UKDRN

Anything Nostalgia Related.

Moderators: timetravel, ukdrn

 #35902  by carpenterracing
 
Well first of all I must apologise for a lack of info until now!!!
I'll explain all.......

Firstly I'd like to thank Tog and Jon for their help with getting the information out there about the rebuild.
Tog broke the news about the rebuild on Eurodragster back in November which was great! It got us a lot of attention which was amazing!!!!

Then Jon kindly followed up by running the story on the front page of the UKDRN site which was brilliant! He also set this forum post up for us which is why I'm here now writing this update.
To help us along the way he also got in contact with Custom Car magazine who kindly ran the story in their January issue
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We'd planned to get on with the rebuild before Christmas but work kept us busy which stopped us moving the car into our other workshop to start the strip down.
I must say it was very lucky it did however, as Christmas eve we got a call that the storms had caused some damage to the workshop. Off we popped to assess the damage to be welcomed by total carnage!!!!!
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A tree had come down over the corner of the workshop causing thousands of pounds of damage! Had the car been in the workshop and the tree fallen a few feet further to the left it could have all ended before it had begun.

Unfortunately that workshop wasn't the only one to suffer from the weather. At the beginning of the year I'd built a new engine workshop in my back garden to rebuild the engine in at home in any spare time I managed to find.
Over a few evenings before Christmas I'd started to strip our old spare engine ready to assess the condition of it and begin the rebuild of a short motor. After a week off for the holidays with the flu and more time spent erecting a repair on the car workshop, I opened the doors of my engine workshop to find the week+ of rain and wind had managed to drive the rain in everywhere leaving an inch of water in my workshop and a coating of mould on the walls inside. Engine parts on my bench were sat in puddles of water and everything had started to rust! A can of wd40 and a heater later and a day of wiping everything over and I'd managed to salvage things but this was not the start to 2014 I was hoping for!!!!
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While all this was happening John Bockelman of the US based Radio show "Racing' and Rockin' with Draglist.com" had been in touch. RacersReunion Radio is a great radio station which broadcasts every Monday evening at 8pm EST playing rock music and speaking about drag racing. Each week John features a sportsman racer of the week telling the story behind the historic racer and team, and he wanted to run his first European racer feature on us. Obviously we were very honoured and so after some chatting and story telling he put together a segment for broadcast on the 13th of January.
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And so that leads on to today. I finally managed to get the car uncovered and out of storage and up to our workshop ready for the work to finally begin.
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Luckily she still looks great! She's in quite good condition and there doesn't appear to be half as much work as originally thought so we're fairly confident we can have her ready by Easter for the Surrey Street Rodders 40th Wheelsday show.
To continue with the media interest in the car the county paper "Surrey Advertiser" is looking into running stories on the history, rebuilding and return of the car this year to the strip so even more interest and publicity is to come our way!!!
All we need now is someone to invest in sponsorship to take full advantage of all the media interest we are receiving!!!! Should anyone be interested or know of anyone who might be please get in contact with me at carpenterracing@btinternet.com - I'll happily get in contact to discuss options to get you and your company noticed in partnership with our World Famous and Record Breaking Historic Junior Fueler!!!
I'll post more news as and when it happens
- Andrew
 #35909  by ukdrn
 
Thanks for the update Andrew :)
That was a lucky escape with the tree and all the other problems but I'm glad you're carrying on regardless.

