Fressingfield Oily Rag Club

Newsletter

December 2017

FORC: “A loose affiliation of motor sport enthusiasts”.

December meeting preview: For our last meeting of 2017 we welcome Stuart Rolt to Stradbroke Community Centre on Wednesday December 13th. So where to start? Stuart promises a fascinating visual presentation of the Rolt dynasty. Many of you know that before WW II Stuart's father, , was an up and coming racer before hostilities drew him from Donington to, eventually, Colditz!. Post War, racing in Connaught single seaters and Nash-Healey sports-cars, led to works Jaguars, winning at Le Mans with Duncan Hamilton in 1953 in the C- type– the 'called from the bar race' - plus Connaughts in Formula 1. Eventually his research into 4-WD led to the 'F1 Tractor' the Ferguson P99, the last 'new' front engined Formula 1 car, and the only 4 wheel drive machine to win a F1 race, the 1961 Gold Cup, driven by . That's before, like father like son, we get onto Stuart's own racing and rallying exploits which range, for starters, from Formula V and Clubmans to International Touring Cars in the 1970's – The Silverstone TT and Spa 24 Hours for example, Historic Racing in Cooper, and rallying in Porsche 911, followed. In between all this Stuart managed to fit in Chairmanship of the BRDC for nine years up to 2016. And that’s just skimming the surface! Now the P99 is back in the hands of the Rolt family, a unique and competitive sight at major historic race and hill-climb events. Another FORC evening not to be missed! No time to lose – book it now!

©James Ellacott/Primotipo 1963 , Warwick Farm. finished 6th in the Ferguson P99 with 2.5 Litre Climax power entered by Rob Walker.

THE 2018 FESTIVE FUELLING FRIDAY 26TH JANUARY Booking is open for our annual get together at the Fressingfield Swan Inn.

As well as a great informal social evening, plus Mat's excellent two-course carvery, you will be able to see a review of all FORC activities from 2017. After our meal we will announce the 2018 guest speaker programme!

Numbers are limited so better book now: • Register on the Programme web-page, then: • To make payment by BACS (Preferred) our details are Sort Code 20-16-12, Account No:93689689. Reference: Festive Fuelling • or send your cheque payable to Fressingfield Oily Rag Club to Mrs Hazel Allchin, 3 Police House, Bramfield Road, Halesworth, IP19 8DU • Or you can book at our Stuart Rolt evening at Stradbroke on Wednesday 13th December! If you plan to come as a party of four or more and want to sit together please tell Carol Wyatt (01379 586225 or email [email protected]). All bookings will be acknowledged.

The View From The Editorial Desk December 2017

The anatomy of a hopefully un-typical FORC meeting......

Monday November27th: Just two days to go to our penultimate Stradbroke meeting of 2017: Steve Nichols in conversation with our very good friend Motor Sport Magazine features editor Simon Arron. The phone bursts into life; it's Simon.... Sod's Law is a name for the axiom that 'if something can go wrong it will' or perhaps it's Murphy’s Law the axiom of which says that 'Whatever can go wrong will go wrong'.....either way Simon has a bad case of the lurgi. His Doctor has told him to keep warm and rest and he should be OK for Wednesday.

I promised Steve that Simon will be there to 'interview' him so what to do? Get on the internet, surf through my library, bless Jo Ramirez for some excellent stuff in his book, I need a list of topics, I've got less than 24 hours to compile and rehearse. Call Roger Shipp: 'Sorry mate, I'm going to have to miss out on the trip to take your gearbox for rebuild' I need all the time I can get.

Ah, I remember: this time last year I inveigled David Whitham into 'helping' me interview Oli Jarvis – was that really a year ago! David readily agrees so I send him my list of topics. We agree a loose strategy and set it up so that David takes Simon’s place at supper. John Holder calls in sick so we are a little short on the set up team. David, bless him, will collect Steve from The White Horse. Simon says he might still make it but sends his topics just in case. First thing Wednesday he's, if anything, worse so Plan B is triggered, at least I can take John's place setting up. Off to Stradbroke and we get stuck into chairs. 4.30: David should be picking Steve up now. 5.45 call from Sarah Reynolds: no sign of David and Steve. Ring The White Horse: they've just left....relax.

