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Take one WSCC round stoneleigh sticker, and cut some slits in the edges. Add one round, magnetic ‘bits cup’ from the trader in hall 2. (£2) bingo. DIY WSCC stoneleigh merch 😄

A combination of Dorset, Devon and Somerset cars at breakfast ahead of the Dorset Tour on Saturday morning.

😁

Provisionally sold.

Essex and Kent monthly meet and annual car weigh in Sunday 8th May @ 9:00 am Mike Rowland has very kindly volunteered to host this event at his home. Breakfast bacon rolls, teas and coffees will be available. if you fancy weighing your car please add your name, cheers meet address: Crossways Kelvedon road Wickham Bishops Witham. CM8 3 LY

Meet McDonald's, Bakewell Road, Matlock 10am for a run out around the Peak District. Who is coming?

Definitely adds to the fun

Thanks Julie. Hopefully I will see you at some point en route to Happy Hens

A maybe for me 🤞

Dish looks quite small @shrops-paul.... will all your nuts fit?

I will let you know the finish point, or we may be calling at Adam's Happy Hen's as we seem unable to drive past this place without calling in for a coffee and a traybake (ice cream if your name is Andy) @Paul Hurdsfield - Joint Manchester AO 🙁 might be near you tomorrow, text me if you want to meet up!

Only when I’m not using them @Scott Young (Captain Colonial) - Club Secretary

Not me again, working😞 This pesky jobs really getting in the way of my Westfielding!

Not Ali and me. Finally managed to escape and go boating for a while. Passing this boat today, I also wonder whether bagpuss has joined us on the water?

@shrops-paul keep his nuts in a dish? I hope he warms the dish up first.

He just want's to show off his amazing new garage! (Not jealous at all!

Just wanted to add my thanks to all the organisers and helpers following my first Stoneleigh trip (in a Westfield that is!) on the Monday:

Well, no one is going to bemoan you not being open to suggestions 😉

Got to start somewhere!

Meeeeeeeeeeee

Sorry. I agreed to photograph the local Scout Group's 10K charity run (avoid Holymoorside in the morning!) not thinking that driving season would be on us. I may get the chance to join you later depending on where you end up. Luke.

Myself and Mike headed over to Mavericks near Holywell in North Wales for their Classic and Supercars night beforehand, then took a longer, more scenic route back to the pub via Caerwys and Mold. Thanks to all that made the effort 👍.

Hopefully, me!

Me!!!

Just seen a post from last year. Hope to meet up soon. Neighbour.

Only the second time for me. Last year I made it in my (new to me) SEight. This year found an oil leak 3 days before grrr still to be fixed... Stand looked great though, a real credit to the organisers and volunteers. Stood out from all the rest. Great turn out on Saturday despite the weather not being stable as well. Managed to speak to few of you, mainly to ask inane questions about rollbar types. Were to leave my contribution to the auto jumble. Chat about cars You may have noticed me staring closely at some of the SEight's... It's not a fetish, just looking for inspiration and answering my own questions, hope you owners didn't mind lol.

Indeed I did, but mine were Sierra SDV uprights. However the theory is the same.

Sorry, just need to add that I hope we don’t see the follow up photos - if he’s a real cat, he’d be flexible enough to lick his own ball joints and tailpipe.

This was the view we got!

Thanks Nic, it’s taken much longer than I’d planned to get to this stage but this is bigger than any restoration I’ve taken on before now. I couldn’t have got to where I am now without the help of JMW motorsports who are just up the road from home and have been increasingly helpful both with the loan of their workshop space last year for the fabrication and their contacts in the motorsport community to do the jobs that I don’t have the skills for. They put me in contact with Richard who did the roll bar and chassis repairs and Andy for the engine work. Richard spends the majority of his time making repairs the BTCC and GT grids whilst Andy works for a current BTCC driver and ex LeMans GT Winner. I certainly couldn’t have found this level of talent alone.

Entered and hopefully will have a 2nd driver entering shortly.

On to todays jobs and all the rest of the engine ancillaries have been fitted and the coolant hoses connected up, I still need to route and make the hoses that run to the front of the car and connect to the radiator. The exhaust and inlet manifold have been temporarily mounted in place but due to a slight oversight on my part I’d forgotten to order a new manifold gasket so it’ll have to wait till another day before I bolt it on permanently. Oil catch tank fitted, a job for next time will be to make up the breather hoses to the engine and gearbox. The last job for the day was to swap the rocker cover over to something more befitting of the engine bay. The colour I haves it painted in is a hint at what’s eventually to come for the bodywork. Finally a few photos of how the engine bay looks now.

Yes I quite like it for all its quirks. When I was having the brazing done on the chassis I was very specific in my instructions for them not to grind flush any of the past alterations or straighten out the dents as to me they’re all part of it’s history. I considered a concentric slave but the mounting would have been complicated as there’s no flat surfaces and the original method was also slightly cheaper. the original method is also tried and tested with the AP clutch and roller release bearing as it’s the same as was used in the Bill McGovern /George Bevan Imp. Helpfully his grandson Jonathan Bevan who I bought the engine off from that car last year helped me source the parts needed.

That Japanese thing hurts my eyes!

I could fill my driveway if I went 😀 Nice to see you both today. I'll get myself on a run sometime soon👍

With the clutch fitted I could finally move on to fitting the engine. Despite the sales brochure for the car saying that it had been designed so the engine and box could be fitted as a single unit my trial build last year showed that this definitely was not the case, not least because the clutch fork needs to locate one side of a chassis rail whist the slave cylinder and the casting it mounts to on the gearbox is the other side of the rail. I forgot to take a photo of this so I’ll try and remember tomorrow. Not wanting to damage the paintwork the chassis was liberally wrapped in corrugated card and the the gearbox could then be slotted in to position. This is the originally gearbox from the car and this is the first time since 1972 that it’s been in the car as I used a scrap box for the trial build. The big job came next of lifting the engine in, this needed to be stripped of all the ancillaries to stand any chance of squeezing into the engine bay. The mounting flange on the engine for the box is actually larger than the aperture in the chassis so to lift it in the engine has to be orientated vertically with the crank pulley pointing up and then once through it needs to be laid down horizontally. Once in the engine mounts, water pump and starter motor could then be fitted before finally bolting it up to the gearbox. This whole process took the best part of two hours to get the engine and box in. At this stage one job I needed to do was make a nylon bush to support the gearbox. The original got destroyed trying to get it out when the chassis was stripped for Powdercoating and I’d not made this before as I needed everything assembled in the chassis to work out its length.

Finally some progress and a long overdue update. After an extended wait as my engine builder was busy preparing for the start of the racing season the engine is finally back together again. first job is fitting the new clutch. As the engine came with a flywheel machined for an F3 clutch when i bought it, I decided it would be a sensible upgrade for the standard imp clutch that the car originally ran as these are a known week point. I didn’t however factor quite how expensive this upgrade would be! The AP clutch also meant that I’d need a custom made clutch release bearing to suit and some minor mods to the gearbox to fit a spring to support the bearing and stop it rubbing on the unit shaft.

Not me I’m afraid, we have the grandchildren staying over on Saturday night 🙁😀🤔 🙁 = can’t come. 😀 = grandchildren staying over. 🤔 = life is complicated.

Sorry can't make this one 🥺