As this decade draws to a close I thought I’d reflect back on the motoring changes I’ve experienced. As we celebrated the new millennium I was the almost proud owner of a 1992 Ford Escort estate. With a lusty 1.4 litre engine it could barely pull the skin from a rice pudding, but it was mine and I could deploy that 75 horsepower to take me wherever I chose. As this period pre-dates my digital camera ownership, I only have this rather sorry excuse for a photograph:

What a beauty! I upgraded those 13 inch wheels to – wait for it – 14 inch wheels. With extra driving lamps I ranged across the country – I shared my first trip to the Lake District and even nipped across the border to Gretna in this machine. It had manual windows and mirrors, no central locking, no power steering – not even ABS. Looking back this was useful, as it provided an excellent bare bones introduction to motoring.

Yet this wasn’t the only Dagenham Destroyer in my fleet – hell no! I was also the extremely proud owner of a 1990 SWB Transit – used to cart around my sound and light gear.

A real rust wagon – powered by a 2.0 litre petrol engine that offered neither performance nor economy. Whether I was in the Escort or the Transit, I was always seen tearing around the streets with all the apparent vigour of a tortoise with gout.

Having had the Escort since acquiring my licence in 1996, during 2000 I began to look towards moving on. I was driving my dad’s car occasionally – a Vauxhall Vectra SRi (pictured here in 2005 at the Nordschleife entry gate – an episode I’ll cover later).

Suddenly I had all the modern luxuries – electric windows and mirrors, 15″ alloys, air conditioning, remote central locking – even traction control. Perhaps most importantly for me, its two litre engine developed 136 horsepower, with – compared to the Escort – very useful low down torque.

2000 was my first year of full time employment, so as 2001 arrived it was certainly time to stop borrowing the Vectra, and replace the Escort. Being 21, my needs weren’t very complicated: I needed to be faster than anyone else I knew, I wanted it to be reliable, and I had heard that rear wheel drive was A Good Thing. This ruled out the Peugeot 306 GTi6 I was considering, and the Audi A6 Quattro that wasn’t pure RWD, so I got myself one of these:

This car introduced me to a whole new world of motoring – both on-road and virtual. It absolutely ignited my passion for driving (and perhaps, oversteer) and also introduced me to car internet forums. The latter provided a double-edged sword – such forums attract all sorts – but one forum in particular led to some absolutely fantastic road trips around the UK. The first of these was a visit to the Lake District in early 2003.

While all this was going on my sound and light business had outgrown the little old transit, so I “upgraded” to a 1992 LWB 2.5 litre diesel effort. Look how beautiful it was!

Okay, so it was an eyesore. But it did offer significantly more load space and payload, and with power steering and a classic diesel chugger it was far more the freight machine I was looking for.

Still, back to the cars. With almost 200hp and over 200 lb/ft torque at my disposal, in the 328i I was fast, it was reliable, and RWD was good. After two years though it was time to move on, so in February 2003 I took the next natural step: it was time for an M3.

Still to this day this has been my favourite car. 321hp, 258 lb/ft of torque and a proper LSD. I didn’t care that the interior was a bit manky, and I liked the fact that it was a saloon and not a coupe. I used this car a lot. I shared my maiden voyage to the Nürburgring with this car, multiple trips to Cornwall, the Lakes and Wales, and had an epic tour of Scotland.

Sadly I was separated from this car by a local garage who rather carelessly wrote it off for me in March 2005. While the insurance wrangle was taking place I once again took ownership of the old family Vauxhall Vectra SRi. Of course, this was quite a step down, but as a utility wagon it was very useful. The transit had recently died, I had wound down my sound and light business, so it was a good one-stop interim solution.

There was however a complication. I had a trip to the Nürburgring already booked before the M3 was written off. I therefore had to take the Vectra – a grim prospect at the best of times – but significantly more so given that its gearbox was obviously broken. I therefore fitted a refurbished item and headed to Germany.

In convoy with an E36 M3, an E34 M5 and an E39 M5 the SRi was completely out of place – an utter embarrassment. However, it redeemed itself with some massive lift-off oversteer:

All jolly hilarious, until on the way home the car once again spat its gearbox. Having to come home from Bonn on a flat-bed transporter is horrible, and the entire trip was perhaps the low point of my motoring decade. The Vectra therefore finally left the family, and I was car-less.

