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Transcript of two long voicemail messages received from Tent No 72 just outside Khovd
Hello all ... not sure what Day I last reported on ... but I'll go back only as far as Day 7 ... because that morning was so cold (-3C) that I can't remember anything before it.
Day 7 was not very exciting ... almost nothing happened. We started out from a place in the middle of nowhere ... we drove for hours and hours through the middle of nowhere ... and we stopped that evening in the middle of nowhere.
Day 8 was still in the ****end of nowhere ... still unbearably cold ... the camping was very grim ... but the day's drive was a lot more exciting.
The corrugations on the roads have to be seen to be believed .... it seems that the big trucks remove the surface layer ... and then the wind does its work and coats everything in fine sand. But whatever causes it, the corrugations shake everything apart ... even the door-handles fell off today. I have photos to prove it ... but you'll have to wait until I get to an internet connection to see the evidence.
Day 9 was a continuation of Day 8 in that more pieces broke ... and general disintegration continued. The main problem was that the gear lever snapped off ... leaving a 3 inch stub. This made gear-changing quite awkward ... which was especially annoying because we had to drive across a lot of soft sand.
Fortunately a Frenchman called Michel (Car No 84) had brought an arc-welder ... as you do!! ... and when hooked up to a generator at the campsite ... we were able to reattach the broken part of the gearlever.
Day 10 was fantastic. We hit a top of 108 kph across the flat open plains ... that was as fast as Fugly would go. Naturally the mechanical disintegration continued ... the gearbox started to whine badly ... the gears become more and more difficult to select ... the horns stopped working ... and the wheels started to wobble badly ... the kingpins are worn.
Hungarian Bob ... one of the camp mechanics and a top bloke ... suggested that we pull out the gearbox and take it apart. He said it would take just 25 minutes ... and was only a matter of a few bolts. Sure enough, 25 minutes later ... Bob had the gearbox lying all over the tent ... and declared that the spigot bush had fallen out. Apparently that's something that never happens ... but it did ... anyway Bob hammered, pushed, shoved and glued it back into place. The gearbox no longer has a whine ... but as a result the clutch is now slightly out of alignment.
The non-working air-horns resulted from 2 problems ... firstly they had been mounted upside-down ... do they filled up with water on one of the crossings ... and secondly the fuse for the RH fuel pump was wired to the horns ... which we discovered purely by accident. So we bought and fitted new air-horns and rewired the fuses.
As I mentioned in an earlier despatch, the radiator mounts have broken twice and are now quite loose ... but this looseness seems to be beneficial ... because there are no rigid mounts to break.
Through all of this, the engine has continued to run beautifully ....
As you may have seen, we set 4th and 5th fastest times yesterday on the timed stages ... this was despite the firm resolution to stick to our new goal ... of just making it to Paris rather than trying to win. What we have discovered is that by slowing down, we go faster ... and in addition, the navigation is easier.
Today, Day 11, is a rest day ... but despite having had showers, we still look a complete mess ... well, at least I do ... and my voice is croaky ... but we're still having the time of our life.
CD and Ces
(Clive is using a little known converse of Einstein's Theory of General Relativity. As you recall, Einstein theorised that the faster you travel, the slower time passes. Having disproved the usefulness of Einstein's theory by rattling the Chevy apart at very high speeds, Clive is swapping over to the little-used converse of the Theory ... The slower you drive, the faster the times. ... Peter)
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