PIGLET (Mk1 #5) Pt2
I still wanted to race but after how harsh the dirt event was I thought I'd try hill climbing. This was the track that the previous owner Tom won the 2001 State Championships so I figured I would have a shot. The event was the Collingrove Come And Die (try) Day 26/4/09.
Here is the vid of our day...
A bitumen event but I still couldn't get away from the mud.
Mark from MWP Sports Photography snapped up this great shot of me warming my tires before a run.
I went with my mate Greg in his civic and we had an absolute blast.
I did pretty well too given I'd never done it before and it was wet and the paddock was muddy. Greg's times in red, mine in green.
Only a couple of weeks later and I got the first photo of one of my cars in a magazine. It was in an article about Day of the Volkswagen in the May - July 2009 edition of Volkswagen Magazine Australia.
If you look really closely where the red arrow is pointing you can just see it... :p
I was having a little too much play in the steering rack a quick visit to a friends workshop and I got it sorted.
There was another event coming up at Collingrove so I picked up a set of Enkei mini lights and wrapped them with some Yokohama Advan A048R 205/60/13’s.
Back to the hill for the Collingrove Multi Club 1 14/6/09.
I did rain a lot and I had major issues getting off the line without wheel spin, on one run the start official was sweeping the water off the track :/
I went up again with my mate Greg in his Civic, we had all our gear under the tarp to try and keep it dry.
Here is the footage of my runs...
Very pleased to pull off a second place finish in my class even with the lack of grip. The Advan's helped but there was just too much water on the track, even though I had little grip it was still a great day :)
Just two weeks later and I was back for the Collingrove Winter Cup 1 28/6/09.
The engine was prepped and perfect after being run on a dyno a few days earlier.
Greg and I back in our spot, with all our tools etc. under a tarp ;)
Again cheers to Mark from MWP Sports Photography for the great photos.
Here is a less shitty video of my day ;) my best run is at 2:42.
So there you have it, run 3 saw my best time of 40.14, not a blistering pace but really good fun.
This car was my daily drive for a few wonderful years, but sadly the body underneath was a mess. Structural rust everywhere and the two main rails underneath the car were squashed flat so under braking and accelerating you could feel the car twist.
There was only one thing I could do :'(
The engine came out and eventually got a full rebuild and lots of sexy new parts, but as for the shell...
This looks all too familiar.
To give you an idea how bad it was under the surface this is what was left of the front engine mount.
With a full strip down underway I wanted to keep the suspension so I "improvised".
Seems legit...
Although I think this is pretty funny it also makes me a bit sad :'(
After all that love and fun unfortunately it was time to say goodbye.
Yes this was the end for Piglet but as you can see hidden in the background it was the beginning for our little yellow rat Avril :D
The end.