Hopefully to outward appearances the evening went well. Steve is a lovely laid back man with a 30 odd year fund of stories from the days when Formula 1 also meant motor-racing. I enjoyed it, hope you did too; just want this to remain an un-typical prelude to a typical FORC meeting!

All from me for now. Look forward to seeing you all at Stradbroke on Wednesday 13th December for Stuart (and Freddie) Rolt which promises to be another fascinating evening....keep calm.....

Fun and safe Oily Ragging

Steve -

Do you know who you sitting next to at Stradbroke? No. 275

James Clarke's 2017 Racing Season by Malcolm Clarke

James raced in two series, the BARC Clubmans Register in a Mallock Mk 27 (named Mad Dog from the Barry Foley Catchpole cartoons) and the HSCC 'By Box' Historic Touring Cars in the Lotus Cortina.

Photo submitted. Winning in the Mallock at a soaking wet Thruxton.

The Clubmans series started a bit slowly, as the new car wasn't ready for the first three rounds at Croft and Pembrey, so James had to race the slower Catchpole car in the higher power CSP1 class. By the third round at Silverstone GP, the car was ready, we had a test day beforehand but were still setting the car up at that round. Got pole in a 2m 5.6s, but came in second behind Mark Charteris in all three races. Moving on to Oulton Park, then Thruxton and Finals weekend at Silverstone International, James had pole, won every race plus new lap records, so won both the CSP1 class and the overall championship. The two main highlights were probably winning at Oulton Park, on the full circuit, and lapping everyone in the process, and then doing the same at a very wet Thruxton – somewhere he had not raced before.

Picture submitted

James takes the flag at the Oulton Park Gold Cup meeting.

The HSCC Historic Touring Cars was rather disappointing – James had to race the older Class C Lotus Cortina all season as the new Appendix K Lotus Cortina never got completed. The Class C car suffered from numerous reliability issues so we had four DNF's – Croft Nostalgia meeting being the low spot when in the first race the prop-shaft broke, and in the second race the A frame snapped – at exactly the same spot on the track! But the highlight was the Oulton Park Gold Cup meeting, where James came in first overall in race 1 and second overall in race 2. Since James is named after Jim Clark, and I used to go to the Gold Cup meetings with my Dad to watch Jim Clark in the mid-60s, it was a very special weekend for the Clarke family. James eventually came in sixth overall in the championship, and second in class.

Unfortunately we weren't able to make the HSCC Awards Dinner, but apart from the class award, James was awarded the Desmond Monson Memorial Trophy for best newcomer.

Picture submitted

At the HSCC Awards Dinner. left to right: Mike Evans – Clubmans Register Chairman, James -, Patrycja Zabawska, James girlfriend. .

James now attends the MSA Academy at Loughborough College (where he started in September) and is on a three year course there, which also allows time for testing and racing. We are currently looking at options for 2018, recently tested a Formula Ford with Cliff Dempsey Racing which he really enjoyed, but are also looking at running in Europe in the VdeV Proto Endurance series. I will keep you posted on what transpires.

- Members Services – highlighting the facilities offered to FORC by our advertisers:

Italicar

If you open the event programme for the FORC Peter Andrews Sprint the first advertiser confronting you on Page 3 is Italicars. Managed by the brothers Luke and Kirk Miller Italicar specialise in selling Italian cars, including Fiat, Alfa Romeo and Lancia, based in Norwich. The Miller brothers clearly inherited their interest in Italian cars from their father who managed a major Fiat and Alfa Romeo dealership. As Luke says "with that background neither of us grew up wanting to be train drivers!"

