Land Rover Series III Rally Car. (Yes really)
Discussion
Hello!
Tis a frequently told story but non the less apologies for the length!
In January 1973 Brian Fulton supplied a 1972 88" hard top reg to the National Trust in Cumbria. They used it for shunting duties round Fell Foot park beside Windermere.
It didn't get registered for many years and was put on the road in the 80's by which is was getting on a bit and shifted on.
In 1994 a man called Adrian Loxam bought it as 2nd car which did a lot of laning and offroading in general.
A pair of Lucas 20/20 lamps, capstan winch and some 7.50 SATS were all that was needed for good times!
This is long before the CROW or even the NERC act and many trips were made up great passes such as Walna Scar and Garburn.
Is was a trip up the Garburn pass that changed all that. Adrian and and a few others were near the top one winters day and got out to admire the view and have a chat.
Unfortunately the handbrake in the 88" let go and the still with the drivers door ajar the landy rolled off the pass and went a very very long way.
This was the result:
A team of people recovered it and Adrian did actually drive it off the pass!
Now a lot of people would have given up at this point with this motor but Adrian had a background in rallying and liked the idea of Hillrallying. (He like many had seen that episode of "old" Topgear with Tony Mason inteviewing Ian Sykes in his mental leafer.) I'd love to have a copy of that clip but anyway...
The wreck of the series 3 was taken to a workshop and a big rebuild started:
A Bettaweld external cage and truckcab were fitted along with a lot of new bodywork! All the required safety gear of buckets, harnesses, fire extingquishers went in and then he got to the engine.....
The 3 bearing block was getting it a bit tired so a 5 bearing engine was found and put in. I've said before a 2286 engine and a A series engine are quite similar well it turns out Minisport were willing to do a balanced crank and super light flywheel for the engine!
A friend took an old cylinder head and did a nice job of porting and general gasflowing it. ACR tuning supplied heavy duty valve springs as well so it sounds like a bag of spanners and always will. A set of tubular manifolds were fitted that included a 4-2-1 exhaust manifold onto a big bore performance exhaust from Roland Marlow.Fuel was fed via whopping SU carb and a K&N.
Leaf springs were still LR at this stage with Monroe heavy duty shocks all round.205R16 Stone County diamonds were the tyres of choice (shame they're all but banned now).
The first event was the 1997 Scottish Hillrally. Things didn't quite got to plan. It ate halfshafts for breakfast, lunch and dinner and on the next to last stage it broke one to many and they couldn't go on. With the overdrive in this to and a quarter petrol was doing over 60mph while in low box!
After that came the Welsh Hillrally. A different co driver this time who unfortunately got involved with a tow rope during the event and injuring his leg to the point where they had to retire.
The 1998 Scottish was up next with another new co-pilot...driver. Katy Mas
ter had been co driving on stage rallies both Katy and her husband Neil were friends of Adrian's.
Once again things didn't go well. Back then there was a famouse stage a Clow featuring the "1000ft climb" which claimed the front diff. This was replaced however engine mountings were broken the the point where one or more were needing changing per service.
During the afternoon run round the gearbox kept jumping out of 4wd and Katy ended up holding it for 3 stages (not sure how!). A return to service showed that all engine and box mountings were totalled and only the handbrake linkage the yellow knob (with Katy) and the exhaust was holding it all in! Mounts were drilled out an M12 bolts were put in and have done the trick since!
The Welsh that year was worse. A hard landing shattered both front shafts with the bits welding themselves in the stub axle. The service crew managed to source and change the front axle overnight but the next day both front shafts broke again and then the rear broke as well! Game over again.
A Salisbury (with anti tramp arrangement) was fitted to the rear and the Chandlers Tour of Lincs was entered. This shortlived event was special in that it was both a Stage Rally and a Hillrally with some parts of the event being run at the same place. Even the vehicles got to set of head to head at one point. The sight of a Group A Escort Cosworth with full anti lag etc being left standing by a Rivet buggy was eyeopening apparently!
Another heavy landing on the first day bent the front left chassis leg in two places but fortunately they managed to the finish (admittedly in last place!)
The Scottish went a little better that year although conditions were poor. While trying to tow another racer out Katy manage to fall off the track not doing her back any good but they carried on only to run late and miss a re fuel.
