Sletti - 1993 348 Spider

[sletti]

April 2010

April 2010

Mileage 150
Faults
Costs £258 (Wheels repainted)
£40 (Paint and painting stuff)

Whilst I had the car in the air during the early part of the year, I could not help but notice the rather dire state of my wheels. There was peeling paint, corrosion and staining so I figured that it may well be a good time to get them repainted. I had flirted with the idea last year and I was in two minds whether to chose a colour other than silver, but issues surrounding cashflow and personal inertia meant that like so many other good ideas, it went by the wayside.

After a fairly protracted search I found a company in Crawley who would repaint them (no-one else wanted to touch magnesium wheels) called Wheel Works. And due to the metal they were made of, it would likely cost between £75-85 +VAT per wheel because removing the manufacturers epoxy coating would be very slow and laborious. Being fearful for the survival of my wheels, I rationalised that this would have to be done, so with the car precariously balanced on axle stands and jacks, I chucked them in the back of the Volvo and headed for Crawley, where I left them in their capable hands. When asked what colour I wanted them painted, I was going to say “silver” but in a moment of madness, I blurted out “Black”. As I drove away from the place I started worrying that black may be a bit too much, but I figured that it looked great on Neil’s 360 so it must surely look as good on my car.

With the car immobile, I took the opportunity to whip off the windscreen wiper arms and take a squizz at some corrosion that had been bubbling up under the black paint below the windscreen. It looked rather nasty once the arms were off, and quite a bit more extensive than I first estimated but I carefully started scraping away the bubbled paint in the sure belief that the panel had become perforated because the rust. As it was, it was not too bad, so some anti rust primer, filler primer, paint primer and matt black paint and it’s not looking too shabby.

A week later my wheels were ready for collection, and mighty fine they looked too. As an added bonus, because the wheels had been previously refinished, there was no epoxy coat to remove so they only cost me £55 +VAT per wheel. Judge for yourself from the picture below, but feel free to come up to me and tell me that my wheels look fantastic…

Best news came on the very dying embers of April when I was contacted by Alex Baker who is one the staff employed by Motorsport Vision. We had a long chat about my frustrations last month at the trackday that had been blighted by unruly MX5s, and how I felt that mixing such race cars with road cars presents a problem. Alex revealed that they would be running a new type of event with 3 sessions; Novice, Experienced Road, and Experienced Track, the inaugural event of which would be running in mid June, and would I like to attend the Experienced Road session free of charge? Er, yes..

I find that we increasingly live in an age where the consumer seems to have less and less of a voice, and what voice we have is countered with small print and indifference, but my hat is well and truly doffed to MSV for customer service.

Oh yeah, and the power of the gentle letter of complaint.

 

[sletti]

May 2010

May 2010

Mileage 360
Faults Misfire
Costs £50 (Gearbox Oil)
£35 (Shell Helix Ultra – 5l)
£8 (long funnel)

May was the kind of month that reminds you reasons why you bought a Ferrari in the first place, with a show, a trackday, and a small amount of maintenance.

At the beginning of the month there was the annual trip the Brooklands to drink in the Italianate ambience of Auto Italia. Ferrari were very well represented but most of us ended up parked in the lumpy grass section just inside the entrance via Mercedes World which seemed a sadly ignoble location for such a prestigious marque as ours. But it was good to catch up with some old faces.

Slap bang in the middle of the month was Dads Day Out down at the Top Gear track in Dunsfold, and what a day it was. A whole day of taking out Joe public in Ferraris to raise more money for Tadworth Children’s Hospice, and raise money they did; over £60000. Top work put in by Bachi, Bungle, Pete, Anna and countless others ensured that a great day was enjoyed by passengers and drivers alike.

My increasing confidence with the car was allowing me to drive faster and faster to a point where I had one moment where the back stepped out suddenly on the last corner, right by the marshal at the pit lane exit; an incident that I would later to be gently reprimanded for, with the suggestion that I consider driving a little less enthusiastically.

