Leaderboard

Such a beautiful morning to be out.

After 1 year and 11 days, I can finally post a picture of the Westy on the road!

Not a lot going on as late but the tracks are coming on, only another 19 to do. Since the weather was nice I popped down to the Armortek factory to collect all the electronics and took the Wessie. 308 mile round trip. I’ll post what’s in the box when I’ve had a good look myself. I didnt take take many pictures but this Centurion caught my eye.

I slotted in the box section steel I applied a load of carbond all over the steel and underside of the housing, and then positioned and clamped it. Hopefully that will be up to the job

Up in the hills between Durham and Cumbria

He's quite a Thespian too: Another of his orange friends: Back at the trough: Chocolate orange flavour? Acting the goat: In trouble again! Is this the end of Tango Man............................................or does he escape?

I suppose it's never the end of one of these stories, who knows what happens next. But in four short years I have gone from "where can I get the oil changed" to "I have swapped out one engine and gearbox for something completely different" and I have a huge sense of satisfaction as a result. A big thank you to Mike @Kit Car Electronics and Ken @KennyP for their invaluable help and to everyone else who has encouraged me along the way, either directly or through this thread. It's home!

Lunchtime run along the South coast - car needs a clean after yesterday’s track day at Castle Combe.

Beautiful morning to be out.

So today’s challenge was clean up and modify the gearbox selector spline and tap on new M10 course thread for a carbon fibre gear knob. Did this with a spare plate. Remove and cut off old outer casing so left with spline. Tap M10 course thread, will also fit original Honda gear knob. Clean all components etch prime & paint. Also put some heat shrink on the shaft to smarten it up and protection from corrosion. Reassemble with Honda high temp grease and new bolts. Fitted new Carbon know. very please with the result and will lower the gear stick for better driving position. Now will attach to the box torque & mark with Orange pen (IVA)

He likes the Peak District too and can often be found at the trough! He's got high standards: His favorite polished chariot:

Tango Man does like motorsport when he's in the UK, especially as he feels at one with the marshalls:

Some more work on the bonnet hinge arrangement tonight

After life getting in the way, spent a bit of time and money and it is now running a healthy and smooth 130bhp after a carb tune. New tyres and tracking and now running great.

He's not adverse to danger either: He's even friends with faries:

Not a lot to show for the effort & angst...but one panel on the way. It seems to fit tolerably well so far, although the curve at the top isn't perfect so needs some 'help' to sit right. It's not too far off though, so I might live with it as-is rather than risk stuffing it up by trying to improve it. The roughly drawn circles are marks to show some panel damage from delivery - managed to make sure these will be under the wheel arch/behind the wheel so won't be a problem. I've done my best to tidy them anyway. Bottom edge is oversize at the moment, concentrating on getting it placed properly at this stage - I reckon the line of Clecos will do it...... I'll work my way up & around the curved tubes to the top with some more fixings, then I can accurately mark where I need to put a 90 degree bend in to form the edge.

So had a little play last night and this morning. Checked all the connections at all the injectors/coils/crank and cam sensors all seemed well. I could see from the ECU that it was seeing crank ok. With the cam sensor disconnected it didn't make any difference to how the engine runs which set bells ringing. Had a look through the ECU settings and noticed it was set to single tooth which from memory didn't think was right. Found a pic in my jag manual which showed it was a 4 tooth So changed that. Also noted the iacv instructions from emerald only showed the map table to set up which I'd done. However the ECU setting had not been set. So set that to 2 pin and 300hz. Could now hear the iacv actually doing something. So tried a other start and it's running much much better . Idle was way up at 2500 rpm so wound the idle stop back off now as the iacv was now doing its thing. However even with the throttle butterfly nearly closed its idling at 1900 so I guess I'll need to tweak the iacv down a little. I'll wait till I've got the plumbing back in and filled up before I run it any more now. Video of better running. Only thing I've noted is I'm getting a chirp on shutting down from the air filter. Possibly because the iacv is wide open? Not sure if the video picks up the 'chirp' if anyone has any thoughts?

