A Blast from the past - Arc Blast that is - MIG welder restore

So, I probably mentioned  that I used to repair welding equipment...no? ok: I USED TO REPAIR WELDING EQUIPMENT.

Well ever since I got a Landrover trails vehicle, I've needed to carry out repairs, mostly to the steering guard, since this bears the brunt of all low lying obstacles: tree stumps, rocks and the like.

I bought a stick welder thinking that would do the job: Its a 145A Clarke Stick welder, that was in good nick when I bought it for about £40. I then went to the local farmers auction and managed to bag more sticks than I would ever need for about £20!

Clarke 145A Stick welder, in better nick than mine!

The good thing about this kind of stick welder is that there are VERY few components and cheap to run. It is essentially on over-sized step down transformer with an adjustable center tap-off and a either a heavy bridge rectifier or no rectification at all. Some older versions of this design are submerged in mineral oil (and I've heard from the old skool they are BETTER than modern designs)

Typical Adjustable stick welder, this is a schematic from a Lincoln AC-225 stick welder

However; this has its limitations. For one: you have to replace the sticks when they run down, and another is its flexibility. Welding with a stick welder, on your back, under a Landrover is full of pitfalls! If the hot weld starts to pool, it eventually turns into a hot, molten drip of DOOM! And you have to take drastic evasive action, usually meaning you clonk your head on the diff

Amongst other things, the finish: stick welding leaves a lot of slag, which you have to brush off. 

Replacement?

Anyway I got donated a MIG welder from a friend. I had offered to fix it for him and he had giving me the control box out of it to look at to start with, and christ its old skool! LM324's, triacs and more 4000 series logic than you can shake a shitty stick at! I started to fix it, but I picked up something else and forgot about it, it wasn't an urgent job fortunately as he had another welder. So he decided to give it to me, and turned up a trail event and dragged it home.

Typical MIG welder

Its pretty beat up, its seen better days, and it "doesn't work" (we'll see). I was told that it would turn on, you could feed the wire but no power, as the contactor wouldn't close. The contactor had been replaced but still didn't close, which means its the drive circuit probably. I have fixed boards like this before and they are pig! alot of signal sniffing and 9 times out of 10 its either a leaky diode, or leaky transistor, or leaky triac or a leaky output on a logic gate or op-amp.

Welder electronics are like people - when they get old, they get more leaky!

And with good reason, they get a lot of hammering and some of the welders I have fixed have: Made in West Germany printed on the side! so quite old about 30 odd years or so!

Plans

I plan to keep the major components: the wire feed motor, contactors, gas solenoid and existing transformer; and replace the drive electronics with an arduino based equivelent.

I'll be employing relays to control contactors and solenoids and a high power MOSFET to control the wire feed motor.

The whole lot will be plonked onto strip board and fitted back into the existing electronics box.

Wire everything back up, beat a few panels back into shape & a lick of paint and jobs a good-un. I'll aslo need to purchase a new lance too.

Right: best clear the crap out of the shed then!

Stripping the Swivel on my landy

This weekend I managed to fit the Swivel housing back on my Landrover (YEY a post about something other than electronics!)

I had done it before when I first got the vehicle. This was because at about 40mph a horrendous wheel wobble manifested itself when driving on standard road tyres! After changing the pan-hard rod bushes & Hub bearings, I did a quick overhaul job on the swivel housings and then the problem cleared.

However, a year down the line and the passenger side started leaking a mixture of EP90 and CV joint grease on the driveway......something not right and I had clearly not done a good job.

This lead to finding some useful advice and an glimpse into this vehicles past....

Do Your Research!