Big Bird performed faultlessly for 22 runs, but on the 23rd she begat the same annoying misfire as she did on the 23rd run last year. Spooky! I pulled into the rest area and allowed the car to cool, disappointed that I could not be taking passengers out to the bitter end. Thankfully, the drive home was unmarred by a return of the misfire but it did occur to me that this fault has never presented itself on a proper trackday, so it is worth bearing in mind that this kind of day is far harder on your car than you might think.

Later in the month my mind turned to changing my gearbox fluid. Flicking back through my service history I found it unclear as to when it was last done, so there seems no time like the present and since I have a trackday in the middle of next month, now would be a good time.

I had a good read around on CS and Fchat to find out what people are using, and it does appear to be a fiercely debated topic, but the general census seems to be 4 litres of Redline 75w90NS, topped off with about half a litre of Redline 75w90 to eliminate diff chatter. I also needed a long funnel so I could fill up through the dipstick hole. The oil came from Camskill and the funnel from Halfords.

Jay loaned me his oil catch tank which made life a lot easier than using old oven roasting tins. The oil that came out was very black leading me to think that it really had not been done in a very long time. Encouragingly though that there was very little metal on the magnetic drain plug leading me to suspect that the box is in pretty good condition. Threads on Fchat show that they usually come out looking like a little metallic hedgehog, but no so mine. I flushed the box with some automatic transmission fluid as recommended, but I’m pretty sure that achieved sod all as it was very clean when it was drained again. There was also no evidence of any condensation in the fluid which seems to be a matter for vexation for so many paranoid souls on Fchat.

So with the plug reinstalled again, the required amount of the amber nectar was poured in through the dipstick hole via the long funnel. And I can report that as a filling method, it works fine but is indeed very slow, giving me adequate time to investigate my new least favourite smell, namely, that of transmission fluid; it stinks! Kinda like north sea gas tainted with vomit. I shan’t be dabbing any of that stuff behind my ears whilst strutting my stuff at Stringfellows.

I liberally coated the bottom of the gearshift lever with white grease in the hope that it too would add to the slickness of my shifting.

Sadly, I has made bugger all difference to the smoothness of my shifts which is not what I expected, but at least the box is now as protected as it can be and will stay that way for a few years yet.

Next month; my free trackday…

 

[sletti]

June 2010

June 2010

Mileage 316
Faults None
Costs None

Bromley Pageant figures highly on most Kentish motorcar enthusiast’s calendar and this year was no different. The usual suspects were found manning (or is that ‘personning’ – sorry Alicia) the Club Scuderia stand, but we were short a few drivers who chose to go to the Cliveden event. The sun shone as if it were going out of fashion, and much tea and bacon was consumed. Big thanks to KenC for organising and providing the marquee.

Mid-month was the much anticipated free trackday and what a contrast to last time it was. A paltry thirty cars made up the day, so with the day split into two sessions, there was little or no traffic, so I spent a fairly solitary day as most of the drivers had been put into the novice group. And more remarkable was the weather; for the first time in an age, it was not raining at Brands. I was beginning to think that maybe I were a rain god, such was the frequency of unwelcome precipitation in the vicinity of this postcode, but there was not a single drop for the duration of the entire day.

Again I was plagued with understeer, and whilst not as severe as in March when the track was wet most of the day, I figured I should find some expertise to educate me in the error of my ways, so I booked an instructor. After six or seven laps of my driving, he indicated that we should pull in to the pitlane so he could tell me what I was doing wrong, then out we went for another fifteen minutes with constant instruction. At the end I received the equivalent of a school report. It was all pretty good; braking, throttle use were very good, positioning was fairly good but I do need to be a bit more consistent, and I could get a little closer to the apexes, but this was down to the understeer ultimately caused by me carrying too much speed into the corners.

He was very pleased with my ‘mechanical sympathy’ which I guess refers to me not forcing the car to do something it does not want to, so in some small way this man and this machine have at least some harmony.

After milling about in the garage, trying to look cool, I could not help but notice a small amount of oil in the floor under the car. A sniff of said fluid confirmed my new least favourite smell in the universe; gearbox oil. Judging where it had leaked from I suspect I may have issues with the seals on the prop shaft, probably caused by the gloopy particle filled old oil being replaced by detergent rich, lovely and thin fresh oil. I cleaned it all off and since then during regular use I have seen no evidence of the leak.

