Jon mentioned that we have been lax with on the studs.
nominating members for the 'Dip Stick' award Note: Since this advice was given the proposed
recently but said that this time he would nominate new rules for wheels have come out and are
Brian Worboys. Why? Well, Dave Frost may suggesting that filling and drilling will be allowed.
have fancy leather upholstery in his Cobra but
Brian is quite happy to use a folded 'Dominion' - Another new member asked - "Can you tech
seems Jon saw Brian place a newspaper on his screw an aluminium floor pan onto steel?"
seat before he came into the meeting to keep
Roy - Yes, but it will pay to glue it on also.
the frost off - now that's true club spirit and lateral
thinking.
Yet another visitor asked - "Who can okay a cut
down (shortened) floor pan if the roof has been
Spare Parts:
removed?"
Ross said that the current magazine speaks for
it's self. We might have more pages soon if the Tim - we can, but it will require stiffening. There
advertising side keeps progressing as it has was more brief discussion about how this could
recently. He is going to introduce a new column be done.
on 'smart idea's'.
Committee Report:
5
Buy, Sell or Swap:
Your chance to speak up at the meeting to buy,
sell or swap items. These are recorded in a
separate article elsewhere in the magazine.
Remember, email, type or neat hand written
details, or use provided forms to the secretary
before, during or after the meeting to have them
included in the next magazine. You can also send
details directly to the editor or publisher. The
secretary does not record details at the meeting
- we don't have time.
MotorSport NZ:
Nothing to report.
General Business:
Jon mentioned about committee deciding to
recognise the extra effort that our certifiers put
in over a normal year. They were starting to show
signs of stress. Members, please remember that
these guys are volunteers who give freely oftheir
own spare time. Don't hassle them if they ask
you to change something to suit the rules of
make them comfortable with signing off your
vehicle. Ultimately they carry the responsibility
of any future questions or problems so they must
feel confidant of any vehicles they are asked to
sign off.
Members please note:
Change of PO Box number and location to :
PO Box 38 573
Wellington 6332
Ken McAdam asked if there were any members
who would be interested in helping as volunteers
at the 4 Wheel Drive Rally to be held in wellington
on 3 january 2004. Contact Ken if you can help
or know of someone.
Shop Steward:
Brian still has plenty of rivets.
Brian said about progress on ordering club
jerseys or jackets - Polo Shirts, Polar Fleece,
etc. The order should have been ready for
tonight's meeting.
Guest Speaker:
Grant Wahrlich a tutor at Weltec. Grant started
by making some comments about questions
6
raised earlier in the meeting. He has re-drilled
wheels in the past for a Fiat Bambina that his
son owns.
working with aluminium, get him via Weltec,
extension 614.
Gluing of panels is fine, but it is better to glue
and spot weld or rivet. The extra support of the
weld or rivet stops the panel rolling up in an
accident. Another trick is to add a drop of araldite
to rivets - stops them rattling later.
Toyota 'WIL' or is it WILL, I have the photo's
from Patrick at work which would tell me, though
I did see another completely different Toyota
WILL advertised recently. Whatever, Patrick
brought tonight's car along as it belongs to a
friend of his. Patrick told what little he knew about
the car including snippets like the owners
daughters were proud that so far they had not
been seen in the car. There are 3 of this model
in the country, it's 1300cc, has ABS braking, and
the lightest gearbox in the world. And yes, it is
as ugly as the pictures make it look.
Grant started his working life as a panel beater
with ?? Blair, now retired, who, like Grant, is also
into aeroplanes. He has also worked with
Graham McRae. He mentioned that he had also
worked for the Reynard race car team.
Although he started as a panel beater he was
seconded into the Poly tech a couple of times,
well 5 times actually.
He now also runs an Aluminum Shaping
business up in Paraparumu. Yes I know I have
dropped the 2nd i from aluminium - that's how
the Yanks spell it and his company is aimed at a
lot of Yanks. This company makes parts for old
aeroplanes.
A few years back an exploratory trip to Australia
to gauge the market for his products there turned
into a 4 year stay.
Somewhere in here he built the special little
Bambina, that he will bring along one day, for
his son. It was built from pictures they saw of a
special built by an English company. The
originals are in fibreglass but theirs is in steel normally it's the other way round. Here Grant
commented that if you are going to chop off the
roof of a vehicle, frame up the inside first.
I stopped taking notes here for awhile.
Their Bambina is weighted about 50/50, or was
it 51/49 (my notes get confusing sometimes),
but Whatever, it is very light. It is still not certified
and was built about 9 years ago. It has never
had a warrant or registration so has only ever
been on private roads.
I stopped taking notes again here as Grant
started talking about working aluminium and it
was too hard to try and record notes of any use
to members.
Guest Vehicle:
Raffle:
Number: 26 Won by: Roger O'Brien, who
received a lovely book on how to build 4
cardboard cars.
Another draw of numbers produced 53, which
was Barry Dawe who got a small model car of
our 10th Anniversary, a convertible Viper. (from
memory)
m[t;~@MagaZ;ne
Classic and Performance Cars
New Zealand's newest car magazine!
72 full colour pages
devoted to grassroots Kiwi motorsport, constructor's cars,
hillclimbs, classic races & rallies, touring,
performance modifications and equipment. ..
On sale every two months in all good bookstores
Annual subscription (six issues) $42 postage incl
TARMAC Magazine RD2 Waihi 2980
email: [email protected]
Ph: 07 863 6909 Fax: 07 863 8289
Grant said that members were welcome to
contact him with any questions regarding
7
For Sale
NISSAN-Ferrari GTO
This car has been modelled on Ferrari GTO's,
and as you'll see from these pic's ours is not
100% but not too far off, the most obvious being
the lack of the 3 nose scoops. Also, detail is
missing on our car, the builder made a beautiful
body but his badges are home~made and the
interior is average.
Gizzmo Electronics Ltd
I04 B L(Ulsf()rd Cres;c¢fit
rllJbo Vehicles Ltd
Avoodah~
Penrose
Auckland
Auckland.
6% Great Sooth Road
Q9;,,828~9699
09;"S2S~6696
Tuning and Performance
Hitecn :r...1Qtorsport
8 King Street
it Crosbie Rood
Fr~Ulktl)fl
If you or any of your members are
interested let us know as my
mother and I agree we would rather
see the car go to an enthusiast. We
are open to any reasonable offer.
We will advertise the car soon,
probably for $20000 o.n.o and see
how it goes.
Anton Kirkbeck
[email protected]
For Sale
Hamilton
Pukekohe
Q7~846~6S46
BI.ackwood .Motors
09..231M~1S4
PAD Racing Ltd
$ Chappie Place
31 Hands Road
1 x 4AGE Engine Red & Black top TVIS EFI complete with
loom and computer.
Hornby
Clulstch\lfch
Middleton
Clulstcrn.lfCh
1 x 4AGE Engine FXGT Fraser sump converted for side
drafts.
03-349-0424
03<,38-6288
The Chequered Flag
WeUingtonMotorcyles
83 Sydney SU'C.et
12 Kettt terrac-e
Petone
Wellington
Wellington
04·939.3636
04·384·4149
TOYOTA Engines
Due to change of plans - Engine sell up, in excellent
condition.
Twin 40 DCOE carburetors, twin o/head cables 4AGE
manifold, unused.
Extractors x 2
Sensible Offers.
F-or furth¢r'i ofon:natiofl e<.m.tact us on 04~5:~J:7-04S4 Qr
e.mallintemational Dynamometers on
sale$l@dynPJIckc(}ffi or VI$itW\vv.i.dyfiap~k.com
Dave Beazer 04 5666 209 021 543 943
[email protected]
For Sale:
1983 Jaguar XJ6 (Black) series III, fuel injected. Good motor (owned by mechanic),
good tyres & general condition, 120,000km approx., damaged nose cone and LH front
guard. Could be repaired or used as donor car.
Offers to Dennis Rowe Ph (04) 801 5890
8
9
LeHers·. Received
RUSSELL
Dear Sir
I hope to get to a meeting one day but in the
meantime if members happen to be on holiday
in our area. (10 minutes by slow vehicle south
of Russell) a game of spot the cock-up can
usually be had in my workshop at about 1700
hrs. Coincidentally about the same time that we
remove the cap from a bottle of home brew.
We can offer a camping site and generally a
bed or two, but it does get a bit busy around
Christmas. The hobby (Allard J2 rough copy) is
drawing towards the theorising stage. I am at
this time stuck for want of information e.g.
Wheelbase - track - any relevant information
really.
]
internationally recognised standards, and 12
years of Low Volume Vehicle inspection to
parallel 'limited production run' standards there
is a wide range of requirements, with just as
many "but, if. .. " clauses.
Best to say though, that if it is road legal there
then one can expect that it will be able to be
'certified' as road legal here. Any vehicle (of
limited production volume) coming into the
country will be obliged to be 'certified'to the local
standards, no matter how well built it is. As
ultimately the standards tend to be practical, e.g.
no particular technical requirement for chassis
but it must be 'fit for purpose', lighting and tyres
to meet recognised international standards (for
the components, but little requirement on their
placement), and suspension not to bind or rub
throughout its travel.
done lots of 1. 18s
John Bennoch
Auckland, E-mail: [email protected]
John,
Many people have driven it and most fall into
the low 25s 24s after only a few laps.
The yellow Sabre is my car.
I do not race at the moment because of a back
It was built as a joint venture by Alex and myself.
problem, but I am thinking very seriously about
making the car road legal. I have included my
It is very much a budget Race car, But is great phone number should you want to get in touch.
fun and very quick for its $4, 000 engine The Ron Robertson
fastest lap time at Manfield was 1. 17 56. It has
Members please note. our new
postal address is:
PO Box38573
Wellington Mall Centre
Wellington 6332
We look forward to seeing an odd visitor.
John Gluyas
Russell, (09) 4038512,027-4982550
ENGLISH Imports
Dear Sir
I make kit cars here in England and I have an
enquiry from a customer in NZ.
New Members
Certainly there are many Lotus 7 type and Cobra
replicas on the roads over here, so I would carry
on with the assumption that what works there
will be pretty good here.
Regards
Grant Major
SABRE Racing
(Note-Our redirection order
runs out on18 August)
The Constructors Car Club warmly welcomes the
follOWing new members...
Simon Wellum:- Ford Laser rally Car Poruria (ph 233-1867)
E-Mail: [email protected]
Simon is the son of member Andrew Wellum. Like his father he is keen on anything automotive
too. Six months ago he purchased the Laser and he hopes to use it for sprints and for next
years Targa.
Dear Sir
Can you point me in the direction or briefly
explain what rules and requirements there are
to put these specials on the road over there.