Established in 2007 Italicar has gone from strength to strength and established a reputation for their exhaustive on-line car descriptions backed up with excellent highly detailed photographs.

Parts too: Italipart is a hive of Alfa Romeo and Fiat parts for models from the 1970's right up to date and have been involved in the development of some brand new bespoke manufactured items for classic models that you won't find elsewhere.

Italicar are to be found at Renson Close, Beech Drive, Mile Cross, Norwich NR6 6RH Tel: 01603 487436. Go to Italicar.co.uk or for fast access go to the FORC Services web-page, click on their logo and you will be taken directly to their website. -

750 cc Rickman Triumph Pre 65 Motocrosser.

FORC is not just about cars we do motor cycles as well. Philip Phoenix tells how he revived a pre-unit Triumph 750 cc engine to give his friend Gene Womack a fighting chance in pre-65 Motocross.

After a chat with Gene Womack in the Ox & Plough, Old Buckenham, Gene asked could I rebuild his pre-unit 750cc Triumph engine. I said yes, but we should rebuild it together. The engine had seized 18 months previously and had been demoted to the back of the shed. It had been running 11-1 pistons with methanol & Castrol R for lubrication.

We stripped the engine to find a seized drive side big end. The crank was re- ground. The seized drive side big end had distorted the forged ally con rod and to our dismay the timing side crankcase had cracked horizontally between the cam shaft bearings. After discussion about the crank case with Richard Bensley of Competition Fabrications, he said the distortion if welded would be horrendous. So with pre-unit big bearing Triumph cases now at least 50 years old, a brand new set was sourced from Thunder Engineering together with new forged alloy con rods.

Picture submitted

The purposeful Rickman framed Triumph powered “Scrambler”.....

The original 11-1 pistons had broken the top rings and I have found in the past that big-bore Triumph pistons seems to stretch if used hard and the top ring gap becomes too wide. A new set of 8.5-1 pistons were purchased. My reasoning being slightly less power but we would end up with a smoother engine with less fatigue for the rider. With lower compression I also suggested we run it on petrol! Gene agreed hesitantly to this, with the proviso we still used Castrol R in case he wanted to go back to methanol. The cylinder head was rebuilt with new valves and guides and another carb with petrol jets fitted.

With all the additional extra components the engine was finally built mid April. Gene fitted the engine back into the Rickman frame and Friday night brought it back for start up. I like to run rebuilt bikes on rollers with plugs out before starting. This gets the oil circulating under no stress and any leaks can be sourced with out burning your hands. 20 minutes on rollers and with plugs back in, the bike started 2nd kick. A few rides across the farm yard included a powered wheelie. Gene was racing on the Sunday and I said “are you going to run the engine in tomorrow?” No, he said, “I haven’t got time, I am working.” My reply was, “are you going to cruise around at the back?” We will see; was his reply.

Picture submitted

….... doing what it does best!

Gene rang with his results – won first and second races, kicked plug cap off in third race and engine now wouldn’t start (solid). Debate in pub followed “what’s wrong?” Poor engine rebuild? Did rider not run the engine in? Or something else? No one dared speculate – from my perspective, I prayed it wasn’t my fault.

With the engine removed from the frame and I pulled it apart with no signs of piston seizure. With the crank cases split the right hand (timing side) con rod was tight and a large crack was evident through sludge trap hole, which ran ¾ way down the side of the big end journal. Phew, no one was at fault and luckily the crank shaft didn’t break (brand new cases).

Gene sourced a standard low mileage crank and new main bearing were fitted because the roller bearing cages had flared so the rollers were not held square to bearing tracks. I also machined the piston inlet valve recess to a larger diameter, because the valves had just been catching the back edge of the piston. I rebuilt the engine and Gene fitted it back into the frame. Gene was happy running the engine on petrol, so 10/40 semi synthetic oil replaced the Castrol R and a modern oil filter was fitted.