For those of you unfamiliar with parts of a Land rover - the swivel housing is located on the ends of the front axle:

From Landroverclub.net

And here are some exploded diagrams of the housing for my axles, courtesy of AllBrit (list of parts their website, follow the links under each pic)

The Swivel housing

http://www.allbrit.de/UNI.cfm?PAGE=805193&SPRACHE=EN

The Swivel joint

http://www.allbrit.de/UNI.cfm?PAGE=805070&SPRACHE=EN

The housing fits over the joint. Inside the housing is a CV joint (#2 on the swivel joint). This enables the drive from the differential to be transferred to the hub/wheel, via the half-shaft (#1 on the swivel joint), whilst allowing the hub/wheel to be steered.

I also did a bit of a search for guides on how to service/overhaul these swivel joints and came to a favourite channel of mine on youtube: Landrover Toolbox Videos  

If you look though his playlists, you can find an entire playlist dedicated to replacing the swivel housing in detail and from someone in the know, also a load more on tool reviews and tips & hints; mostly Land Rover related +Land Rover Toolbox Videos

I then ordered a swivel joint overhaul kit: DA3164P, from Paddocks and made a start.

Stripping & Re-build

On the bench

After taking the wheel off and freeing the track-rods, I undid the 7 Bi-Hex bolts holding the swivel joint to the axle, allowing me to pull the hub, housing and half-shaft out all in one go, to then take to the shed and start stripping it down and cleaning all the parts and inspecting them individually.

One thing I noticed when taking the half-shaft out was no EP-90 followed it out or leaked out when taking the bolts off! Probably cos it had escaped onto the driveway! A sure sign the seals had probably not been fitted properly!

After stripping the whole assembly down to its individual components and cleaning them in paraffin, I found a few errors I had made:

1. I had left the old gasket from before, for the bottom pin on the housing!
2. I had not put grease on the inside edge of the swivel housing
3. I had totally pre-loaded the housing incorrectly!
4. All surfaces for gaskets were not cleaned properly or at all.

Well that's what you get for a rush job! lesson learnt!

After I had cleaned up the parts I gave the surfaces where there would be a gasket (Housing face to stub axle, the face where the swivel joint joins the axle, and the face of the stub axle)  a pass with a Stanley blade, a scrub with a wire brush and then a finish with some wet/dry paper to clean them up proper.

Using a vice to hold the swivel ball, I began to pre-load the the housing as per the video. Once happy with the pre-load I fitted the the axle seal, and the oil seal. then moved the whole assembly to the vehicle where I cleared the old gasket & gunk for the axle end and built the rest up on the vehicle.

All new gaskets were fitted with some sealant on the mating surfaces.

Fresh pack of one-shot in the filler for the housing and some fresh grease and seals in the hub & bearings and job's a good'un. No leaks so far, but will see after I top up diff with EP90.

What was learnt

• Pre-loading the housing bearings properly is vital!
• Clearing the crud of mating surfaces helps
• Greasing seals helps ensure a good seal to keep unwanted muck out and keep lube in.
• Taking the time to clean your parts aids to a doing a job properly!

Also found out that the front axle is of a series 1 discovery:

This is not surprising really, the vehicle was trailed a lot before I got it, so it's more than likely that they were swapped due to damage.

Unfortunately, I damaged some of the brake lines to the calipers whilst trying to re-fit the assembly, another job on the list then!

HEY-HO!

Just how conductive is conductive ABS?

So a good friend of mine does a fuck-ton of 3D printering (Shameless advertising here!)

I was round his workshop today to help fix a bit of car trouble. Alas; turns out OBD and OBD2 are not the same creature.....nevermind.

What he did show me was some "conductive" ABS he had and wanted to do a project with it. I was sceptical - I had come across conductive plastic before and you either had to pump a couple of 1000V into it before it would conduct or it was only good enough for ESD/EMC purposes.

Basically "conductive" when used in terms of plastic means VERY high resistivity! To an electric source: its a resistor of MAHOOSIVE resistance!

A few Youtube hits yielded some interesting results - but one piece of information cropped up, if conductive ABS bends/deforms: it changes resistance.

This means it could have applications for:

• home made strain gauges
• bendable potentiometers
• movement sensors
• weighing heavy masses - e.g. a car

So, trying REALLY  hard to remember our GCSE physics we did some thinking. (seriously there was smoke coming from the top of our heads!)