Any help would be very much appreciated.
Many thanks,
Toni Dwornik, England
Web site www.dwornikengineering.co.uk
mailto:[email protected]
Toni,
I wish I was able to give you a quick rundown on
the relevant regulations that would permit a
scratch built car to be road registered in NZ but if the system was that simple we wouldn't
be where we are today! After 27 years of
legislation observing four major markets (Japan,
Europe, North America and Australia) for
IO
I recently came across the CCC website while
searching the web for info on the Almac Sabre.
I'm keen on building a race version of the Sabre
for track and Targa type events. Having raced a
couple of other open cars on circuits and Targa,
I have a pretty good idea of what I'm after, but
I'd really like to hear from others who have
owned / raced a Sabre. My only knowledge of
the Sabre comes from the Almac website and
the recent article in New Zealand Classic Car.
I've e-mailed Alex McDonald for information, but
as mentioned, would like to hear from Sabre
owners. Do you know anything about the yellow
raCing Sabre on the Almac site, or could you put
me in touch with anyone who has done any
racing in one of these cars?
John Mines:- F2 Sports Racer Wellington (ph 388-2695)
John has been keen on racing for years and having recently purchased a F2 body from Auckland
he is now building a chassis for it.
Larry Price:- LR Roadsters '0 Type' Papakura (ph (09) 298-2774)
The D Type jaguar is Larry's opinion has a timeless shape with its long nose and full fin it is still
something to look at. Larry purchased the kit from LR Roadsters in the UK. It is a replica of the
1955 Le Mans car and comes with a full space frame chassis and GRP body. Mechanicals are
Jaguar.
Gavin Bateman:- Mk 4 and Mk 6 Mallock U2, Hulson Concept, Ibex Wellington (ph 4770880)
Gavin owns Bateman Racecars which partially explains the large number of projects he has on
the go. He is also a good source of there piece wheels.
Thanks for you assistance.
11
-----------------0-----
Australian Kit is aReal Diva
PatrickHarlow
..
Earlier this year my family and I crossed the ditch
and spent some time in Melbourne. I took with
me the addresses of five kit car manufacturers
in or around the Melbourne area. However on
consulting a map on arrival I discovered that
around Melbourne was anything up to a ten-hour
drive and in Melbourne was still a long way.
However on arrival we were directed to a factory
around the back that specialised in automotive
glass. Barnard Sports Cars shared the same
floor space and we knew that we had finally
found the pot of gold in the form of bright yellow
Diva. Alan Barnard introduced himself to us and
was happy for us to talk to him.
The best way to describe it is as a modern version of the
legendary and over copied Lotus 7 with the additional lUxury
items such as space and style. It looked like a cross
between a Dodge prowler and a hot rod. The motor was a
Toyota Lexus va, which was pumping out respectable
power through its catalytic converter and controlled by an
Aussie version of our after market Link computer. Chassis
is tubular space frame with Barnard fabricated front
wishbones. Rear suspension is Holden Commodore. All
other parts were available off the after market shelf including
the Morris 1000 windscreen. I expressed surprise at his
using such an old car for the windscreen and he said that
their were no problems getting hold of parts in Australia as
they have a much older fleet than we have. Japanese
imports effectively wiped most of our classic cars.
--~--
However I did manage sit in the
Diva and I was quite comfortable
with plenty of room for my six foot
frame and not so wide girth. Foot
well had even space for footrest.
Pedals were well placed and the
blue interior was very functional
with gauges in an easily viewed
position. Seats were comfortable.
The car has a lockable boot that
was mostly full of fuel tank but there
was room for a weekend bag or
two.
The car can be ordered in various
stages of manufacture starting at
about $13,200 (Aus) and going up
to a fully completed turnkey model
for about $69,000 (Aus)
Specs:
TYPE: Front, mid-engine, 2 seat
roadster
BODY: Hand laminated fibreglass
Being diplomatic I negotiated with my family how
The Diva is the result of Alan spending every
many I would be able to visit. After in-depth and
spare hour hard at work producing the Diva in
complicated negotiations it was agreed that an
just under a year. His wife used to show his
acceptable number would be one. Cochildren pictures so that they would remember
incidentally it was the closest with only a fortyfive
what daddy looked like. What we had in front of
minute drive. My wife and her mother decided
us was the complete ADR approved car at least
to spend an expensive day shopping in central
in Victoria. It had a few more tests to pass before
Melbourne while the boys and I headed off to
it could be sold in Sydney but Alan was quietly
Barnard Sports Cars. The map book we were
confident that he would get it there. Public
using had it on the next page. Anyway several
response to the car had been good and a second
pages and an hour and a half later we found it.
was already under way. At some stage in the
We had actually driven past it a few times but
future he would like to export them to New
the six lane city roads were a bit much for this
Zealand but he has yet to sort out an agent.
country boy from Wellington. Lack of external
signage (last two drive bys) ensured that we took
the scenic route (wrong road) to get there.
CHASSIS: Fully triangulated space
frame
ENGINE: V6 or va
TRANSMISSION: Auto or manual
REAR AXLE: Commodore LSD
Unfortunately it was raining very heavily while we were
there and there was no possibility of even politely inquiring
about a ride in it. Melbourne had been in a state of drought
for six years and naturally Alan blamed us for breaking it.
Anyway we left the city the next day, so they could not
blame us for the flash floods that occurred then.
FRONT SUSP: Custom upper and
lower A arms, with coil over shocks
REAR SUSP: 5 link trailing arms,
panhard rod, coil over shocks
BRAKES: Commodore discs all
round
LENGTH: 4,445mm
WIDTH: 1,aOOmm
HEIGHT: 1,100mm
WHEELBASE: 2,540mm
WEIGHT: 900 - 1000kg
WHEELS&TYRES: Front: 16x7,
225/50ZR16 - Rear: 16 x 9, 225/
50ZR16
12
13
--- - ---,-
Building a GT40, The Second Time Around. Part 1
By Bob Needham
Back around mid 2000 Ron Mangan contacted
me with a view to having me construct his GT40.
The kit Ron has is a NZ built kit that was, at that
point in time, marketed by Phil Ware of GT40
Replication Ltd. The business has since been
taken over by Dave Harvey.
The kit is based on the 'rWA out of the UK, and
having built a Tornado kit and worked on a GTD
it is in my opinion one of the more complicated
chassis out there. The chassis is constructed
using hollow structural tubing rather than the
seam welded mechanical tubing and as such is
far heavier that is necessary to obtain the
required rigidity.
Some work had already been done on the car,
but after seeing an article in a Performance Car
magazine on both Clyde Thompson's and my
GT40s, Ron expressed an interest in me taking
over the project. I agreed to undertake the work
and Ron said he would be in touch.
About six months went by before Ron contacted
me again and said that he was ready to continue
with the project. As luck would have it I had just
completed another major car build up a week
previous so I had a work slot open in the shop.
I went to overview the project where Ron had it
il. slo:tage arrl m 26h February 2001 the car
was delivered to my shop.
Reprinted from Classic Car
are two small windows. It only became apparent
later on in the project, and only then because I
had my Tornado GT40 in the shop to make the
comparison, that there was a serious
modification to the rear bodywork which
It was established very early that Ron was not compounded this problem and added to several
prepared to sacrifice quality for price; although others. The rear bodywork had been shortened
it became equally clear later on in the project up by approximately 4Smm in the area where it
that the two are not mutually exclusive. The first closes down on the centre spider (centre
point to be addressed was the positioning of the bodywork.) Given the short wheel base of the
engine and transaxle unit in the chassis. The GT40 and the fact that the engine intrudes into
way the chassis had been built the engine and the driver's compartment the last thing that is
transaxle sat in it sloping forward so as to clear needed is a reduction in the rear bodywork
the distributor under a chassis member on the length. This means that on this kit the engine
rear bulkhead. Ron wanted the engine to be level intrudes an additional amount into the driver's
in the chassis as per the original GT40s. In order compartment.
to achieve this the engine and transaxle mounts
had to be relocated and a chassis member that I had discussions with Bryan Ireland of AC
interfered with the distributor had to be modified Fibreglass, who had already built one of these
to enable it to clear. The end result is that instead kits, as to other problems in the build. He
of a single window in the rear bulkhead there highlighted the points that the lower rear radius
14
rods had been moved up by SOmm in order to clear
chassis members and that the top seat belt mounts
as installed were in the wrong location for certification.
It seems that suspension points had been changed
to alleviate interferences without due regard to
suspension geometry. By now my suspicions were
really aroused and after checking the bump steer at
both ends of the car I took the time to layout the
suspensions on paper. I found, by careful
measurement, that the front roll centre was 67mm
above the ground level and the rear one was 2Smm
below ground level. Given that the GT40 is a midengined car the roll centres went against all logic.
While this was going on I
was
keeping
Ron
informed as he was the
one who would be paying
for any corrections that
were to be made. True to
form Ron was more
interested in having the
job done right than trying
to gloss around the
problems.
raised the inner
mounting pOints for the
lower rear a-arms up by
4Smm and moved them in
by 3mm to maintain the
track width. This required
quite a lot of work as the The skinning of the forward chass. There are two access panels
boss on the a-arms
in each wheel well area on each side and all the panels on the
interfered with the inboard
top surface where the master cylinders are located are
ends of the shock towers
removeable
which had to be cut away
and curved sections welded in to clear the arms. and finally the nut holding it all together. In order
However, it resulted in the roll centre at the rear to adjust the toe-in without changing the wheel
of the car being raised up to 76mm above the base (i.e. without resorting to using the radius
rods to crank the leading edge of the upright
ground at a static ride height of 12Smm.
forward) you have to remove the through bolt to
At the same time that this work was going on it screw the rod ends in or out. If it sounds like a
was decided to rework the rear suspension to mission, believe me it is! The fix was to bore
make it more readily adjustable. As supplied, out the thread in the rear rod end mounting point
the rear reversed lower a-arms have two rod and fit a barrel nut that allows the easy
ends in their outboard ends and a long bolt adjustment of the rod end when it is in place.
having a clevis on one end to which the rod end
forthe lower radius rod attaches passes through Similarly, to change the camber on the rear
the lower shock mount through a spacer through wheels the bolt, having a clevis for the top radius
the first a-arm rod end, through another spacer, rod, had to be removed to allow the outboard
through the rear upright, through another spacer, rod end holding the top link to the upright to be
through the second rod end, then another spacer screwed in or out. The inboard end of the link
15
had a welded on boss with a resilient bushing in
it. The inboard ends of the radius rods were
supplied with bosses equipped with resilient
bushes and threaded shafts welded on to them.