By this time Diane and I were living together, so we got by using her Peugeot 106 Rallye. Despite being of French origin I feel this little car was certainly good enough to warrant more than a passing mention in this post. It was light, had over 100hp, and developed a good chunk of torque from its little 1.6 litre 8V unit. So despite being a touch unreliable and a FWD scrabbler, it was a lot of fun.

We had this car from 2004 to 2009, so it certainly made its mark on our motoring decade. So, back to March 2005 then when I was car-less. After much research, I concluded that for the money I’d received for the green M3 I simply couldn’t do any better, and so bought another M3!

Rather than the all-I-could-afford green saloon, this was perhaps my ideal E36 M3 Evo. Techno-violet with heated silver leather – this thing even had electric rear vent windows!

I had this car for a year, ensuring it took in all the usual Cornwall/Lakes/Curborough/Nürburgring trips, and even a camping holiday to La Rochelle. At the end of 2005, we once again – but briefly – became a three car family. Robin and I invested in a £50 Ford Sierra Ghia for our charity “Staples 2 Naples” rally trip.

The car was of course horrific, but everything worked, and it didn’t let us down at all despite thorough abuse all the way from Woking to Naples. We scrapped it in Rome and flew home; something I really regret.

By early 2006, despite the M3 Evo being a fantastic example, I felt it time to move on from the E36, so I traded it in for an E46 330d sport touring. This represented a significant step down in terms of performance and a shift away from motorsport in general. Yet the new car was a lovely place to be, extremely practical and pleasingly efficient.

In our first month together we went to the Lake District, to Birmingham, to Wales, to Scotland, and to the Nürburgring – some 5,000 miles! I chopped off the droopy tail pipe and sorted some nice straight tips, and changed the wheels to the more recent items (more recent above, originals below).

As we leave this decade, this is now our primary family car. We sold the 106R in 2009 when it became a little too unreliable, and frankly basic, for our liking. We’re now married, own a dog, and this is our car. I write this article from the Lake District – marking this car’s 4th visit there with me. However, this doesn’t end my motoring decade review – not by a long shot!

I realised that, much as I love my tractor (330d, above), it lacks a certain bit of motoring soul. I filled this in January 2007 with the purchase of a 1988 E30 M3!

With a screaming straight four and LSD I was back in the M-club, and what a party it was. I loved it so much I decided in July 2007 to upgrade to a 1990 E30 M3 Evo II.

I held onto this car for another year, during which it featured in two BMW Car Magazine articles and two trips to the Nürburgring.

In amongst all this I decided to take up a spot of rally navigating. Pictured here with driver/owner Simon Stevinson, I spent a few shifts in 2007 in the nav-seat of his E36 M3 Rally Compact.

It was a great little car, and Simon an extremely composed driver, who I can’t thank enough for being so patient with me while I learned the ropes. I had a massive amount of fun in that car – we had many battles, and I’ve even got a trophy or two as a result somewhere. It was fantastic having to deal with the elements, and at times fix the car, to get us through to the end of the day. I would have loved to have taken the next step to driving and car ownership, but I sagely (and perhaps boringly) concluded that I couldn’t afford to allocate funds in that way.

Ultimately though, when I became married in August 2008 I decided that both rallying, and E30 M3 ownership, and all the oil and rust which was involved, wasn’t really becoming of a husband. I therefore packed in the rallying and sold the M3. Immediately I realised that in doing so I had lost much of my identity, so 4 hours later I rushed out and bought a nice sensible family car:

That’s right, it’s a 2000 E39 M5 – 400 horsepower to you. This basically brings us up to date – we’re a two car family with a wonderful E46 330d sport touring and a V8 M5. The 330d is a great utility vehicle. I’ve modified it to play DVDs on the move to entertain my passengers, it has iPod integration, stealth sub and a built in inverter. It’s a fantastic, quick machine, boasting 200hp and 40mpg. We love it, and it is backed up by a super saloon sporting an astonishing blend of performance and comfort. While both cars have been around the block a few times (both just under 120,000 miles), they still scrub up nicely and provide everything we currently need on the road. Oh, with the exception of four wheel drive – that’s my prediction for the 2010s!