What we wanted to do was find out what the resistivity (ohm/metre) of this ABS was. Seen as all the bag had on it was "Conductive ABS" on it, this wasn't much help! Nor could he remember the supplier to bring up some datasheets.

The Experiment

Initially we thought: Right just bang an DMM in resistance mode across it!

Tried it and got diddly squwat! meter didn't budge.

So I came up with a better idea! Apologies for the lack of photos folks:

Jez had a bank of batteries on his desk he'd pulled out of something. I had a automotive DMM (in my tool box) with a micro-amp range on it. I was sceptical as to how precise and accurate it was, considering it cos about £30 - but give it a go.

Some Croc clips and about 4" of this conductive ABS and the circuit was constructed. Battery voltage was confirmed to be about 5.2V from a quick test with the DMM - DMM means Digital Multi-Meter by the way.

I first took a current reading at 40mm from positive point to negative point. Reading on ammeter said about 10uA. Same process again but at 50mm - current = 7uA. OK; this was enough data to just get a figure that should give us a sensible answer.

The Maths

OK so from experience - I found conductive plastic was in the hundreds of ohm-metre range.If I got 2 readings in the 100's of kilo-ohm-mm range then I knew we were in the right ballpark!

OK so from trusty Wikipedia - Resistivity:

• roh( the p shaped symbol, which I'll use p for) = resistivity in OHMS-metre's
• R = resistance = Voltage / Current
• A  = cross sectional area of ABS
• l = length of section that current is flowing through

Diameter of ABS filament = 3mm, therefore radius was 1.5mm. this gave a area of: 7.086mm^2

So for 40mm:

R = 5.2 / 10uA = 520,000 OHMS

Substituting R into the resistivity equation:

p = 520,000 (7.086 / 40) = 91891.585 OHMS-mm

(Remember: always keep units the same, don't mix cm with mm for example.)

OK: so roughly 91K - not bad, 10K shy off target!

Solving for data obtained at 50mm:

R = 5.2 / 7uA = 742,857 OHMS

Substituting R:

p = 742,857 (7.086 / 50) = 105,277 OHMs-mm

OK: so about 5K out from target, looking good.

So you could sat that the resistivity of this sample of ABS is ~100kOHMS-mm or ~100OHMS-metre (as there are 1000mm in one metre)

Outcome and findings

So considering plastic is usually a good insulator, you'd think 100 OHMS-m is still resistive, and that conductive ABS is just a con - when actually this IS conductive for plastic!

Plastics can be in the order of 10's of Gigaohms-m (depending on plastics).

Also: this experiment cannot be trusted - turns out there are 2 measurements of measuring resistivity: Surface resistivity and Volume resistivity.

With the configuration of our experiment, we may have been measuring surface resistivity; so the current may have been flowing around the sample like a tube not through it.

As a result - the resistivity could actually be lower? Saying that: this was on fresh ABS: its properties could change after being extruded into a 3D object.

Another note: I wouldn't consider relying on conductive plastic to make your own resistors with a 3D printer - the tolerance on them will be shockingly bad - so I wouldn't expect 0.1% on values!

So: I'll leave you to pick holes in my Back-woods experiment - but it does demonstrate how you can use some bits lying on your desk to quickly determine some material properties!

Also that my micro-amps range on my £30 DMM probably works to a decent degree of accuracy!

LCD's on Ebay

LCD, Matrix Orbital LK204-25, 20x4, white Text on Blue, RS232, TTL, I2C

Roll up, Roll up, Roll up! Screens are on EBAY!

Get em while they're hot! 
Managed to verify that 22 are working, turn out I had less than 30 at last count, considering I gave a few away!

I am doing international delivery, if your country's not on the list, then drop us a mail, and I'll see what I can do for you!

Thanks for viewing!

