Vintage Metal

on the SX. Once on, another test start.

Yey. It started first go! !@#$%^&*()! A $5 part

had stopped us. I don't kiss blokes but I did

Colin. A quick run up the road on a test run

(which had a neighbour really upset as it was

11pm) and it was loaded on the trailer and taken

back to Parc Ferme by midnight.

On Saturday Madame Alpine ran beautifully

and cornered well, and we thoroughly enjoyed

the day on some very good roads, apart from

several km of really potholed gravel leaving one

stage, and returning later on the same road to do the stage in reverse.

Several people with new or expensive cars were

not happy with stone chips, and I have to restore

the radiator air lip yet again. A policeman on

duty stopped us and said he would pick up the

fibreglass pieces for us!! Ha Ha.

The last 2 stages were held on the slightly

extended race track again late afternoon, but

before we started, the car 0 came off the track

into a tree and was severely bent, (an Evo)

which made it a night time run with headlights

on by the time they had cleaned up.

ABC has a clip of a red Escort cornering on the Chain of Ponds stage which is worth seeing.

Just after this corner is a wiggly straight followed by a sharp LH 3 corner. The driver of a V8

Capri from Perth, Simon Gunson thought his

navigator said it was a 9. Mmmm.

While we were in SA I was surprised how many

people came up to look at the Alpine, and

mention they had owned an R8, R10, R12, R16

and a few Gordini owners too, so they must have

sold a lot of Renaults in SA. All knew Colin too

which is not surprising.

Then it was back on the road again across the

Nullarbor. Coming back we saw a dingo, several eagles, kangaroos, emus and just out of

Norseman some camels including one that had been hit that night.

As a foot note to the condenser, I was speaking

to Wally Phoebe at the Classic car show and he

said "if you had rung me up, I could have told

you that was at fault, just by your description on

the phone",

John Hurney also said condensers were always a

problem, especially with Ford/Lotus engines.

Mark Duder