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For you was it The Bible, the works of Shakespeare, James Joyce's 'Ulysses' or one of many novels? I was impressed by Shackleton's 'South' for its courage and TE Lawrence's 'Seven Pillars of Wisdom'. For its long lasting effect on me the winner is Ron Champion's well known book 'Build Your Own Sports-car for £250' an over ambitious financial claim, with dimensional errors and not a great work of literature but its ideas carried on with me for a good number of years. I was tempted to build one of Ron's Locost cars but felt that the finished vehicle would not be worth very much. After attending some kit car shows I decided to accept the higher cost and in late 2004 I bought a Westfield SEIW starter kit for £3000. The kit gave the chassis, all the wishbones, the aluminium rear uprights and drive flanges, the pedals, brake master cylinder, brake pipes, the aluminium panels, bolts and importantly all the ZK fibreglass body panels. I bought some parts from Westfield and made some parts, such as the dash panel and made careful purchases of good used parts. Even allowing for inflation Westfield's 2004 prices were a bargain compared with the current extortionate prices on Westfield-Chesil's website. I finished the build in 2006 and got it through an SVA test at Shrewsbury and still have the car today. The urge to build a car from scratch was still there so in 2008 I set to work on Autocad to design one. I decided on a mid engine configuration of Seven size and wanted a full roll cage integrated into the chassis rather than bolted on. I also wanted a full windscreen with a curved profile. I drew the chassis and made an eighth scale stress model of it in 3 mm square balsa wood to see how the stiffness varied when members were taken in and out. On eBay I found a good 1.6 litre Ford Zetec SE complete engine and gearbox from a crashed Focus for £450. In simple terms the engine and box were picked up from the normal front position and moved backwards and dropped behind the driver. Moving the gear selector mechanism from behind the engine to in front changed the positions of the gear lever so a flipper mechanism was made to correct this. I went to several windscreen companies to see about cutting down a car screen from a template. I got 'can't be done' replies until I found someone willing to give it a go. A mark 3 Escort screen was only £28 so the deal was: if it cracked I would pay £28 and if successful the charge would be £56. Fortunately it succeeded. The only bespoke fibreglass part was the upper part on the nose cone. I made a buck and took it to a fibreglass company who made a mould and two off for £150. Quotes for painting the loose external aluminium panels were very high, one was £2000. A local powder coating company charged a very reasonable £550 to coat the chassis, suspension parts,and all the inner and exterior aluminium panels in French blue. They did a good job and the finish is still good today 14 years later. Omex mapped the ECU for me and gained an extra 20 bhp over standard .In 2010 the finished car was trailered to Avonmouth for its IVA test. It failed first go on minor points but passed second time. So this lengthy explanation is why Ron Champion's book wins for me. Mal

Meet 10am Sun 20th Oct at Whitworth Terrace Cafe, Darley Dale, DE4 2EQ for breakfast before going round the Peak District. THIS IS WEATHER DEPENDENT AND IT IS CURRENTLY FORECAST RAIN but I am posting this because I am an eternal optimist and it might just be a dry forecast by then. Please keep an eye on this post and your fingers crossed 😁

I sincerely hope it isn't, for you!

I’ve just purchased my Westfield a few weeks ago and not really had a drive in it yet. so looking forward to next year but going to do a few jobs over the winter months. I’m located in Derby and would like to do a few ride outs and track days with fellow Westfield owners

We had some great Ladybird books, I found this one super helpful back in the day...

Any of the “Secret Seven” books by Enid Blyton🫣

That might be the room I cancelled. Change of plans for the following day for us.

Looks good what size is it?

Thank you kind sir, I have booked!!

Sumptuous 👍

So - it's an OK @Julie Hall - WSCC AO Representative - drove by yesterday while working up that way, got out and looked at ramp from top, and in my opinion should be no issues at all (I wasn't able to go to bottom)