Some CB work with the chase crew and Adrian's celebral friend Simon worked out that if the two and a quarter could manage 6mpg in the next few stages they'd just make service.
It didn't make it with 200yards to spare. A quick run round with a can got it going but the next day the weather really turned with some competitors including Bowlers etc never making the finish.
While all this happened Adrian was also using the racer on the road now and again. Adrian had stopped at a little pub the lakes called the Outgate Inn. As he left he put his foot down and the noise brought attention to a load of students playing snooker in a hall next to the road with a large chapel style window looking onto the road.
One of the students was me. I could only see the top half but the cage and the spare wheel hinted at something purposeful and I liked it. Fate it seems, has patience.
Foot and Mouth gave the chance to address some issues. The Salisbury was proving to be strong so the front axle was upgraded to a military spec casing and 24spline shafts (+ 11" brakes) along with parabolics all round with Decarbon shocks. A homemade snorkel also was fitted (one that could survive the odd knock!) as the K&N was prone to blocking.
Fame came when a write up (which made the vehicle appear to be the Jonah on wheels which it was at the time) was in Land Rover World on 2001:
In fact there was enough time to build a 105" coiler buggy but sadly it never made it past the rolling frame stage.
It didn't matter though as Team "Smut" was up and running well! Adrian had also done some digging and it now had it's proper age related plate as it has been a shunter for so much of it's life moving boats - "OJM946L"
2002 Adrian upgraded the cage and fitted door bars (getting in and out was a bit interesting to say the least) and by the end of 2003 the Series 3 had something not a lot of series 3's have these days. A Stage Rally Log book! It took some doing as those in command at the MSA viewed it as a commercial vehicle and thus is banned but some common sense and a lot of cajouling by a friendly scrutineer won in the end.
The first event was Grizedale Stages 2003 which featured "that roll":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bN85X9TiImM
I'd started doing road rallies by then and knew Katy and Neil. When I dug the series 3 that is now my trialer back out the barn and coverted it from Student transport to off road toy I met Adrian and Simon as well in "CROC" Cumbrian Rover Owners Club.
Both Simon and Adrian ran range rovers and had done all the necessary courses etc to be approved LPG installers. One issus the racer had was that the SU had never really worked properly and the mixture was always a compromise. An LPG kit solved all that in a stroke and the compression could be wound up with no issue of pinking. It went even faster!
In 2005 quite a few stage rallies were entered including the Malcolm Wilson the Lion Stages and as always the Grizedale.
Ok it was slow compared to the rally cars but importantly it was never last either. Being built for hillrallies made it nicely tough for doing the "smooth" forest rallies.
I was servicing for Adrian on the Malcolm Wilson 2005 and at the time I was writing the club newsletter.
[i]Imagine in the scene: It’s bitterly cold, windy and beginning to snow. Simon Hobson, Alex
Cowsill, Neil Master and myself are sheltering behind the open hatchback of Neil’s car
watching the hard work going on in the car park around us.
To our left an Impreza rally car arrives and expires on the spot with smoke billowing from its
orifices. To our right a team of lads run round working on a Metro 6R4 (hmmm 6R4…dribble),
it’s eaten it’s tyres, and the spare which lives under the bonnet is proving difficult to change.
(Probably because the front end, where the spare lives is looking a bit dog eared and the front bumper looks shredded.)
Across the car park someone’s straightening the sump guard and gear linkage on a Peugeot 205
which, like the Mk2 Escort beside it, is missing its exhaust system and back bumper.
This is the harsh reality of doing the Malcolm Wilson Rally in a car. Alex quietly surveys this
scene of expensive engineering destruction and says: “If I was going rallying I’d definitely use a
Land Rover”. Never a wiser word spoken!
Given the cost of an entry fee for a stage rally why on earth would you do it in a £30,000 car that
will do it’s best to self destruct by the first bend? OK Adrian Loxam’s Series 3 wasn’t the fastest
thing through the forests, (or the slowest, I might add) but I get the impression Adi and Katy had
fun and of course the slower your motor the more competitive driving time you get. Last year I
worked out that competitive driving time on the Cumbria Classic Caper rally cost me about £8.50
a minute. (yep I thought “ouch” too) But if you were in something quick it would be over a
tenner!
