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A run out to Wellesbourne today!

A couple more from Curborough

@ianali you’ll be pleased to know Becky has washed my trousers 🙄 Just for fellow enthusiasts I can confirm there is something more Solid than dried weetabix 🫣 don’t leave cow stuff on your car overnight, the effects are your garage smells like a farmyard and the amount of soap and water to loosen it up was unbelievable , I’m off to spray wd40 and brake cleaner in the garage to make it smell normal again 🤣 cheers Andy

We had an amazing morning at Turweston Aerodrome for the inaugural Westfield XI meet up. Four XI's (and one Renault Clio V6) showed up which was a great turnout, given the rarity of this model, and how spread out we all are over the UK. It is amazing that even though there is only one model/ version of the XI, each one clearly stood out as being stamped with its builder's own unique identity. In addition, we had current builders, a past builder and two under age apprentices (😃). The weather was very kind to us, with thunderstorms being forecast for after lunch, but not materialising. There was plenty of chit chat and admiring of each others cars (and the food at the cafe was great too). We even had a 'Le Mans race start' to see who could race their car to the cafe first! Sadly the chap on the end (er hmm!!!) didn't get the memo and thought it was a robotic breakdance-off 🤓. Here's to the next one 🥳

Tis a gorgeous car indeed. Was lovely and warm when we got south of the Peaks huh 👍

I wrote some stuff about the pics I just posted, but the words have disappeared, along with my comb I think. Despite feeling a little bullied by some today, it was a brilliant day out with some lovely people, though some are a little cruel at times. Lovely chat as ever about the usual stuff. Engines and cake, cake and sperm banks, nothing out of the ordinary. Hope you(or Becky) have cleaned up your little accident Mr Gilbert! Thanks for organising another terrific day Julie & Glen. Look forward to the next one guys 👍

Another great day out with friends ……….. 🤔 Finding the lovely quite back roads Following the sunshine @Julie Hall - WSCC AO Representative can always find the best roads 🙄 how do you know it’s autumn not spring ……… in the spring there’s more moisture on the road so you can get rid of cow stuff before you arrive home in the autumn it’s bright and sunny so cow stuff sets like concrete before you get home 🫣 Parking ( dump it and run) at lunchtime follow this car if you want cake 🤪 thanks for a great day and see you all soon luv Andy & Becky

I'm sure there will be lots more photos in the appropriate forum area from the inaugural XI meet up. To wet your appetite though, here are 4 prime examples.

There are some brilliant photo's there, @ianali @aeg please thank the ladies for their efforts. Calendar entries is open! I thought we had gone to the garden centre for some bags of manure, but you had bought it with you Mr Gilbert, it's good for the garden you know. I fancy lamb for tea, can't think why😁

Meeting somewhere North of Nuneaton were 5 Westfield's. The sunshine totally ruined my photo so Iam hoping someone else has a better one. Cupola Cafe car park Cold, clear air combined with sunshine on the back country lanes made for an excellent run out. I might have forgotten a turn and ended up on a different route but no-one noticed and it worked out better than planned. That landed us at Chatsworth Garden Centre for lunch, where Chris and Mo were waiting for us. Chris gave us the upsetting news that his back is no longer conducive to driving the Westfield and it is now up for sale. Look out for it coming up in the For Sale section, it's a well maintained one with lots of history of it's reliability documented on here, as it has been used in the Peak District for the last decade. Here we are in Chatsworth, thankfully Ian had sorted his hair out before we let him loose in front of the lens This one is called Andy, that means he is capable of eating lots, it seems to be a thing in the Peak District. A full English, followed by fish and chips eh Meaning we then needed dessert and with that sun still putting it out we were not in a rush to go home Look at 'em, like vultures they are A hilarious day out in a wonderful part of the world. It was our first cold one and it really makes me look forward to the next season, snuggling down into the Westfield all wrapped up, electric clothing on, no caravans/tourists, less cyclists and searching out the real fires in the pub, bring on winter. See you all next time and thanks for coming everyone, hope you've enjoyed it too XXXX

If there’s no front window or windscreen, then it’s definitely a must! And it’s not just about stones — my friend once hit a bird while riding a motorbike, and he almost fell!

After the torrential rain on Saturday, Sunday morning turned out to be really nice. No rain, sun shining and the chance of a breakfast, what could go wrong? Nothing. We had 6 Westfields, including Oliver, @OllieP, out for his first run in his newly purchased white FW from Toybox, nice to meet you, a MX5 and a Karman Ghia. Also joining us was returning member Richard, @Rickyboy100 in his V8 a brief flirtation with a BMW. Welcome back Richard. After feeding, we went over to Ackworth for the show on the cricket ground. Fully expecting the grass to be waterlogged, but it was surprisingly dry. Great work by the groundsman.