Given that I got talked into booking on the RMA day at RAF Odiham next month I guess I will be able to confirm if it is hard track driving that is causing the issue, in which case the clutch assembly has to come off in order to replace the seals. Well, either that, or I sell it.

Should not be too difficult, after all, it has had a mechanically sympathetic owner.

 

[sletti]

July-September 2010

July - September 2010

Mileage 700-ish
Faults None
Costs None

July started well enough. I used the car a bit and then I had the RMA day at RAF Odiham.

It had all the hallmarks of a good day; some fast sweeping airfield roads, millions or orange cones and a healthy run-off area on most bends. It was also all in aid of charity and the RAF caterers were to put on fabulous lunch. It was also to be run by RMA who stuck me as a no nonsense organisation with a strong “act-like-a-****-and-you-are-going-home-early” type vibe. It was also pretty cheap which is also scores quite high in my list of priorities.

I first became nervous in the driver’s briefing where it was announced that we were all sensible, grown-up ladies and gents and that for today they would belay their usual “overtake only on the left” rule in favour of overtaking on whatever side you feel like, and the responsibility for that manoeuvre would be down to the driver making the overtaking move.

Now if all drivers were as sensible as, for the sake of argument, me, then I cannot see much in the way of a problem, but the simple fact is that some the drivers were gung-ho morons, and after the first few laps it became apparent that it was less like an organised track event, and more like a drunken Saturday night in Dodge City, when the local cathouse was closed. If you were unlucky to head into the chicane at the end of the straight (for me at about 130Mph) with anything but a clear track behind you, then you were treated to the experience four or five cars wide across the track driving like utter *******, trying to figure out who had the biggest bollocks of all when it came to being the last of the late breakers.

Make it unscathed through the first chicane and the next bunch of corners you had no idea who was going to try and dart up the inside of a bend, looking for a gap that did not exist. And many did.

Mayhem. Absolute mayhem. I did about forty minutes in total time on the track and went home early because it was no fun. The like of Andy Hills loved it because it is the kind of thing he relishes, but for a more laid back chap like myself, it was just plain frustrating to see the manners that are usually in evidence at Brands Hatch get abandoned in favour of such an anarchic approach that I reckon some of the drivers were trying to pilot their cars using The Force.
The lunch however was very, very good and there was a complete shedload of it, and I had a moment where I spun the car quite suddenly in a cloud of tyre-smoke, but only damaged my pride and my tyres.

This event looks to be a regular evet, but attend at your peril...:wink3:

August was a bit of a dead loss; despite having three weeks off work, it was all spent doing a bathroom, a cloakroom, decorating two bedrooms, having a new porch installed along some rotten window frames, and a new fireplace. There was little time for anything else that and an exhaustive rehearsal schedule with my punk band as we were building up for a couple of charity gigs.

September saw the regular Littlehavens event at Dunton in Essex, and there is little that can be said on the subject of that event that has not been mentioned in this running report over previous years. As ever, top marks to Bruce for organising another cracker of an event. There were so many people who turned up for rides that I felt quite guilty at having to leave them at lunchtime to go to do a gig.

I include not only a picture of my car at Odiham, but also a picture of my band in action, because it was such a great night…

 

[sletti]

October 2010 - January 2011

October 2010 - January 2011

Mileage : Not sure, less than 200 certainly
Faults : None
Costs : Tyres (4) £830

Before I had ever owned a Ferrari, if I’d heard tell of an owner that had locked their steed away and not played with her/him/it (delete where applicable) for months on end, then I would criticise this person for being a feckless idiot, with less God given right to be on this Earth than a weasel. Henceforth I have little right to be labelled as anything other than a weasel because apart from the Help for Heroes trackday, Big Bird has remained resolutely stationary since November.

The trackday was good fun but a tad blighted by torrential rain. It was such a shame that we could not illustrate to the collective heroes the true abilities of our vehicles, because the moment you start to approach the limit, you were despatched, spinning wildly, into the boondocks accompanied by the sound of screaming passenger and a shower of muddy wet grass. As I did.