This sums up my review of the decade. Throughout these years I’ve documented a good deal of motoring action which has, in some parts at least, been well received. I’ve even landed a regular slot writing for BMW Car Magazine. I’ve had an absolute ball these ten years thanks to my cars and my motoring friends. I can’t thank those friends and family enough for their support of my crazy ventures, and as my last blog post of the decade I’d like to thank you all for reading, and wish you a very happy new year.

A couple of days of Lake District action to catch up on. I have been amazed by the constant severity of the weather here. During previous visits I have wished for a decent attempt at winter weather, and this time we’ve got it. I’m used to snow covering the hills during winter, but here we’ve got proper snow coverage even in the relatively low lying towns like Ambleside. As a result, many of my usual pastimes such as white knuckle rides over mountain passes are completely off the agenda; they would be a suicide mission, ending prematurely at best. Furthermore even the fell climbing I’m used to has proven too much.

Our aim on Monday was to have a bit of a walk and to generally give the antipodeans a feel for the Lake District. The morning was damn cold – some minus 4 degrees.

After a certain amount of scrapy scrapy, we headed north-west from Ambleside to Skelwith Bridge, and from there we walked to Elterwater – a beautiful little village. We parked the tractor up:

Got out our walking sticks:

We got our hike on:

Brenden loved a bit of it:

We made found a snowman:

It was a touch icy in places:

Brenden and Emily were clearly getting on nicely with the great British countryside:

Even Robin popped in to join us:

After a spot more trekking:

We happened upon the delightful Brittania pub in Elterwater. Hound friendly, a great selection of drinks, open fires, low beams, real ales etc – it had it all.

After a stride back to the car we set out to see how viable climbing Sca Fell would be the next day. As it happened, getting across the Wrynose and Hardknott passes just wasn’t feasible at all, so we attempted to drive the long way around. Sadly, even getting to Wasdale wasn’t possible so we had to scrub that idea. In any case, we headed back to base (Ambleside).

We found Ambleside’s “Royal Oak” to be most accommodating that night. The next morning we woke to find a stunning view across lake Windemere.

That (this) morning we decided that as Sca Fell wasn’t accessible. we should attempt to climb something else – settling on Helvellyn, the third highest peak in the Lakes (and England for that matter). Further reading on that Wikipedia page to which I just linked suggested that during winter months anyone considering climbing Hellvelyn should first consult “weatherline”. Here’s the entry for today:

Issued: Tuesday, 29 December 2009

FELLTOP CONDITIONS REPORT from Helvellyn at 1.30pm on Tuesday 29th December 2009. There is significant snow and ice at all levels. Snow depth increasesi with height to reach between 20 to 30cm. With the recent wind the snow has shifted and drifts of over 100cm are common with some evidence of loose windslab. The deep snow makes the going slow. Significant cornices have formed along the summit ridges, so please keep well back from the edge and advise others to do likewise. Full winter clothing, footwear and equipment, including ice axe and crampons are essential for anyone venturing out onto the fells. Several Lakeland tarns, such as Red Tarn, have frozen. The ice is not that thick, so please do not be tempted out on them! Summit statistics today (these are taken when the Fell Top Assessor is on the summit, they do not represent max/min figures for the past 24 hours). Temperature, minus 3.4C. Wind chill, minus 13.4C

Between the four of us, we were prepared to some extent: we had two walking poles and two water packs. No ice axes or crampons in sight! We didn’t know all this of course, so set off regardless. It was a picturesque journey north from Ambleside:

Upon stepping from the car we soon realised that yesterday’s calm, bright conditions were history; today was colder, overcast and damn right breezy.

We began our ascent, and quickly made progress. In the photograph below, the car was left at lake level:

The snow quickly became deeper:

The wind grew in strength:

The going soon got really tough. Hail in the face, snow drifting so fast it immediately covered the tracks laid by the person in front. Frightening stuff; time to sit down:

This picture just about shows the rate of snow drifting:

At this point, given that we weren’t fully prepared, we decided to turn back. Even those with crampons, ice axes and rucksacks full of various other unimaginable kit were turning back. So we bailed too. Fortunately romping back down the hill in deep snow was tremendous fun!

We had climbed quite a distance – certainly enough to justify a bit of relaxation for the rest of the day. We tried to explore the Kirkstone pass, but unsurprisingly, that too was formally shut. So with little else to do, we headed into town for some ale and whisky, pausing briefly to photograph lake Windermere.