Anyway all this got me thinking about that old saying about how Land Rovers are so versatile.
Not just as work horses but in motorsport in general.
CROC, like North Lakes 4x4 maybe primarily a trialing club but I think we should never ignore
the other fun things you can do in a Landy…… Steady now, all those with depraved minds……
The green (or black) oval is obviously common in Winch Challenges, Comp Safari’s and Hill
rallies. But as well as this they often appear in every sort of rallying created. I can’t think of any
vehicle that in near standard form has competed in so many different motorsport disciplines.
Especially one that was originally designed for use as a small tractor!
It’s quite ironic, that given the media hype surrounding modern “form over function” softroaders:
If you set out to own a genuine ”Sport Utility Vehicle”……..
……..You should really be buying live axled Landy![/i]
After that Adrian had an accident in his daily driver (A 3.9 range rover) and yes he was fine and in true style as the rangie was a cracker prior to the crash he started work on building a Range Rover rally car. Having seen it in progress it's going to be loud and surprisingly light!
But that meant the Series 3 had to go. I couldn't buy as I'd just rebuilt my series (again) to go historic rallying in (which was to be turned back into a trialer in the end) and then bought another house and so it went back into the magazines and it passed into dark hands.
The doors bars as it was used as toy by someone who wasn't really well versed in these things. It was spotted around south lakes getting slowly worse.
When it began to missfire plugs and leads were changed and it was driven until it literally stopped under a tree in a village near Kendal. And that's where it stayed. The overdrive had been taken out as well.
2 months passed by which point it was out of Tax and MOT and 1 week away from being taken by the police and scrapped. It's last week before the reaper came was the week was the "Car's the Star show" which I like go to with the club stand Simon was there and I heard that Katy Master had been rung up about this land rover “abandoned” (it still had her name on the side).
Katy was the show organiser so after getting the details I went for drive and found it. Trouble is the owner was now missing and no one knew where he lived. I got to do "The Prisoner" line in the nearby pub when the barmaid asked what I'd like and I could reply "Information....."
The owner was desperate to get rid especially when it wouldn't even fire up to clamber onto my trailer. I gave him some notes and off he tottered/staggered. I didn't care that it looked in a bad way and didn't run I HAD TO SAVE IT!
Once home I found the chassis to be pretty good (only where high speed stones have chipped the chassis were there any issues. It’s not great but it’ll do. Bulkhead was fine. The engine however had an inch of head gasket missing between pot 3 and 4!
I rebuilt the head and cleaned everything up and put it back together. It runs like a dream! Admittedly a very cammy/no torque at tickover/twitchy dream but smooth none the less.
The cage was rubbed down and galvafroided straight away and shortly afterwards I put some new wing outers on to tidy it up a bit more. The back axle needed a full rebuild and the rear prop was shot to so a normal series 3 back axle with pegged diff has gone in/
Work continued bit by bit as I was still working on our cottage but things were looking rosy for it.
A full repaint is in order as well as the colour I started to use I don't like so much. Back to bronze green I think
After a repaint (still not happy really but it'll do) it looked like this minus the number boards:
Come October sporting a Simon BBC ignition we did the Solway Historic Rally.
Cracking day although at 120competative miles very long in such a loud motor.
Thanks to my brilliant wife calling the notes faultlessly all day meant no penalties and so we came 11th overall!
And 1st in class beating the big engined Escorts and Triumphs!!!!
We came in just over 2 mins behind the fastest car and nearly 6 mins in front of the slowest which is nice. Never stood a chance on any test even the gravel ones but consistancy pays off!
Some Photos (taken by a kind mate who was at the Rowrah tests) It was so wet in the morning the wipers were understeering!
Back in the afternoon:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedd...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedd...
After the rally to help with the tighter stuff I fitted a Detroit Truetrac in the back along with stiffer dampers all round as well as stiffer rear parabolics and I can confirm it does donuts rather well! :
Also thanks to Roland at ACR tuning I got the bits to rebuild the carb and it now runs on petrol of a fashion certainly well enough to be used on road link sections should LPG getting low.
It went back in the garage for a few months while I carried on doing trials and came back out for this summer. I treated it to a VIP100 LPG trimmer which as hugely improved the running but does nothing for the economy.
We then threw an entry into the Lakeland Classic and found this was a different kettle of fish with some of the top classic rallying boys as well.