A positive lie in compared to Geoffrey ( Buttercup ) 😉

How does that differ from a normal 'working week' Have a good holiday

I don't think John Hoyle runs a camera but plenty of others do. @Terry Everall - WSCC Competition Secretary. Is it worth a separate thread for folk to post their videos up of this seasons antics.

Some of the drivers of our lightweight sports cars look like they could do with a little less buffeting 🍕😄

Well, the last two session have been almost entirely given over to CAD. CAD of the dead tree carcass variety to steal a phrase. Having run out of big enough offcuts of the right material to complete the front air duct panels I decided to concentrate on the large rear panels and hope to end up with enough spare material to get back to the front panels...IYSWIM. So, after much fiddling and faffing, I got to here. This was with the wheel at full bump, minus squish on the bump rubber of course, the black marker outline s roughly where the arch will go. And here with the arch roughly placed. It might want to come up a bit from here, I'll decide once I see how it looks with the wheel at normal ride height. And this is with the profile of the rear edge tweaked a bit, it still needs some more tweaking to tidy the rear edge around where it dives forwards. It's close to what I plan on though. On the bottom right of this last picture, you can see a couple of magnets I used to hold it in place and they define where the curved lower rear chassis tube goes. The bit of panel behind this will be unsupported, but I think it needs this extra bit or the arch will be too close to the back end of the car, visually speaking. Thoughts & opinions welcome. Not a great picture, but this is what's behind the cardboard. I've brought the profile about 25mm back from the rear edges of the smaller vertical and horizontal tubes and will weld some 7mm round bar to the edge to soften it. The alternative would be to cut the panel tight to the tubes and maybe put some piping or similar on the joints to make them IVA compliant. I think the round bar will look better and it'll add a bit of stiffness anyway. Also, I kind of like the idea of the recessed rear panel it'll give. Having the sides extend slightly beyond and with the curved up rear panel it'll form something vaguely diffuser-ish....for whatever that'll be worth! Keen to get back to cutting metal, I took the plunge having made these two templates, which are pretty close to right, and marked out two sets on aluminium sheets. Apart from a few odd shaped offcuts, this took an entire 8' x 4' sheet, leaving me part of the last one I have left to make the engine cover, with just enough left over for one mistake.....no pressure. Yes, I did remember to flip them over so the good surface will be on the outside of all the parts

Hi Folks for our usual pre Christmas get together I’ve booked the “ Glover Arms” , Crieff road , Perth. On Sunday the 1st December at 1pm, bring your wife’s , partners and as the weather will be questionable Westies are optional if you can let me know who’s coming I can confirm numbers with the Glover Arms Gary Brian Rab Brad & Diane Jim & Jean Michael

Wow, just wow!

Two more shed sessions with very little to show for it apparently.... Although it looks pretty much the same as at close of play Friday, a lot of time has gone into it, not least because some numpty put some holes in the wrong place so had to move them along a bit. Evidenced by the stripped off protective film and hint of filler. I welded up the incorrectly placed holes, ground back the excess and put a light skim of filler over the top. Came out well, considering, and I haven't even distorted the lovingly crafted curve either, which was nice. Having sorted that SNAFU, I then very carefully marked the location for a 90 degree bend along the top edge to form a lip that sits tight to the longitudinal tube that forms the boundary for the engine bay opening. Must have got that bit right as it came out bang-on. Today was trimming the bottom edge accurately then marking and drilling the row of fixing holes along the bottom, which competes this panel for now. I then moved to finessing the template for the next panel, working to this panel as reference. Completed that and made a start on cutting it out in metal. Not quite finished that, but I predict another couple of sessions will be needed to complete it. I may need to add an extra bit of structure where the panels meet around the curve. Happy enough with them elsewhere, but unless I can get the next panel to bend exactly the same as this one, it'll need some help. I was wondering if I could find some sort of suitable aluminium extrusion that would do that - kind of a miniature carpet threshold strip IYSWIM. I briefly thought about putting a joggle on the overlap but I really don't think I could get it accurate enough around a curve. The simple alternative is a backing piece with two rows of rivets, but I don't fancy that.

