honitonhobbit

Seeing the number that broke or played up today, best to sell it or scrap it Les. Get a decent winch, not some aged, out dated, overweight, inefficient hunk of wanna be boat anchor

I had just failed to recover a certain Bull Bar Cowboy. Mind you Lesmond, I don't run 35's and lockers and yet I got a damn site further than some - and I wasn't punch hunting. The big bang and subsequent lost front drive turns out to be the front diff and one half shaft. So add that to the wrecked rear door aquired when I backed into a tree whilst attempting to recover Sean... Bloody expensive day marshalling! Angela, if you read this, sorry about the panhard rod. That bog is cursed.

Or some off cuts from Dave Langs latest work project - say 95mm plate

Personally I favour Belzona Liquid Metal for my imitation welds - much easier to form with a spatula

Sorry mate, I respect your expertise in many areas but that is absolute b*ll*x It is a generalisation that belittles your knowledge and experience I would reply that anyone who has true long distance experience of night driving with roof lights will know that they are worthless and will always resort to a decent set of grill mounted spots that will pick up the shadows of potholes and depressions. Where a roof light is good is for very slow speed work or stationary illumination of obstacles but only when mounted far back on the roof

Don't bother e-mailing them though as they seem to have a problem with replying!

At the recent night challenge at Huntsham Barton it was pretty damn obvious how useless they are unless mounted well back down the roof a'la Aussie stylee Would be better to have underlights for the iffy bits and nice white light bulbs to show up deep holes more

Less than 1 mile from the caerphilly site. Where - I will drop in tomorrow

Used Pro Comps since 1993 never had a problem Eye bushes are available from Richard Fearn at SuperPro for next to b*gg*r all

Righto lets get this right SuperPro bushes are from the same manufacturer as Bearmach BUT the steel inserst are not (they are cheapo indian imports and only andodised not galvanised) AND the Bearmach stuff uses a basic fitting grease whereas SuperPro use loads of bloody good high impact grease. Bearmach bushes are mostly the older design as the trade agreament was signed a good while back. SuperPro are warranteed for life! OE bushes DO NOT last as long and will not work as well off road as polyurethane bushes - what is good about OE bushes is that they are soft unlike the cr*p from Deflex and Polybush which is too hard. SuperPro/Bearmach are much softer (almost the same as rubber in some fitments) and will last almost indefinately in most conditions even those that certain numpties in the challenge scene would put them through. SuperPro are more than worth the extra pennies but don't bother with the castor correction The above is fact not partial hearsay/urban legend

Bl**dy funny - top Quality Top Gear, one of the best

If I could find a decent scource I would go back to internal lubricated steel wire. Not galve aircraft control cable which is carp, but the old style soft weave steel with a greased cord down the center. This is what all commercial winches used to have fitted and is so resistant to abuse it is untrue. As I can't get it, I am happy to use synthetic rope but like Paul, I can splice very quickly now! There are some good questions there Jim, worth asking both Andy T and Diddy Dave for thier answers. They are both very switched on blokes and sell good products.

Tony You need to ease the tension in that rope a snadge

That's Roger Shaddicks motor - only ever seen it on a lorry when on the road.

Tim took a few - but that was just to temporarily blind JST as he was doing so well! Marshaling was great fun - little work, stayed reasonably clean and got to watch muddy people falling over a lot. Thanks Russ - great night. I will forgive you for making my LR smell like a breakfast grill!

I was going to say alomst exactlt what Highway Star said about Raynet - bloody good bit of kit. CODAN is good but IIRC illegal in the UK We used to use Jesau (sp?) proper PMR at the experience - bloody good and very long range for handhelds - bulk buy worked at about 80quid each plus base station A decoent CB without amp will get about 11 miles but Thunderpole sell amps that will take that up to 60 in good radio weather I want to go for my Ham licence over the next couple of year - been talking to Dave Bowyer about this as he is a bit on the keen side of amatuer radio Good sat phones are down to about 600 quid S/H

I do happen to know where there is a T series Turbo not a million miles from here The guy who runs the nursery down the road from here has one - he loves it. If it were me I would sell on the engine and box to the comp safari crowd and throw in a 200Tdi. Simple job take about a weekend with lots of tea

I might pop down to home base as I ned two more grinders That will make: Cut, Grind, Falp rough, Flap smooth and Wire I need a 9" jobbie as well

I used to run an Allisport cooler in the RRC (200tdi). Loved it to bits, loads of mid range and top range power increases and half the gear changes. The quality of the fit and the product was superb. When I sold the RRC I kept the cooler with the intention of fitting it to the 100". I had a chat with Andy at Allisport about fitments blah blah and was going up for a fitting as and when time allowed. That was back at Malvern last year. The thing is I honestly don't know if I need to bother. The pump has been tweeked a tadge and the wastegate tweeked. Boost starts at 1600rpm now. The thing is the old girl pulls like a train even with the 1.22:1 T box and is very driveable in higher gears. I don't need the top end power because anything over 70 is illegal, bloody scarey and uses fuel like a v8 On the same lines I was a passenger in Matt Neales 110 the other day. He runs a standard cooler with a few pump tweeks , but the vehicle weighs in at about 10tonnes ( ), he was towing a small but very heavy trailer up the hill on the A35 out of Honiton and the b*gg*r was in 4th and 5th all the way. Again he doesn't drive fast - no need. Makes you think. Both vehicles are more than capable off road with loads of low down torque, but neither are stupidly over geared. Matt does carry more tools than most garages (including a four poster, plasma cutter and a lathe) but my 100" weighs in at just over 2.1tonnes fully loaded Looking at it from another side, the ever expandin wife has an RRC with a 300Tdi auto. This has the full Jezzer Fearn tune, running two (!) increased size cooler in series, turbo timer, turbo oiler, very tweaked (non ECUed ) pump. It's pushing out around the 150bhp/280ft/lb mark. Power starts higher up the rev range and continues on way past the norm. It is far more responsive than a normal 300Tdi but that is ideal for what it is used for. It never goes off road, rarely tows more than two tonnes and is often used for long motorway journeys. It returns 30plus mpg at 75mph with a full load in side and will see off chipped P38's like they are on Kwaludes. None of the above vehicle have EGT problems. I would fit a standard cooler, for a while (S/H ones are cheap) until the warrantee is up. Then I would seriously think about what you really need.

Those of you that know Big Andy (or Glassbolt as he is known on ORRP) will know he can cook a meal for five with a kelly kettle, whilst using the smoke from it to deter biting, flying things

Give Anton at OEC4x4International a shout - they do a good price on KK's

All very impressive Kev but it needs gas cannisters. So it becomes a paperweight/desk ornament when anywhere remote. There are places with no pie shop me old mate! I know from practical experience my KK will heat water when burning diesel soaked sand/Camel Turds/Dries Bracken/Dead Gorse/Toilet Paper/Oily rags . They are b*gg*rs for wearing out though - takes about five years of hard use but then you are somewhat stuffed until you can get a spare.

I just keep a small bundle of dry split kindling in the 'brew box' - My Kelly Kettle is like Grandads broom, had it for about 20 years but it has had a new base and a new top! Used it all over the world and it's damn good. For small 'brews' though I use a Swedish army Trangia - it has a bigger burner than a Trangia 27 and will boil water in a billy in about 3 minutes

I have provisional permision from the ever expanding Mrs HH to be away that weekend. So if Mike would like me to marshal I can, if not I shall stay at home and earn brownie points

Tony, you are a bl**dy star! I shall be on the phone to David this pm