I set off from South Cumbria for a gentle drive through the county to the start some 46 miles away. Got almost half way when the misfiring kicked in big style and it all came to a halt. One dizzy in super retarded mode! A quick bit of timing and one very tight pinch bolt later and it was running better than ever.
Sat at 50mph on the northern roads and stopped at Rheged fuel station. It was virtually full when I set off...and about 48miles had past and 24 litres went in. Today was going to be interesting!
Got signed on at Penrith amongst the amazing collection of motors and was presented with War and Peace or the rally pack as it's known. I'm glad I'd taken 3 clipboards!
There was 13 "tests" on private land some of which were literally flat out stages intermixed with 4 sections of Average speed on the more remote and challenging roads around the Eden Valley.
Thing is the normal road sections are given in Tulip diagram form which is easy to follow. The against the clock bits on the road you get handed in coded form as you sign on.
So for example for one 7 mile section all you have to know exactlydown to which side of the junction to drive on was this:
Start: MR91/580133
58 12 MS N590095S N596062NW G 59
And then you have to average 30mph for say 3.2 miles....then 23mph for 2.4 miles etc and at any point you'd round a corner and pull up at a unknown Marshal point to the exact second. It only takes a cyclist or tractor and that 30mph becomes something quite different.
So with maps plotted my dear wife turned up having followed up in the Puma 90. 13 test diagrams to annotate some of which looked like mind benders and we lined up just outside for the first test round a lot of brand new trucks!
I have to thank the lads from the Young Guns forum for these pics:
Some of the turns were too tight to get the back end out early without using a hydraulic handbrake. Which are currently banned for no sporting reason anyone can think of.
Non the less it went well and off we went down the road. Next test was tighter still and the one after that was on very loose shale. Good fun but still needing a handbrake really!
First regularity came up and 4 seconds after we'd been counted down by the marshal our stopwatch froze. Which meant doing the whole thing on guesswork! I think we lost about 90 seconds which is a lot.
Next couple of tests and wife had a uncharacteristic freeze on one of the tests as the diagram didn't seem to plot onto the test. This resulted in I think a number of crews blasting into a farmyard after about 1.5miles flatoutness only to find the chicane cone that looked like it should be up the yard right next to the gateway he'd just flown through. Cue some reversing and confusion!
That test was still impressive.
The last regularity before lunch was over the roads that thread between the two carriageways on the M6 before turning to the infamous Bretherdale road that meets with the Breasthigh greenlane. The farmers permission had been granted but after dropping a mere 4 seconds I think Bretherdale proved a challenge after getting stuck behind a big gay boingy 4x4 and then encountered haytiming contractors driving New Hollands flat out which is scary enough in a Land Rover with a whopping great cage but in a period non caged mini I'd have been pooing myself because with such hold ups by the end the speeds required are not something I'm going to detail.
Lunch was at the excellent Tebay Services and fueled with Beef and Stilton pie we set off for an afternoon of rallying heaven. The test at oddendale quarry was rough, loose and the landy slid about with it's tail out exactly as I wanted it too. Finished the test laughing like a maniac. After that we did a reverse of the long farm test with the odd placed cone. Knowing where it was and the fact that it was mostly down hill meant some interesting speeds even for the landy. What the Lotus Sunbeams and Mk2 Escorts were pulling god knows! We got into flat 4th a couple of times which is good considering you can enter in a road car.
Some other tests near Lowther Park may have meant some brushes with scenery put I just kept the foot down.
Arrived back at Penrith tired and deaf. Wife headed home while I relaxed for a bit at the feast afterwards and saw some provisional results.
44 crews entered. Not all doing the full event but I was told we got 17th overall. More than happy with that!
Oh and it averaged about 10mpg over the whole day. It might go faster than it did a few weeks ago but blimey can it sup!
There's still a funny rattle like piston slop but it's getting no louder so I will do my best to ignore it while I sort out another engine for the future.
Couple of rallies planned in October/November.
Tis a frequently told story but non the less apologies for the length!
In January 1973 Brian Fulton supplied a 1972 88" hard top reg to the National Trust in Cumbria. They used it for shunting duties round Fell Foot park beside Windermere.
It didn't get registered for many years and was put on the road in the 80's by which is was getting on a bit and shifted on.
