Tag Archives: marcos

Le Mans Classic 2016

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Back from this years Le Mans Classic & it was a blast! I had a great time with my chum Doug, & below you can see him piloting my Mantis past the famous LM clock into the straight between the grandstands. Whoohoo! Photographer Mark Scarrott you are a very nice man!

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The drive back today, Monday, was generally uneventful, making the Roscoff ferry in good time & a decent crossing to Plymouth with a bracing sea breeze under a grey sky. The hood stayed down all the way, despite hitting heavy rain just south of Junction 19 on the M6. Tiredness & mediocre visibility led to driver error with my prematurely turning off the roundabout &, after around 600 miles and just 10 miles from home we found ourselves back on the M6 heading north again & now away from home. D’oh! An interesting development over the previous few miles had been a growing lack of stopping power, with the brakes becoming increasingly ineffective! I decided to figure out what was going on the following morning & continued home using the engine to brake. Feeling more than a little sheepish, it was off at M6 Junction 20 & (with apologies to everyone in Lymm for driving a very loud sportscar through their village at about 0200 hours on Tuesday morning), we finally got home. It’s fair to say I slept well!

The race… Saturday

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Today was race day at the 2016 Le Mans Classic, but before heading off to the circuit again to park up on the Bugatti Circuit there was time to get some unusual shots of the cars from above, courtesy of Darren & his cherry popper picker.

The race itself was enjoyable & I was pleased to have Grandstand seats after a fair few hours wandering around looking at the cars, stalls & the odd bar. Lots of big screens make following the rcase a lot easier & the weather was better than 2014! Yay!

We’re off to Le Mans!

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We’re off to Le Mans! Day 1 saw Doug & I hit Folkestone Wednesday evening after a leisurely drive down from Cheshire (i.e. nothing fell off) & we checked into the hotel which was a pretty cool Victorian pile on the coast. The obligatory tour of local hostelries followed, & a quick call to Jay Sherwin who was due to meet up with us outside Calais in his rather cool fliptone converted Mantis Challenge car. The conversation with Jay quickly moved on to whether he had gone ahead & swapped out the original 4.6L Ford Mustang engine for a GM LS3. The answer was that he had , & I was rather amused to hear that he had only finished & MOTd the car that day, with the test drive being our 400 mile trip to Le Mans. Excellent! Bravo!

Day off day out

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A day off from work today & I finally pulled my finger out…  at least in terms of getting the stereo working again! I always rated the ads component speaker install SQPlus did on the Mantis a few years ago, but knew the company had disappeared – another victim of the recession perhaps? (Their installs must have averaged about £2k 😮). By the miracle of the Internet, it turns out that the owner, Phil Leach, is now working with Manchester Car Audio, so I popped over there this morning. After a brief discussion around my dead Nakimichi amp, I was soon putting a deposit down for a new Amp & Alpine head unit. I’ll be back next Wednesday to get it all fitted. So that’s the tunes sorted… never mind the leaking engine, badly fitting hood or shocking shocks! 😂

As it was a gorgeous spring day with some warmth in the sun, I decided to go the long way home from MCA and headed out to Macclesfield, home of JP Exhausts. I was soon chatting to a mega helpful chap called Will who instantly confirmed a small hole near the weld in the exhaust downpipe.

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He very kindly gummed it up for me & we agreed a return visit was in order to get two new downpipes made up. I also tentatively asked about a system that would allow me to lower the exhaust noise levels – the answer was remarkably straightforward: a solenoid driven diverter valve which sends the exhaust flow via a bigger silencer. Simples! There is enough room under the Mantis but it’s a lot of work so £500 plus the exhaust flow controllers. Maybe next year?…

MOT’d… Just in time

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So…  Happy days, the car passed its MOT – third time lucky. All the previous fails were on the indicator flash rate after the LED conversion. MOT actually expires tomorrow so that is the closest I have run it for a while. As usual multiple advisories,  including a nail in one of the tyres (which have had a good innings to be fair) and, more annoyingly perhaps, some flex in the front shocks. Not all that long since I got these Protech units & had hoped they would last longer – perhaps not handling the comedy speed humps in the office car park so well, or the four potholes in the first 500m from the office. Seem to remember some good feedback on Gaz Golds on the Forum so will investigate. Maybe another trip to TopCats on the horizon…

A lottery win would be quite useful at this point.