Because of the changes to the chassis mounts
for the radius rods the room available for these
radius rod threaded bosses was restricted and
they were replaced with rod ends. This allowed
two of the threaded bosses to be used on the
inboard ends of the new top links. Replacement
top links were made up having a right hand
thread on the inboard end and a left hand thread
on the outboard end. The inboard end of the
link now has the boss complete with threaded
shaft and resilient bushing while the outboard
end has a left handed male rod end. Toe-in and
camber adjustments are now both rapid and
easy.
Try as I might I could not get the rear bump steer
better than 1.4mm toe-in on full bounce (76mm
of wheel movement up) and 4.3mm toe-in on
full droop (76mm of wheel movement down). I
put this down to the fact that the radius rods are
nearly parallel to the centreline of the chassis.
On my GT40 (the Tornado kit) I got the toe-in,
toe-out situation at the back considerably better
in so much that the wheels toe-out slightly in
droop and toe-in slightly in bounce thus steering
the car's backend into the corner. This is a result
of having the inboard end of the top radius rod
very nearly in line with inboard end of the top
link and similarly for the inboard end of the
bottom radius rod and inboard end of the a-arm.
I have never checked the bump steer on the
GTD40 but since it has a similar set up with the
radius rods as this kit I can only assume that it
will have similar problems.
chassis but it was the best I could achieve under
the circumstances. On the Tornado I got the front
bump steer to within 0.25mm total but only after
having to adjust the outboard steering arm rod
end up by 25mm. It is interesting to note that on
obtaining my GT40 kit I joined the GT40 Replica
Owners Club in the UK. In all of the articles that
were published in their magazine during the 12
or so years that I was a member of the club not
one made reference to bump steer in their GT40
kits. I can only conclude from this that not many
builders consider it important or that they just
assume that the kit supplier has taken care of it.
When setting up the rear suspension it became
obvious that two of the radius rods were too long
and would require shortening. The rods are
made from aluminium pipe with swagged ends
that are tapped. Fortunately for once the problem
was quickly solved as Kerry Jones of sprint car
fame has the equipment to do the changes and
his shop is in Waiuku just 22 kilometres down
the road.
Another sore point with the suspension is the
front a-arm mounting points. The difference in
the width between the chassis mounting
brackets and the distance between the a-arm
mounting bosses is such that packing washers
of varying thickness are required between
bosses and the mounting lugs on the chassis.
Given that there are four a-arms having two
bosses per a-arm then you are likely to end up
with 16 washers each one of a different
thickness! I chose to make the washers out of
polypropylene, which at least made it easier to
part them off in the lathe.
The car came to me with a top hung set of
Wildwood pedals and master cylinders mounted
After considerable experimentation with the front
in the chassis. On checking the positioning of
suspension I found that the best I could achieve
the pedals it was found that they were mounted
in the way of bump steer was 0.25mm toe-out
in the chassis in such a way that the pedals came
on full bounce (76mm) and 5.3mm on full droop
in contact with the rack before full travel. This
(76mm). In droop it jumped from 2.5mm after
was made even worse by the fact that the car
50mm of droop to the 5.3mm at 76mm and this
has fibreglass liners that go inside on each side
was after having to lengthen the rack by 60.6mm.
of the centre tunnel and the foot well end of them
It was not practical to raise or lower the rack, as
is even further back towards the pedals than
given that it is an HQ Holden rack its method of
the rack. This required that the existing mounting
mounting does not lend itself to repositioning
lugs for the pedal assembly be removed and
without fairly major structural changes to the
relocated.
mounting points. I must say that I was not too
happy about the amount of bump steer on this Knowing that one of the key points Ron was
16
concerned with was the skinning of the chassis very little room to fit the bonnet catches etc. I
I started to figure out the best way to achieve it. didn't remember it being like that on my car so I
He had been impressed with the skinning on checked it out and sure enough the filler caps
my chassis and had mentioned that it was one on this kit are 125mm further apart than on the
of the reasons that he had given me the project Tornado. (So far I haven't had a chance to
in the first place. The problem with this chassis compare the spacing with a GTD.) Good bad or
was that no thought had been given as to how indifferent the increased spacing does make a
to skin the chassis. Mainly, I suppose, because big difference when it comes to fitting up the
supplied along with the components were body and catches. Since one of the drawbacks
various fibreglass skins intended to be attached to the GT40 is the limited access in the foot well
to the chassis rather than aluminium skins. Quite and dashboard areas as well as the front of the
frankly I couldn't think of a better way to engine compartment I decided to make as many
downgrade the entire car than to use these skins. panels removable as I could when skinning the
The various cross members and alike that made car.
up the top part of the front chassis were all on
different planes so there was no way you could
attach a sheet of aluminium flat onto the chassis
as it was. I decided that the easiest way out was
to reframe the area using light walled tubing so
that, as much as possible, the surfaces were
flat.
While doing this work I found that the fuel filler
caps on either side at the front were very close
to the outside edges of the chassis and hence
the bodywork. So close were they that there was
Bob's extremly well put together
Tornado GT40
SAKER CARS
Saker Sprint
Saker SVI
BV TURNBULL ENGINEERING
P.O. Box 9, Bunnvthorpe, Manawatu, New Zealand
Phone/Fax: 06 329 2923
web site: http://www.sakercars.com
e-mail: [email protected]
17
~
______l_oo_k_ing__
Ba_c_k_at_A_ug_u_st_S_pa_re_P_a_ri_S______
15 Years Ago. 1988
Roy Hoare President
Patrick Harlow Secretary
Well, from the first meeting of fellow idiots to an
active club has only taken six months and I am
sure most of use sleep better knowing that there
are other fellows out there who also believe they
can build better - faster - smaller - prettier lower or cheaper cars than you can buy. I'll bet
it will also be uncomfortable and bloody draughty
too.
The display that we had for TELETHON showed
the amount of public interest there is in out type
of vehicles and we need to promote publicity to
the hilt. Special thanks to Colin Hainsworth
organising this display at such short notice and
also many thanks to those that brought their cars
over. We raised $60.00 for Telethon.
For those who could not make it, you missed
out on an excellent night out. The electric radio
controlled cars are a lot of fun to race. Our club
captain, Colin Young, had it all organised and it
was good to see wives and girlfriends present.
Roy Hoare
Presidents report
10 Years Ago. 1993
George Ulyate President
Grant Johnstone Secretary
Dear Patrick
You will remember that late last year your
members took a number of teenagers from
Canteen to Southwards Car Museum and back
again to Wellington. As a parent of one of these
teenagers I had earlier meant to write to you to
thank you for this day but would like to do so
now.
18
~I
We have a framed, an enlarged photo of Tim
sitting behind the wheel of a black Cobra,
wearing his leather WW1 flying helmet and a
huge beaming smile from ear to ear. A portrait
of pure enjoyment.
This photo is very important to us, as is also the
memory that Tim had a wonderful day at your
club. You see, Leukaemia claimed Tim's life in
February of this year after three years of fighting
it with radiation and chemotherapy. So I just
wanted your members to know how very
important it was to a 17 year old for that
wonderful day out that they were able to give
Tim and his other friends at Canteen.
Yours ever gratefully,
Sam Cranfield
5 Years Ago. 1998
Grant Major President
Patrick Harlow Secretary
Trivia progresseth. Have fitted clutch and throttle
cables, petrol tank, found and fitted the four
missing balljoints and completed much of the
wiring. Used the original motorbike harness with
the addition of a metre to each wire. Next week
I expect to fit the third and hopefully final set of
front springs. I greatly appreciate the time, effort
and patience of Kevin (Jaguar Springs) to
provide the satisfaction whilst putting up with my
ignorance. Designing and manufacturing and
redesigning and remanufacturing bits and pieces
and the like uses up an awful lot of time. A kit
project must be a lot easier and much less
frustrating.
Tri-Via
John Bell
~1
G_ron_tM~~~or~
lt_al_V_9__________
_______________
chandeliers. The weather was fine and hot, but
we escaped some of it in the city museum and
the Gugenhiem (Museum of modern art). This
was the former residence of Peggy Guggenhiem
in Venice, a single storey residence of mixed
age, with a large central courtyard, sandwiched
Paola, my Italian penpal, was looking after me, between two canals, where the main entrance
and I was staying at Hayley's flat where I got is off a narrow pedestrian walkway by the smaller
introduced to many other Italian speakers of the two canals.
including the flatmate Melanie. Dinner when
Hayley returned (she'd been away, and left me
the use of her place in her absence) was 10 or
so people. Most had a mix of some English or
German, but Italian dominated - and I had no
option but to practice. I must admit it seems to
flow better after a couple of red wines though.
I really want to speed up the pace of this narrative
in some ways because all the interesting car
stuff happened once I left northern Italy. So lets
quickly knock off the next week which was spent
in Trento, not far from Riva del Garda.
Hayley arrived home on Monday evening after
a month in China teaching English to Chinese
schoolchildren. The place she was in was in
Palazzo Venier the home ofthe
the middle of China where western Culture has
Guggenhiem
(behind the gondilier)
not penetrated, and people were stopping to
stare at the tall woman (she's about 5'4") with The modern art was rather more interesting than
funny pale skin and auburn hair. She saw a the other recent museum visits, and parts of the
naturopath while she was there that, and he did house were still as they would have been when
a diagnosis by feeling the pulse in both wrists at it was a home, with couches and sideboards.
the same time (and with no other aid) he Pictures in each room showed how the same
promptly diagnosed a cure for her freckles... :- artworks had been present in those rooms when
)
Peggy lived there.
Wednesday Paola and I travelled to Venice for
the day. The main train line from Trento runs
down the river valley to the south and to Verona,
but there is a second branch line that heads
south-east through the mountainous countryside
and more or less directly to the sea and Venice,
so it was an easy trip of around three hours or
so. We left shortly after eight and arrived before
lunch, direct to the terminus, the Venice train
station at the end of the causeway, actually on
the island, there in the middle of Venice.
Venice was everything that I had remembered,
buzzing with tourists, full of little shops selling
gelati, costume masks (like for a masked ball),
and Murano glass - coloured glass cups,
glasses, bows, jewellery, ornaments and
Abstract Speed + Sound by Giacomo
Balla, another in the Peggy Guggenhiem
collection
19
!
I
I
Sea=Dancer by
Gino Serverini,
one ofthe many
futurist works
in the Peggy
Guggenhiem
collection in
Venice
Detail of the
canal frontage
of the museum
I'm sorry to say though that I really haven't found
that much that is stunningly different that I want
to bring back to NZ, so I've bought very little.
The best thing (after the people) has got to be
the food, but I can't see how I an bring back a
gelato!
