Helmingham Festival of Classics

7 Cars from Club Triumph Norfolk Area attended the excellent Helmingham Festival of Classics and Sportscars on Sunday, meeting in Eye for a convoy of Triumphs over the 15 miles to Helmingham.

Weather was dull to start of with but brightened up and was quite hot in the afternoon
This is an interesting event, with prestige classics lined up in front of the House belonging to the Tollemache family. We the lowly classics where mixed in with about 200 others, a very varied selection of cars, both classics and sportscars. The more modern sportscars and larger clubs where in a seperate area, there was a large contingent from Pistonheads comprising a couple of Ultimas, Dodge Vipers, TVR's galore, Club Lotus with many Elises, couple of Exige, Esprits and Elans, the Porsche Club had a large selection and others including Mazda.

There was enough to keep the ladies entertained, which is becoming a pre-requisite of any shows we attend, there was a very good Samba group, falconry, dogs, plus crafts, most important a beer tent for the boys, and car related stalls, etc.

A highlight for me is the runs up the main driveway by classics and sportscars, held twice, "prestige" cars in the morning and "normal" classics in the afternoon. Sight and sound of the day was the Ultima grinding its way up the drive, sparks flying due to its low ground clearance.

A few pics.

AC Cobra blasting up the drive.



















Stag owners out in force.

Club Triumph Cars.

Shaking and Moving!

Nice Aston Martin.

One of the very last Esprit of the Hethel production line.

Cobra, or is it a replica, all badging looked correct but maybe reg gives it away.

Stately 1930's Riley.

Ultima.

A good day was enjoyed at this popular show, food and drink greatly improved this year, with more outlets, bacon baguettes where reported OK with 6 rashers in each. We even remembered the Club Gazebo this time.

Classic Le Mans

Club Triumph Norfolk Area took along 6 cars to Classic Le Mans over the weekend of 9th to 11th July. Most made their own way there, some by Ferry, some by Eurotunnel, and all made it back safely. I think the word of the weekend was "Scorchio" Camp site was ok, loads of Triumphs about.
I won't post too many pics here, if anyone wants to see more they can look at http://www.andys-tr7.co.uk/63761/97261.html

Here are some pics of some of the the Le Mans cars in the paddock.

Former Graham Hill/Pescarolo Matra Simca 660-01 from 1971.

Lancia/Porsche/Ferrari Racers from the 1980s Le Mans Races.

Capri 2600 RS from 1971 Race.
BMW M1 from 1979 race behind, returning to paddocks after their race.

As close as you can get at any race, engines starting prior to formation lap.
Gulf Porsche 908/3 from 1971 era.

Jigsaw Racings Le Mans Spitfire.
ADU 1B.

Ferrari 512 M from 1971 era in paddocks.

Just a short video of some of the cars going back to the paddock after a race session.

Vintage Transport Day - North Norfolk Railway

The usual Club Triunph suspects attended the Vintage Transport Day at the North Norfolk Railway at Holt Station on Sunday 4th July. A hot day, Gill and I where in trouble for leaving the Gazebo at home, but with only a couple of days to go before our Le Mans trip, and a car just back from headgasket and jackshaft failure we had more to worry about. This was a new event for Club Triumph Norfolk, and we again picked a good, yet different event, not just sitting in a field looking at cars.
Most of our contingent left the cars parked up on view at Holt Station and where able to take advantage of free travel on the North Norfolk Railway, drawn by steam to Sheringham or Wybourne.

CT contingent lined up at Holt Station.

GER Engine and Quad Set after arrival at Sheringham.

We spent a couple of hours at Sheringham, looking around, a quick go on the penny pushers in the arcades, had some very nice fish and chips in a resturant, followed by the usual seafood we have when on the coast, mussells, prawns, and a crab to bring home, then watched the ships with an ice cream on the sea wall before heading back to the station to catch a train to Weybourne.

View of North Norfolk Coast from the train on a bright sunny day.

Stanier Class 5 at Weybourne.

Fourth form of motive power we used on the day, Diesel Railbus at Holt.

Couple of old trucks from Jack Richards Transport, a concern still going today.

Some members took the vintage bus service in to Holt for a look around, however we did not have the time. Was a good day out, brillinat weather, and worth attending, Managed to get around 80 miles on the car with no problems prior to Le Mans, easing some worries about the long journey ahead on a partly rebuilt engine.

The Jackshaft Failure, which looked as though it had been caused by a metallic buildup on the front bearing surface end of Jackshaft, thus jamming in the bore, caused this damage.

Closer inspection reveals that the Crankshaft timing chain sprocket teeth where knurled over, the tensioner had a big lump chewed out by the chain, camshaft timing chain sprocket had a bolt sheared, and the chain snapped, I presume it had all happened in this order, luckily was only on tickover at the time so no lasting damage was done. The head was removed again, valves and guides checked for damage, and camshaft removed to check free operation of valves. There was no evident damage to pistons. All was put together again with thicker gasket due to head skim.

Norfolk Area Treasure Hunt and Euston Rural Pastimes

Sunday 27th was our annual Treasure Hunt which clashed with an insignificant sporting event, thus reducing the numbers attending. Speaking to owners of Triumphs at our last few events we expected to see around 30 Triumphs, but Englands pathetic display reduced the field. Those who did not turn up missed a glorious day, best weather of the year so far.

14 cars left Caistor Hall Hotel, on a circuitious tour of the Broadland area, searcing out clues around some lovely interesting villages.

