Eastside breakfast - Sunday 5th March

Phillip Island Classic - 10th to 12th March

I know this is not Clubman related, but there may be some interested people in the club regarding the upcoming Phillip Island Classic.

I am one of the commentators for the event (my Clubman bios sometimes shows SMILE).

- Phil Memery

Best local car race meeting every year, IMHO.

- Gavin

Westside breakfast - Sunday 19th January

Usual spot: The Nook in Sunbury.
Usual time: 8am onwards.
Usual bunch of ratbags.

Les writes about last month's westside meetup, prior to the Tassie trip:

I’d already worded up the West side regulars that we’d have 2 SA visitors. Jim and Simon were equally excited to drive from my place to Sunbury so were up early and prepared for our mini convoy.

Typically, the road was being ruled by folk wanting to drive 80 in a 100 zone so when we had a chance to overtake safely, we did…..but that’s when a juvenile kangaroo decided to cross without looking both ways!  

Jim’s Birkin took the full force.
Gerkin was a mess so we got it back to my place via Jim’s trailer, then I went on to Sunbury to tell the guys what happened.  
Bloody annoying but given the size of a clubbie, Jim was lucky the roo didn’t go over the top.

Back at the garage, we tried unsuccessfully to transplant parts from another Birkin but in the end, Jim agreed to use my Volvo on the trip and become the back-up/rescue vehicle, should that become necessary.

As I write this, it’s 4:45am on Monday morning and we are almost in Tassie.
LET THE ADVENTURE BEGIN 

- Les



 

Bright Not the Nationals - 24th to 26th March

Book with the Bright Accomodation Park.
 

Evening club meeting - Wednesday 29th March

Manningham Hotel, Bulleen.
Formal meeting from 7:30, munchies/drinks/car talk before.

Tim Woods will be bringing the group up to date on his + Dave Down's bike motored exo build.
 

Last month's Peninsula Run

The Mornington Peninsula chapter had its second group run on the 11th of February.

Perfect weather, a good group of seven clubbies, two tin tops and fabulous driving roads (once we got to the turn off to the Gurdies).

The roads and scenery in the Bass Hills are fabulous, although I think Gavin was the only one with time enough to enjoy it as Kim was piloting the 777. Charles did some unorthodox tyre warming at the Kernot store and as such was able to stick with the group.

We managed to hang together for all but one turn off and after calling in the wanderers, we regrouped and headed off again. There was very little traffic to spoil our fun, though Brian did get closer to a Hilux ute than he would have liked. We had a little over 100 kms of fun roads and finished the day at the bar and grill in Tooradin, with a lunch and a few beers.

A great day with no incidents and ten smiling faces.

Who wants to organise the next one????

- Arie Wetsteyn

MSCA Matters

A slight changing of the guard at the Marque Sports Car Association's AGM.

Petrina has become Competition Secretary, taking over from Mark Rae who is unwell.
In turn TIm Schreiber (Lotus Club) has taken over the MSCA Secretary position from Petrina.

Some big shoes to fill for Tim, with Petrina keeping things running smoothly for many years.


Calendar change: The Winton round in August has been moved by a week to the 13th.

Next up is Sandown on Saturday 18th March.  Anyone welcome to come and see the action.
 

Tradition continues

AOMC blurb

Recognising that the VCBG has joined the AOMC, here are some recent missives from said organisation:

AOMC February Newsletter
Spoke 'n' Hub Torque December 2022
Automotive Historian
Spoke 'n' Hub Torque March 2023

Club members at Vic Hillclimb Championship

Following our recent purchase of a Leitch Clubman, I arranged my competition licence with the intent to participate in a number of Hillclimbs this year including the Victorian Hillclimb Championship. Unfortunately Round 1 of the VHC was deferred to later in the year due to delays in finishing the track upgrades at Rob Roy.
 