So far, while the roads that have been closed due to snow and ice have certainly proved to be a disappointment, we’ve had a wonderful time sampling perhaps the most beautiful slice of English winter.

I need to take some photos of the cars for my BMW Car Magazine “longtermer” report which is due in today. I haven’t run the M5 for about 20 days now, and I’ve got a lot of decorating to be cracking on with, so I took the photos on the rather unglamourous surroundings of my driveway. I’ve decided to post them up here partially because it’s been a while since I’ve shown either of them, but also because it’s “cold, damn cold” this morning, and I thought Robin might like a little reminder of a classic British morning!

There are snow showers forecast for later today, and on this firm base it will lay, but those showers are also forecast to turn to rain.

On other matters I didn’t make a great deal of progress with the decorating yesterday, but I did bizarrely get the heating and upstairs toilet fixed. I would like to concentrate more on that task today, but Diane is out so I’ll be entertaining Snoop – an activity which isn’t compatible with a steamer!

I’ve just finished putting the car back together, and I’m pleased to report a full recovery. Gear changes are once again quiet; the faint ‘clonk’ has now departed.

I’m disappointed I didn’t take more photos. When things start going wrong it’s easy to forget to document stuff. The removed part looked like this:

The new part can be seen in the corner of this photo:

This goes between the gearbox output shaft and the prop shaft, and provides a valuable bit of shock absorption. Here’s a good example of how a worn item breaks down – picture stolen from Andy Eccles’ excellent post on the matter.

The issue I had was that one of those bolts pictured above had become seized in the end of the propshaft. In the photograph below you can see the extent Alex and I had to go to in order to get it out. The 6 mm hole in the middle was drilled by me on Sunday. The next circular cross section is the bolt itself. The outer ring is a sleeve from the old donut. This piece was removed from the end of the prop shaft. Quite something!

When it came to test driving this evening, I had almost forgotten about the new brakes. I’ve bedded those in nicely – I’d forgotten what it feels like to have straight brake discs! So we’re pretty much there now, with a couple of exceptions. While at BMW today collecting the new bolts I also grabbed a replacement oil separator. When I get a chance I’ll look at fitting this, and straightening the exhaust that just doesn’t look quite right at the moment. This will have to wait though – I’ve got a stag weekend to attend to this weekend, and there’s a rally I want to see the weekend after.

I had the 330d serviced by Vines of Guildford BMW earlier this month. I was pleased with the £99 cost of the oil service, but less pleased with the advisory notices:

• Front N/S tyre worn on outer edge
• Front N/S brake caliper seized
• Prop shaft coupling worn

This weekend I got down to business to sort all this out. £35 had the tracking sorted (after the usual – tedious – discussions about them not being able to guarantee their work unless I bought new tyres). For £274 I had new discs, pads, front N/S caliper and a propshaft donut delivered from C3BMW (after my usual – tedious – stupidity saw me state my old address on the delivery note).

Here’s the haul:

Looking good at this point! I set to work – in the rain.

Old brakes:

Shiny new brakes!

All the brake work went perfectly (as far as I can tell). I even remembered to undo the disc retention screw before removing the caliper, so with a little help from an assistant on the brake pedal it was easy. I had forgotten to order a pad wear sensor, but a quick blast in the M5 (in the rain!) soon saw one gathered from ECP for £10 (over-priced, but worth it for the M5 wet road journey).

So I moved my attention to the worn prop shaft donut.

Six nuts and bolts. Easy. Except of course, that it wasn’t easy at all. Getting access was quite easy – belly panels off, exhaust down etc. But two of the bolts just weren’t interested in coming out of the end of the prop shaft. And, to make matters worse, the prop shaft just wasn’t coming out of the differential, so I couldn’t remove it from the car. Ben Smith was kind enough to pop over and confirm such on both counts.

That marked the end of Saturday. On Sunday morning, bright and fresh, I tried a number of things. I went to Halfords and bought a three legged puller. Fail. I even tried a vice:

Fail. I got angry and took the angle grinder in. The first bolt soon yielded, and I was jubilant:

Sadly, the second bolt was significantly more stubborn. I chopped both ends off, and drilled a 6mm hole through it (12mm bolts). I was planning on eventually drilling the whole thing out, but by this point it was 4pm on Sunday, and frankly, I was utterly exhausted. There was nothing else for it – I had to make an SOS call. I called A Barden.