In 1994 a man called Adrian Loxam bought it as 2nd car which did a lot of laning and offroading in general.
A pair of Lucas 20/20 lamps, capstan winch and some 7.50 SATS were all that was needed for good times!
This is long before the CROW or even the NERC act and many trips were made up great passes such as Walna Scar and Garburn.
Is was a trip up the Garburn pass that changed all that. Adrian and and a few others were near the top one winters day and got out to admire the view and have a chat.
Unfortunately the handbrake in the 88" let go and the still with the drivers door ajar the landy rolled off the pass and went a very very long way.
This was the result:
A team of people recovered it and Adrian did actually drive it off the pass!
Now a lot of people would have given up at this point with this motor but Adrian had a background in rallying and liked the idea of Hillrallying. (He like many had seen that episode of "old" Topgear with Tony Mason inteviewing Ian Sykes in his mental leafer.) I'd love to have a copy of that clip but anyway...
The wreck of the series 3 was taken to a workshop and a big rebuild started:
A Bettaweld external cage and truckcab were fitted along with a lot of new bodywork! All the required safety gear of buckets, harnesses, fire extingquishers went in and then he got to the engine.....
The 3 bearing block was getting it a bit tired so a 5 bearing engine was found and put in. I've said before a 2286 engine and a A series engine are quite similar well it turns out Minisport were willing to do a balanced crank and super light flywheel for the engine!
A friend took an old cylinder head and did a nice job of porting and general gasflowing it. ACR tuning supplied heavy duty valve springs as well so it sounds like a bag of spanners and always will. A set of tubular manifolds were fitted that included a 4-2-1 exhaust manifold onto a big bore performance exhaust from Roland Marlow.Fuel was fed via whopping SU carb and a K&N.
Leaf springs were still LR at this stage with Monroe heavy duty shocks all round.205R16 Stone County diamonds were the tyres of choice (shame they're all but banned now).
The first event was the 1997 Scottish Hillrally. Things didn't quite got to plan. It ate halfshafts for breakfast, lunch and dinner and on the next to last stage it broke one to many and they couldn't go on. With the overdrive in this to and a quarter petrol was doing over 60mph while in low box!
After that came the Welsh Hillrally. A different co driver this time who unfortunately got involved with a tow rope during the event and injuring his leg to the point where they had to retire.
The 1998 Scottish was up next with another new co-pilot...driver. Katy Mas
ter had been co driving on stage rallies both Katy and her husband Neil were friends of Adrian's. Once again things didn't go well. Back then there was a famouse stage a Clow featuring the "1000ft climb" which claimed the front diff. This was replaced however engine mountings were broken the the point where one or more were needing changing per service.
During the afternoon run round the gearbox kept jumping out of 4wd and Katy ended up holding it for 3 stages (not sure how!). A return to service showed that all engine and box mountings were totalled and only the handbrake linkage the yellow knob (with Katy) and the exhaust was holding it all in! Mounts were drilled out an M12 bolts were put in and have done the trick since!
The Welsh that year was worse. A hard landing shattered both front shafts with the bits welding themselves in the stub axle. The service crew managed to source and change the front axle overnight but the next day both front shafts broke again and then the rear broke as well! Game over again.
A Salisbury (with anti tramp arrangement) was fitted to the rear and the Chandlers Tour of Lincs was entered. This shortlived event was special in that it was both a Stage Rally and a Hillrally with some parts of the event being run at the same place. Even the vehicles got to set of head to head at one point. The sight of a Group A Escort Cosworth with full anti lag etc being left standing by a Rivet buggy was eyeopening apparently!
Another heavy landing on the first day bent the front left chassis leg in two places but fortunately they managed to the finish (admittedly in last place!)
The Scottish went a little better that year although conditions were poor. While trying to tow another racer out Katy manage to fall off the track not doing her back any good but they carried on only to run late and miss a re fuel.
Some CB work with the chase crew and Adrian's celebral friend Simon worked out that if the two and a quarter could manage 6mpg in the next few stages they'd just make service.
It didn't make it with 200yards to spare. A quick run round with a can got it going but the next day the weather really turned with some competitors including Bowlers etc never making the finish.