"Trash" find screens - testing

About a few months ago, I caught one of my work colleagues throwing out some parts from a project long since mothballed.

"They're all going!" - nod from my colleague; I told him to put them to one side, had a chat to higher ups to make sure I could "acquire" them: "If you can pull em, you can have em! Bin wagons due in 3 days" - managed to pull out roughly 30 screens out of these dud units along with more stepper motors than I knew what to do with and about 30 V-Drives (that's for later).

About half the stepper motors went to a mate who was building a 3D printer - I think he's set for about 8 printers!! But as a thank you, he bought me a Erbauer grinder + blades (SWEET!), which I needed to do some work on the landy - which reminds me, I should post some work I've done on that thing on here!

So did any of these screens work? Some were still in packaging, some I'd removed from fittings but didn't even know if they actually would power on, so I did some digging:

The Screen

Its a 20 Character by 4 line LCD which is backlit in blue and with white text. That's all I knew about it when I first looked at one. After a google: JACKPOT - Matrix Orbital - VK204-25

Turns out it had more connectivity than any other LCD I'd seen: I2C, RS232, TTL, USB, RS422 & Dallas 1-wire (new to me anyway!). I was doubtful about its USB capabilities as I could not see a USB port on it, but it had footprints for one.

It also has an input for a keypad and a set of 6 general purpose outputs.

Physically, it is a 2 boarded device; by that i mean it has one board that appears to handle the communications protocols the user selects and the board with the screen fitted, which I assume is a standard LCD based around a Hitachi HD44780 LCD controller. I assumed this from the interconnecting header between the 2 boards: its pretty similar to most LCD's out there and seems to be a standard that many manufacturers seem to adopt - but from the data sheets and info I can't verify that.

I suppose by that observation, and if you were deft enough, you could pull the LCD Board away from the interface board, if you just wanted the LCD on its own.

Getting Started

When I had pulled them out of their units they were connected by a 4-way molex KK header, which turned out to be the TTL & I2C port, with power pins. I had heard of I2C and have designed systems for I2C devices, but never actually got to grips with it - this opened a perfect opportunity to pull out the Arduino and get started.

Fortunately; Matrix Orbital supply an some demo code designed for  the Arduino environment:

• Arduino I2C demo - it's technically not for this screen, though if you pick it apart, it works
• LVK204-25 serial demo - opens download from googlecode in .ino format, no documentation unfortunately but will allow you to communicate to the device if its set in RS232 mode

I whittled up some pull-ups onto a bread board and linked the connections for the I2C bus via them to the Arduino:

such a tidy desk....its not like that now!

I then pulled the Demo sketch apart and managed to get it display text, as above. Now that I could get it working, I decided to expand the setup so I could test them all.

Test Development

To ensure all aspects of hardware were functional, I decided on a set of tests:

• Make sure the backlight works
• make sure that there aren't any dead pixels
• test to make sure that the contrast is good
• make sure that it can display test legibly -  and not garbage/corrupted
• test that the General Purpose Outputs are working

This I thought was enough to go on to ensure that they weren't buggered. I thought about testing the keypad input, but I thought that its mostly a device based on outputs and not to bother.

I decided that each test would loop and then press a button to confirm that test had passed and then move onto the next test. The test takes a little longer then if it went though each test automatically, but I wanted to do something with interrupts to prove to myself I could do it.

After some tinkering with the contrast functions, I decided that I could perform a dead pixel test by ramping the contrast up to full and look for empty spaces in each segment.

So I came up with this setup:

Here's a picture of the back of the LCD to show where all the connections went:

Connections to LCD - 4-pin KK is comms & power, 6-way header is GPO. D-sub 9way can be seen for RS232/RS422

The LED's are 5V rated, hence why there is no current limiting resistor on them. I added a resistor & cap to the switch as while testing the code, there was alot of debounce on the interrupt, causing it to skip tests.