In northern Italy and the scenery is like that of
'the alps' (as we might imagine it) with little
houses on the steep hills clustered together in
tight little villages. I should mention the couple
of walks in the mountains, with Trento being on
the edge of the Dolomites. There always seems
to be lake involved too - there are lakes
everywhere, go up to the top of a mountain but
be careful when you step over the ridge because
there is probably a lake lurking on the other side.
And then there were the 'piramidi', where the
Italian 'pyramids' is better translated as
'pinnacles' in English. This soft sandy hillside is
eroding rapidly in the rain, with the occasional
rock proving resistant, and sheltering a column
of sandy earth below it while all around it erodes
away.
Travelling on the four-lane main road north from
Trento leads you to the German border
(eventually), and this is a toll road along several
sections, populated as usual with truck stops
and cafes just like the rest of the world. At the
toll booths you can stop and pay your way, or
20
for the sophisticated frequently local traveller
you have a small electronic device like a pager
that you 'buy credits' for from time to time, and
it communicates by radio with the toll booth as
you pass through, deducting the appropriate
credit from your current balance.
On one day we head to the Dolomites, to an
area that has ski chalets and chairlifts, but they
are sitting in the middle of grassy hillside here
in the middle of summer. We walk into the hills
some mile or two, along with many other people
out for the day, to a small settlement where a
Mexican (yes Mexican!) band is playing a free
open-air concert that day. As they play they
wander as a group around the valley floor, the
crowd of spectators a moving ring surrounding
them.
But however alpine in appearance the lifestyle
is like nonetheless city-like, with the prime form
of entertainment being "where shall we eat
tonight", people getting together in groups at a
restaurant or at somebody's house.
Everybody seemed to be able to dredge up more
friends to introduce me to that spoke only Italian
- "No sorry they don't speak English, Grant, but
you want to practice your Italian don't you?". I
think I met, on a social basis, about 30 people
in the week in Trento. My Italian took a serious
hammering trying to answer the "how long are
you here for", "where have you been", and
"what's NZ like" questions. But the upshot was
that my Italian improved in leaps and bounds.
Yep, it's went from 'non-existent' to 'shockingly
bad'!!
Next stop - Geneva.
Venice - yes it really does look lie that, and
the water and sky were the deepest blue
The Ankle Biter's Column
Hello honey I'm home, well not quite, but another
column from me after a brief break. I'll start with
the good oil, or in this case the sad story of a
good oil gone bad. Until recently I have been able
to buy Castrol products at a very good price
through a friend of mine who aided by the
purchases of the local petrol head youths who lived
in his neighbourhood was able to maintain an
account with Castrol. Not any longer. Seems BP,
that great big petroleum giant has purchased
Castro I. Suddenly my friend's purchases were not
enough to keep the account going. Okay that's
business but also their loss. I will now be switching
to Shell products as I have been told of a place in
Gracefield that sells Shell products, amongst
other things, at reasonable prices. It really annoys
me when big business buys out the small but
superior opposition. The rot set in with the closure
of the Seaview depot a few years back and having
to order from that place up north called Auckland.
Not to worry, life goes on.
Local members will have noticed that the Vintage
Car Club have finally started on the renovations
to their club rooms. For the next couple of months
we will be inconvenienced somewhat but it will
be worth it for the end result, I promise. We will
not be able to bring a vehicle in during the
construction period but after the changes it will
be easy to roll up the new roller door and wheel
them in. The kitchen is in for major changes as
well.
Members of more than a year will know of one of
my pet hates - the misspelling of the name of the
race circuit up at Feilding. Some will recall that I
said I had read or seen somewhere why it was
spelt with the E before the I. Due to the
renovations happening at the VCC club rooms I
recently cleared out our cupboards and took all
the contents home to store temporarily. Flicking
through Issue 4 of Tarmac magazine for August!
September 2002 page 8 revealed a photograph
of the signboard near the entrance to the Manfeild
circuit. This sign is still standing, although it dates
back to an earlier era. Under the main name,
Manfeild Autocourse, is Manawatu - Feilding. So
there you have it, the source of the circuits name.
Simple isn't it. Now we will all remember won't
we.
What started out recently as a simple bleed of
the front brakes on my Leitch Super Sprint has
turned into a total strip down of the front steering
and suspension. While the wheels were off I
noticed there was some rust on various
components and since I will be selling it soon to
help finance my next project I thought now would
be a good time to tidy it up. Can't have people
thinking we Constructors would sell a dodgy
product. This has meant that the design of the
kart trailer has taken a back seat once again.
Luckily a friend has offered to lend me his trailer
to get the kart to the track if needed. I haven't
raced the outdoor kart for 3 months now so I am
hoping for fine weather this month.
No new news on when my next project will be
arriving. The designer has informed me that the
Holden VRNS IRS has been ditched in favour of
the tried and trusty Jaguar XJ6 IRS. It also
transpired that the chassis wasn't stiff enough for
the strict Australian market and that has had
changes proposed for it also. Not to worry, the
weather is improving and the little motorbike hasn't
had a proper outing for a few weeks now so guess
it will just have to be karts and bikes for a wee
while yet.
I really enjoyed the recent garage run. Some very
interesting vehicles are under construction. Also
discovered that Lotus Elan's are a dime a dozen.
No doubt someone else will write a summary of
the run.
Off on a completely different tack. I recently
purchased, on impulse, a new Optical 3D mouse
for my computer. These have no roller ball but
use a LED in the base somehow and are fantastic
to use. It is the best $28.00 I have spent for ages.
I usually get a sore wrist in minutes using a normal
mouse but this one is great. Don't believe me, try
one, you'll love it. The other feature, a wheel scroll
sure beats mucking around with the scroll bars in
documents and spread sheets as well.
Until next month, or whenever, keep on designing
and constructing ....
Cheers,
The Ankle Biter.
21
Slightly abridged version of the July 2003 LVVTA
Newsletter to all Member Associations
editing by Grant Major
Transition from
Manurewa office
Glenn
to
since mid last year to ensure as smooth an
introduction as possible.
Obviously, this has been the key issue for LWTA
over the past few months, ensuring that the low
volume system continued to tick along with
minimal trauma as Glenn stepped away from the
running of the association. This has all gone
remarkably smoothly ...
We have conducted two rounds of nation-wide
LW training sessions on the subject of the PRS
(November 02 & April 03), had several meetings
with LTSA and effected many major changes in
the PRS as a result. This has meant for LWTA
the development of quite a lot of new
documentation for the LW certifiers, an additional
mail-out to the LW certifiers, plus a lot of on-site
and telephone support to nervous or unprepared
LW certifiers. LTSA have been very co-operative
and helpful throughout this, even to the extent of
requiring all of the LTSA reviewers involved in low
volume coming to Auckland for two days of
training in low volume issues by us.
Glenn is remaining on in a (significantly reduced
time-wise) support role on an 'as and when
needed' basis, so we will continue to reap the
benefit of his calm wisdom for some time yet.
Technical officer vacancy
Over the past three months, we have been
advertising for a new technical officer; effectively
someone to come in and work in a salaried
position for LWTA, to operate as an understudy
to me (Tony Johnson), build up knowledge of the
low volume system, and ultimately be able to
continue the running of the organization if the need
arises. This began with situations vacant
advertisements in 'Petrolhead magazine', but due
to a lack of response, the net was cast much wider
throughout many other automotive publications
and newspapers, and we now have around 25
applications narrowed down to 6 possible
candidates, with the first round of interviews taking
place next week.
Performance Review System
The other big issue that has been taking place
and taking up time during the first half of this year
has been the preparation for, and commencement
of, application of LTSA's 'performance review
system' (PRS). The potential consequences of
this transition going badly is monumental; the last
time such a change occurred was when Motorsafe
took over the LW quality management system
operations, which resulted in our system losing
around 40 very good certifiers. Clearly we couldn't
afford similar losses, so this has been a top priority
for LWTA to work with LTSA and the certifiers
22
under such time-frames that it was littered with
errors and problems, not the least of which being
the modification threshold items supplied by
LWTA for inclusion within each relevant section.
The VIRM has over the past two months
undergone a rewrite, and is to be re-issued to the
WoF community any day. During this process,
we kept in close contact with LTSA, ensuring that
this time our threshold items were incorporated
correctly. This relatively simple job become quite
a large and on-going one, as yet more people
within LTSA wanted to amend and modify the
document that we thought had been seen and
agreed by everyone within LTSA that mattered.
This modification threshold issue is a very
important one, as it defines the start-point for LW
certification, which we've never really had before.
We've been working on this for around two years
now, so it will be a relief to see it finalized and in
place.
Motorcycle representation and certification
Exhaust noise issue
No doubt you've all heard or read about this.
Again, a lot of time has gone into making
submissions on this subject back to LTSA,
researching and testing noise levels to give us a
better understanding of the whole issue, attending
industry meetings, writing articles to enable the
media to keep their readership informed on the
situation, and working with the exhaust industry
to try and push LTSA toward improving the
situation that existed as a result of the initial LTSA
Information Sheet that initially caused the chaos.
This has all got some way to go yet, but the
situation for Joe Average with his sports exhaust
fitted to his 5 litre Commodore seems to have
improved. Long-term, LWTA will have to develop
a noise emission standard, but the biggest battle
will be to ensure this only has to be applied to the
scratch-built and engine-swapped vehicles that
would have be to certified anyway, and not every
Joe Average Commodore with a sports exhaust.
Vehicle Inspection Requirements
Manual rewrite
The LTSA Vehicle Inspection Requirements
Manual (VIRM) issued last August was done
With the introduction of the LT Compliance Rule
35001 in 1999, motorcycles that are modified or
scratch-built are now subject to LW certification.
To enable their needs to be met, we've started
discussions with various motorcycling enthusiast
groups to try to get them co-coordinating
themselves into one national body that could
represent the interests of all modified or scratchbuilt motorcycle enthusiasts, to look at assisting
us with completing a code of practice we wrote
some years back, establishing a network of
specialized LVV motorcycle certifiers, and
possibly be represented at the LWTA Council.
improving this part of the system is to try and limit
the number of LW certifiers geographically, where
necessary. We're concerned that an additional
certifier being appointed in, say, Auckland where
15 exist already (and are struggling for work) is
detrimental to the system. We've formally pushed
this line of thought asking LTSA to enact a clause
within the LT Compliance Rule that allows the
director to "take into account the number of
certifiers already appointed and available in the
relevant geographical region".
Also under the certifier appointment heading,
we've also been pushing LTSA into ensuring that
any new certifier undergoes training between
becoming appointed and going into action.
LW Standards
The price for progress in the areas above is,
unfortunately, a lack of anticipated progress in the
area of LW Standards. Frustratingly, the Wheel
& Tyre Standard, the Seat & Seat Anchorage
Standard, and the Disability Adaptive Control
Standard, are not, as they should have been by
now, finalized to a point where they have been
approved and circulated. These, together with
an Emission Standard, will go back to becoming
the priority from July on.