The day did however highlight the rather shallow tread depth I am currently sporting or the rears, so the quest for new rubber has been started. Five years ago I put some Toyo Proxes T1R on the rear. I may have intimated at the time that I did it to nobly stand against the received notion of “P” rubber being the accolytes sole choice, but I really did it because I got them for £80 each. As it was, they were very good. But sadly, as they have “Rolled up the curtain and joined the choir invisibule”

No matter which car, tyres always struck me as such a frustrating item choose. Make, size, compound, tread pattern. And Ferrari enthusiasts, never being short of opinions, don’t help by sporting views ranging from “If you don’t fit Pirelli rubber, then you, your family and seven subsequent generations are likely to killed, and it will all be your fault you evil pariah”, to, “What the chuff; it’s only rubber and Cally remoulds would probably serve just as well, plus you’ll save enough money to foster an addiction to any number of the humanities high grade pharmaceuticals”

I found someone who could supply Toyos to fit (295/35-18) but as this size has now been deleted from their range, they would have to be imported from Germany and would come in at a whopping £320 each. £320??? That is four times what I paid five short years ago! Sod it, for that kind of money I’ll have Pirellis, and whilst I’m at it, I’ll swap the fronts as well. There is legal tread on them, but not much and they are somewhat battle scarred, by myself and Mr Hills who used to sport them on his car.

So I have ordered Assimetrico for the rear and Direzionale for the front and they shall be fitted in mid-February, along with a geometry check and re-shimming where needed.

I shall also be fitting new discs on the front along with new Ferodo DS2500 pads, and getting some of my chipped and scuffed paintwork tidied, so Big bird will be stopping on a sixpence, and gleaming like a freshly polished cabochon gemstone.

Can’t wait…

 

[sletti]

February 2011

February 2011

Mileage : 43
Faults : None
Costs : Front Brake Disks (£230) Hill Engineering shims (£50)

Another crappy winter month so little to report apart from trundling down to Maidstone Tyre and Motorist Centre, which rather oddly were on an industrial estate in Tonbridge, Kent, to have my tyres fitted and get my suspension alignment checked.

Tyres went on with no issues as one would expect, and I must praise them for both the care and consideration they showed my car, and the warmth and enthusiasm of the staff there. An added bonus was that they filled the new tyres with Nitrogen, which will be great asset when to my first track day of the year and I won’t need to muck about with tyre pressures, as nitrogen does not expand nearly as much as air when it gets hot. Usually you pay extra to get Nitrogen put in your tyres, but they do it as standard as they can guarantee that that their nitrogen is dry and they won’t be inducing moisture into the wheel that can (and often does) promote corrosion of the rim.



The Hunter alignment system they use looks like a pretty groovy thing. They attach large reflective paddles to the wheels that return infrared beams to a camera that feeds information into a computer to diagnose toe, camber, caster and all manner of stuff that I honestly don’t grasp the implications of, even if I do understand in mechanical terms what they are. It revealed that my car was alarmingly shy of its factory tolerances as can be seen below.



I had to make another appointment to come back to have adjustments made. Generally they do this by swapping existing shims around, but I sourced a bag of Hill Engineering shims to speed this process up. And a thousand thanks to Paul for sorting me out at the eleventh hour.

Didn’t get the chance to install the front brake disks; I will have to leave that till March, or at least until it is not either too busy at the weekend, or too cold to be hefting around large slabs of steel. Yeah, I know I’m a wimp!!!

 

[sletti]

March 2011

March 2011

Mileage : 47
Faults : None
Costs : Suspension alignment service (£260)


More crappy weather kept me out of the car for most of this month, but I did get down to the garage to get the alignment done. And boy has it made a difference to how the car feels. I never had an issue with the handling of the car in as much as the rear always felt very planted and grippy, and my understeer issue that seemed to blight me last year appeared to be down to my lack of ability rather than and fundamental flaw in the handling.