A couple from Curborough today

I know this has probably been chewed over a number of times im still going to throw it out there.I had just put the megablade clutch back in and decided to take it for a little shake down I only have an aeroscreen so always wear a crash helmet thank God I do minding my own business traveling at about 50 mph a car passed me bang a large stone hit me straight between the 👀 eyes I was surprised at the force of the impact jolting my head back slightly and I thought instantly if I hadn't been wearing a helmet that would have been at least an eye gone at worst a knock out if I had been going considerably faster within national speed limits of course like all Westfield drivers it could have been a different outcome the visor held up really well with just a scuff I think it must have flexed and absorbed some of the impact a peak cap the wrong way round with shades might look cool but it definitely won't stop much get your helmet on be safe and have fun.

What if I put an orange go faster stripe on the orange XI?!

I do. Can be a bit of a faff if you don't have 2 inch hans harnesses. I have a schroth one. Fits well. My advice would be to go and try one on. I got mine from rallynuts because I could try different sizes

I'll take it. Pm your details for payment.

Its finally here! My SBFSs Storm cap! Ordered in January. Only thing is I'm away on a work trip so cannot try it for awhile. But hopefully I'm all good for using the westfied on a camping trip next summer

Yes,. please!

That’s a lovely car in front of you @ianali 🤪 thanks for the southern companionship were you just in shirt sleeves when you got home 😎

Your wish is my command 😎👍

It will be totally different i had the same every time I hit the gas it went sideways so after a check 32psi which I found strang as mk sportscars done mine.

With covers…. I realised after coming back why the car felt a bit strange and bouncy. Pressures were 32psi, inflated by the guy that fitted them as I forgot to tell him any different. Now reduced to 18 so I’ll see how I go with that.

Finished at Harewood Hillclimb today! Spotted this little Westfield sign. Only made bigger by me & the couple who kindly took the picture. Thought I was mad!

That looks great @Julie Hall - WSCC AO Representative 👍 I used to work for Rolls Royce in Derby but would occasionally visit the Hucknall site as part of my work. They seemed to do a lot of the more interesting tests, including the fan blade off test you mentioned, plus bird ingestion and water spray testing etc. I would be interested to go to the museum, and if there is a group of us even better 👍

https://youtu.be/vf6IaQCNCUs?si=nSnH3LicE5RhTAnd

Quick blat out towards Chard, then a stop at Waitrose. Just testing out the 15” winter wheels/tyres. Will look a bit better when I put the hub covers on 🤪. Still missing one unfortunately.

Doesn't a 'go faster stripe' trump that though? 😃

Well it's blindingly obvious which is the fastest one right? 🍊🍊🍊🍊🍊🍊🍊🍊

Extra charge, by reservation only.

Missed many great pictures, loved them all! What amazing cars! But I was involved in a TD that was announced last minute, and with such great weather I had to take the MNR there — to pay back and do justice to all the effort that went into building it.

