Westie gets a Brother

This weekend I will be clearing out the left hand side of the garage in order to make space for this:

And hopefully after a refurbishment of the donor parts and build it will turn into this:

I've ordered the kit:
Westfield Racing Green
Le Mans Hump
Crimson Interior with cream piping
New wiring Loom
Protech Shocks

I'm intending to refurbish the major components from the Midget with the only remaining debate being the gearbox.  The Type 9 conversion kit and gearbox from Westfield is a £1800 option and is relatively easy to install at a later date so I'll see how good the Midget 4 speed box is before deciding.

The Midget is being picked up this weekend and the kit pick up will be in ~12 weeks

Winter Upgrades

After the European Tour I had to buckle down and complete the dissertation for my Masters and by the time it was submitted in October the weather had turned and apart from a couple of short blats the car has spent a lot of time in the garage.

Over the winter I have a number of upgrades planned:

New Protech Shock absorbers £400
New Front ARB £200
Carbon NV flared engine bay side panels £220
Bonnet Aerocatches £40
Replace the N/S Rear Wheel Arch £220
Strip and powdercoat the Front Wishbones £30
Replace the steering Lock £25
LSD reset to 120Nm and refresh - £520

The weather was wet but mild this weekend so I ventured out to the garage.

First things I've done were (1) to refit the was to fit wishbones, (2) fit the new Front ARB which is a Westfield Sports Turbo one as it's compatible with the FW Bonnet, softer than the Inboard ARB and well matched to the Rear ARB (also a ST one), the disadvantage being that it's not adjustable, and finally the fit the front shocks.















After removing the Inboard ARB and fitting the ARB, I fitted the front wishbones and shocks.  Hopefully the flared engine bay side panels will be ready to pick up from Milton Keynes at the end of the month.

Next will be the wheel arch repair and rear shocks while I'm doing it.



















Steering lock

Euro Tour 2016

Day One

The plan was an early start and then catch the ferry from Portsmouth to Bilbao followed by an Atlantic Coast and Pyrenees Mountain Pass drive.  Unfortunately the weather was awful so we adjusted the plan and dropped down on to the motorway for the last leg just to make sure we got to the overnight stop in time.

Day Two - Pyrenees to Millau

The morning driving was incredible - mountain pass after mountain pass up into Andorra.  After lunch in Andorra we elected to drop down to the coast and use the motorway and N roads as the sky was looking threatening

Day Three -

Tarn Valley and Grand Canyon (French)

The route was "borrowed" from the Bentley Owner Club and worth the effort.  I had to pick up Myles from Nimes Airport so missed the morning but after lunch we all completed the drive through Grand Canyon with sme excellent driving and weather.  The last stage was the run down to the coast and a night in a luxury hotel.

Day Four - St Tropez and the Coast Road

Excellent weather and breakfast and photos in St Tropez followed by a drive up the coast to Cagnes-Sur-Mer.  Following the coast was very scenic and we tracked in land to find some more bending roads while heading to the overnight accommodation.

Day Five - Monaco

Grand Prix circuit half a dozen times plus stops for photos.  Chris' car needed some work as the front wishbone bushes decided to crumble.

Day Six - Monte Carlo Rally route and Northern Italy.

Lots of switch back roads - stopped for coffee at a café along the route of the Monte Carlo Rally and first taste of the Alps

Day Seven - Stelvio

After Lake Como a long boring drive to and from the mountain but totally worth it for Stelvio - I could have stayed all day.

Received a package of bushes from the UK and replaced all on the lower front wishbones on Chris' car before dinner.

Day Eight - The long One

Left Varese at 4am and got up into the mountains.  Grand and Petit St Bernard Passes driven (The Italian Job) with the 43 Euro Mont Blanc tunnel between the two.  A slight change of route included a stooped for lunch by Lake Annecy and then a run through Lyon to get to Vichy by early evening.

Day Nine - Loire Valley

A relaxed start with time for breakfast - after a faf with the paperwork/jobsworth receptionist we left at 10am and ambled through the Loire stopping at Magny-Cours where a track day was in full flow.  After coffees we headed of to Sancerre for a wine tasting and lunch before a final short leg to the over night stop.  Well it should have been short but unfortunately we fell foul of the French Police who decide that a 20 minute talking to was warranted - we eventually got to the over night stop but it took a couple of hours for everyone to meet up again.

Day Ten - Run Home

Beautiful weather again and another relaxed drive.  We had an early start and stopped after Le Mans for breakfast - omelette and coffee.  Easy crossing to the UK and a dark final run to Yeovil - just short of the estimated 3,000 miles

Cambelt Change

Whilst my engine was a new crate engine it was actually built in 2004 so the cambelt was 12.5 years old with only 3.5 years and ~12,000 miles.  After a discussion at the last WSCC Dorset meeting about preparing the cars for the European Tour I got a call from Malcolm who had bought a couple of Gates belts for £25 each and changed them on Chris' and his own car and offered to change both Colin's and mine before we left.  I'd already bought a full kit with pulleys and a water pump and had all the necessary tools but my cams weren't at the standard Ford settings after the 'swing' at Northampton Motorsports so I'd delayed fitting it until I'd worked out how to retain the offset.



