LW Plate Volumes
LW Compliance Plate numbers have continued
a steady upward trend during 2003, increasing
from a monthly average during 2002 of 485, to a
monthly average during the first half of 2003 of
541.
New LW certifier appointments
Next LWTA Council Meeting
With the problems previously and currently
experienced by having sub-standard LVV
certifiers in the system, we've worked hard with
LTSA over the last couple of years to establish a
very tight screening and test process, which is
now in place and working very well. This pretty
much ensures that someone who lacks the
necessary experience, expertise, and skill to be
a LW certifier, will not become appointed. LWTA
is heavily involved in this screening and testing
process.
Now that Neil Fraser (the LWTA President) has
finished swanning around the world over the last
few months while the rest of us have been
working, we are able to set a date for the next
LWTA Council meeting of Thursday 14th August.
(Remember, if the CCC has issues to be raised
or presented at the LWTA, our representative on
the LWTA Council is Grant Major, and those
issues should be presented at the next club
meeting or to Grant so that he can take them to
this next LWTA Council meeting)
From LWTA's point of view, the next step toward
23
CCC Technical Committee Meeting - Tuesday 29 July 2003
Grant Major
Present: Alan Price, Tim Hutchinson, Dave
Clout, Mike Mcready, Phil Derby, Roy Hoare,
Kevin Richards, Brian Worboys, Rob West, Ken
McAdam, Grant Major
This led to a reconfirmation of the club's
intentions and expectations in respect of the
LW system.
The meeting was asked to consider whether
Apologies: Mike Boven, Anthony Moult, Roger we should retain three 'officially recognised' LW
Certifiers. The conclusion was that, yes, we
O'Brien
should.
Previous minutes: the minutes were taken as
The meeting was asked to consider whether,
read.
in the bigger picture, we needed to be
Draft standards: The 'Fuel Systems' section of performing the commercial role of LVV
the NZHRA Build Manual (the 'Hobbycar Certification internally within the club when we
Manual') was tabled in final draft revision for could be directing club members to other LW
comment and feedback to the authors. Certifiers in commercial practice. The meeting
Discussion on this document read through the concluded that this remained part of the
draft point by point making comments as strength of the club, with the added advantage
appropriate, taking around an hour of the that the club members vehicle had greater
meeting time. There were no major points of continuity of support throughout its construction
contention, and it was noted that some of the with our club system - and this would be lost to
earlier feedback had been adopted in revised some extent by relinquishing the internal
wording that suits our interests.
completion of certification.
General business: the meeting paused for The meeting was asked to consider who might
general business from the attendees. Roy be moved into this role once Alan vacated the
Hoare sought to confirm the recognised position. The suggestions included Mike
standards for replacement steering wheels. It Mcready, Ken McAdam and asking Andy
was noted that there is no (apparent) obligatory Osborne. Ken and Andy have the advantage
standard, but many of the aftermarket items are of being LW Certifiers already, however Ken
marked with the European standards does not yet have the 'scratchbuilt' category
compliance markings E2 or E4. The use of a authority, and Andy is not currently on the
replacement or aftermarket steering wheel is Technical Committee. Mike has the advantage
not and LVV issue, other than any general of being involved in the system through his
provision of the Interior Impact standard that employment at a testing station, but would need
are affected by this modification, nor is it a WOF to be recognised and appointed as an LVV
item (unless the original steering wheel Certifier.
incorporated an airbag.
The meeting also noted the need to be fair and
Draft standards: The final revision of the LW reasonable about the apportionment of LW
Wheel & Tyre Standard was tabled for review. Certifier fees (audit fees, documentation etc)
The meeting read through the documentation especially if the club was to appoint someone
point-by-point making comments as who was already operating on a commercial
appropriate. The feedback will be passed to basis. There would need to be a balance such
LWTA by G Major.
that the club was not taking advantage of the
Scrutineering review: G Major noted that A individual and their having already committed
Price has indicated a desire to relinquish the to the various expenses of the system, versus
role (and official recognition as) LW Certifier. the recognition that the club should not end up
24
paying the full expense of someon~ that. was not been frequently used.
using the appointment for commercial gain as
The meeting noted the need for stability and
well (but not forgetting that they would be
foregoing their normal commercial income long-time commitment from the appointed LW
when acting within the club as part of a Certifier(s), given the difficulty and expense of
apPointing and maintaining people in these
scrutineering team).
positions.
There was discussion of the workload on
certifiers, as one of them is typically involved The meeting considered the possibility that the
club could benefit from having four certifiers
with every scrutineering check the club
performs. This was seen to be appropriate and rather than three - and it was agreed that this
good practice as the Certifier would need to would be ideal, if there was the ability to support
personally sign off the vehicle at the end, so the expense, and to find the candidates for
these positions, and if there were sufficient
they should be confident of every detail.
projects being completed by the club members
However there is still the opportunity for the
each year (so that there is sufficient practice
Certifier to (when they feel comfortable about
and experience being obtained through the club
it) delegate a scrutineering check to a team of
activities).
three other technical committee members,
knowing that the Certifier will be able to trust Kevin Richards volunteered the use of his
the team and to confirm that all is satisfactory premises for certification checks if needed on a subsequent visit.
gratefully acknowledged.
There was some discussion of the travel
expenses involved with the scrutineering
process and it was reconfirmed that the
accepted rule was that a kilometre rate was
available to be applied for travel beyond Brown
Owl or Pukerua Bay. The kilometre rate would
be based on those published by AA or IRD. This
additional reimbursement would be paid to each
scrutineer making their own way to the
scrutineering check, and it is payable (in
advance, along with the scrutineering fee) by
the builder. It was noted that G Major normally
levies and records the payment of fees and
reimbursements, and as a matter of practice
the ability to invoke this additional charge has
The use of the clubs services by transient
members was discussed, where they might be
using the club as a low cost method of
certification. Ultimately it was concluded that it
was difficult to categorise people's motivations
and their likely contribution to the club, so the
current system that has one set of rules for
everybody is satisfactory.
The meeting then reviewing (quickly) the
recently completed and outstanding
scrutineering checks. Any necessary actions
were noted.
The meeting concluded at 10:15pm
25
LAST LOOK
Filling In An Otherwise Dull Weekend
Alan Stott
Ian Price
On the weekend of 25 /26 July Tony Patmore
and I went to Hamilton to spend two days
with Rally Drive NZ. That's a great way for a
couple of petrol heads to spend some time. Day
one is spent with instruction on the safety
aspects of rally driving, how to read a route book
properly, what all the signs mean and what you
can, or more importantly cannot, do inside of
rally zones. The afternoon included a short
tarmac sprint and a speed control event.
Day two was spent in the Maramarua Forest
with four top drivers for one-on-one tuition on
the correct lines to take, and how to control the
car at speed. We thought that we were getting
good times and real speed. The conditions were
mud, clay, gravel and sand, not the most stable
of bases to be driving at speeds of over 120ks.
Thank goodness we used their cars as I'm not
sure that mine would have stood up to the
thrashing we gave them. They use a variety of
Mitsubishis of Evo 2 & 4 GSR's, all fitted out to
top level as these cars are often leased out to
international drivers to compete in NZ. At the
end of the day you are taken through the same
road at race pace with Marty Rostenburg,
travelling at over 170ks and he makes it look
like a walk down town. Amazing. An all up cost
for two days is about $780.00 and worth every
cent to me. For anyone who wants a fast fun
weekend it's to be recommended as a great time.
They can be contacted on
Rally Drive NZ limited
PO Box 5392
Hamilton
ph 07 847 8777
Email: [email protected]
Web : www.rallydrivenz.co.nz
Almac Cars
I[LMR~
P.O. Box 40483
Nicolaus Street
ALMAC
CARS
UPPER HUTT
Tel/Fax: 04 528 8680
Contact: Alex McDonald for Brochure
26
Fifteen of us, CCC members that is, now know how it's
done. It's true we might not be able to actually make
one, but we do know the fundamentals of car windscreen
manufacturing. You import some flat float glass from
Australia, UK, USA, or even South America. Cut it into a
windscreen shape, put a thin layer of vinyl sheet on it,
wop on another piece of windscreen shaped glass, heat
the whole thing to some amazing temperature and wizzo,
you've got yourself a laminated windscreen. Well, I did
say fundamental didn't I?
On Friday 1st August, we met at Pilkington Automotive
Glass Factory at Peterkin Street in Lower Hutt to see for
the last time the full procedure of manufacturing car
windscreens, windows etc. The last time because, by
the 31st of next month, everything will be gone, gone to
Finland and China.
Once 250 people worked here, now when the doors finally
close, 130 people will be without work - sad. Our guide,
who had worked at Pilkington for 18 years, thought he
mi~ht go back to being a plumber if anyone wanted him,
or If he could remember how!
Split into two groups, our guides Kevin Turner and Ian
Dunham took us in opposite directions around the factory.
In many cases the machinery was static, which was a
shame, as in better times these very special glass cutting
and shaping machines, furnaces, pressure chambers etc
would have been in full noisy swing, producing up to
60,000 toughened windows and 20,000 screens every
month. Now, often standing in half-light, much of the
machinery looked tired and sad, like being in a theatre
when the actors have all gone. Once a million screens
and windows left here every year, now it's almost over,
the last batches of VW screens stand ready to leave for
the UK, most Mondeo screens have already left, while
small, but special orders, like groups of 25 custom Jaguar
screens for specialist companies in Europe, have all been
completed. Some machines still chatter away completing
orders for toughened glass windows, the cold air jets
playing onto strategic parts of the heated glass,
toughening and stressing it exactly as the Design
Department or the customer ordered. The scrap bins
still fill as the waste from the computer controlled glass
cutters cut out the final runs of screens, but the days of
three million dollars worth of scrap going off to bottle and
glass fibre batt companies every year
is over.
It seems incongruous to see the large
'STAFF WANTED' boards still offering
well-paid jobs, and the 'OSH' safety
instructions still plastered around the
walls. Let's hope the 'Indoor War
Games' or 'Second Hand Clothing'
people, or whoever takes over the
building, heeds them.
Kevin, our guide, pointed to factories
each side of the street which, once like
Pilkington, used to produce for the now
defunct New Zealand car industry,
some closed, some just hanging on, a
whole street, hundreds of workers
unemployed. Are cheap Jap imports
really worth this?
Anyway, thanks Pilkington and
especially Kevin and Ian. I must admit
to feeling a little distressed about the
place, but we did do what we set out to
do, see how automotive glass was
produced - even if it was for the last
time.