Line up at Caistor Hall

Having organised the Hunt, and not being able to participate I stood at a crucial junction, on the correct route from Hickling to the Coast for nearly one and half hours in the boiling sun and saw only Dave and Vi, who I thought would win with their experience in Holland, HCR, etc, and the car below who where the only ones to come from the right direction.

This convoy of Stags took the long route round.

This Stag being the eventual winner.

David and Julie Aspinall with son Buster coming home in 2nd place.

The finish was at The Lighthouse Inn at Walcott on the North Norfolk Coast they allowed use of the Gardens for parking the cars and use of a marquee for some well deserved shade, and the game was also screened. Best sight for me was a 30ish, tattooed, England shirted bloke who came out crying when the 3rd goal went in, kicked a bin, and hurt his foot.

Ted and Christina, not last or lost for once!

Nice line up at the finish, with Stags prominent.

With entrance fees, contributions, and a raffle we raised £250 for East Anglia Air Ambulance, so thanks to all who attended.

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Euston Rural Pastimes.

A small group of Norfolk members went along to Euston Hall for the Rural pastimes event a few weeks ago, I must admit to not looking forward to sitting in a field of cars, but this show was massive, with masses to do for both the Ladies and the Gents. Plenty of stalls, crafts, 2 show rings which demonstrated country orientated stuff, along with steam power, tractors, cars. commercials, etc. So good we managed to lose the Ladies for hours!

Keith provides these photos.

Steam power.

Interesting Bristol

Think this is one of his dream cars?

Or this?

Alans Stag.

Will definately add this to next years events.

Norwich Classic vehicle Club Show

At this time of the year the shows come thick and fast, on Sunday, 5th June, Gill and I took both cars along to the Norwich Classic Vehicle Club Classic Car show. Weather was poor, cloudy and dull in morning, a few showers, the odd minute of sun, then a thunderstorm on way home, forcing me to dive under a tree to put the hood up.

Quite a few Triumphs around, both from CT Norfolk area and Norwich Classic Vehicle Club.

I foolishly took along my DHC, even after having confirmed the head gasket is on its way out with a gas test, was only about 20 miles to the show and I had not used it for work during the week, so thought what the hell, did not have any overheating on temp gauge, but definately used some water, coming through Norwich on the way home I had the fan on overide just in case. It goes in to Anglian Triumph for Head gasket and skim next week.

A few pictures of show, Triumph biased.

Our 2 sevens on show.

More cars, Nissan Figaros crept in again. There was a Best in car award to 4 places, 3 places picked by entrants, and one by organisers, I was surprised that 2 Marinas won awards!, one in this picture.

Few more Triumphs.

Nice early Spitfire.

Car of the Show for me was this Stanley Steam Car, I admire the dedication to a) restore something like this, b) drive in modern traffic.

Out with the MG's

After participating in the Broadland MGOC run for the last 4 years around Norfolk, we gave it a miss this year, opting instead to do the 2010 Boadicea Run with the Iceni MGOC, held in Suffolk. It was a scorching hot day, the run beginning at Rougham Airfield, near Bury St Edmunds. There was a choice of 4 routes to take, with Tulip maps provided for each, rally plaques for the cars, and refreshment vouchers included in the entry cost. We chose the route to Lavenham in the Gold DHC.

Waiting for our departure at 10-30, boiling hot at this hour.

There was approx 90 cars on the run, predominent where MG's, of the other there where 5 Triumphs, some modern machinery, and approx 15 other classic.

They must have been hot on the run in this!

Typical Suffolk Scenery.

We soon caught some of the more sedate MG's.

Lavenham, a pretty Suffolk market town.

A lot of rather nice houses in this town. Known locally as the Chelsea of Suffolk, with house prices to match!

Back at Rougham Airfield we headed for the shade with fellow Club Triumph members Alan and Christine.

View of the control area from the control tower.

Was a very good run, and well worth the entry fee, if there where to be any cylinder head or coolant problems on the dhc, today was the day with tempertures around 29C, it did kick in the Kenlowe in dead slow traffic or at long waits at junctions, but this is normal and the fan soon did its job. With Le Mans looming nearer I am going to get the head checked over on Friday with a gas test at Anglian Triumph just to put my mind at rest.

TR7 Troubles

Its been a stressfull couple of weeks since the Strut Gaitor replacement, I had symptons of Head Gasket failure, ie: water being pushed out of header tank, I am keeping an eye on this as it worries me, I think it was an air lock, due to the front end being up on axle stands for a weekend whilst I changed gaitors and fitted needle rollers to improve slow speed manouvering.

I can see no trace of oil in the water or water in oil, and after I had flushed out, changed thermostat, changed a slightly collapsed hose, everything seems OK. The car also failed its MOT with "little or no effort from the RH rear brake" this was finally changed and the MOT passed on Thursday.

Today we completed the recce for the Norfolk Area Treasure Hunt, 125 miles home to home with no signs of overheating, there was plenty of stopping and starting, lots of sitting at idle, but temperature was normal, electric fan not needing to cut in often, this makes it about 250 miles with no further symptons, so touch wood everythings OK.

We located a good venue for the Treasure Hunt finish, a coastal pub, open all day, choice of light snacks to full meals, with a marquee we can use for free for marking, prize giving, etc, we can also park entrants safely within the grounds.

For a pretty, historic area like the Broads, it is surprising how few good clues can be found, where a car can stop safely or where you can park up and search for clues, thus having to resort to churches and village signs!

Out and about seeking clues in the Broads.