After a few trials I settled on this code:

/*LVK204-25 test bed code Author: Chris Woodhouse Date: 22/01/2014 Version: 1.4 tron9000.blogspot.com - Trons Workshop */ /*display template*/ #include <Wire.h> #include <stdlib.h> #define I2C_Address 0x28 //Define default 8bit I2C address of 0x50 >> 1 for 7bit Arduino //global variables byte contrast = 128; //default contrast byte bright = 255; //default brightness int test = 0; //test number integer void setup() { //setup pins and interrupts pinMode(13, OUTPUT); // pinMode(2, INPUT); // pinMode(3, INPUT); attachInterrupt(0, pin2ISR, FALLING); // Serial.begin(9600); //============================= //functions to run on start up LCDsetup(); //setup the LCD first } void loop() { switch(test) //check test number { case 0: //run backlight test brightTest(); break; case 1: contrastTest(); //run the contrast/dead pixel test break; case 2: //run teh Alpha numeric test reset(); AlphaTest(); break; case 3: welcome(); //run the welcome screen while(1) //this loop turns the GPO's on & off { int x = 1; for(int OP = 0; OP > -1; OP = OP + x) { if(OP == 7) x = -1; if(x == -1) GPO_off(OP); if(x == 1) GPO_on(OP); digitalWrite(13, !digitalRead(13)); delay(300); } } break; } } void pin2ISR() { //incease test number, so long as test < 4 if(test < 4) { test = test + 1; } } void welcome() //the welcome function { char* string[] = {"Matrix Orbital", "LVK204-25", "Hello World!", "Performing GPO test"}; //array of text //line1, line2, line3, line4 clearScreen(); //clear screen for(int i=0; i < 4; i++) //write each element of the text array { writeMessage(string[i], strlen(string[i]), 1, 1+i); } delay(2000); } void AlphaTest() { clearScreen(); char* string[] = {"abcdefghijklmnopqrst", "uvwxyzABCDEFGHIJKLMN", "OPQRSTUVWXYZ01234567", "89!$%^&*()-_=+[{]}' "}; //contents of array for alpha test for(int i=0; i < 4; i++) { writeMessage(string[i], strlen(string[i]), 1, 1+i); delay(500); } delay(2000); } void brightTest() { int lvl = 0; while(lvl != 256) { setBrightness(lvl); //set backlight brightness lvl = lvl + 16; //increase backlight brightness delay(300); //wait } setBrightness(128); //reset brightness } void contrastTest() { int lvl = 0; while(lvl != 256) { setContrast(lvl); //set contrast lvl = lvl + 16; //increase contrast delay(500); //wait } } void LCDsetup() //setting up the LCD before testing { //Setup I2C bus and serial reporting Wire.begin(); Serial.begin(19200); //Setup display setReportingMode(0); //Transmit via i2c port rather than serial for(int i = 1; i < 7; i++) //clear all GPO { GPO_start(i, 0); } reset(); } void reset() { //Reset display to defaults setContrast(128); //set defualt contrast setBrightness(255); //set default brightness clearScreen(); //clear screen } void setBrightness(byte level) //set the backlight to value returned { char command[] = { 254, 153, level}; i2cWrite(command, sizeof(command)); } void setContrast(byte contrast) //set the contrast to value returned { char command[] = { 254, 80, contrast }; i2cWrite(command, sizeof(command)); } void clearScreen() //clears the screen { char command[] = { 254, 88 }; i2cWrite(command, sizeof(command)); } void writeMessage(char* data, byte length, byte col, byte row) //function that actually writes the message { setCursorPosition(col, row); i2cWrite(data, length); } void setReportingMode(byte mode) { char command[] = { 254, 160, mode }; i2cWrite(command, sizeof(command)); } void setCursorPosition(byte col, byte row) //move cursor to a position { char command[] = { 254, 71, col, row }; i2cWrite(command, sizeof(command)); } void GPO_on(byte OP) //sets a selected GPO to on state { char command[] = { 254, 87, OP }; i2cWrite(command, sizeof(command)); } void GPO_off(byte OP) //sets a selected GPO to off state { char command[] = { 254, 86, OP }; i2cWrite(command, sizeof(command)); } void GPO_start(byte OP, byte state) { //set the starting state of each GPO to on(state = 1) or off(state = 0) char command[] = { 254, 86, OP, state }; i2cWrite(command, sizeof(command)); } void i2cWrite(char* data, byte length) { //End transmission sends bytes queued by write function Wire.beginTransmission(I2C_Address); for(int i = 0; i < length; i++) { Wire.write(data[i]); } Wire.endTransmission(); }
I'm not sure if i should have included the Wire.h library (is it included by default in the arduino IDE?). Anayway; you power it up, after the screen has been setup by running the function LCDSetup(), the while loop runs the the SwitchCase to check the test number it should do. Each time the interrupt button is pressed; the integer: Test is increased by 1, so long as it doesn't already =4, as there are 4 test and going beyond that may cause it to take a hissy-fit!

