From Campsite to Comfort... Day 16 Usharal to Almaty

SEPTEMBER 25TH, 2010

Peking to Paris Motor Challenge update. More about the race here

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Bruce Selbie and Bruce Washington - Rolls Royce 20/25

It promised to be an uneventful day… all that was necessary was to drive a main-road route of some 500 kms to Almaty, and after a night of camping in a field, bask in a warm soapy bath of the Almaty Intercontinental. Nothing, however, goes to plan – it wouldn’t qualify as an adventure if it did so.

Dick Disaster, however, is a constant riding companion. Car 22, the 1922 “Bonnie and Clyde” Chevrolet Roadster of David Clements and Russell Stevenson, burst into flames yesterday. The crew jumped out but were unable to rescue their bags of personal possessions. They lost everything except their passports as they watched the car turned to a pile of ashes.

The dark red Alfa of Alastair Caldwell and Catriona Rings pulled up in front of the glass revolving doors to unload their luggage, still with two spare wheels on the plastic see-through home-made hardtop, but now looking rather the worse for wear. There are large “lumps” appearing in the alloy wings from the battering of stones – the inner wings have no protection – and the car had been mighty sick of late, first with muck in the petrol tank giving acceleration of a kangaroo quality, and then more worrying, a wheel-bearing failure provided an added headache. This was cured by drilling holes in a wheel-spinner to turn it into a hub puller in order to replace the offending item with a spare carried in the tiny boot. The driver has looked worried and totally unapproachable for days, is now cheerful again, after a spot of encouragement from Peter Banham.

Here’s a run-down of what we have heard from crews on arrival here in Almaty: Car 43, Jorg Lemberg and Rene Mueller, in a Lagonda, report a failed head-gasket, but reckon they are going to sort this themselves; Car 9, the Dodge Tourer of Jeff Robinson and Rob Blake, is to sort out a duff bearing in the generator; Car 38, the Alvis of the Wilkinson’s, has a leaky radiator and a jammed starter-motor due to too much sand; Car 70, the Dodge of Bill Shields and Daniel Day, has a broken engine mount and needs a new steering arm; Car 11, the Vauxhall of Max Stephenson and Carl Watson, reports a minor oil leak and problems with the starter-motor, “otherwise everything is happy,” and Car 76 David Smith and Anne Marie Smith, in a La Salle, have a noisy clutch release bearing; and the Hickling’s MG SA has a cracked differential, and the radiator has a fan blade stuck in it… (that’s been a common problem).
Driving the Impossible

Alex Howard and Dominic Collins - Rolls Royce Phantom II

Car 75, the Bolsover’s Chevy, needs a change of a half shaft and repairs to a cracked radiator; the La France, Car 6, is sorting a holed radiator and a broken spring; the Rolls Phantom of Alex Howard and Dominic Collins, in a Rolls Phantom, has a broken fan, slipping clutch, dodgy brakes, the running boards are falling off, and no lights; Car 101, the Holden of Frank Bird and Ross Oakman, say they have had no problems since Ulaan Bataar when they fitted a new camshaft.

All seem optimistic of running repairs as we are here for the next two days, and after a spot of fettling in the network of workshops here will be back on the road again, fighting-fit.

The Peking to Paris is surely all about the masochism of a faithful re-enactment of the kind of hardship, endurance, and test of tenacity that the pioneers of 1907 displayed on the world’s first ever inter-Continental rally, and most crews are stuck into the spirit of things, knowing that surely when it comes to the pain-threshold, nothing could get much tougher than this, and with no back-up when things go wrong. However, this column can exclusively reveal that there is another side to life on the Peking to Paris.

How about this – we understand that a private plane was chartered to enable a bunch of competitors to fly into Almaty from Semey. Our sleuth reckons the culprits, who explain themselves by the need to either get to the hotel first in order to bag the Penthouse Suite, or, ensure a workshop is lined up to work on their car before everyone else, (traditional Terry Thomas regulations being applied here), called up a private aircraft. Well, you could not make this up… a plane load of rally-crews with cars that have spent a great deal of time crossing whole countries on the back of trucks have arrived here as the rally jet-set. We are reliably informed they are crews of Cars 31, 29, 89, 99, 43, and 56, and so large was this bunch, the pilot had to be persuaded to take a few on one opening leg, and then return to pick up the rest, so twice flying what the rest have driven the hard way… Cheating? How could the rule-makers possibly have forseen such cunning initiative as this?

Yep, you couldn’t make it up. Must go… the bubble-bath is over-flowing.

