Club Triumph's 10CR 2009 – The Control Stops

We made it ‘round 10 European countries (at least I did, hopefully Barry arrives safely back home too). So as “proof” some photographs of the various control stops and a few pictures taken en route.

Waiting for the start of the event at The Plough in Crews Hill

The start at Crews Hill (Thursday 10/9 - 9:52 GMT): 0 km

More waiting, for the ferry in Dover this time

Control stop 1: Les 2 Caps Services (Thursday 10/9 - 15:22 CET): 244 km

Boulevard Lénin in Rouen, en route to the control stop in Le Mans

Control stop 2: Le Mans (Thursday 10/9 - 20:32 CET): 671 km

Hanging around at the entrance of the “Circuit des 24 Heures du Mans”

Control stop 3: Condom (Friday 11/9 - 4:27 CET): 1237 km

A short stop near the top of the Port de la Boneigua

Control stop 4: Trying to enter Andorra (Friday 11/9 - from 12:14 to 13:44 CET): 1584 km

Control stop 5:Beziers (Friday 11/9 - 17:48 CET): 1838 km

A rest for man and machine at the Ibis hotel in Beziers

On the A75 near Poujols (F)

Control stop 6: Millau Bridge (Saturday 12/9 - 10:29 CET): 1965 km

Lunch stop in the small village Le Béage on the D16 (F)

Barry trying to repair a sheared off exhaust downpipe,

on the roadside of the D578 near Nonières(F)

The sponsors of a pair of jubilee clips to repair the exhaust manifold.

And sourcing more repair materials for the broken exhaust downpipe (in the shape of a coke can).

With these three items we finally managed a repair that lasted. Along the N532 in Granges-Valence.

Heading for the mountains, at least that was the plan. On the A41 near Montmélian.

Entering the small town of Beaufort, well behind schedule and the start of a long night of driving

Control stop 7: Beaufort (Saturday 12/9 - 20:38 CET): 2436 km

Control stop 8: Nürburgring (Sunday 13/9 - 8:21 CET): 3273 km

Hanging around at the entrance to the Nürburgring’s famous Nordschleife (D)

The exhaust repair at the Nürburgring. Still going strong after well over 1000 kilometres.

It eventually brought car and driver home safely to England!

Control stop 9: Malmedy (Sunday 13/9 - 10:32 CET): 3367 km

Finish Rolduc (Sunday 13/9 - 15:17 CET): 3586 km

Statler and Waldorf at the Rolduc abbey (NL).

And finally a small selection of pictures shot in the courtyard of Rolduc Abbey:

Edited on the 10th of September 2024: Because it is nearly 15 years ago that we set of for the 4th edition of Club Triumph’s 10 Countries Run, it was time to freshen up the pictures of this “Continental Tour”. Also added some extra pictures and edited the limited text where necessary.

DHC report nr. 44; Under body protection

Went over to the car a few times over the last week to have a look at the progress but also to make a small stand to make transportation and painting of the body a little easier. Last week the seams underneath the car were filled in with sealant;

After which it was time to mask of the body in preparation for the under body protection;

Just visible on the left is the (light weight) stand that will be used for support in the spray booth. And with the masking done the under body protection could be sprayed on;

Followed by a thin coat of spray filler, as a final base for the top coat.

This needs flattening down, after which the underside will be painted in a 2-pack uni-colour, this is planned for early next week. After which the body’s outside can be painted. It is booked in with the paint shop for the second half of next week 😎

DHC report nr. 43; Front brakes

After last weekend’s struggle with the front suspension I thought it a good idea to take ‘t Kreng out for a spin in the country. And I enjoyed every minute of it. But it also give me the opportunity to visit local brake specialist C&C Parts and see if they could provide me with some new brake pads. I have used EBC green stuff before, but whilst performing pretty good overall, they lacked proper bite in extreme situations. So I opted for some Mintex M1144 pads which they had in stock for the ATÉ M16 front calipers I have on the car;

They even had the proper fitting kit for these Ford Granada based front calipers in stock;

DHC report nr. 42; Front suspension frustration

Progress on the DHC has been a bit slack over the past few weeks. Won’t bother you with the reasons for this. But as my holiday started this weekend I thought it a good idea to get some work done. So to get my motivation back I started with something simple like reassembling the front suspension. As all the parts were already coated or cleaned it shouldn’t take more than a few hours to get them back together. How wrong one can be!

Right from the start it went wrong. The first job to do was to get the damper inserts into the struts. Usually this shouldn’t take more than a few minutes, but the lock-nuts refused point blank to go back in the struts. Their thread just didn’t want to engage with the thread inside the strut tube. A closer inspection of said nut quickly revealed the problem;

Clearly the thread got damaged somewhere, but I can’t remember how. But luckily I do have a few spares so out came another nut. This time I made sure the thread was good but the result was the same. The thread just didn’t engage properly, every time I thought it was engaging the nut would tilt. But a frustrating hour and a half later, in which I swapped lock nuts and struts, and cleaned and re-cleaned threads, I got a result. I managed to get the lock nut in a few threads by hand, after which I had to change to the special (Koni) tool to get it in further. But it soon became very heavy work indeed. As I was afraid to damage the thread of the struts I removed the nut again. Number two was also ready for the litter bin;

Luckily the struts’ thread wasn’t damaged so it was time for number three, which went in with only very little persuasion. Strangely enough the other strut suddenly went very smooth too. But now I was pretty fed up with them so I decided to finish them! From here everything went slightly smoother, only cleaning out the bolt threads for the calipers and the disc shield proved rather time consuming.

Before putting them back in I thought it a good idea to check the Sierra bearings I put in two years ago. There were a few people who had their doubts as to how I had mounted them. But I’m pleased to say that they still are in pretty good nick and still work as I meant them to.

And after a stubborn plastic ring, that for no obvious reason didn’t want to fit in its designed hole, a bit of a hassle with one of the springs and a pair of gaiters that went on to smoothly (so slid of immediately afterwards), and lots of perseverance I managed to get everything back together in the end!