Now the tyres have been changed and the suspension alignment rectified the car feels quite different. Whereas before it felt quite numb, now it appears to have come alive and I seem to be getting more information from the road surface. It feels as grippy and assured as ever it did, but somehow more involving and maybe more nimble. Undoubtedly the narrower tyres will contribute to this somewhat, but the alignment has improved the feel on the road compared to driving home after getting the tyres replaced last month.

Big thanks to Ryan at MTMC for the brilliant job he did on my suspension.

Next month will be the long awaited Brake disk replacement… expect pain!

 

[sletti]

April 2011

April 2011

Mileage : 94
Faults : Busted flare nut.
Costs : DS2500 Brake pads (£140), Front OS calliper brake pipe (£2), calliper repair £50

So with nary a though of the potential complications of the task, I sat down on the floor of the garage and contemplated the simple journey ahead of me. How hard or mired with complication could replacing a brake disk be? Remove the wheel, take the pads out, remove the calliper, remove the old disk, fit the new disk, refit the calliper, refit the pads (they were new last year), refit the wheel and drive off into the sunset.

How wrong was I?

I took the nearside wheel off, removed the pads to inspect them and found that the inside pad was crumbling away in a rather alarming fashion, so I immediately ordered new pads. Probably should have done that all along I guess but I was in some small way trying to not bankrupt myself before the season has started. At this point the prospect of completing this in one day was completely out the window

I tried to wiggle the calliper out of the way to get the disk off, but in the end I had to remove the rigid pipe that feeds the calliper its fluid. With the disk off the state of the inside of the disk could be assessed. There was a 10 mm wide strip of heavy corrosion on the inside of the inner face and it was this that was tearing the living crap out of the pad. Looks like changing disks and pads was a damn fine idea. Well done me!



So on went the new disk, the calliper and the steel pipe, but I would have to put the pads on at a later date, so round to the other side.

Wheel off, unbolt calliper. But the gentlest turn of the flare nut spanner sheared the head of the bolt off. I had to remove the other end of the pipe from the flexible hose to get the calliper off. Gonna need to replace that bit of pipe, I thought to myself.



Last year I replaced a length of brake pipe over a metre long which I had made up by the motor vehicles dept at work. As it happens, if I had purchased the part from Eurospares it would only have cost around a fiver, so I figured that a 20cm length of broken pipe should cost a paltry number of groats.

How wrong was I?

Eighty quid! Eighty bleeding quid for a short length of pipe and two flare nuts? I don’t bloody think so, so I purchased some pipe, some flare nuts and a draper flaring tool and tried to make up my own. Trouble is, I was never happy with any of the flares I could make. It seemed like the tool wasn’t precise enough for the task and it scored the pipes where they were clamped. I put that particular issue on the back burner, but and eventually asked my local motor factor (Biggin Hill Motorist Centre) and they made one up for £2 that was unkinked and beautifully flared

But I still had half a steel flare nut wedged in my aluminium ATE calliper with no real idea how to get it out, but I’m sure it would be straight forward.

How wrong was I?

I asked our Motor Vehicles dept and in unison they did that mechanic thing of simultaneously sucking air in through their teeth whilst tutting in the most world-weary fashion imaginable. They muttered my most feared words, “new calliper” , because they did not think it was likely that it could be removed without damaging the calliper itself. I was pointed in the direction of a brake refurbishment company who would charge around £300 to remanufacture the calliper, but then I’d have one spick and span one and three comparatively tired looking, but fully functional units. I tried to source one from a breaker, but was never successful. And a new one was about £500 for Eurospares.

In the end, Paul Hill came to the rescue. He drilled it out, cleaned it up and helicoiled it for the princely sum of £50. Thanks go to SteveW who is always so generous with his time to discuss options and for suggesting Paul, and a thousand thanks to Paul for getting me running, again.



Reassembly of the brakes was a breeze, and after bleeding, they are stopping perfectly, and they have not been fully broken in yet. So the car was back and running in time for Autoitalia at the end of April; a great event to make new friends and renew old ones.



Car was looking sweet after many hours cleaning and polishing (see picture for what I use to keep my car looking tiptop) and I should thank Ric, Andy, Joe, Paul, Tony, Daz and Graham for chipping in to buy me a pot of Zymol for my 40th birthday so many years ago, because it is still bringing shine to my motor. Thanks chaps.