In Fields of Gold... Day 15 Semey to Usharal

SEPTEMBER 24TH, 2010

Peking to Paris Motor Challenge update. More about the race here

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Rhys Timms and John Hastie - MG SA

Another day of bright sunshine – nobody has yet to use their windscreen wipers since leaving the Great Wall of China – and 500 kms of tarmac takes us to a vast open field of axle-high parched grass.

We are 500 kms from Almaty, the capital city of Kazakstan, and it’s here that we are camping the night. According to the rally schedule this is the final night that we have to resort to our tents. From here on, it’s hotels every night.

The run today was not without its patches of broken tar and bumpy stretches, requiring a driving technique that resorts to sweeping from side to side to incorporate both sides, made all the more interesting with the oncoming locals doing the same thing. First car to the campsite this afternoon was the bellowing exhaust of the yellow Chevy Coupe of Steve Hyde.

The day was an transport-section sort of day with four passage controls set up in local truck-stop cafes along the road, Steve is not one for hanging about, however, the temptation of burger and chips, or a bowl of potato soup and mug of coffee, is something he insists is for the end of the day. His whole approach to this event is one of “get going as soon as possible, knock off the day, and then use what daylight is left to fettle the car…. I can’t understand those who want to mess around half the morning and then want to keep stopping.”

Steve admits he is no mechanic and his routine of spanner checks and general servicing as he moves around the car is something that he says doesn’t come easy. He has a list of what to check over, tightening suspension bolts, checking for play here and there, and today he found several bolts that needed a good half-turn in the suspension, and was most concerned that the big front drum brakes of the Chevy had gone right off during the morning, and it seems that the slack needs tightening up now on a very regular basis.

Steve hacked down the hard-shoulder for most of today’s run to avoid the deep tarmac tram-lines caused by the heavy trucks pounding the road that has rippled badly under the constant baking sun. There is no doubt that leading the Vintageants Category is a pressure that is beginning to tell, and Steve looks more worried than most.
Driving the Impossible

Bill and Biddy Bolsover - Chevrolet Coupe

Clive Dunster, also in a Chevy Coupe, reports a similar problem with the front brakes, “your foot goes flat to the floor with nothing there, one moment, and then its rock hard, difficult to fathom.” He has made a steady recovery after losing his Gold-medal on day one due to a duff coil, and has set about climbing back up the leaderboard ever since.

Our campsite is just off a junction of a main road and close to three petrol stations. Toilets have been dug in the ground and set up in square canvas cubicles complete with flushing china loos. A large marquee has been erected for our dining room this evening, food is being cooked in large bowls, heated on fires glowing in trenches dug into the ground.

Mark Winkleman in the blue Plymouth Coupe was among the first to arrive this afternoon, and reports that “simply nothing has gone wrong” with his rallycar since the start. He says he considered the temptation of a four speed gearbox but decided in the end for total originality, and runs a three-speeder, with the original low axle-ratio, which he says gave him a benefit on the gravel climbs in Mongolia. He is running light, with minimal spares and equipment that fills less than half the boot which slopes over the rear axle.

William Medcalf’s four-cylinder Bentley arrived this afternoon with oil all over the rear of the car, the vibration has finally split a gallon can of Castrol 60-grade.

First of the Classic Category cars to arrive at the camp site was car 104, the Mercedes Coupe of Stephen Fitzgerald and Paddy Judge, the 280E two-door Merc is one of the lowest-riding cars of the whole rally, and Paddy Judge was in reflective mood when he pulled up this afternoon. “We had a lively discussion within the car and decided that after we cracked the exhaust manifold, and felt a lot of rocks banging and crashing under the car, that we simply had to either chuck out a load of weight, or, go back. It was a make or break type of discussion. I threw out Stephen’s five-man tent, and even his sleeping bag. It was cold at times, we borrowed some blankets off the Nomad support-crew. We even threw out three sets of springs. Others have been breaking springs, and coil springs are much harder to get made than those with snapped leaves, but we simply had to be a lot more ruthless to avoid grounding the back of the car. We have had a good run today but there is now a bit of a blow in the exhaust so it might seem that while we have had fewer issues than most – we had some electrical bothers, including a trip-meter than packed up – getting shod of a load of weight early on must have been the prudent decision.”

The leader of the Classics Category is still the Holden of Gerry Crown and Matt Bryson, who have a commanding lead now that the challenge of the VW Beetles has faded. For Garry Staples Jnr, it was his first ever timed event, and to challenge for the lead is something he says will be memories he won’t ever forget.

The leader of the Pioneers Category, Max Stephenson, was also in early this afternoon, the Vauxhall has lost its starter-motor, and it needed a push-start twice today… Max says he can get it rebuilt when we have a day off after tomorrow.