With each case, is a function to perform a test; within them are the relivant functions to send values to the screen for Backlight brightness, contrast & so forth by using Wire.beginTransmission to the I2C address specified in the beginning of the code (#define I2C_address 0x28, as specified in the manual)

And here's how it worked:

Backlight test

Contrast/dead pixel test

Alpha-numeric test

The Welcome screen

Toggling GPO

The setup

Issues

One minor issue was that the interrupt didn't take affect instantly, it only kicked in till the test had ended. Its not that bad.

One other thing I found: whilst testing some screens that were already packaged; the would power on but only displayed the default screen. After a quick read of the manual: i found that you have to solder some jumpers onto the board to enable the mode you require:

Notice the solder bridges made in the area marked I2C - this means its in I2C mode

Here: there are 3 0R links in the area marked RS232, just under the silkscreen text LVK204-25 - this means its in RS232 mode.

Also you will notice there are some track going from the jumper pads for the RS422 mode, leading to and un-populated IC footprint: U8. This also means that RS422 is not likely to be featured on this model of screen.

I'd like to point out at this point that this is why you RTFM!

I found that un-soldering the links from RS232 and bridging over the pads in the I2C area, I managed to get the screen to work on the test bed. So by default, they are shipped in RS232 Mode.

Outcome

I'm now using this test bed to verify the screens I have work. This is cos I am selling them! yup, they're going to be up on ebay! once I've tested them all, I'll be posting a link up on this blog if your interested in buying one.

They make a great tutorial tool and an excellent display for any project. Plus can expand the outputs of a micro controller project if needed (say you were making a project with an 8-pin ATiny?)

I suppose I learnt a bit more about functions, switch/case, more about using interrupts and a I know more about communicating with device than I did before. At least from this end of the device!

I must admit my code is very messy and thrown about, I really need to hone my skills getting the functions onto one sketch and reference it in the main sketch - something I could do next.

I will be saving a few screens for myself. I would definitely get one - they are quiet a useful little thing, even as a beginner you can learn a lot about I2C.

Feel free to pull my code apart & watch this space for the ebay link if your interested

Trails & Tribulations

So as promised, here's the ins and outs of trailing.

How I got into Trailing

I first got into trailing after I got in touch with an old mate of mine. I was a bit down after a break up and was watching Love The Beast. I am a a bit of a gear head anyway, so this got me inspired to get into motor sport so how....then remember: my friend mentioned he had got together with his dad to build an off-road trails vehicle.

So I rang him up and asked if I could help: 

"What you good at?" he said

"Wiring and electrical things" I replied

"Right, we could do with a sparky, see you Saturday!"

I showed up and was introduced to bare skeleton on wheels in a garage. There was quite a bit of work to do and it wasn't going to take a weekend.

So after my first weekend; hair full of oil, hands smelling of swafega, grit in my eyes and head full of new found knowledge, I decided to come back again the next weekend, and the weekend after, and the next weekend. After about a month or so's work she was ready!