Glad I could help BTW.
 #36008  by carpenterracing
 
How many of you can say they know a Page 3 Model? :D You can now!
Last week I had my interview with a reporter from the Surrey Advertiser paper regarding the rebuild of the Dragster. I'd sent them a few of the clippings from the 1970's and 80's from when Dad was racing along with the press release I'd drawn up and they were keen to write about us again.
Usual couple of mistakes as usual but that's not unusual in paper articles.
Either way good exposure in my search for sponsorship!
Shame they chose the worst photo of me with the car they took on the day!
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Taken from the Surrey Advertiser - 31st January 2014 - Page 3
Surreys County Newspaper
 #36125  by ukdrn
 
One for Dave Derry
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 #36771  by carpenterracing
 
I'm sorry its been A LONG time since I last posted.
Since my last post lots has been going on! I've spent a couple of weeks seriously ill in hospital and a few more recovering, an operation and lots of work.
But heres a short story of what we've been up to.
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We stripped the engine and embarked on a complete rebuild. All our machining work was carried out by one of our sponsors Classic and Modern Engine Services (http://cmesuk.com) who handle all of our machining work for all the Daimler V8 work we do day to day.
Any engine parts were supplied by our main sponsor David Manners Group (http://www.davidmanners.co.uk) who stock parts for not only Daimlers, but Jaguar, MG, Triumph, MX5, Morris and Classic Mini.
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While we rebuilt the engine I took some time to check over the chassis. There were some minor surface rust patches which needed treating but all the welds were still good and strong so once the rust was dealt with a fresh coat of paint was applied.
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Gary Davis of the Surrey Street Rodders was very good to donate a brand new set of frontrunners to help us in our goal of rebuilding the car.
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Once we rebuilt the car we ran her up for the first time.

All seemed ok although there were a few things we needed to address.

Today we fitted a new fire extinguisher system, as well a get the final vinyls fitted to the car and the trailer ready for Dragstagia
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Tomorrow will be spent finishing the jobs we haven't managed to so far including fitting the new rear slicks.
Then we'll load the car and pack ready for Friday, and our first trip to the Pod to race in 20 years.
Lets hope for a good successful weekend!
 #36772  by ukdrn
 
Thanks for the big update Andrew, it's very much appreciated when people like yourself take time to support this website, I just wish others would do the same sometimes.

Sorry to hear you haven't been well but your turn in the beast will come although I'm guessing after this weekend dad will get a taste for it again :)

The cars looking great (and the old trailer) and I can't wait to see it this weekend, certainly one of the highlights of dragstalgia for me.

See you there..
 #36859  by carpenterracing
 
Dragstalgia 2014 was a weekend of mixed feelings for us.
It was great to get dad out in the old girl again after so many years. It was just a shame we only got the one run on the Friday due to niggly little problems.
First we had a cracked fuel fitting, then we had a fuel injector leak and then to top it off the seals in the 3/71 failed dumping the oil out the gear case.
But we had a great weekend and a few photos to share.
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We had a Daimler V8 racers reunion on the sunday. John Whitmore was on site for his induction into the Hall of Fame so spent quite a lot of sunday in the pits talking to dad about the Good Ol' Days!
Robin Read also popped in to have a chat for a while.
My brother Garry was also there crewing for us so we had 4 Daimler racers in our pits. (Soon to be 5)

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We had our 1967 Daimler Saloon out as towcar to add to the nostalgic theme.

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Our trailer was vinyl printed the day before Dragstalgia! It was decided to keep it quite basic to stay with the right era rather than a modern full wrap. We're lucky enough to have a couple of sponsors this year although we're hoping to increase on this next year.
If you have any contacts with people who might be interested in helping us in the rest of 2014 and 2015 please get in contact. There is plenty of room on the car to place company logos and details!
We still have a number of car shows this year to attend with plenty of press attention to help maximise your sponsorship investment.

And to top it all off today (25th July) dad's news of the BDRHOF induction was published in the Surrey Advertiser.
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 #36864  by carpenterracing
 


Here is the run Dad made on the Friday at Dragstalgia.
I'm afraid its not high res and it was filmed by my rather excited 13 year old nephew so excuse the camera movement.
 #36869  by ukdrn
 
Thanks for the update Andrew.
You all done so well with the problems you had and you dad done a great job in the car.
I really hope you can find some funding as I would love to see the car run more.
I have some more photos when I get a chance but here's the burnout.
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