Being precious

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This afternoon I dropped the Mantis off at Invisifilm’s new premises in Cheadle. Tomorrow Steve will fit the Armorfend paint protection film. It’s an 18 year old CAD drawing & very basic compared to modern kits, however a new drawing & bespoke kit is another £500. Yikes!

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The paint is still relatively unscathed after a few weeks of (admittedly cautious) driving. Hopefully the Armorfend will keep it that way for a good few years (there is a 10 year warranty on it). A couple of trips to Le Mans should be a good test! 😂

Con-FUSED

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So the fuse box got melted a couple of weeks ago… 

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Yes,  that lump of yellow plastic is the Ignition fuse! Many phone calls to the likes of Guru Chivers et al have revealed that the original fuse box is no longer available so a Plan B is required which I am now discussing with Joe Cubitt, who I trust with the Mantis electrics.

Priorities

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The Mantis is taking a back seat as family matters take priority ATM. Currently outstanding are the two press studs on body where the rivets have pulled out, and the voltage stabiliser. I don’t have the tools to do the riveting so that is a garage job (although getting some kind of reinforcement to rivet into on the stud to the left of the Nearside headrest will be challenging!). Having posted on the Marcos Forum about the voltage stabiliser I have bought a solid state one off eBay & that again will need wiring in by someone with more time than me.

Other things to be done of course include an LS engine conversion, a respray & a new interior…

Hitting the Redline

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A somewhat postponed trip down to Redline Sports Cars today. Left Manchester an hour behind schedule & in the rain (as forecast, to be fair) but as I expect to be without the car for a good three weeks the hood was down… didn’t get too wet! The sun was starting to show by Birmingham & by the time I was half way down the M5 it it was lovely. It’s always a pleasure driving into Wiltshire.

I made it to Redline with only one ‘practice’ circuit of the site required, before I parked my male ego & looked at the site map. Good to see Jeremy & later Joe. Had a quick look over the car & talked through the job list before leaving it with them. The two major items are the new hood (I have lived with Selotape over the growing split in the vinyl rear screen for three years so I can’t be accused of rushing this one!), & chassis checkup/Waxoyl. I now know from the Marcos Forum that there are 13 bungs in the chassis (to be removed when Waxoyling properly) – just the sort of essential information that will get me invited to wild, crazy swinging parties I reckon… Anyway there also the minor jobs including;

  • Replacement electric aerial
  • Suspension check (ride seems harder than last year, after a few potholes!)
  • Water ingress through windscreen jets
  • … the windscreen jets!
  • Oily fumes coming in through windscreen vents
  • Waterproofing door cards (water seeped around door speakers a few weeks ago, but does not seem to have damaged speakers themselves)
  • Air director thingy (i.e. windscreen/footwell/split)
  • LED bulbs to gauges (I need to check these out more, as SMD bulbs appear to be the way to go, rather than unidirectional ultra bright LEDs). Do I go for blue or white ones though?!
  • Secure offside dashboard (been on & off so many times I don’t think there’s anything left for the screw to bite into).

Jeremy has suggested the chap making the new hood will tweak the flaps at the front to make them a bit more effective, which sounds very promising. Not as good as the later hood frame & cover with all the metal plates & acres of rubber & velcro (that will disappoint some people on Google), but that was £££ when I spoke to MHS. And let’s face it the hood is not up much anyway, rain or shine. I also got to see a half-built Invicta that Joe is finishing off. It’s a fab Mercedes blue, & looks very imposing (2m wide!). Hope I see it again when it’s finished.

The car is still doing about 13mpg (Waaaaah!) & the conversation drifted onto ECUs, & Joe has left me to ponder a Unichip (as chosen by the factory) or I have been recommended Omex. Neither of which are cheap but in the medium term would pay for themselves if they take the mpg into the high teems or low twenties. Now… where’s that lottery ticket?

Alternator Ulster

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Alternator light has been flickering away last couple of days. Yet another area of the car that I know bugger all about. Have found a high output version in the States but no idea if I actually need a new one or if it’s battery not even a loose cable. Not ideal but at least I can still drive &  weather is truely awesome 😎