It has started to become an annual event for us in Derby & Notts to do a trackday our two so a bunch of us had booked the Opentrack Donington GP evening for the 1st September. We were all nervously weather watching all weekend as it looked like rain, thankfully we needn't have worried as we had amazing weather! Sadly @Steve Bosworth @Naranja_Al and @Glynn Walters couldn't make it so we ended up with five cars with 5 different engines..... @Tim Coles in his 280+bhp ecoboost engined SEIW @Nick Mucklow in his 185bhp Duratec Silva Striker. Nick had taken Glynn's spot at the last minute. @DanDB in his 200bhp Zetec SEIW @ben1975 in his 180bhp R1 MNR Vortex Myself in the MegaS2000 We also had a load of spectators, including Tony, Rachael, Iain, Hedley, Tim's son, and Jonny (my brother in law who had come for his first track experience). Great to see you all, and thanks for cheering us on! Waiting for the briefing, we were all surprised and delighted to see @Simon Waterfall Syman84 who had brought one of his BMW race cars for a shakedown before the next round at Croft this weekend. Simon has graduated from the Sprint Series, through MX5 racing and now is a multiple race winner in the BRSCC BMW 1 Series Supercup, I was looking forward to seeing the car on track! After the sighting laps, we sat out the first 10 mins and were amazed that there were no red flags.... time to get out on track! With Jonny strapped in my passenger seat, we all headed out slowly building up our pace. We spotted Ben on the grass at one point, thankfully was fine and had pulled off due to a sticky throttle. Thankfully, he made it back to the garage and was seconds to sort (debris under the pedal). Having a look at laptimes, I was pleased to see I'd managed to get into the 1m54's with two 16 stone blokes on board and a lot of traffic to pass. I'd been a little worried how Jonny would find the experience but he absolutely loved it, getting out of the car with rhe biggest of grins! My last (and first) time on the GP circuit two weeks ago had seen me get down to 1m52.6 running solo and felt I could improve on that... so I went out for a run without a passenger to really wring it's neck! A few laps later I headed in to check my times and was so pleased to see I'd managed a 1m50.5, much, much better. I think im going to need some tuition to get much quicker than that.... I had been running with and passing a couple of race winning Ginettas (a G40 from the 750MC roadsports and a stunning 60's G4R that has had many class wins in the HSCC and CSCC). The G4R in particular was amazingly fast and consistent, taking beautifully clean lines, he had far more talent than me! The other guys had also been charging round, getting in very quick laps in the 1m56 to 2m0 range, we had a great atmosphere in the garage 😂 Heading back out with Jonny riding shotgun again, we had only just got to Redgate when I saw Simon in the BMW 1 Series looming in the mirrors! I pulled aside to let him by, then set about chasing him down the Craners. It was amazing fun following him for a couple of laps, a fabulous opportunity for someone of my meagre talents to watch a pukka race driver's lines and braking points up close. We had a bit of traffic on occasion but were pushing hard when the track was clear. The memories of chasing him down the Craners at over 100mph, throwing the cars through the Foggy Esses, and then sideways trail braking into the hairpin are truly bucket list stuff 👌 Back in the pits and still buzzing, we were all comparing laptimes. Ben who had been lapping in the 1m56 bracket was pulling my leg about my Racechrono app being about 5 seconds optimistic vs his far more expensive AIM Solo he has fitted to the bike engined MNR 😂. Challenge accepted, we went out in tandem so he could follow me round and either prove or disprove the myth! With Ben clamped to the FW rear end, we charged round for a brilliant couple of laps through a bit of traffic before he got over enthusiastic on the power exiting from the Melbourne hairpin and had a harmless low speed spin.... it looked brilliant in the mirrors 😂 In the garage, we compared times and he had managed his personal best. My Racechrono app had me at 1m51.88, with his AIM Solo registering his lap at 1m51.79, result! It is amazing how closely matched his light bike engined car is to my heavier car engine over a lap. Nick, Dan and Tim had also been charging around, making the most of the fading light. Tim had swapped his new wheels/tyres for the R888R's he'd all but worn out on the hairpins of the Alps trip (his son had brought them in his daily), these were totally destroyed by the end of the day 😂 It was a fantastic evening, all cars ran faultlessly and everyone was safe, and all had a great time. Track etiquette was generally pretty good and we only had one red flag (the G40 had a gravel trap excursion). As always, you get some fantastic photos as a memento, here's a few I've downloaded and edited. Simon and Dan at the Old Hairpin Dan chasing Nick through Coppice Tim proudly displaying the 2024 Alps Peaky Blatters stickers on the side heading up from Mcleans Ben chasing me down the Craners on our 1m51.8 lap. Chasing down the beautiful (and very fast!!) Ginetta G4R through the Old Hairpin Heading down the Craners Using up the last of the sunshine! Simon looking focused! Tim and Dan at Coppice Nick pushing hard at the hairpin

@Hedley Bennett (HB46443) - Club Chairman strikes again with an amazing shot! @ben1975 and I giving it the full berries chasing @Simon Waterfall Syman84 in the BMW Supercup car down the Wheatcroft Straight

Have a great day @Simon Waterfall Syman84 🎂🍺

I'm sorry to announce the passing of Andy Cutts, @MR.C suddenly last Tuesday. Andy had been out on his bike, then felt unwell afterwards and taken to hospital after suffering a heart attack. He had not been unwell before. A life long biker who came to Westfields around 5 years ago and also a keen green laner, who helped out many of us with his mechanical knowledge, including finding a dodgy connection in my ignition system. Andy had retired earlier this year, he was 62. Our thoughts go out to his wife, Helen.

Hi @AndrewBClarke. Sorry, we can't make it this year - just checked diaries with the boss. We have a room reserved at the hotel on the Saturday night too, so will release that in a minute if anyone was struggling to find somewhere to stay