27
John Hill
It was some time ago, it must have been quite a Our trip over started well with an upgrade to first
while because we were meeting at Silverstream class on Emirates between Singapore and
at the time, when a meeting included a Dubai. lit is easy to see why this airline is making
discussion on suitable subjects for 'Spare Parts'. such inroads into the international air market.
I don't remember much of the discussion except They have been flying from Melbourne for some
that we all agreed that in addition to stuff about time and have just started flying from Auckland.
cars etc. travel and photography were deemed Our stop in Kuwait was supposed to be overnight
acceptable fare. Who can remember anyone in a transit hotel. Now this hotel is on the 'airwriting about photography? I can't but there have side', that is you get to it without going through
border formalities. This is a good plan but it all
been plenty of travel stories over the years.
falls apart when you find some luggage did not
Everyone who writes of their travel experiences arrive and that all facilities to recover it are on
does a very good job and I am especially the 'land-side. That took from 8 am until nearly
impressed by the way Grant obviously keeps a midnight to get sorted by various and repeated
detailed travel diary. Unfortunately I am not so phone calls. Once the 'claim' was accepted it
meticulous and neither am I very good at keeping was only a matter of minutes to determine the
a photographic record.
missing cartons of computer server equipment
were
enjoying the air-conditioned lUxury of the
I have been 'away' three times this year,
Afghanistan in January, Pakistan in June and cargo sheds in Singapore.
Iraq in July.
A fortunate coincidence was that our flight from
Pakistan was a promotion trip while the other Kuwait to Baghdad did not operate that day due
two were associated with restoring airport to a problem with the aircraft and we were
communications systems in these newly advised to be ready by ten the following morning,
which we were, sitting in the lobby of the transit
'liberated' countries.
hotel with a great pile of cartons and a couple of
A couple of weeks ago was "coming-home-from- bags. At 12 we got a phone call to say the plane
Iraq" and a very nice feeling it was too! We got would not be flying that day either but that an
our job done but hardly anyone else was ready alternative had been arranged. At four a pickso it will be some time before things are fully in up truck raced across the tarmac, the driver
operation and anyway the Baghdad airport did looked in through the lobby window, saw us and
not re-open as intended due to continued made 'hurry up' signals. With everything piled
security threats.
on the back he raced off across roads and apron
areas to where an Antonov AN12 was starting
28
to taxi out. Again more urgent hand signals but I did not have enough courage to turn it on, due
this time to the pilot who stopped his plane long mainly to an irrational fear that one more amp
enough for us to nip around the back, throw the would have been enough to overload something
stuff through the big cargo door, clamber in after somewhere. I noticed a number of small patches
it and make our way forward. Then we were had been applied over the years, some around
away with my colleague commenting that he obvious stress points near locker hinges etc. but
hoped they had the right passengers as hardly there were also a few in seemingly random spots
a word had been spoken since the transit hotel. about 3 inches square including one, rather
The only other passenger then assured us that chillingly I thought, in the middle of the flight
he believed we were indeed headed direct for engineers' seat back.
Baghdad.
TheAN12 is the old Soviet 'Hercules'. About 900
were built between 1958 and 1973 and I think
we had struck an early model. One can carry
about 18 tons with 4 turbo props of about
4,400hp each. Our cargo was a couple of
Mercedes 4WDs, a few crates and our stuff.
There was a crew of four including a navigator
who actually seemed to have to navigate for what
one would have thought would have been a very
easy VFR exercise. The other three were two
pilots and a flight engineer. I was intrigued to
see the flight engineer controlling the four
engines but slightly disappointed to see his
instructions came by voice rather than a ships
brass telegraph which would not have seemed
too far out of place.
The small crew and passenger compartment is
pressurized, just three passengers in our
compartment which had all you might need for
a long slow flight. Six good seats, each facing a
reasonable sized table, a hot plate, little fridge
and above it all a couple of adequate sized
bunks. We also had crates of Norwegian beer
and a few cartons ofTurkish bottled water. Every
seat had one of those ubiquitous rubber bladed
fans that every Russian plane is fitted with. I
have read that 14 seats can be fitted in the same
compartment. An hour and a half gives plenty of
time for looking around and examining the
interior details. I hoped we would not need to
use the crumbling perished oxygen masks and
although the fan next to my seat was not spinning
The Author onboard the AN] 2
The flight to Baghdad went without event and
we landed and taxied to a large apron area where
there was no one to meet us and no sign of the
return passengers. It was there I learned the
crew had almost no English just a few aviation
type phrases. They were from the Ukraine and
were really just as lost as we were. We offered
them our satellite phone which the captain
gratefully accepted and got instructions from
somewhere. Then we shook hands and they
piled on board and were away again leaving two
of us with our boxes and the third passenger
with his two 4WDs. I later learned they had not
charged us for the flight.
We were in Iraq, with absolutely no formalities,
totally at a loss as what to do next and getting
slowly roasted in the afternoon sun.
The temperature on the tarmac was in the high
40's with us standing there like a couple of youknow-whats when an Australian RAAF Land
Rover drove up. The Aussies were not on any
official errand, just out for a bit of sight seeing
having driven over to take a look at the old
Antonov. These guys passing by was a great
stroke of luck as our official welcoming party had
29
r
give up on us 24 hours previously and we were
faced with about a mile walk in the heat through
goodness knows what security checks just to
reach where we were headed. One thing about
working at airports is it is usually readily apparent
where the control tower is and Baghdad is no
exception. Next to the control tower is a four
storey building that once housed a significant
technical installation and offices for 400 people.
Now the RAAF occupy the fourth floor and we
were to set up camp on the third floor.
Aussies on Guard
So our ride was ideal and took is right to where
we wanted to go, the guys even carried half the
stuff up the three flights. The building had
suffered from 10 years of diminishing use. All
surviving equipment is seriously run down but
there had been no serious looting. What
furniture there is, is very old and threadbare but
adequate for what we needed to do. Fortunately
for us the Iraqi staff when the invasion/liberation
became apparent elected to take what they could
to their homes for safe keeping. I guess a fair
bit ended up in the bazaar etc. but a significant
quantity including 20 or so PC sets were returned
while we were there. Although the building is
only a few hundred metres from the main
terminal building that featured in some of the
TV coverage of the invasion it was not damaged
in the fighting.
A few hundred American troops camped in the
building for some several weeks and during that
time managed to smash a few things including
every door in the building. They also managed
to block up the toilets and fill the cellar with
sewage. Now, incredible as it may seem, they
actually continued to live in the building in the
STEERING &SUSPENSION SPECIALIST
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30
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Steering joints, bushes
Shock absorbers
Wheel alignment
Brake Disc and Drum machining
All work unconditionally guaranteed
22 years of knowledge and experience
Discounts for eee members
stinking heat with no electricity, no water, no
air conditioning of course and no toilets.
'Calls of nature' were taken in a few corners,
on top of the blocked toilets and in places
like the cable ducts. The Aussie hygiene
officer said he arrived expecting to have to
look after the 'battlefield hygiene' of about 40
Australians but ended up looking after a few
hundred Americans too. He said 40% were
suffering from hygiene related conditions. The
Aussies had arrived some time ago, back in
May I think, and had taken over from the
Americans. The first thing they did was pitch
their tents and set to putting the place in order.
I understand that in about three days they
had pumped out the cellar with a fire truck,
unblocked the toilets, got the water flowing
again and fixed up the power systems enough
to make life comfortable.
Operations building
everywhere else was officially 'dry'. We got lots
of official visitors on very weak pretexts
especially in the evenings. Just across the
corridor was our workspace, it had been a
moderately big computer room in which we were
installing the satellite and communications
equipment. This was actually a very good room
with false floor for the cables, air conditioned
(which our party had installed), a reasonable
capacity UPS and a separate room for the
operators to sit. There was quite a debate about
In the Cable Duct
operators because there will actually be nothing
Conditions were not too bad when we got there for them to do, but they won't find that out until
except for the lingering smell from the cellar and operation begins in earnest. Our room was the
the occasional cable duct that the Aussies had base for the Baghdad installation plus a few other
missed. Some of our advance party had locations in Iraq. Our stuff is unitised so there is
continued the good work and fitted shower heads no need for us to visit each site. We just make
in the hole-in-the-floor toilet cubicles, quite up the software and pack it with the equipment
serviceable with the ambient temperature water and the satellite installation guys take it to the
being just about right. Dropping the soap was other airports, put it on a table and power it up.
to be avoided though. We had one big room with I made a couple of exceptions to this procedure
about 8 of us camped there. We had camp and insisted on going to oversee the installation
stretchers, air conditioning and stacks of US at the USAF area control centre. A bit of a let
military rations 'MREs', 'meals ready to eat' aka down really. They had fairly old looking stuff
mounted in air-transportable containers
'meals rejected by Ethiopians'.
positioned under camouflage netting among the
We had room for a work table, covered by tools,
sand hills. I also got to visit the RAAF in the
laptops, chargers, printer etc. plus another table
control tower a couple of time which was good
for eating and general social activities. This room
for a look around but also an endurance test to
was also the building sly-grog zone as
31
climb the 11 floors in the heat of
the day.
There are attacks on the airport
almost daily with occasional reports
of shots towards aircraft. This
came to a rather more credible
scare when someone stole a
number of Russian shoulder
launched anti-aircraft missiles.
One, maybe one ofthe stolen ones,
was fired at a RAF Hercules
exploding a few hundred metres
from the plane. Military aircraft
were firing defensive flares on take
off but the civilian pilots were mainly
relying on random departure tracks.
The DHL pilot of a twin jet,
Saddam Bunker
(something like a Boeing 737 but
different, perhaps a small Airbus), Just about every day sees someone killed around the airport
liked to put on a show of low level or on the road to the city so the opportunities for off-duty
stunts such as a full rate turn as sightseeing were extremely limited.
and floors and if things had got hot we could no formalities but I had tools etc. in my bag which
have sheltered in the central corridor giving was supposedly checked luggage to be handed
another concrete wall for protection. Australian in at the gate. However in true Kuwaiti fashion I
RAF troops were guarding and patrolling our had to go through security to do this. Needless
compound while the building doors were to say they confiscated my tools and it was only
guarded by Ghurkas employed by a private by rather strong assertive action that I got the
security company. Outside this of course were airline to intervene and have the tools returned
to me. There was time for some duty free
shopping in the Singapore terminal building
where my colleague bought a digital camera and
I got 20 dollars worth of Lego, then home to
Auckland.
s
so~n as the wheels left the tarmac Life in our two rooms was not too bad. We were safe enough
while others Just contented although mortars did occasionally land on the tarmac outside
themselve~ ~ith a spiral climb the closest about 400 yards away. We had concrete wall~
above the airfield.