Nice, new & shiny!

The first time it trailed, I didn't drive or navigate, I just watched. the second time I got offered to drive, and why not: I had a full UK drivers license and £10 for club membership & £20 for entry in my pocket. So I strapped myself in and my friend navigated. Here is one section of the event that day:

Yes...that is a pile of horse shit we are driving into at the end!

Since then I drove "Cannon Fodder" (that's what she was dubbed) for a few more trails, till I decided to go it my on and stop sponging rides off me mate.

How Trailing works

I joined the Pennine Land rover Club: who call themselves a slightly nuts bunch of land rover & 4x4 enthusiasts. I joined cos my mate was a member along with his dad and a few others I was introduced to through his dad.

Some clubs have different rules and regs but the principal is the same. 

So what happens?

I think the best way I can describe it is a bit like golf, but with 4x4's. Each event is split into 12 sections and each section has 12 gates. Lowest score wins.

A Gate is essentially 2 canes set apart with the a gate number ticket on on of the canes: this is ticketed cane must be on the drivers side of the vehicle. Between each gate are obstacles to challenge your driving skills or test your vehicles abilities. Sometimes the gates themselves are strategically placed to test the driver.

Barry attempts gate 5

Each section is set out by the clerk of the course: basically a member assigned to setting out the sections for that event. They usually turn up the day before to set out the section.

Each entered driver must then drive the section starting at gate 12 and ending at gate 1. Each gate you drive through; your score for that section decreases: so if you go through all 12, you get 0 (clear), if you get stuck between say 4 & 3 gates, you get 3 and if you hit a cane on a gate, you get the score of the gate you hit! 

Best score you can get for the whole event is 0 (12 x 0) and worst is 144 (12 x 12). My personal best is 12 for a whole event.

Then your scores are totalled up at the end of the day and the person with the lowest score gets bragging rights and club championship points and/or a prize (usually a t-shirt with clubs logo). 2nd and 3rd get club points accordingly

The clerk of the course however gets 10 points for his troubles for the whole event!

That it?!

Well not really, there's more to it. 

You don't have to but highly recommended that you walk the section before driving it. A navigator is optional, but providing they are 16 or over and not pregnant, its good to drag them along to walk the section too, making mental notes of obstacles and driving lines.

Jedi Clive advises Padawan Jezzmund on driving lines

I should make it clear at this point that speed is NOT the key when doing this kind of trailing! Your navigator does not have to by Nicky Grist and rattle off pace notes! All they have to do is remind you of lines and obstacles.

For more information, read the How To Play section on the Pennine Club Website

So Who makes the calls?

Each group or section as a number of Marshall's. These guys watch to make sure you don't hit a cane on a gate or fall foul of the obstacles.

Never argue with the Marshalls, their word is final! If you carry on arguing or misbehave you get a 12 for the rest of the sections and told to pack your shit & piss off!

So what counts as out?

• If you hit a cane, you stop, get off section & get a score for the cane you hit
• If you are not moving for 3 seconds, you stop, move off section, and get a score for the last gate you cleared.
• not moving means you are stationary, even if your wheels are spinning.
• If you get stuck in a gate: providing a wheel hub (centre of wheel) of one wheel is through the gate, that gate is cleared
• it is worth noting that if you think you are going to hit a gate, but can get your hub through: STOP!

Vehicle Classes

Vehicles are split into 2 main groups. All vehicles are closely scrutineered before competing to ensure that nothing bad happens to spectators or the drivers + passengers.

CCV

Mark 'il championi', MB62 CCV trailer

CCV or Cross Country Vehicle are mostly towed to and event. They are divided into classes depending on profile, running gear & drive train. they don't have to be taxed or MOT'd, nor be road legal. They do however have to be fitted with a roll cage sturdy enough to hold the vehicles weight and at least a 4 point harness for driver and passenger.

Our club most commonly run this group of vehicle with rover V8's ranging from 3.5 litre to 4.2 and even 5.5 litre! though some are now entering with turbo diesels and showing up the V8 lot!