Another Friday night start up (Sunday race!) This time the Triumph was treated to a few blasts up the lane beside the farm. It sounded a treat with open high level pipes.

Gene has competed very successfully in the National Pre 65 Championship this year (2017), travelling considerable distances to compete in each round. Gene finished third in the Championship, missing out by one point on coming second. He also had numerous firsts in the local races. The Triumph on full bore with a cockrell's tail coming off the back wheel is something to be seen. For me it has been a great privilege to be involved in this journey and witness some of Gene’s great success, a very, very talented rider. Philip Phoenix - LOOK! Next events: Wednesday 13th December – Stuart Rolt – Final event for 2017 – Please book on-line now Your 2018 holiday planning guide: Please make sure you have the these FORC dates in your diaries! Friday 26th January – The 2018 Festive Fuelling. Book now – Full details in this Newsletter and on the Programme Web-page Guest Speaker evenings: all at Stradbroke Community Centre:

Who are they? Come to the Festive Fuelling and be the first to find out!

Wednesday 28th February Wednesday 26th September

Wednesday 28th March Wednesday 31st October

Wednesday 25th April Wednesday 28th November Wednesday 30th May Wednesday 12th December

Please remember: If unforeseen circumstances affect our plans we place an announcement on the home web-page. If time allows we will email all members a News Flash backed up with local broadcasters. This could simply mean a change of guest speaker. Outdoor Events:

The Peter Andrews Sprint: More details soon.

The 2018 Presidents Wifes Run: Date to be announced

Saturday 2nd June – The Legion Rally, Fennings Farm,Stradbroke.

Tuesday 14th August – FORC Snetterton Track Evening

Keep an eye on www.forclub.org.uk for more dates as we go along

See our Friends Events web-page: for news of other upcoming events which FORC members are invited to support

Don't forget to look in our Members Services web-page for businesses which offer services to FORC members.

_ Please remember..... Ernie Constable 27 September 1933 – 26 August 2017

Norman Reynolds and Steve Wyatt together with a number of Ernie's friends from FORC and the aviation and Alvis communities attended his funeral at St Marys Church Horham on 7th September.

Pretty much a founder member of FORC Ernie was a regular on the President's Wife's Run right up to 2016, in his self constructed Alvis Silver Eagle tourer, invariably navigated by one of his RAF chums.

Ernie learned to fly on Tiger Moth's in 1952 and progressed to the Gloster Meteor in the days when that transition required you to obtain a 'twin-rating' on an Airspeed Oxford!

Ernie would tell the story of conversion on to the Hawker Hunter. At the time the two seat T7 version had not been delivered. After a test flight with an instructor in a Meteor T7 you were strapped into the Hunter with the instructor leaning into the cockpit briefing on the controls and reminding the 'student' that instead of rod and cable controls you now had servo and the Hunter was a good sixty knots faster over the hedge on landing. Off you went on your first Hunter flight which also happened to be your first solo on type.

After the RAF Ernie joined BEA flying pretty much everything in the fleet from the early 1960's onwards, including the D H Comet, spending the final years of his flying career with Cyprus Airways on the BAe 111. He will be sorely missed.

Picture Rory Aldridge

Ernie in the Silver Eagle departs on the 2010 PWR. Classified Adverts

SCOLE ENGINEERING. Rolling Road Facilities Weber & S.U carburettor jetting. Vintage & Modern Telephone 01379 740940 www.scole-engineering.co.uk

-

- MAZDA MX5 Servicing Tuning Track Day & Race Preparation Accident Damage Repaired Four Wheel Alignment Rust Proofing

Sponsor of the: Michael Cleverley AMSC 2017 AutoSOLO Challenge Mazda MX5 Trophy.

Valley Farm Business Unit New Street Stradbroke IP21 5JL www.mx5expert.com/ Telephone 01379 384046 - -

Please support those who support the club!