Bit unfair of me to resurrect that photo really. On both Alex and of course dear reader, you. Alex offered, extremely kindly, to pop over first thing in the morning to sort it out. From Wales. What a darling.

So at 8am this morning, Alex arrived to find the driveway looking like this – proper pikey.

Alex took my advice and tried to shift the bolt in situ. Then, when I’d left him alone and gone to work, he decided to stop messing around, removed the prop shaft from the diff, and twatted (technical term) the bolt out. He has cleaned up the prop shaft, sorted the connection to the diff, fitted the new donut (loosely, with the four remaining bolts) and left things looking, well, just like the photo above.

Hero.

I have now ordered a complete set of 6 nuts and bolts from BMW which I can collect on Wednesday. Then, I shall attempt to rebuild things in the dark. What luck!

Both Diane and I have kerbed our cars. Needless to say, Diane managed this in a rather mundane way, where I suffered a racing incident at full left lock. In both cases, remedial action was necessary. Tractor’s front left:

And the SS’s rear left – properly kerbed!

I started with the tractor wheel – gave it a good wash and a sanding.

At this point I realised that I needed to go the whole hog and remove the wheel to paint it.

Prepared and ready to go:

Two coats of Titan Silver and a coat of lacquer later, and things were looking much better. Big thanks to Tom Titler for supplying these paints (back in 2006!). While I’m mentioning people, I should also express my apologies to Julian Lockyear, who sold me these wheels in immaculate condition and good faith (that this would never happen to them).

While this was drying, it was time to turn my attention to the M5′s wheel.

I think these wheels are actually made black, and a silver finish is applied to the front. In the above picture, at about 11 o’clock the blackness appeared after I used a bit too much Autosol metal polish. The spray cans soon sorted that!

Both wheels drying on the garage floor:

Ready to put the tractor back together:

And there we go:

Finally, a close up of the M5′s wheel:

Not perfect by any means, but a substantial improvement. Clearly a better option would be to have them professionally refurbished, but that would be more expensive and then I’d be really afraid of further damage. I think the best solution would be not to kerb the wheels in the first place, but sadly this requires more co-ordination than in readily available in our household.

Last weekend I went to Rock äm Ring – a German rock festival held at the Nűrburging. It proved to be a great boys weekend, with a squad of Bens, Brenden, Jonny, Pete, Richie, Steve and me. We took the Shaguar and the 330d:

I was pleased to make it from the ferry to Germany without stopping, let alone getting out of the car. After an entertaining meal out and night stop over in Aachen, we were up bright and early to make tracks for the ‘ring. Geddit?

The Lidl in Breidscheid is normally full of stickered cars, but not quite like this:

We moved to the circuit, where we’d paid a premium for track side camping. Initially it looked as though we were going to struggle to find a place, but eventually lady luck (in the form of some Swiss, eager to avoid the Germans) found us, and we had a place. Ringers: we were by the 3km mark (Hocheichen).

It soon became apparent that as the festival didn’t start until Friday, we should spend Thursday drinking. So Huge and I nipped out to top up the 330d’s tanks.

However, none of us were prepared for the Germans and their crazy drinking games. Good videos of the festivities on Brenden’s site.

We decided to play them at their own game. We even won a few times:

But ultimately, we were all wrecked by 4pm.

To the soundtrack of the German’s rock sound system, all kind of crazy capers commenced. Those lucky enough passed out by 6pm. The rest of us continued:

Eventually we’d had enough of the German’s rather gruff taste in music, so we unleashed the 330d’s system, complete with roof top ghetto blaster. We weren’t as loud, but the Germans soon bowed to our superior taste in music and switched their system off.

It was a great night. And an even greater hangover. In the morning we were all ruined. The Germans, of course, had barely noticed the previous night’s drinking.

We went for a walk along the circuit to get some currywurst, and stumbled across many unusual sights. This is perhaps the highlight:

We nipped up to the festival. During Papa Roach’s performance, a Jager balloon flew over.

The main stage area was HUGE. A capacity of about 70,000, and easily a 100K+ sound system. It rocked!

That night saw Placebo and The Killers as the headline acts on the main stage. Placebo (below), were many, many, many times better than I had expected. A great show, and immense talent. I was really impressed.