Common choice of transmissions are automatic: low range, stick it in drive, point, stamp on throttle and watch the world go backwards!

Most of them weigh in around under a ton, so power to weight is quite good!

RTV

My pride & joy

RTV or Road Trails Vehicle are road legal, have a tax disc, and MOT and are commonly driven to events. Again the group is divided into classes depending on shape and specs. Vehicle must have a valid MOT to compete as RTV class. Roll cage is not required but some form of protection from the drive being crushed by the weight of the vehicle is require, so rag top vehicles must have a roll cage.

This class usually contains a mixed bag: Land rovers old & new, both diesel & petrol, Susuki's and Jeep's.

Commonly manual gearbox. Some are heavily modified with extra Armour underneath to protect the vital parts like the steering rack, oil sump, gearbox, Transfer box & differentials: front & back! Cos if it goes on section, your driving home on the back of an AA truck!

More information on vehicle regs can be found on Pennine Land Rover website.

So why do it?

It is the cheapest for of motor sport. Forget about TopGear and their outlandish statement that motor cross is cheap, compared to trailing: you can be up and running for under £2000! It requires no special licensing for competitors. Most importantly: ITS A LAUGH!

You meet like minded folk, there is some good competition and banter, some clubs like ours have social camping events: 2 days of trailing, BBQ's and beer (though that's after the days event!). Also there are the usual Christmas and club anniversary parties (Pennine Land rover club just celebrated its 50th Birthday!!)

No off road experience is required, though its worth having a practise with an experienced driver before competing. The basics and an understanding of how the vehicle handles off-road will help a lot!

Safety gear is not necessary: you don't need a crash helmet, but if it makes you comfortable, then by all means. For RTV; a roll cage is not a requirement, but it will save your bodywork if you end up on your side.

If the worse does happen and you blow a differential, snap a half shaft of worse, then there is always a helpful soul that will lend you tools, spares or advice to get you back up and running. In my view: always help your fellow competitors. Playing by yourself is just boring!

You get to be outdoors. If the weathers good, then bonus, if not: man up and get on with it. Unless there weather of apocalyptic proportions, Trailing happens all any weather, all year round: Horizontal rain, snow, or blistering heat, its always on!

You will get mucky: the clerk of the course is 95% of the time a sadist! And will set out parts of the course though a muddy and wet part:

Here is Tony "Man-Duck" taking his navigator of the little ride! This actually wasn't part of the section :D

Checklist for a days trailing:

Spectating:

• Water proof's
• Stout boots
• Lunch
• Drink/Water
• Change of clothes
• Towel (wet)
• Suncream (Sunny)
• hat (as per weather)

Competing:

• The above
• sunglasses
• Tools & a jack
• your motor (obviously)
• membership fee (new members / renewal)
• event fee
• any spares you think you may need (optional but advised)
• tow rope (mandatory) - no kinetic ropes, steel cables, chains or snatch ropes! Must be made of none elastic or non-metal material and be able to hold your vehicles weight - see regs on Pennine Website
• Spare fuel
• a decent set of off-road tires WITH INNER-TUBES - if the bead on your tires breaks due to the flex in the tire off the rim, then the pressure in the tire will escape VIOLENTLY!
• a sense of humour - there will be ribbing and banter, so leave your pet lip at home and try and keep your toys in the pram. You never know, you may get your own nick-name at the end of the day (some of the clubs favorites: Cane Killer, Dangerous Brian, Grinch, il champioini, jezzus, Gobby, Man-Duck)

So......You fancy it?!?

Absence

So I've not blogged for a while. Mainly cos I've been Uber busy doing fatherly and land rover based things.

Some of the landrover based things could have been blogged, but its like painting the forth road friggin bridge! So understandably, I've not had time to Blog.

Rest assured I'm planning on returning, and first by posting (as promised) about the trails vehicles I've helped build and a little about trailing......