And next month there is Dad’s day out to look forward to. Sweet!

 

[sletti]

May 2011

May 2011

Mileage : 121
Faults : None (apart from a badly damaged back.)
Costs : 6 boxes of Neurofen (£25)

“When will I ever Learn? With my 46th birthday less than a week old I should not be riding slowly on the road attempting to pull wheelies on my mountain bike. I was crap at them when I was 16 and the intervening 30 years of slothful indulgence has done little to improve my technique. In fact, my greater tonnage has clearly strengthened the bond I share with the gravitational properties of our beautiful planet.”

These were my thoughts as I was laying in the middle of the road unable to breathe after the front wheel came up and I landed with all the force that the equation F=ma could apply to my feeble skeleton. Thankfully there were no broken bones to contend with, just damaged ego, and cartilage in my ribcage, but it did mean that sitting in a car was uncomfortable, driving a car was even worse and the heavy unassisted steering of my car was agony. Suffice it to say that four sessions around Dunsfold at full chat were so eye wateringly painful, that I enjoyed little and contributed less to the event of the day.

I was hoping to use the day to get an idea of how my new tyres and suspension setup affected the way the car felt. It did not feel as good as I had hoped, but I put this down the combination of the car just feeling different, and the distraction afforded to me by my rather painful back.

I guess I’ll have to book a day at Brands to really get a feel for how different the car feels but I fear I may have to wait a while until my wheelie induced thoracic discomfort has abated.

What a tit I am, says I!!!

But top marks to the usual suspects for prying in excess of £100,000 from the general public for Tadworth…. Roll on DDO 2012:thumbsup:

 

[sletti]

June/July 2011

Mileage : 124
Faults : None
Costs : £130 (trackday (+£10 donation to Odiham Car Club)

Another strangely quiet summer in Ferrari use terms. Average weather and a horrific workload contrived to seemingly rob me of every opportunity (and sadly, desire) to enjoy or exploit the athletic properties of my vehicle.

AndyHLS and Ric355 did manage to talk me into another trackday at RAF Odiham. After last year’s abortion of an event courtesy of RMA, I was reluctant to surrender either the time or the hard earned cash to experience similar shock, awe and stress to a frontline troop in Northern France during the early part of the last century.

This event was to be hosted by Motorsport Events, and they are a far more laid back (and inexpensive) organisation than RMA, but generally their events are restricted to 99Db. I have two chances of meeting those kind of noise restrictions; fat and slim. This event however was set at a generous 105dB at 4500RPM (this is a good 1000RPM less than the ¾ of the redline that we are usually asked to provide). Surely Big Bird should be able to pass that.

Morning broke with a typically wet mid July rainstorm. This faded to a grim persistent rain that would do little to help me assess the grip potential of either my new tyres or my recalibrated suspension. Odiham is not equipped with a fleet of pit garages to shelter in so If this weather was to persist it was gonna be a wet and lonely day, cowering under my canvas roof for shelter. At least I wasn’t spending my day driving anything as stoopid as a Caterham (J). Fortunately Andy had the sense to bring a sturdy gazebo which, when attached firmly to his van, did valiant service in protecting us from the inclement conditions.

The chap measuring the noise could not reliably get 105dB. He would probably settle for occasionally getting this figure but he was consistently getting 108dB no matter which side of the car he tried testing from. After much discussion with his colleagues he did pass the car, but I think he had to wait for a gust of wind to disrupt the propagation of noise from exhaust tip to microphone. Suffice it to say that much to my relief I was awarded one of his obligatory orange dots.

Despite the endless rain, it was actually a very good day. The layout was unlike the one chosen by RMA, being run anticlockwise, and the main straight was punctuated with a couple of coned chicanes. This kept the overall speed down which I believe to be a good thing because ultimately, who gives a toss about maximum speed; it’s how these things corner that keeps us hooked.

And, rather perversely, a lack of grip was not that evident. Or perhaps the lack of visibility due the spray kept me distracted to a point where the grip limit was way in excess of my ability on that day. Whichever it was, I was more than happy with the day, and the way my car performed.