The Killers were frankly awful. No interaction, no show, just a dull, dreary performance of their collection of frankly bland ‘hits’. So I went to see Basement Jaxx on another stage, who were amazing!

On Saturday I felt slightly better, but the German’s insistance on playing their sound system until 6am in the morning had got the better of me, and my tent was leaking in the rain. I checked into my favourite Bavarian haunt:

Saturday night at the festival was amazing. We saw Machine Head (or Machine-F*cking-Head) as every moronic German shouted repeatedly for the rest of the weekend).

Then the Prodigy were on. No photos for this – it was full mosh-pit action. Hilarious stuff!

The headline acts for Saturday night were Slipknot. Heavy metal! The arena was at capacity, with everyone from front to back leaping around like loonies to powerful rock. Crazy Germans!

I was pleased to get back to the cafe that night. I ventured down from our room about midnight to sneak a quick beer (I’d been driving), and was delighted to find an on-road-cafe and more importantly on-form Lex behind the bar. “How is Neil?!” he asked. “Cold, tired and in need of a beer”. “Here’s a beer, and now you have thisch yellow shit on the housche!”. It was fantastic. We didn’t get to bed until 3, but apparently the Germans left their PA on until 7:18am that morning so we fared better than those who opted to stay at the camp site.

Needless to say, on Sunday all 8 of us were checked into the Cafe. The camp site was a mess – just look at the state of our neighbour’s site!

We spent a lazy afternoon in the cafe:

We popped out for a quick steak on a stone, at an alternative to the Pistonklause we found in Adenau.

And then came back to the cafe. We watched Billy Talent and Limp Bizkit on MTV, and were glad we didn’t bother returning to the festival to see them.

Great weekend!

The tractor is now half way through its 13,500 mile service interval. As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t believe that oil can maintain useful levels of lubrication if left in an engine for that kind of period. I’m also extremely aware that the turbocharger shares the same oil supply. As such, I change oil twice as often as BMW recommends.

BMW’s oil filter kit is good value. A little over £5 gives a new filter, sump washer and filter seal. A classic last minute Halfords oil purchase was significantly worse value: a little over £90 for only 8 litres of Magnatec diesel 5W30.

I also had trouble changing the filter. E36 M3s have a metal casing clamped together with a 10mm headed bolt. The E46 330d has this plastic casing held with a plastic moulded 36mm hexagonal lump.

As I don’t own a 36mm socket, in the past I’ve managed to operate this with an adjustable wrench, but in this case it would appear that a BMW technician has overtightened the container at the last official service. Still, I’m a great believer in having the right tools for the job so another £10 of overpriced 36mm socket at Halfords and the job was done.

I’ve had a brilliant day out yesterday with friends Robin and Alex, spectating at the Wyedean Forest Rally. We were up at the crack of dawn to get to the Welsh border at a reasonable time. It was a really thick frost – opening the car’s doors at 6am reminded me of the time machine in Back to the Future! The electric windows didn’t start to work until we were passing Swindon and there was still frozen ice on the roof when we eventually arrived in a rather snowy car park.

Maneuvering the car around that car park was hilarious. Needless to say we quickly became stuck in a trough where it was necessary to climb a hill to either get out or get in to a parking space. With wide summer tyres and rear wheel drive it looked for a few moments as though we’d never even manage to leave, let along park and get to see any rally action. Lateral thinking came to the rescue: Robin and Alex sat in the boot, and with the extra tonnage over the rear axle we were able to easily drive up the hill and park neatly. Result!

We arrived at special stage three well before the first cars ran. It was covered in snow and ice – the organisers were doing their best to get it cleared.

We took our time wandering along the track, soaking up the scenery and deciding where the best place would be to see the most action. The Wyedean forest looked stunning as the sun lit the winter landscape.

Before long the first of the special cars was out. Just look at how icy it was!

This was a strange looking chariot:

There were some larger than normal intervals between the cars. We don’t know why but it would make sense that there were many crashes and difficulties getting to the start point; even the public roads were treacherous! Robin went for a brief skate up the track to warm himself.

The specials were mainly Novas and Rovers, so with all due respect to the rally juniors, I didn’t take many photos. Robin was a little nonplussed.

There were some cars we liked though, like this little 106 romping along.

This MkII was fantastic, permanently oversteering all the way, even on the straights! I wish I had videoed him.