With entry fee paid for Round 2 at Bryant Park Haunted Hills I came to the realisation, after ringing a number of trailer hire companies that I needed a specific trailer for the Clubman which the hire companies couldn’t provide. I contacted Gavin who in turn reached out to fellow club members seeking assistance for my dilemma. I was amazed and so grateful for the number of responses I received from members offering me the loan of a trailer. A big thank you to Gavin, my fellow members who contacted me including the very generous chap who loaned me his tilt trailer !
 
The 18^th February arrived quickly and after an early start, 2 hours later I arrived at Bryant Park to be greeted by perfect weather. As I’d never been to BP I was really surprised how good the place looked. I guess my expectations were based on my knowledge of Rob Roy which has basic facilities.
 
For those that haven’t been to BP – there are about 10 garages available for rent, plenty of hardstand area in the pits, loads of room for trailers etc, easy line up access to the start line and a spectacular club house and amenities with a terrific view over most of the track.
 
The track is actually a circuit and can be configured in a number of different ways. For Round 2, it was the clockwise version. Just as well we had a familiarisation lap as there are blind corners, crests and off camber parts which all add up to make BP challenging even for those that have been there many times.
 
In my class  - B 1 Sports Cars Clubman up to 1600cc there were 5 entrants including the current lap record holder.
 
Colin Newitt Locost (after speaking with Colin he said his car was anything but Locost !)
Steve Buffington Westfield
Dale Hocking Dalrick
Fellow VCBG member Rob Nethercote Elfin, plus myself
 
The first three above were literally in a class of their own given the money invested in their cars. At least one of them was getting close to 11,000 RPM if I heard him correctly !
Best times were Colin 55.4, Steve 56.3, Dale 57.13, Rob 61.57, and myself 66.02
Unfortunately Rob’s day was cut short to a leaking wheel bearing seal.
 
Not withstanding there were some timing equipment issues on the day, it was an extremely well run event by the Gippsland Car Club given there were a maximum number of entries.
 
For me personally, I absolutely loved the track and can’t wait to get back there for another crack.
 
In hindsight I should have done a bit more research for my first event at BP including watching this Yutube clip which I just saw the other night.
 
Bryant Park 59 seconds https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwyTbjjOOY8

- Peter Giulieri

Colin and Steve have great cars and they can both drive. They are great to watch. 

I had hoped for a sub-60 but my Elfin ran beautifully and I got half of each run right. There are many great corners and I’d love to see my time if I got all of them right. 

- Rob Nethercote






Accomodation at The Bend - MSCA event, June

Tassie Trip

Sunday dawned pleasantly.  Or so it seemed.  Alas at breakfast we heard that one of the clubbies destined for Tassie had a fight with a kangaroo on the way over for a chat and coffee for the Westside catchup.  Poor Jim wasn't able to resurrect his clubbie so had to take Les's Volvo and they filled it with jacks, tools, etc so it became the support vehicle.  This turned out to be great as the jack was used a few times.
 
Chris Goldsmith had a rose joint break on the way to Geelong but his support crew are second to none and got him going in record time.
 
We all met up at the Geelong docks and had to wait an eternity in the hot afternoon sun before loading.  The boat is quite spacious but the good things about it pretty much end there.  Food was very expensive.  Drinks were expensive.  The rooms pokey.  The shower was excellent.  The ceiling buzzed all night driving me bonkers.  Tried jamming paper into the joint but that barely helped.  Finally had the sense to swap ends in the bed and then I was able to get a few hours shuteye.  The boat vibrates badly... They really need to get the motors, driveshafts or props balanced.
 
We arrived in Devonport to be greeted by Rod who gave us directions to his place for breakfast.  Karen and Rod dined us liked royalty.  What a wonderful way to start the day.  Eggs, bacon, sausages, beans, toast, coffee, tea and so many other lovely delicacies to enjoy.  Lots of chatting and enjoying Karen and Rod's place.  Thanks Karen and Rod.
 