This was to be the final rounds of the Westfield Speed Series Championship in 2024. The event was organised by Longton and District Motor Club. And there were high expectations that this again would be another successful event. The running order was with the most powerful cars having the initial runs. So this meant that the British Sprint series competitors were the first to line up on Saturday morning. It was still a little bit greasy and Pete Golding managed to spin at the cork screw, this set the scene. Dave Smith in his Westfield Sports 250 with a highly modified engine reported that he had a plug down on the first practise run. Worse was to occur to Harry Moody in his megabusa. He had had problems with his drive shaft at the previous event at Harewood a couple of weeks previously and had replaced the drive shaft joint and tested it on the drive where all was well, however, 200 yards into the first practise run and the drive shaft pulled out again, so that was it, game over for Harry. In the first timed runs, it was still proving to be slippery. Dave Smith reported a spin along with Mick Dent having a tank slapper. As the day progressed, the weather conditions improved, and some good times were recorded, Dave Banner took the class record with a 52.81, Chris Boyd was happy to get back to seeing some of the times that he had set several years ago in his Sylva Riot. Steve Arkley had a good day until his final run when he suffered issues with his fuel pump, which was diagnosed as a loose connection after the run! Howard Gaskin had started the day on his Uniroyal rainsport tyres and decided to change them to his Nankans, but went slower, so he went back to his Uniroyals and ultimately three seconds faster He had suffered a misfire off the line going up to Rocket, but that cleared throughout the day and managed to finish the day on a 59.99. So he was happy with his result. Dave Smith. reported to be having a good day and was managing to get into the 55 seconds, but couldn't do any better, However, this did result in him setting a class record for the road going class.. Mick Skidmore was on form and managed to beat his PB by 0.5 seconds. John Loudon. was second in both runoffs in the British Sprint series and managed in the progress to set a new personal best beating his old time by 1.42 seconds. Mark Bishop had had a brilliant day and was looking forward to Sunday. Also going well was Stuart Gilks and he was having a good day as well, he was running with a interesting tyre combination with Avon 888 on the rears and Uniroyals on the front. He was sharing the driving with his daughter, Louise. Ian Davenport was back out again, he has not done many events in 24. was enjoying the camaraderie. at Anglesey. On Sunday, the weather forecast for the day forecast rain from late morning. So the organisers wanted competitors to get in as many runs as they possibly could in the morning session before the rain came. However, the rain did not materialise and a dry day was had! Overnight, Mick Skidmore had altered the gear ratios in his gearbox so he could have more top speed on the back straight as we were running a different circuit combination. Dave Smith had also changed class and gone from road going into the slick tyred class. Howard Gaskin kept the same tyres on that he had switched back to and the misfire was gone. So all went well on Sunday for Howard who may be retiring from competing.........Ian Davenport, on the other hand, switch to Uniroyals and had a good run. Dave Banner had the misfortune of a rod coming through the side of the block in his megabusa, so an early finish for Dave. We managed to run through the afternoon in dry conditions with no other major incidents to report. So this concluded the final round of the championship and the points ended up being. equal for Dave Banner, and Dave Smith, both scoring. 10 maximum points on 10 rounds. So the result for the Westfield Speed Series Championship was a tie between Dave banner & Dave Smith. Competition throughout the season has been great and hopefully there will be more to be had in 2025. If you are thinking about competing. I would seriously recommend it. It is just great fun and a great set of people. and some really good circuits to visit, here is to 2025.

I have the same from Ali and can confirm they are great !

We have been meeting at the Tudor Rose, on the A540/A550 crossroads at Two Mills for as long as I can remember. The inaugural meeting, in 1986, had two members. The venue is now under new management and is temporarily not available for our November club night. So we will be meeting at Ego, Little Stanney, CH2 4HT on November 5th. Bring your own fireworks. 🧨

I am doing a track day at donnington a week on Saturday if you fancy getting one in this year!!

Glad to help, its what the Club is all about! I've certainly had my fair share of help over the years too 👍

LED headlamp modules from AliExpress. I can't fit them yet, but they're cheap so I thought I'd get them now and check the connections, in case it affects how I'm wiring my lamps at the moment.

After taking a while to get these vent mesh made, they’re finally completed and installed. @Quinten the moulds worked really well - brilliant. And managed to make a spare set just in case. Moulds on route to @Flying Carrot Steve please let me know when you get them. Cheers Phil R

Hi and welcome! As @Naranja_Al says, we do loads of meets in the area (I'm based in Swadlincote). We have a monthly pub meet at the Clock Warehouse in Shardlow (1st Thursday of the month) and do loads of other meets throughout the year (if it's dry we'll be out!). A few of our favourite local haunts are Donington (watching or doing trackdays), the Superbike Factory for breakfast, Curborough Sprint Course (to watch or get on track), Mallory Park, and we often get to local classic car meets through the year. You are also well placed for the Peak District meets that @Julie Hall - WSCC AO Representative organises, these are a must for anyone in the area! We also have a local Facebook Messenger chat group you're welcome to join. If you fancy it, just drop me a Facebook friend request and I can add you in.

The racing and car control is incredible. If only F1 was this entertaining.

Absolutely amazing. That kerbside shot of double drifting is fabulous. Waaaay faster than they were in period of course as all historics are with an extra 60 years gradual development but crikey that's fun

I am not a fan of mint but did once buy some Kendal Mint Cake to try it, yuk, never went near the stuff again 😦

Spent the morning with @SXRORY at the Clevedon Cars & Coffee meet. First time trying this one out, was a really good event and well attended for this time of year. It happens monthly in Clevedon and is based around three big gatherings across the town, dividing up the cars into different eras. I think we timed our arrival well as we ended up in the centre of one of the displays. Some nice machines on show with Ferraris and Lambos etc. Saw a couple of nice Ultimas to drool over. And here's a few other random photos I took:

Nice little Westfield sticker from Demon Graphics Here. Really pleased with the quality and how well it went on.