sorry for the separate posts, on my fone just about to load up and head down to the rally

Good luck wit the rally, I reckon that car would look kosher with the felicia style rally decals green bumpers etc.

Looks amense buddy, from a far almost looks standard!

Hope it comes back in one piece

Great to see its progressed along and good luck for the rally!

Are you going to be doing the Dukeries or Premier rally this year?

Looks awesome! Have a good rally and let us know what fell off!

Lol passed scrutinerring all ol just keeping an eye on the weather tonite, first stage for us is 10:25 so hopefully I wont be posting here before tea time

Why the front and rear have very different heights?

Just how it's parked mate I'll get a better pic in a bit

Well it's still straight anyway ;-) all good so far everything working well too. We changed the rear springs for std ones as it was a bit twitchy . Just been building confidance in it so far and trying to keep out of trouble on very slippery greasy roads

In service before 1st stage, after today's 6 stages we are 55th overall which I an happy with and now I have some confidence in the car we will push harder tomorrow and try to make a bit of time up. There are over 15 retirements already so we are doing well to be running still with the only problem being the power steering fluid boiling by the end of the stage every time meaning tight chicanes are done with no assistance lol

Is it possible to fit a bigger steering fluid reservoir so there is more capacity? Or maybe get one of those mocal oil radiators in line with the fluid return?

Yea think we just need a longer copper pipe run for the return fluid.god knows how hot it's going to get in the 5 mile stages tomorrow lol

Beer is good here tho ;-)

I suppose the other thing you could try is fitting rack stops to prevent it going to full lock.

Yes once I get a plate diff it will need lock stops, its just the revs now and a short pipe run I think . It's ok until the end of the stage at the mo, I might use a saxo electric pump yet much more reliable than the vw one is

In service before 1st stage, after today's 6 stages we are 55th overall which I an happy with and now I have some confidence in the car we will push harder tomorrow and try to make a bit of time up. There are over 15 retirements already so we are doing well to be running still with the only problem being the power steering fluid boiling by the end of the stage every time meaning tight chicanes are done with no assistance lol

Still higher from the front :p

Power steering fluid boiling!! ... That is the first time I hear about this ... Could you explain? ... Sorry for being so naive about rallying

About twitchiness, from my experience fabias are tail happy :/ ... weird but it is the case with the fabias I owned ... They are really easy to when the angle of the slid is narrow; however, when angle gets wide with a lot of corrective lock it sticks suddenly without giving you the chance to go back with the steering wheel.

Edited 27 January, 201313 yr by waool1988

Well we finished ok. 44th overall the steering problems lost us a bit of time as there was no assistance below 4000 rpm so I was having to use 1st gear a lot just to turn in to the tight stuff which just made.the wheels lose traction . It's.all straight and something to build from

At least you finished, that's the important thing.

Still higher from the front :p

Power steering fluid boiling!! ... That is the first time I hear about this ... Could you explain? ... Sorry for being so naive about rallying

About twitchiness, from my experience fabias are tail happy :/ ... weird but it is the case with the fabias I owned ... They are really easy to when the angle of the slid is narrow; however, when angle gets wide with a lot of corrective lock it sticks suddenly without giving you the chance to go back with the steering wheel.

I am using an engine mounted power steering pump instead of the fabia electric one, and it seems that there is a mismatch in flow rates causing the fluid to get hotter and with the short pipe runs I have back to the resiviour it doesn't give the fluid chance to cool before entering the pump again, it was actually bubbling after the 5.5 mile stage and I had no assistance below 5000 rpms which was a bit of a problem in the slow tight parts lol.

The rear was sat about right with the octavia springs on but too stiff for the very slippery roads and after a couple of high speed "twitches" we decided it would be safer on softer springs, front is a bit too high really and too soft on 225 lb springs for tarmac but I didn't have time to fit the tender springs so we could drop it more.

we have done 55 competitive miles with it now and the only spanners we needed were for the spring change so I am happy with that and we didn't have the tyres that would have made the difference on the cold roads.

The biggest improvement will be a plate diff and some better gear ratios but it will have to wait for a bit while I save up first.

I'm going to give my liver a break for a while now as I think I must have drank a bit too much friday and sat night lol..

It seems you had a great fun ... Very happy for you and I hope you can get your car to be the you want it soon