Some brake bleeding on Keith's clubbie was in order and then we all headed off towards Hobart for our few nights accommodation.  Great roads were found to buzz along in our perfectly suited automobiles.  Thoroughly enjoyable drive to Hobart.
 
Geoff struck trouble with his clubbie as it decided not to run anymore.  Eventually it was flatbed'd to the Hotel where lots of peeps looked at it.  They managed to get a usb cable to connect to the Haltech.  Brenda's work laptop was hurriedly loaded with Haltech's software to chat to the car to see what was wrong.  Seemed like the early bets were on a crank sensor.  Nothing was untoward in the software.  Took a day or 2 before a faulty fuse was found hidden up under the scuttle with a bank of relays.  Once that was replaced Geoff had a great time again in his car buzzing around Tassie.
 
From Hobart we made several day trips around the south west side of Tassie.  I never realised how mountainous/hilly Tassie is (my 1st time there).  I really like the little town called Kettering.
 
Cheryl and Keith hosted us for a delicious BBQ, also treating us like royalty.  The pumpkin soup recipe was asked for but the secret never left Cheryl's lips.  Lots of great chats/jokes/laughter getting to know all the clubbie guys and gals.  What a great evenig was had by all.  Thanks Cheryl and Keith.
 
The Gordon dam was amazing to see and getting there and back had been on mostly empty but amazingly twisty roads.  What traffic we encountered soon pulled over to let the gaggle of clubbies pass.
 
Before we headed up to Launceston I got an email for the Big4 caravan park and suddenly realised an error I made with the date of departure.  My wife's sister was getting married on Saturday and I thought we were coming back Saturday morning.  Alas I was too scared to call my wife preferring to mull it out in silence texting her the goof I made.  I called SoT to try to get rebooked for a Friday night sailing but there was nothing available.  She texted back - See you Sunday.
 
I lost the group as they headed up the east side of Tassie and stopped for lunch in St Helens.  I missed this detail at breakfast in the morning so I turned inland and was over an hours travel before a nice police lady waved at me heading towards me and then flashed her lights and then did a u-turn to chat to me.  Told me I was doing 120km/h, I said I was doing 105.  She asked if my speedo was working - Yes was the reply.  She said I'll be getting the fine via email and so far haven't received anything yet...  maybe she really did give me a break/benefit of the doubt as I was polite to her and we had a good chat about the trip the club was having in Tas.  She suggested calling SoT to try to get onto a cancellation.
 
Thursday morning while we were at Mal's farm looking at his nice collection of cars and farm stuff I remembered to call SoT and was able to snag a cancellation for Friday night's trip to Melbourne.  I texted wifey that I was going to make the wedding and that I was tempted to not tell her and surprise her saturday morning - her reply - Thank you.  And you were right to NOT surprise me - wrong occasion.
 
So I ended the trip a day early and missed getting wet waiting to board the SoT Saturday night.
 
To sum up the week all I can say is that I'm so glad I took the chance to fly to Queensland to look at my clubbie and buy it.  It performs so well against all these new fangled fuel injected multi cam clubbies.  It's noisy, loud, a chick magnet, drinks, accelerates and brakes like nothing else yet the Smiles Per Gallon is off the charts!!!!
 
See you at the next Catch up/Event/NTN/Nationals/On the road somewhere.
 
- Karl Mueller
 

Other upcoming events

• 65th Kalorama Rally - Sunday 5th March - Kalorama Memorial Reserve, Mt Dandenong Road
• Rob Roy Revival - Saturday/Sunday 18th/19th March - https://www.robroyrevival.mgcc.com.au/
• 6 Hour Relay Philip Island - 29th/30th July - Last year we ran a team of 6 cars; should we do the same or run 2 teams of 4 cars? If you are interested in running please contact Les Bone
• FFCC Driver Training day at Sandown - Saturday 11th June (Long Weekend) - contact Paul Lechner if interested

Send interesting stuff for the newsletter to:
gavin.eakins@gmail.com