The Diff has been in the Marlin for 10 yrs now so I thought I had better take a look at it. All looks OK except a small area of pitting on the teeth of both planet gears and 1 sun gear all the teeth are effected, its in the centre of the polished wear mark covering about 10% of the mark . My spare diff has more crown wheel to pinion slack than the current. If I swap bits about should the planet and sun gears be kepted in sets. Does anyone know if new gears are available.
Cheers
Pete
Any views on the Exmoor. We watched the first few cars at Sepscott 1 before marshalling at Lyncombe Bridge all appeared to go well and the pre event marshall pack was excellent.
Pete & Carlie
Having studied the results I don't feel I disgraced myself on 'The Clouds'. Although Murray will no doubt note the reasons for my 7th position in class and he's right I could have have done much, much better. Anyway I was beaten into said position by Simon. My times being considerably slower as I just wanted to get it right.I guess it's the gamble you take at least in some circumstances. Has anyone any thoughts on this?
Hazel
I, for one, would like to propose a hearty round of thanks for John Salter's efforts in providing us with a huge range of pictures of the Clouds and also for his 'Blast From the Past' compilation.
Events conspired to prevent Stuart H, the Troll and I competing in the Clouds, but John's pictures have given me a pretty vivid impression of the event, and also some good pointers to the correct line on some of the hills for next year.
Thanks John, and keep up the good work!
On a technical point, is it possible to alert Members that there are new photos in the Photo Album in the same way as with the Message Board?
I nearly missed the expansion of the Clouds photos from 40 to 70 this evening.
One last point. The names of some of the sections that are included in trials bring smiles to the faces of some of our colleagues in the office. Crooked Mustard, Beggar's Roost, Litton Slack to name just three. ( Is there a Straight Mustard somewhere or a Litton Tight)
What is the strangest named section that Members can bring to mind, current or past?
Chris
This will mainly be of interest to Beetle & Buggy owners, and other users of 165x15 tyres. However it probably has longer term implications for many others.
Users of retread/remould 165x15 tyres will no doubt be already aware that they are difficult/impossible to obtain.
I discovered this about 18 months ago, soon after I changed from 'new' to 'remould' tyres (on cost grounds). I started to use Colway CM (tread pattern per Michelin XM). Initially I had no real problem obtaining them through my local tyre depot. However about 18 months ago I ordered a quantity and they didn't arrive. Having chased them many times via my local supplier and subsequently direct with Colway I eventually discovered the problem was lack of 'old core'. Reading between the lines Colway was diverting all the old core they could find to the production of competition tyres for the Historic Rallying crowd (more profitable!).
This sent me searching elsewhere and to start with I had no luck. Desperation was setting in so I opened a direct account through my business (Murray's) with Motorway, and became an official Motorway distibutor and commisioned a substantial quantity to be manufactured. After a couple of months they arrived. The surplus to my personal requirement were soon sold off to other users I knew of at a special preferential 'trialling' price (they of course were also having sourcing problems, so they were very happy). Consequently another batch was ordered - these took even longer to arrive, and when they did were quickly distributed. A third batch was only partially filled as the old core problem arose again.
Now the really bad news: This week I received a letter from Motorway informing they have ceased production of car tyres (but are to continue with commercial) and that production has been transferred to their sister company Colway.
[Reason: I had read in the trade press and heard through the grapevine the all of the retreading companies were coming under severe pricing pressure from cheap imported 'budget' Far Eastern new tyres......
typical retail price branded 165x15 tyre £45
typical retail price remoulded 165x15 tyre £30
typical retail price budget 165x15 tyre £25
I know what Jo Punter would go for - don't you?]
A range brochure was included with the letter, but it didn't include the 165x15 size. A quick phone call to Colway revealed that this size had been deleted from their range due to non-availabilty of old core.
So thats the end of that! Someone needs to sort through those millions of old tyres in landfill sites - any volunteers?
Murray