While all this happened Adrian was also using the racer on the road now and again. Adrian had stopped at a little pub the lakes called the Outgate Inn. As he left he put his foot down and the noise brought attention to a load of students playing snooker in a hall next to the road with a large chapel style window looking onto the road.
One of the students was me. I could only see the top half but the cage and the spare wheel hinted at something purposeful and I liked it. Fate it seems, has patience.
Foot and Mouth gave the chance to address some issues. The Salisbury was proving to be strong so the front axle was upgraded to a military spec casing and 24spline shafts (+ 11" brakes) along with parabolics all round with Decarbon shocks. A homemade snorkel also was fitted (one that could survive the odd knock!) as the K&N was prone to blocking.
Fame came when a write up (which made the vehicle appear to be the Jonah on wheels which it was at the time) was in Land Rover World on 2001:
In fact there was enough time to build a 105" coiler buggy but sadly it never made it past the rolling frame stage.
It didn't matter though as Team "Smut" was up and running well! Adrian had also done some digging and it now had it's proper age related plate as it has been a shunter for so much of it's life moving boats - "OJM946L"
2002 Adrian upgraded the cage and fitted door bars (getting in and out was a bit interesting to say the least) and by the end of 2003 the Series 3 had something not a lot of series 3's have these days. A Stage Rally Log book! It took some doing as those in command at the MSA viewed it as a commercial vehicle and thus is banned but some common sense and a lot of cajouling by a friendly scrutineer won in the end.
The first event was Grizedale Stages 2003 which featured "that roll":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bN85X9TiImM
I'd started doing road rallies by then and knew Katy and Neil. When I dug the series 3 that is now my trialer back out the barn and coverted it from Student transport to off road toy I met Adrian and Simon as well in "CROC" Cumbrian Rover Owners Club.
Both Simon and Adrian ran range rovers and had done all the necessary courses etc to be approved LPG installers. One issus the racer had was that the SU had never really worked properly and the mixture was always a compromise. An LPG kit solved all that in a stroke and the compression could be wound up with no issue of pinking. It went even faster!
In 2005 quite a few stage rallies were entered including the Malcolm Wilson the Lion Stages and as always the Grizedale.
Ok it was slow compared to the rally cars but importantly it was never last either. Being built for hillrallies made it nicely tough for doing the "smooth" forest rallies.
I was servicing for Adrian on the Malcolm Wilson 2005 and at the time I was writing the club newsletter.
[i]Imagine in the scene: It’s bitterly cold, windy and beginning to snow. Simon Hobson, Alex
Cowsill, Neil Mas
ter and myself are sheltering behind the open hatchback of Neil’s carwatching the hard work going on in the car park around us.
To our left an Impreza rally car arrives and expires on the spot with smoke billowing from its
orifices. To our right a team of lads run round working on a Metro 6R4 (hmmm 6R4…dribble),
it’s eaten it’s tyres, and the spare which lives under the bonnet is proving difficult to change.
(Probably because the front end, where the spare lives is looking a bit dog eared and the front bumper looks shredded.)
Across the car park someone’s straightening the sump guard and gear linkage on a Peugeot 205
which, like the Mk2 Escort beside it, is missing its exhaust system and back bumper.
This is the harsh reality of doing the Malcolm Wilson Rally in a car. Alex quietly surveys this
scene of expensive engineering destruction and says: “If I was going rallying I’d definitely use a
Land Rover”. Never a wiser word spoken!
Given the cost of an entry fee for a stage rally why on earth would you do it in a £30,000 car that
will do it’s best to self destruct by the first bend? OK Adrian Loxam’s Series 3 wasn’t the fastest
thing through the forests, (or the slowest, I might add) but I get the impression Adi and Katy had
fun and of course the slower your motor the more competitive driving time you get. Last year I
worked out that competitive driving time on the Cumbria Classic Caper rally cost me about £8.50
a minute. (yep I thought “ouch” too) But if you were in something quick it would be over a
tenner!
Anyway all this got me thinking about that old saying about how Land Rovers are so versatile.
Not just as work horses but in motorsport in general.
CROC, like North Lakes 4x4 maybe primarily a trialing club but I think we should never ignore
the other fun things you can do in a Landy…… Steady now, all those with depraved minds……
The green (or black) oval is obviously common in Winch Challenges, Comp Safari’s and Hill
rallies. But as well as this they often appear in every sort of rallying created. I can’t think of any
vehicle that in near standard form has competed in so many different motorsport disciplines.