It has to be an event of choice for me next year, and should it appear on their calendar, I can heartily recommend both the event and the organiser.

 

[sletti]

August/September 2011

August/September 2011

Mileage : embarrassingly little
Faults : None
Costs : £50 (MOT)
Despite these two months being fairly warm and dry I have either not had the opportunity to go out for a drive, or have not embraced the few opportunities that life has presented.There should however be no excuse for not taking Big Bird out now and again to give her a thrashing, if just to keep her fluid flowing.

The beginning of August rewarded me and Mrs Stig with our first grandson, and much of August was taken up by visiting the new addition initially in hospital and then at home. I also needed to ride my bike more in the run up to my charity bike ride in mid September. These two things understandably took my focus away from the car.

Thankfully, when the time came, the car sailed though it’s MOT, once more starting on the first turn of the key after a slumber of nearly two months. After the MOT I spent some time checking over all the aspect of the car I could. All the fluids were AOK. I took the wheels off to inspect the brake disks, pads and lines and all was as it should be. I checked all the hoses in the fuel induction system (no splits) and tweaked up all the Jubilee clips. I guess it could use an oil and filter change as a matter of course, but being that I have barely done a thousand miles since the last one, there seems little point.

 

[sletti]

October 2011 – March 2012

October 2011 – March 2012

Mileage : embarrassingly little (again)
Faults : None
Costs : None

Yet again I have found little opportunity to take the steed out. Work got stupid, Christmas was busy, January me and Mrs Stig were away in SE Asia, and February has been snowy/icy/salty.

November did see a chance to rag the car about, on the new tyres and suspension setup in the dry at the Royal Marines charitable trust event at Brands. Also good to meet up with some of the old gang.

Unlike last year when is pissed down for the whole day, the weather was decidedly clement. The early rain cleared and the track dried through most of the morning. The early afternoon afforded us with a properly dry track and some epic laps which allowed me to properly assess the car’s setup, and I must report that it was absolutely fantastic. Most of the understeer I had previously picked up going out of Surtees and through MacLaren was gone. This resulted in a greater sense of confidence getting on the power through Clark and onto Brabbham.

The gains were not measurable in speed terms as such (timing laps prohibited of course), but more a sense of sure footedness that up until this event had been somewhat absent. I could not have been happier…

I decided to leave early as I was running out of fuel, but the joy of my dry day was replaced with the woe of driving home in the heaviest rain I had ever seen. I was driving along at 10Mph with my wipers being barely capable of affording me any forward visibility. Made it home and dumped it in the garage with the dehumidifier and there is has rested since apart from some small movements to stop it sitting on the same bit of tyre for too long.

I will have to get onto getting some of the paintwork sorted over the next few months because the harsh reality of life means that selling this year is pretty much inevitable. When I bought my first Ferrari, I promised Mrs Stig that it was something I always wanted to do, but it will only be for 6 months; a year at most. That was nine years ago and I am on my third car, so I guess I cannot really complain…

Anyone interested in a Yellow 348 Spider?

 

[sletti]

March – May 2012

March – May 2012

Mileage : Yet again, very little, but used a bit now
Faults : None
Costs : £54 (new ignition cols), £25 (Carpet fixing buttons)

What a difference a spring makes!

Selling a car that has become one of the family is tough enough, but when it is a specialist car, it is even more vexing, and unfortunately for me there are two other yellow 348 Spiders for sale; an immaculate car for loads of money, and an Jay’s excellent one going for reasonable money. With that sort of competition in mind, I either sell my car warts and all (which is an exaggeration, because it is still a great car) for a low price, or I bite the bullet, sort mine and sell it after, so, after much discussion with Mrs Stig, I have decided to retain the car for another year. Maybe it is the good weather, or maybe it was a sleepless night worrying about all that I needed to do to get the car up to scratch, but I guess I rationalised it say that if I’m getting all this work done, I may as well enjoy some of it myself, so in my keep it shall remain.