After the specials had run (those with numbers starting with a ’2′), the vintage class came out (numbers starting with a ’3′). Some real heroes here! Let’s start with an Opel that was beautifully steering from the rear:

A classic 60′s Volvo doing the same:

Lovely MkI Escort:

This Saab was FWD, yet managed to oversteer in front of us into a bit of a ditch. We were on hand to assist, but he managed to do most the work himself and get on his way.

At least I think that’s a Saab. In any case, we’d found a nice icy corner, and after a spot of lunch we were ready to see the rally proper. The fastest cars sound like dragons in the forest. Where the earlier cars has tip-toed their way across the ice, the four wheel drive monsters just dug in, tore up the surface and charged on. In the next sequence of photos, look how quickly the surface changes from ice to ploughed mud.

Car one, Andy Burton, in his Peugeot Cosworth. Andy suffered a horrible accident at the Wyedean last time we saw it in the snow (2007), so I was pleased to once again see him at full attack.

Andy won last year, but that wasn’t to be the case this year – he finished third. First place went to car 5, Nik Elsmore. He was really shifting!

As you can imagine, I took hundreds of photos, and I won’t put them all in this post; instead I’ll put them on a web page and link to them all at the end. Here are a few choice pictures to whet your appetite from throughout the day.

Overall, an excellent day out. I’m pleased I finally managed to drag Robin to a decent British rally event – something he is unlikely to see often as he is emigrating to California in two weeks.

Want to see more? Here are all of my pictures from the day. If you would like a high resolution version of a particular image, please get in touch.

The first thing I did yesterday morning was to give the M5 what I imagine is a fairly typical weekly service: some fuel, a litre of TWS oil, and a pair of rear tyres. I failed to take the camera out with me for that trip, but it’s hardly photogenic stuff. I did consider getting Michelin Pilot Sports, but I couldn’t find them for less than £500 for the pair fitted, and I couldn’t find anywhere who could get them in stock in my size until February at the earliest. I therefore chose something rather more pikey: some Falkens.

I’ve had Falkens on M3s in the past, and I found them to be quite reasonable. Certainly in the wet, these new Falkens offer rather more grip than the outgoing (very worn!) Michelins. Time will tell, but at £256 fitted there’s quite a difference in wallet ache. Once I got back I did remember to take some photographs of the M5′s interior as Paul Stewart requested some after the diff seal work.

I really like the colour scheme – when searching for M5s I didn’t consider any other interiors!

That complete I turned my attention to the 330d, which of course didn’t need fuel, oil or tyres. It did need a new rear wiper, an item I’d grabbed from BMW when I got the M5′s diff seals. So, after a minute of maintenance I was finished with both of my BMWs. My day however was far from complete!

The other car in the family is a little Peugeot 106 Rallye. Diane’s had it for five years now, and a niggling problem has been some occasional hesitation in the mid-band when warm. I’ve made sure everything is clean and serviced, and have replaced the coolant temperature sensor, so yesterday I thought I’d try and replace the air temperature sensor too.

The result? The car drives a little more smoothly, but the hesitation still randomly occurs when the engine is hot. In any case, the car is due an MOT examination, so I replaced some failed bulbs and split wipers, and gave it the minor interval service that was due. While I did this, Ben changed Chavbo1′s front brake pads.

Finally we turned our attention to the M3 Evo that cut out on us on Thursday evening. I stuffed another 10 litres of BP’s Ultimate in there to ensure that fuel level wasn’t a problem. Prior to it letting us down, Ben has purchased some new spark plugs, so we fitted those and swapped the coil packs over from the old engine. Still the car wouldn’t start. A quick phone call to Ian Haynes gave us some further pointers to test the ‘spark’ side of the equation, and we deduced that the coil packs were alive and online.

We are therefore in a situation where we know the immobiliser isn’t the problem, and there is fuel in the car, and the main fuel pump primes. It seems likely therefore that the ECU isn’t running the pump or sending spark signals while cranking, and this suggests it’s not getting a reading from the crank shaft sensor. If this is the case, it seems rather more likely that the wiring is knackered rather than sudden and permanently sensor failure. In either case, we’ve decided that the way forward is to remove the crank shaft sensor from the other block, and dismantle the car to check the wiring and swap the sensor. I’ve also purchased a diagnostic reading kit from eBay – more on what it is when and if it arrives and I can test it!