Visit our website
www.usedtyres.co.nz
Time to go home
the American troops patrolling the entire airfield.
We thought the security was pretty good until
right close to our leaving time we found a cable
tunnel big enough to walk in that ran from the
basement to the main terminal building, totally
unguarded and secured by a cyclone-type gate
and padlock!
A few Iraqi people had braved whatever was out
there to come in to work, no doubt hoping that
their old jobs would be waiting for them, mostly
technical people. At least the ones who came to
where we were demonstrated by their
knowledge that they were who they said they
were. I think there were a few opportunists trying
to sneak in as well. In our group there were four
women and two men. I am quite confident that
they were 'on our side' but a group down the
hall made me thankful they were escorted from
the airfield each afternoon. Our people
occasionally brought in Iraqi food for us as well
that made a welcome change from the MREs.
The trip home was rather uneventful, we flew
out on a Beech twin turbo, just five passengers
on board leaving three vacant seats. We went
direct from that plane to the Kuwait transit
lounge. This should have been real easy with
32
For the first time in my life NZ Customs decided
to do a random check on me. Normally this would
not have been a problem but our route had been
Auckland to Singapore, Singapore to Dubai,
Dubai transit only, Dubai to Kuwait, Kuwait transit
only, Kuwait to Baghdad with no formalities
whatsoever and return to Kuwait, transit Kuwait,
Dubai and Singapore. As far as the passport
showed I had left Singapore and two weeks later
arrived in Auckland. I am sure they thought I
had another passport I was not admitting to but
with nothing concrete to go on they let me be. I
wonder if I am on some data base now.
We get almost daily calls from the group still
there including our 'away' party who got stranded
in Kirkut (or some other regional city) for several
days in howling dust storms and living in a tent.
They were not happy chaps.
The lost box eventually made it's way from
Singapore while another consignment of 24
cartons which left Wellington by DHL had got
totally lost until someone realised they had gone
to Kandahar (in Afghanistan)! They too have
been delivered but this time via road from Kuwait
arriving some days after we left Baghdad. This
is not a good sign as it possibly indicates the
airport at Baghdad is closed to civilian flights
again.
Although I have been to Iraq I can't really claim
to know much more about the place than before
I left home. It is clear that many people are very
glad to see the 'SH' regime gone but there are
obvious lingering fears. The people I got to
briefly know are ordinary working people who
indicate the years since the first Gulf War have
been very difficult for them and now they want
to get on with life.
33
THERAPY
Alan Stott
It's almost 43 years to the day since I left the
UK and return trips have been infrequent. I give
you this nugget of information for no other reason
than to set the background on this and a few
other articles I intend to send to the editor of
this magazine for his consideration.
Let me explain:
I like this place. It's true that I haven't travelled
everywhere but from my experience and
standards I'm convinced New Zealand is the
finest place to live on this planet. Therefore I
don't return to Britain very often.
2.
The UK was filling fast when I left and on my
last visit it was like living in a test match crowd
at WestPac Stadium. I guess I've just got used
to NZ type space. So, as you an see, I love this
country but - but even after all this time I do still
have some deep seated Pommie traits, some
would call them weaknesses.
What it boils down to is that because I have
enjoyed myself so much living here, I haven't
really got around to using up my full Pommie
winging quota. That's the truth of it, I've pretty
well been a winge-free Pommie and it's starting
to catch up with me. Therefore these next few
articles will be more in the spirit of therapy than
in one of moaning. Again to more accurately
focus my therapy, I've decided that only time
spent driving on the country's roads will be the
basis for the hoped for cure. But enough of this,
on with it, let the exorcising begin.
1.
34
Truck drivers, particularly the drivers
driving those vast machines that seem like
a football paddock long (see, I'm getting
there already, paddock, not field!). I've
read a lot of complaints from other road
users about these mainly it's true, from the
Auckland area (that's the place the rest of 3.
us are subsidising so they can drive at all),
but I can honestly say, (and I'm a 20K a
year man) I have never ever struck a less
than considerate truck driver - ever. So
this is now my first winge. A truck driver
pulls over deep onto the often pot-holed
shoulder of the road to let a build up of
cars pass. He could have just driven on
until he reached a passing lane, but he
doesn't, he pulls over and often slows
down. The column of cars shoot past, and,
this is the point, not one driver, not one,
toots or waves acknowledgement of this
thoughtful action. This doesn't happen
once, or twice, it happens almost every
time. Come on drivers, not everyone can
be that bl-- rude - can they?
It's 5.30 pm and raining, you're on the
motorway. Like everyone else, you have
a driving licence confirming you have met
all the conditions to be there. You have
probably paid for not just this, but the
lifetime one that was made illegal as well,
so you know your stuff and, like everyone
else, you're driving to the conditions. Then
you come on it, it's huge and hanging out
above the motorway, you really can't avoid
it, and it has completely taken your
attention off the road. A multi-thousand
dollar illuminated sign that gives out
messages. Obviously something vital has
happened, 'Accident', 'Road Closed',
'Diversion', 'Flooding'? No, No, my
attention has been taken by some idiot
telling me it's raining and slippery and to
watch my following distance!! I've taken
driving tests, paid endlessly for driving
licences, my car has been warranted so
many times it feels as if every last nut and
bolt has been individually crack tested. I'm
hounded by traffic cops, mufti police, speed
cameras, radar speed traps and now I'm
being told by some anonymous public
servant how to drive!! Come on.
Lastly, for this month, how about the new
signs being put up on motorway
overbridges (I believe Auckland already
has them). If you haven't seen them yet,
all the overbridges carrying roads over
motorways in the Wellington area are
getting their roads name attached to them.
assured me it was, if this is the best our
At what cost you can only guess, but many
roading professionals can come up with,
thousands of dollars are obviously being
then perhaps they could redirect their time
spent, why? Well, to reach those
to something more realistic or even
overbridge roads you would have to get
relocate themselves to something more
off the motorway, drive, in many cases
suitable to their abilities! The answer the
several kilometres, through winding back
Transit gentleman gave me was this: If
streets to locate access to the road. Could
you have an 'incident' on the motorway
this really be the reason? Are they
(and frankly how often does this happen?)
you can look up, see the sign, and know
intended to be just ordinary road signs put
up in a strange place? Surely not. If they
precisely where your 'incident' has taken
are, then considering the costs involved, I
place. A useful if hardly vital piece of
feel that it would be a worthwhile winge.
information. It also strikes me that a high
Well, this all seemed just too silly, so I
percentage of people would know where
they were without any sign, and anyway,
thought I'd check it out. After speaking to
as overbridges occur very infrequently on
eight different roading people in the
Transport Departments of Lower Hutt and
motorways, you would have to plan your
Wellington City and a few at Transit New
'incident' precisely to end up under a bridge
Zealand, none of which had the slightest
with 'useful information'. Perhaps then not
idea of what the signs were all about, (most
a full winge, but still given the slightly
'Monty Python' aspect of the whole idea, a
didn't know about them at all). I finally
found someone at Transit who had an
'winge minus' should be awarded.
answer. At this point I must admit his
Anyway, until next time when I get down to some
answer has caused me to reclassify my
serious winging, keep those whines coming
winge to a 'winge minus'. Although, if the
because it's great to be perfect!
reason he gave me is correct, and he
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35
(,om the B'idge
life is Full of Surprises
Ian Price
It is still a small world, even as the ways we
communicate now still leaves room for surprises.
When I joined the club there was only one or two
people that I knew so I was very surprised to find
that someone that I knew when I first started to
drive while living in Masterton. John Wilson. I
met John by accident, though not literally. I had
just bought my first sporty car, a Fait 128SL. John
saw the car and recognised it as one that a friend
had owned new and decided to follow and see who
owned it. I thought that I was being stalked so
tried to lose the following car. John must have taken
the challenge and followed till I stopped. The
following couple of years saw the two of us
attending some events with a Palmerston North
Sports Car Club.
During this time John built the car in the photo
attached based on the standard Triumph Herald
Floor pan, and running gear. Even John will tell
you that it was not the most attractive of cars but
true to his style it was done on a budget and was
such a success it sold almost as soon as he
completed it. There is more than a passing look of
an early Bugatti in the car. John has always had
something to build or alter and I remember the
next project was based on a Fiat 850 , re-powered
with a mid mounted Subaru motor.
What started this ramble was unearthing the photo
while cleaning out some cupboards. Just shows
how small the world is.
It must be true, the computer said Brian Worboys
so.
I turned on my computer at work the other day
and, as is it's want, it tried to fill in the embarrassing
little wait, while it got all it's bits lined up, with
another one of it's corn-ball truisms. This time it
said, "Perfection is not reached when there is no
more that can be added, but when there is no more
that can be taken away." I doubt that this wisdom,
as espoused by some backroom Microsoft
programmer nerd of limited real life experience,
would be appreciated in a poverty-stricken, Aidsridden, drought-plagued village in central Africa.
But when a salesman's boast about a car is that it
is "fully loaded", in our club, I feel we have a duty
to look the other way. Lets build the fully unloaded
car.
Garage Tour: 20 July 2003
The weather forecast was not good, so nobody
made any other plans. Then the weather turned
out great, so I guess folks thought, "why not". We
had a great turn-out. About 30 car constructing
enthusiasts in about 20 vehicles made the tour.
We started off at Lester Reader's place. Lester
has been restoring a Lotus Elan for some time now.
He has put articles about this in Spare Parts already
and we were keen to see how it was coming along.
The fascinating Lotus X shaped chassis was on
display, fully rebuilt with new parts welded in,
painted and with all the fittings in place. Probably
better than new now I should say and looking very
sharp indeed. Lester gave us an interesting rundown on his experiences so far with the project.
Next stop was Alan Hoverd's Morris Minor Mecca.
AI had us all spell-bound with his moggie mania. A
genuine UK Police Panda MM was on display,
along with AI's highly modified, but very traditional
looking Morris Woody and the current project, a
Morris Minor trailer. We were also introduced to
all sorts of after-market MM components that Alan
has developed and that he markets worldwide; for
example, chrome plated carbon fibre taillight shells.
Off then to Miramar and Johnny Mine's garage.
Parked along side some very collectable British
36
Lester shows offprogress on his Lotus
Elan rebuild
Lester's very tidy Lotus Elan rebuilt
chassis
Al Hoverd holds forth on the virtues of
the Morris Minor as police vehicle.
Crowd listen in stunned silence
37
Ford models was Johnny's old racing car, complete
with the trophies it had won for him. Long in the
tooth now, but still very competitive. Then over at
the other side of the garage was the new project.
Set out on the table was the partially built frame
with the very tidy Suzuki Hayabusa engine sitting
in its mid-engine location just behind the roll-frame.