Malcolm and Dale offered to help me work out a method and we agreed for them to come over on Tuesday night.  In preparation I removed the bonnet, HT leads, spark plugs, cam cover, Aux belt , water pump pulley and all the cambelt covers leaving only the crankshaft pulley.  Malcolm and Dale arrived at 7:30pm and set to worked, the engine was set to TDC on a locking pin and the crank pulley removed.  The cams and caps were marked with a paint pen which was then scribed to provide a very accurate position marking.  Once this was done the cambelt was removed and replaced as normal and then the cams 'swung' back to the painted/scribed offset marking.  After manually cranking the engine through a full cycle and the cams checked against the paint/scribed markings with one needing a minor adjustment.  Once this was done Malcolm and Dale left me to refit all the covers etc and give the engine a quick start to make sure everything was okay - total time 1.5 hours.  As the engine was new and we were only changing the belt based on ageing I retained the existing pulleys and water pump and will change them all in 5 years.

Stoneleigh 2016

After doing Stoneleigh on a day trip last year I decided that overnighting was the best option.  With only 4 Westfields from the Dorset Area doing the trip we agreed to meet up with others from the Hampshire/Wiltshire/Costwolds Areas on the way. I met Colin at Sparkford at just before 7am and we headed off to Warminster to meet with Chris, Malcolm and Dale.  From Warminster we headed off to the services at Cirencester to meet up with the main group with one more added to the convoy at Stow-on-the-Wold.  After a spirited blat we arrived at Stoneleigh just before 11am and setup camp.

The show seemed much busier that last year in terms of visitors and Westfield seemed to have made a bigger effort with 3 cars of their stand (Zetec, Vtec and Ecoboost......very nice) plus a lot of spares and  special offers, overall there seemed to be fewer of the smaller niche stands, Omex didn't turn up (so I'll have to post Steve's ECU!) and CBS only offer a short term discount code and free postage for you to order online - I missed the ability to actually look at/measure their kit so didn't spend too much time or any money with them. 





Purchases were a pair of 55mm clear LED indicators for the rear lights, high intensity reversing and fog LED 55mm lights from SVC (about £150 the lot)

and an enamel Westfield bonnet badge (£10) I was severely tempted by the Toyo R888R offer (205/50R15 x 4 for £375) but managed to resist - the biblical rain on the journey home have may proved my decision to have been a good one.

and also led to me getting seam tape for the 1/2 hood

Mid Apr Blat

The sun was shining and after completing a few house repairs (outdoor tap and stop cock replaced and fence panel) is was out for an hour North of Yeovil.

Parked at Walton Hill - across the road there are views over Glastonbury Tor

FreeWheel Pt2

After wiring the transponder to the steering wheel the next step was to install the receiver in the car.  I mounted the main unit just above the rocker switches and the headlight relays where the BlinkStop had been fitted previously.  The wiring was straight forward - power and earth first then confirm that the two unit talked to each other.  Next I wired up Channels 1 & 2 as a BlinkStop largely replicating the wiring I'd just removed except that the toggle switch had to be wired to the output of the unit rather than input so no auto cancel on the backup.  The final element of the BlinkStop was the brake sensor, again using the wire installed previously. 

Channel 3 was wired the BeamStop which needed a pair of relays, one to replace the dipped/full beam switch and the other to switch power for the flash capability.  Channel 3 had to be wired to switch 12V to activate the relays.  When the lights are off pressing the blue FreeWheel switch flashes the headlights and when they're on it toggles between full and dipped beam.  Finally I used channel 6 as the horn, again wiring  the receiver channel in parallel with the dash switch to give a back up capability.  This gives me four spare channels for future expansion.   The wiring is a bit of a bird's nest but I've kept the Westfield Chassis Loom standard just in case I ever want to go back to the analogue gauges and also kept all the additional wires for the digidash and FreeWheel to that I can add functionality at a later date.  Plus I have the extra looms for the windscreen heater and electric mirrors.

Tricia and I have now covered about 120 miles in the car since installing it and the Freewheel has been faultless throughout - having a headlight flash is very useful and I've used the FreeWheel software to adjust the BlinkStop times to see what suits me best.  I've also slightly modified the switch panel on the steering wheel as it was slightly blocking the Digidash.

Mike's website if you're interested in the BlinkStop, BeamStop or FreeWheel
http://rowland-family.asuscomm.com/BlinkStop/