Especially one that was originally designed for use as a small tractor!
It’s quite ironic, that given the media hype surrounding modern “form over function” softroaders:
If you set out to own a genuine ”Sport Utility Vehicle”……..
……..You should really be buying live axled Landy![/i]
After that Adrian had an accident in his daily driver (A 3.9 range rover) and yes he was fine and in true style as the rangie was a cracker prior to the crash he started work on building a Range Rover rally car. Having seen it in progress it's going to be loud and surprisingly light!
But that meant the Series 3 had to go. I couldn't buy as I'd just rebuilt my series (again) to go historic rallying in (which was to be turned back into a trialer in the end) and then bought another house and so it went back into the magazines and it passed into dark hands.
The doors bars as it was used as toy by someone who wasn't really well versed in these things. It was spotted around south lakes getting slowly worse.
When it began to missfire plugs and leads were changed and it was driven until it literally stopped under a tree in a village near Kendal. And that's where it stayed. The overdrive had been taken out as well.
2 months passed by which point it was out of Tax and MOT and 1 week away from being taken by the police and scrapped. It's last week before the reaper came was the week was the "Car's the Star show" which I like go to with the club stand Simon was there and I heard that Katy Mas
ter had been rung up about this land rover “abandoned” (it still had her name on the side).Katy was the show organiser so after getting the details I went for drive and found it. Trouble is the owner was now missing and no one knew where he lived. I got to do "The Prisoner" line in the nearby pub when the barmaid asked what I'd like and I could reply "Information....."
The owner was desperate to get rid especially when it wouldn't even fire up to clamber onto my trailer. I gave him some notes and off he tottered/staggered. I didn't care that it looked in a bad way and didn't run I HAD TO SAVE IT!
Once home I found the chassis to be pretty good (only where high speed stones have chipped the chassis were there any issues. It’s not great but it’ll do. Bulkhead was fine. The engine however had an inch of head gasket missing between pot 3 and 4!
I rebuilt the head and cleaned everything up and put it back together. It runs like a dream! Admittedly a very cammy/no torque at tickover/twitchy dream but smooth none the less.
The cage was rubbed down and galvafroided straight away and shortly afterwards I put some new wing outers on to tidy it up a bit more. The back axle needed a full rebuild and the rear prop was shot to so a normal series 3 back axle with pegged diff has gone in/
Work continued bit by bit as I was still working on our cottage but things were looking rosy for it.
A full repaint is in order as well as the colour I started to use I don't like so much. Back to bronze green I think
After a repaint (still not happy really but it'll do) it looked like this minus the number boards:
Come October sporting a Simon BBC ignition we did the Solway Historic Rally.
Cracking day although at 120competative miles very long in such a loud motor.
Thanks to my brilliant wife calling the notes faultlessly all day meant no penalties and so we came 11th overall!
And 1st in class beating the big engined Escorts and Triumphs!!!!
We came in just over 2 mins behind the fastest car and nearly 6 mins in front of the slowest which is nice. Never stood a chance on any test even the gravel ones but consistancy pays off!
Some Photos (taken by a kind mate who was at the Rowrah tests) It was so wet in the morning the wipers were understeering!
Back in the afternoon:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedd...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedd...
After the rally to help with the tighter stuff I fitted a Detroit Truetrac in the back along with stiffer dampers all round as well as stiffer rear parabolics and I can confirm it does donuts rather well! :
Also thanks to Roland at ACR tuning I got the bits to rebuild the carb and it now runs on petrol of a fashion certainly well enough to be used on road link sections should LPG getting low.
It went back in the garage for a few months while I carried on doing trials and came back out for this summer. I treated it to a VIP100 LPG trimmer which as hugely improved the running but does nothing for the economy.
We then threw an entry into the Lakeland Classic and found this was a different kettle of fish with some of the top classic rallying boys as well.
I set off from South Cumbria for a gentle drive through the county to the start some 46 miles away. Got almost half way when the misfiring kicked in big style and it all came to a halt. One dizzy in super retarded mode! A quick bit of timing and one very tight pinch bolt later and it was running better than ever.