As an impartial owner of similar items - I’d like to point out that the damaged bits* in that last photo will make no difference whatsoever to the way these operate. You just need to make them air tight and job done. I may also have a spare gsxr TPS lying around - need to check the garage (awaits comment from @Trevturtle) EDIT *not inc TPS in that statement as I have no idea if it works - but damage to the throttle body itself is purely cosmetic once sealed.

Here are a few pictures from today. Thankyou to everyone who came today. It was a shame that the event was not as well supported as last year as there must have been around 50% less cars and no side stalls other than a cleaning stand. All set in a lovely setting and the more you venture around the gardens etc, the more things you find. Sewerby Hall is a lovely day out if you are ever in the area. Big house to explore, gardens, zoo, golf course etc, etc.

Ha ha, so true. Trying to make this engine look nice is like putting lipstick on a pig!

Oh, the perversity of it all.. I had an Alfa with German made car computer/entertainment gadget, and you have a German car with Italian made computer/entertainment. Guess the Italians were smart enough to not use Italian electrics Ditto, hope you get a satisfactory and not too painfully expensive fix.

More work on the bonnet hinge today. First job was to shape the box section to the shape of the nose. This involved a cardboard template and the sledgehammer A few sharp blows, and it was done

Never got those problems on me old cortina.......😁 Hope you get a satisfactory fix...

Update: Good news! My insurance company has authorised the repairs on my car 😌 I was concerned that they might write it off with the estimate of over £5.5k to fix it. Given the complexity and lead times on some of the repair items, it won't be back on the road till next year. Ah well ... 😩

Indeed, if you’re touring, and simply needing to cover the miles, petrol stations for most, do come roughly at a point when you do need to stretch your legs and take a short break, anyway. - We’ve forgotten, (us older types) or simply never experienced, (the younger ones), how tiring and uncomfortable, long distance travel was in most cars below the luxury level, once upon a time. The other consideration in a Westfield, is that if you went too far, with the fuel capacity, ignoring all the issues of finding space, pumps etc. you would suddenly find the weight difference between a fully fueled car and one with only a gallon or so left, was suddenly, in proportion to the overall weight of the car, huge. This would then make suspension set up much trickier, as you’d need to choose weight would you set it for, resulting in more of a compromise at the other end of the scale, leading to more varied handling, between full and empty.

A great morning in Lancashire..... couldn’t resist a 6.50am start 😉!!!

Sometimes the solace of a petrol station is welcome relief after a few hours in a westy 😁

Awesome, sounds lovely. Good stuff mate

That sounds sweet!

It was a pleasure to meet you all and have a good old chin wag. I really enjoyed the convoy coming in, the noise and look fo the cars. Such a good variety. Hopefully see you all again sometime.. Regards Patrick

Looks a lovely car mate in great nick - engine very clean too. GLWTS. Mart,

Well done John but also to everyone who has taken part this year. Many people have exceeded personal bests by using products from our valued sponsors which gives me great satisfaction, particularly those on a certain brand of slick There are still a few events to go to finalise the placing so dont take your foot off the gas just yet

MORE PICTURES ADDED. Feel free to contact me for more information. Car located in Warrington.

New starter is in and working fine. So round 2. I'll confess this is 2nd start. But it runs. Lumpy and rich but it starts!

Brake lines and peddles all lined up and marked off. Inlet cleaned primed and sprayed. Removed rocker cover for paint prep and check lifter gaps.

So after 9 years she is off for checks and the final SVA.

Checking out the kitty litter at knockhill at the weekend Pictures rights go to flat out photography

Maybe the term ‘current’ husband is just about to be updated.

One cage loose fitted ready to mark up and drill the holes for the main hoop and the sides. Newer chassis use a welded in plate to secure the cage which means I don’t have to put the side supports in. Hopefully it means some smaller holes through the side panels. Just need to to double check it’s all square then bolt it down tight and go for it!

Good run to the factory today so Dave could pick up his new motor, just a few details. Westfield FW limited edition. Ford zetec on standard fuel injection. Wide front suspension with four pot calipers. Limited slip diff, and lots more which Dave will tell you about when he gets on the forum. Dave's new Westfield

Here's some photos of the models currently in the cabinet.

Painting 😎😎