16th April 2010
thanks to Chris Clark
With the new season already underway Team Fairhurst should soon be joining the rest of the F1 racers at the track in the coming weeks. The team have been busy over the winter completing the build on the all new shale car, which has been totally built in house at the Teams Widnes base. The car was painted at Boundary Garage over the Easter weekend but Mike Ashcroft and the Team are keeping the final colour scheme of the car secret at this stage, even both Derek and Lee have only recently discovered what colour it will be, so only time will tell what colour it emerges from the paint shop. Lee promises that it will look different from many of the other cars on track when all the panels are fitted which is clearly evident from the sharp panel angles on the back of the roll cage. The pictures show that the chassis will be white but the panels will be another colour, to be painted at a later date.
The car is now back at Fairhurst HQ and is having the engine, axles and running gear fitted before the car returns to Boundary for the final colour to be applied to the panels.
Sign writing will once again be entrusted to the capable hands of Brian Evans Signs, hopefully in early may and the car will then go back to Boundary for clear coating before the car returns to Widnes for final assembly and hopefully the car can hit the track in the May or June.
Towards the end of September during the 2009 season it became clearly apparent that things were not well within the engine on the 217 tarmac car as it started to smoke during races and got progressively worse. Inspection by the team revealed some serious internal damage and sadly there was only one decision and that was to park the car and send the engine to the builder for repairs and refurb.
Some kind of contaminant had found its way into the bores either through dirt in the petrol or via the carburettor and done some serious damage to the pistons and bores, so the engine had to be stripped down to the block, the chambers rebored, new pistons fitted, new valves and guides as well as a few other parts to complete the rebuild.
The engine was completed recently and was dyno tested and was ready to collect over the Easter weekend. The engine is now approximately 410 ci having been around 406 ci prior to the rework. As a result the 217 / 218 car should have a little more horsepower this season. The roll cage damage sustained at Kings Lynn last year has been properly repaired and new bumpers and nerf rails fitted where required so the tarmac car should soon be ready to hit the track again soon, hopefully Birmingham or Hednesford all being well. Some modifications were required to the nerf rails and suspension points to accommodate the new tyre size and profile for the new for 2010 Goodyear tyres.
Both 217 Lee and 218 Derek will be racing during the 2010 season with Lee having priority but Derek plans to race several tarmac meetings in the shale car alongside Lee in the tarmac car.
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