Sat at 50mph on the northern roads and stopped at Rheged fuel station. It was virtually full when I set off...and about 48miles had past and 24 litres went in. Today was going to be interesting!
Got signed on at Penrith amongst the amazing collection of motors and was presented with War and Peace or the rally pack as it's known. I'm glad I'd taken 3 clipboards!
There was 13 "tests" on private land some of which were literally flat out stages intermixed with 4 sections of Average speed on the more remote and challenging roads around the Eden Valley.
Thing is the normal road sections are given in Tulip diagram form which is easy to follow. The against the clock bits on the road you get handed in coded form as you sign on.
So for example for one 7 mile section all you have to know exactlydown to which side of the junction to drive on was this:
Start: MR91/580133
58 12 MS N590095S N596062NW G 59
And then you have to average 30mph for say 3.2 miles....then 23mph for 2.4 miles etc and at any point you'd round a corner and pull up at a unknown Marshal point to the exact second. It only takes a cyclist or tractor and that 30mph becomes something quite different.
So with maps plotted my dear wife turned up having followed up in the Puma 90. 13 test diagrams to annotate some of which looked like mind benders and we lined up just outside for the first test round a lot of brand new trucks!
I have to thank the lads from the Young Guns forum for these pics:
Some of the turns were too tight to get the back end out early without using a hydraulic handbrake. Which are currently banned for no sporting reason anyone can think of.
Non the less it went well and off we went down the road. Next test was tighter still and the one after that was on very loose shale. Good fun but still needing a handbrake really!
First regularity came up and 4 seconds after we'd been counted down by the marshal our stopwatch froze. Which meant doing the whole thing on guesswork! I think we lost about 90 seconds which is a lot.
Next couple of tests and wife had a uncharacteristic freeze on one of the tests as the diagram didn't seem to plot onto the test. This resulted in I think a number of crews blasting into a farmyard after about 1.5miles flatoutness only to find the chicane cone that looked like it should be up the yard right next to the gateway he'd just flown through. Cue some reversing and confusion!
That test was still impressive.
The last regularity before lunch was over the roads that thread between the two carriageways on the M6 before turning to the infamous Bretherdale road that meets with the Breasthigh greenlane. The farmers permission had been granted but after dropping a mere 4 seconds I think Bretherdale proved a challenge after getting stuck behind a big gay boingy 4x4 and then encountered haytiming contractors driving New Hollands flat out which is scary enough in a Land Rover with a whopping great cage but in a period non caged mini I'd have been pooing myself because with such hold ups by the end the speeds required are not something I'm going to detail.
Lunch was at the excellent Tebay Services and fueled with Beef and Stilton pie we set off for an afternoon of rallying heaven. The test at oddendale quarry was rough, loose and the landy slid about with it's tail out exactly as I wanted it too. Finished the test laughing like a maniac. After that we did a reverse of the long farm test with the odd placed cone. Knowing where it was and the fact that it was mostly down hill meant some interesting speeds even for the landy. What the Lotus Sunbeams and Mk2 Escorts were pulling god knows! We got into flat 4th a couple of times which is good considering you can enter in a road car.
Some other tests near Lowther Park may have meant some brushes with scenery put I just kept the foot down.
Arrived back at Penrith tired and deaf. Wife headed home while I relaxed for a bit at the feast afterwards and saw some provisional results.
44 crews entered. Not all doing the full event but I was told we got 17th overall. More than happy with that!
Oh and it averaged about 10mpg over the whole day. It might go faster than it did a few weeks ago but blimey can it sup!
There's still a funny rattle like piston slop but it's getting no louder so I will do my best to ignore it while I sort out another engine for the future.
Couple of rallies planned in October/November.
rhinochopig said:
We had an s1 and an s3 lweight and the one question I have is how the hell do you dial in some opposite lock when rallying. The steering box on a landy is the slowest and most vague ever fitted to a road vehicle.
Fascinating write up thanks.
Cheers all!Fascinating write up thanks.
Its not a problem winding the oppo lock on its running out of lock that's the issue!
I rebuilt the steering box as one of the first jobs and everything steering wise is set up as best as possible and its quite direct! Last MOTing man complimented me on it he said it had been a while since he done one that wasn't as slack as a wizards cuff.
It's still too heavy though! Own fault for running bigger offset rims I suppose.
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