Ulster Historic Rally 2012

The Shammy Moo team had a great time at the Ulster Rally, a round of the British Historic Rally Championship, last weekend, spurred on by a star performance from the service crew, good company and weather and the warmest of welcome by the people of County Antrim.

The Friesian Racing herd were joined by Geoff Taylor and Steve Greenhill and their 2011 BHRC class winning Imp. Nigel and Henry were supported by Mike Dent and Keith Livesey.

Whilst the 2 car crews were out doing the ‘recce’ (2 passes of 10 different stages from 09:00 to 22:00) on Thursday, the service crew were setting up in the service park and putting the cars through noise test and scrutineering. Unfortunately on his way back from scrutineering, Mike was gently going round a roundabout when Shammy Moo made a loud bang from the transmission. We have now found out that the diff carrier broke in two and one section rode over the other causing a split in the diff housing case. Nigel and Henry were out of mobile range near Ballycastle and before they knew anything about it Mike and Keith had the transmission pack and engine sitting on the ground ready to fit the gearbox that Geoff had fortunately brought along. In heavy rain they had the car running again at 01:30 on Friday morning just as the generator petrol ran out! What stars!

Next day Geoff went off in blistering pace, using the knowledge of the roads gained from the rally in 2011. On stage two, the very twisty, narrow and infamous Torr Head (if you want a flavour look at the Rob Smith’s Torr Head YouTube video) he overtook a 911 on the stage. Nigel’s times improved during the day and got close to the times of the Porsche that Geoff ‘Imp’d’. On stage one he had total brake fade (EBC Yellowstuff on the front) due to insufficient attention to the heat cycles when running them in. The next stage they were back to normal once they started smelling! Otherwise Shammy (having had its hiccup the day before) ran perfectly although minor things needed attention at service throughout the day.

Geoff, when running so well, sadly had a problem immediately after the Lisnamuck 1 stage when the end of the outer drive shaft sheared at the spline and a wheel disappeared into a hedge. This episode 2 minutes earlier would have been very serious. Both cars fortunately chose to throw their ‘wobblies’ at perhaps the most convenient moments! Sadly this was the end of the event for Geoff.

Nigel continued to improve (Henry said he started to ‘get on it’ over the last three stages) and we ended up first in class and 5th overall in the Historic class (pre 68) which we were well satisfied with. Our first real points in the BHRC has put us in 31st place in the championship.

A truly memorable event, made possible by dedicated and enthusiastic service crew.