It seems like the moment I make the decision, planets have aligned and things are falling into place. I spoke to a paint and bodyshop chap, and he can fit me in in three weeks, which is great because I will have the car for Bromley Pageant. Then I got a call back from Rosneath, and they can take the car and do it in the week between Bromley and the week that the sprayer wants it, and all for reasonable prices.

I love it when a plan comes together.

Again car use has been minimal. I regret wimping out of going to AutoItalia because it is the first one I have missed in 10 years, and it was always a great opportunity to catch up.

I’m beginning to think that Biggin Hill has its own Mafia, and if you do good things, good things happen to you. I took a young chap to his wedding in Bromley, and later that day, my neighbour came round with a gift from another guest at the wedding who has done some work with Ferrari; a brand new bagged Puma Team Ferrari Gore-tex jacket and tee-shirt. Not my thing really so they may have eBay written all over them, but a very nice gesture.

So June should see significant improvement in my car by way of service and paintwork; roll on July!

 

[sletti]

June – September 2012

June – September 2012

Mileage : Not really recording mileage any more as it all seems a bit moot. I’ll get a better Idea when I compare last year’s MOT with this year’s.
Faults : Problem starting
Costs : £2800 (engine out service), £65 (Battery), Hill Tensioner bearings (£200)

Unlike the last time I had an engine out service, this time it was a dream.

I dropped it down the Rosneath Engineering late on the Sunday of the Bromley Pageant (Good to catch up with many of the regulars and not so regulars, and to kudos to KenC for putting on a good stand, and picking up an award from the event organisers for the stand).



Within a few days I was given a pretty comprehensive report on the state of Big Bird and I am happy to say that all was well. Apart from the normal stuff that would be dome at this time. I did take the opprtunity to have my weeping cam seals replaced and valve clearances checked. Weeping cam seals aren’t that big a problem, but if it gonna be 3-4 years before the engine is out again, there is no way of knowing how bad it could get in that time, even considering that in all likelihood, I won’t be the owner at that time. As has been said before, we are not owners of these cars; merely the caretaker until a new name appears on the V50. I took the opportunity to have the throttle cable replaced as well and this lent a night and day difference to the feel of the pedal.



Thanks to GrahamS for taking me down to pick up the car, and thanks once again to Paul Hill for the belt tensioners; I took his advice and replaced them for added piece of mind. I also had the coils swapped out as I got them cheaply last month.

Shame I didn’t get the car back for the Dunsfold event, but that’s the way the cookie crumbles. Not sure I would have enjoyed driving on the greatly reduced circuit anyway, but I went along for the morning to watch, and to have crap scared out of me by Mad Dog Hills. And top marks also to Bruce’s navigation skills…

The Royal Marines Charitable Trust day at Brands Hatch was a great day, made even better by it being in August, rather than mid-autumn as it has been in the past. So despite a wet lunch break, the track was pretty dry for most of the day. Big Bird performed flawlessly. Unfortunately, one of my passengers kicked off a large piece of interior trim when he got into the car, which was left in Garage 1 for safekeeping. Unfortunately, when I left towards the end of the day, I completely forgot to pick it up. I didn’t notice till the weekend, so had to go back to the circuit to find it. I searched garages 1 to 40 to no avail. I checked the start line, control tower, cleaners, maintenance staff, catering staff, marshalls, back office staff. Nothing, Nada. Zip, Rien, Squat. I even went through every wheelie bin and skip in the paddock area. Amongst the discarded engine oil and half eaten burgers, I found some interesting bits of broken racecar which could have made nice wall adornments had I not been so focussed on finding my trim.



I had a long chat with SteveW about sourcing a replacement as there appears to be a differing part number for the Spider and the TS/TB. It seems like some of the Spiders had a chamfer on this particular piece of trim for the speaker, but mine is unchamfered like the TS. Hopefully I should be able to get one from a breaker. The search starts here…

At one point in September, the car refused to start and I had to finally admit that my weak-ish battery was now as effective as Walter the softy, so a new BOSH unit has been purchased from the Bay of E, which I shall get round to install when the car goes out next week for an MOT.

And I shall have to chase up Trevor to get my paintwork sorted out…