There passed what seemed like about 10 minutes
while a dozen or so garage tourists just stood in a
circle round the table and stared at the car with
very thoughtful faces, and nobody said a word.
The basic simplicity and effectiveness of this
emerging car design is very impressive. And the
logic ofthe most powerful, lightest engine available
in the most basic traditional frame is inescapable.
Sitting along side the part-built frame, Johnny had
the body for the car. This is a Can-am style, and
will be as attractive as I am certain it will be quick.
Subaru engine and transmission positioned
in the frame of the Atom
While there, we also had a chance to admire the
work that Graham had put into his other car.
Basically a Mitsubishi Sigma, it had engine, throttle
bodies, turbo, intercooler and computer all sourced
from other models and makes of car and skilfully
modified by Bruce to fit together in a very effective
integration.
This style of car is a rapidly growing racing class
in the UK and Johnny was telling me how the
experienced builders are now including "crumple
zones" into the structure of their cars as the speeds
of these small cars are getting so high, and an
increased level of safety is very desirable. The
concept of crash safety design is something that
we tend to scratch our heads over a bit in the club,
but the approach Johnny described to me is well
within the scope of our typical construction
methods. What they do in the UK is to make side
and frontal buffers out of solid blocks of polystyrene
foam enclosed in an aluminium box built into the
structure. Simple, cheap, effective and very
"constructible" .
sun shining down from a clear winter sky,
enthusiastic car-building talk going on; a
moment to cherish.
Round em up, head em out. After assorted
adventures with "fast" food franchises, City centre
traffic and confused directions, curiously we all
turned up at Glen Murray's at about the same time.
The Lowcost is the ultimate DIY car. It is the Linux
of the kit car market. All you need to know is in
one book, and the library has the book. It all makes
so much sense and building his is obviously giving
Glen a lot of satisfaction. The car is at the Chassisalmost-complete stage, and Glen has most of the
parts he needs to be able to keep forging ahead.
The convenient thing he has discovered is that
there is quite a network of Locost builders, all
following the same plans, so there is a ready
market for the necessary fabricated bits because
a number of builders simply make a few extras for
sale as they go. In this nice suburban setting, with
the street full of club cars in bright colours, the
Up hill, down dale, this way, that way and so
to Jonathan and Bruce's garage and the
inspirational "Atom". No fixed plans. But a
clear, un compromised vision and some
damn solid engineering. The basic shape of
the car is there now. The concept is one of
matching form and function, with exposed
curved structural members outlining the cars
lines, open cycle-guard wheels, mid engine
and some high tech features hidden within
the minimalist appearance. Jonathan
described their progress to date and the
various techniques they had used to get the
frame tubes curved to the right shape. There
looks to be double curvature in the line of
the top rails, but we were assured all the
tubes were bent flat, and then installed at
the right angle to give the desired effect.
38
Johnathan Clifton point out afew
features of the Atom
At Johny's
Glen, justify ably proud of his
achievement so far with his version of
the very popular Lowcost
Those of us who didn't run out of gas were soon
huddled in the Harlow garage casting our eyes over
the very 70's Magnum. Rakish body on Morris 1300
('fraid so) underpinnings. Although now clearly in
need of some TLC, the car still has class. Garth
Stevenson is the man destined to bring it back to
it's former glory, and we are looking forward to the
2004 Wanganui garage tour to see it spick, span
and spunky on the road again. OK Garth? And
please don't change the colour or style of the
interior. We all loved the purple leather. Tea and
cake. Thanks again, Pat and Heather.
So that was the garage tour, and I for one really
enjoyed it. What goes on in the garages is the heart
of our club. I want to again thank the members
who invited us into their garages and homes for
this tour. Lester, Alan, Johnny, Glen, Jonathan,
Bruce, Pat; thanks for the trouble you went to and
the inspiration that you have given us to get on
with it ourselves.
Forced Induction: every bit of air
helps.
We all know how effective turbos and
supercharging are at upping the ergs out of a
Roger Bramley's very attractive Fraser
parked in Glen's driveway
The Magnum project at Patrick's. Now
Garth Stevenson is going to take up the
challenge
motor, but what else is there that might do
much the same sort of thing? My brother-inlaw, back in his miss-spent youth once had a
Morris Eight which had a large metal funnel
positioned directly behind the radiator fan and
39
feeding the fan draught into the top
of the carburettor. He claimed this
significantly
improved
the
performance of the car. I have read
of people with aircooled VW's
ducting pressurised air from the fan
shroud back into the carburettor and
boasting extra HP. This I tended to
believe more than the Morrie Eight
story. So I did a bit of an experiment
using some clear plastic tube. I
formed a U tube with water in it and revving up
the VW motor to about 4000 rpm I generated
about SOmm of water manometer pressure. This
is almost 0.1 psi. I doubt anyone with experience
of real turbo power would be very impressed
with a boost pressure of 0.1 psi.
Moving right along, club member Bruce Graham
mentioned this site he had found on the internet:
http://www.ACTurbo.com . These guys sell, for
US$3S0 an actual12v industrial strength hairdryer designed to just plug onto the air intake of
a fuel injected car. The unit is installed in such a
fashion that it is not switched on for normal mid
throttle range running, but when the accelerator
is fully depressed, a switch is activated and
boost happens. The claim is made that you get:
Electric Blower
hunting about in old text books and fooling
about with all sorts offormulas like Bernoulli's
equation it generally seemed to me that the
power used by the fan is about SO%
pressurising the air, and about SO% just
speeding it up from zero to 120kph as the air
enters the cooling system. So I thought, why
does the air have to be speeded up, after all,
there's lots of it rushing past at 100kph anyway.
If I just direct this outside slipstream air into
the maw of the fan, then half of the work of the
fan will go away, and there will be Shp more
for the wheels. Also the air will be cooler and
potentially more of it. So I built this very tricky
duct to get past all the engine and chassis parts
and connect up the fan intake to an external
air scoop. This was quite a contrivance and
wound up looking like Jabba-the-Hutt's lower
bowel. Anyway, this is done now, but now I
can't fit the body panels back over it and I will
need to reshape the engine cover and the left
side mudguard. I expect to have this done in
For AC Turbo Co. as a supplier however, the
most worrying aspect is that these blowers come
in nine colours including - pink, transparent,
yellow neon and baby blue. Metal flake costs
an extra $2S.
40
time to try it out at the club day at Manfeild in
September. I guess I could just test it on the
road easily enough: full throttle up to 100 kph
(or so), jam on the brakes, down to SOkph, repeat
SO times AQAP. Some how, doing this seems
just stupid.
News flash from the depths of the
sofa
Electric powered 'turbo'fitted to a Honda
•
•
•
10 more HP
Up to 800 CFM flow
2 PSI boost
•
Only 19 Amp draw@ 12 Volts
I suspect that not all the above happen at the
same time. My feeling is you would need to be
drawing a lot more than 20 amps to make a big
difference. Even so, it's not a bad idea.
Obviously, any additional power that can be
achieved will never be available on a continuous
basis, but could be handy forthe odd extra squirt
of power when you need it. Units could be built
for basically any boost and flow. It just depends
on how much the battery can stand and how
often you are going to calion it. If you are keen
to make your own unit, it's easy enough to make
a test rig to test what you can achieve.
Typical view ofgarage tour in progress
Test fitting the new air intake to
the Road Rat
The British programme Scrap Yard Challenge
has started again on Prime at 7:30 on Fridays.
This is TV I'm talking about here. Although
having similar game ethics to American
Wrestling shows, Scrap Yard must still be close
to many car constructor hearts. Last week they
made mud-racing vehicles and next week it is
hovercraft with, I believe, a team from NZ
"competing".
Jabba-the-Hutt's lower bowel
More air
On a similar theme, I have been wondering about
how to improve the air-cooling on the Road Rat
engine. I have a bigger engine taking shape, and
more power will mean more heat. The air for
the cooling is sucked into the cooling shroud by
a turbine type of fan through a 1S0mm diameter
inlet. This uses up about S - 1Ohp at SOOO rpm,
from what I read. From some totally random
website I gathered that the air-flow speed into
the fan is about 120kph at these revs. Then
41
r
The Surgery Intermarque Sunday 27'h July
Dave Beazer
Once again a great meeting with
members of the CC Club making an effort
to be there, with the marvelous
organization of the Intermarque Team
with our own Ron Roberston and Niaomi
Bray leading the way as usual.
Noticed having great fun on the day was
Bede Harris, Saker V8, Roger Bramley,
Fraser, Tim Hutchinson, Skyline Turbo,
and some friends in Chevrons.
Mechanical problems spoilt Bruce
Turnbull and Anthony Moult's day but a
big attendance on the day made
enjoyable viewing for spectators from the
club.
Bede Harris Saker
Darryl Crow and Tim Hutchinson
Left: Anthony Moult
Roger Bramley at speed
Watch the calendar
for the
next event
Dummy grid at Manfield
July03
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spraycans matched to
your car from $29.95
Discounts offered to
club members
"Changing the way you Panel & Paint"
FRASER CARS
Touch up paints matched to any make or model.
Huge range offillers, sealer, sandpapers everything you would need to panel or paint.
MEMBER COMPONENT CAR MANUFACTURERS ASSOCIATION OF NZ
(Inc)
458 High St Lower Hutt, ph 586 6681 or
www.totalbodyshop.co.nz
Open mon-Fri 8 am -5.30pm Sat 9am - 1pm
1/318 Beachhaven Rd, Beachhaven, Box 34610, Auckland 10, New Zealand
Telephone (09) 482-0071
Fax: (09) 482-0516
42
43
r
A new column will commence next
month on workshop hints and ideas.
So if you have a natty idea or clever
or innovative way of doing something
such as "Don't carry a spare wheel roll it", share it with all of us so we
can all be better and smarter at our
hobby. It can be one line or a
paragraph. Send your ideas to me.
- Editor
Technical Terms Explained
Barnicol Engineering
for all mechanical engineering
Members please note our
new postal address is:
PO Box 38 573
Wellington 6332
(Note - Our redirection
order runs out on 18
August)
"Seat Belts"
Valley Plate1's Lill'l.ited
162 Gracefleld Road, Lower Hutt
Phone 04 568 5924
Chrome, Nickel & Zinc Plating. Metal Polishing
<L~4~
Bruce Wright, 04 564 5070
44
172 Eastern Hutt Road
Ph 939 2276
(opposite Taita Station)
Brake & Chassis Specialists
Custom-made Radiators & Repairs
Custom Part Manufacturers
Alloy & Steel Welding
Drive Shaft Balancing
Exhausts
Steering Systems
Engine & Gearbox Conversions
all other Engineering Work

Spare Parts 2003 08 OCRS

Transcription

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