Inside the car with a week to go.
Less than a week to Yerington and it’s all coming together. Wiring is largely done (you can see the new conduit at the bottom of the driver’s side door). Crusty spent the morning building up attachment points for the front fenders, hammering and grinding on a couple of the rims and about 15 other things. I hammered down the rims on a couple of new fenders, then headed back to the house to paint one and the three cleaned up rims.
You can never have too many rusty rims in your front yard.
By this time next week we’ll be in Yerington, Nevada for our first off road race of the season. Another work day tomorrow, but 1107 is in pretty good shape. Most of the rewiring is done. Transmission and engine are in and car fires up under its power.
If there were cell service or Internets at Crusty’s mountain hideaway, I’d live tweet us standing around watching one guy (not me) doing all the work. But tomorrow’s update will be, in the parlance of the business, time-delayed, until I return to civilization.
VORRA organizers are marking the Yerington course this weekend and we should have a GPS file by Monday or Tuesday.
Lookie, three wire wheels later, we got us some more spare rims.
It’s amazing how much you can stuff in the back of a VW, including Bill “The New Guy” Rickard.
The Yerington 300 is Memorial Day Weekend and we’re continuing buttoning up 1107. Bill is working on a complete rewiring. Crusty has been working on reinforcing the frame and repositioning the oil breather so it won’t spray oil all over the engine compartment and Bob came by to reinstall the transmission.
Crusty has also reinforced the fuel cell box, reworked the front bumper and mapped out what needs to be done to relocate the battery on the pan. Engine should go back in on Tuesday.
A gallery of photos here, mostly of wires.
This may have been 1107’s first wiring diagram
Bill “The New Guy” Rickard came by the office yesterday and picked up the GPS unit, the VHF radio and our satcomm display to work his magic on 1107’s electrical system. I accidentally forgot the GPS/Iridium transceiver in the car and Richard picked it up earlier today and he will drop it at Crusty’s tomorrow.
All this means we should be able to travel backward and forward in time finish a race without a short circuit knocking us out of the running in time for our first off road desert race of the season Memorial Day weekend at Yerington, Nevada.
A work day this weekend. Updates as they occur.
Bill “The new guy” Rickard declared our electrical system a disaster waiting to happen. What’s up with that?
He also called it a “rat’s nest” and “TIMEBOMB!” with an exclamation mark and everything. Talk about endearing yourself to the team. So, with Crusty’s encouragement, he ripped it all out. Which doesn’t leave much for the rest of to do until he puts it all back together next week. So we’re taking the weekend off. Also, Mother’s Day.
They’ve started advertising the Xtreme Outlaws June VORRA race at a radio station in Reno. A buddy who lives there and knows I won’t shut up talking about it emailed two commercials that are airing. Interviews with Rod Hall, who designed the course. Here’s the first and here’s the second .