Član
We were contacted by the TV program Fifth Gear on Wednesday of last week. They required two drifting 'experts' to help them build two Drift cars for Jonny Smith and Tom Ford to compete against each other in a fun drifting competition for the show.
They already had the chosen vehicles, and when they told us what they were, we did have a little 'pause for thought' moment. When thinking of a suitable start point in the build of a drift car, a Bedford Rascal is not one of the first things that come into your head. Infact, I'd pretty much say that it would never come into your head. But so be it. The producers had chosen the vehicles, and we were to attend the day of building these drift cars in an advisory role.
That day was the very next day, in Eastbourne at the workshops of the well known stock car racers Cecil's Rent a Rookie. These guys are a wicked group of lads, and their skills developed from building stock cars over the years, were definitely going to come in handy in this build.
We were split into two teams. Presenter: Jonny Smith with myself (Driftworks Phil Morrison) as the drift car advisor, and a team of three of Cecil's Renta Rookie mechanics.
The second team was Presenter: Tom Ford, with Driftworks James Robinson, and again three mechanics.
The builds were to be kept separate, so neither presenter knew what the other was building. Myself and Jonny had a Vauxhall Rascal pickup van as our base, and James and Tom had a full body Bedford Rascal. Both primarily the same vehicle, but with a slightly different look.
Tom had already set his mind on the look of his car, and set about it with a can of red gloss paint, and some masking tape, whilst James and the renta rookie guys decided on some of the more (dare I say) important modifications to the suspension and chassis. James and I have spent a long time working together on our own drift cars, so although we were not allowed to confer throughout the day, it was obvious that the core ‘drift car’ modifications were going to be similar.
The list goes:
1: lock the back wheels somehow, in this case weld the differential
2: make the suspension low and stiff as we know this type of vehicle has a real tendency to roll
3: See what we could do about giving it some more steering angle.
4: Do some tarty stuff
1: Differential
My guys had the diff removed from the rear end and welded up within 30 minutes. Not bad considering it's a front loading diff, meaning there isn't a back plate to remove, so you can't weld it on the car. James's team had theirs done in no time as well.
2: Suspension
James chose to advise using lowering blocks to bring the back end down, so his guys used some 2 inch square section tubing to weld onto the leaf spring and axle. A very effective and quite safe way of lowering a live axle vehicle.. The front coil over spring suspension had three coils removed to even things up.
I used a tried and tested stock car technique of Oxyacetylene torching the leaf spring to bend the metal, while three fat blokes stood on the bed of the pick up (one of those fat blokes being me of course). It's a pretty effective way of lowering a car quickly, and once evened up left to right, we removed the bump stops and it sat very nicely approximately four inches lower than standard. I also took three coils off the front suspension.
I decided that our Rascal drift car now needed to have some negative camber on the front wheels. So we chopped the lower arms with a big grinder, and welded in some plate and rod to extend them by 25mm each side, and adjusted the tracking to neutral again.
3: Steering angle
The Rascal has quite a weird steering mechanism, It's kind of like a steering box, but uses a rack to push an arm that pivots and pulls the track rods left and right. It has incredibly weak steering angle as standard, so after a quick think, I decided that we would chop one side of the pivoting arm, and add a length of metal, making it longer, and therefore giving it a wider sweep, pushing the track rods further.
James came up with an idea for his that did the same thing, but the opposite way. He moved the mounting point where the rack connects to the pivot, making it shorter, and again giving it a wider sweep. Both very effective ways of getting more steering angle, but neither really recommended for long term use, as mine involved welding onto a cast arm, and James's drilled into a weak section of the cast arm.
4: The other bits
In our Rascal, the cab area was obviously quite small as it's a pick up. We also wondered how we were going to get a roll cage in there. The easiest way to solve both of these problems was to just lop the roof off. So out came the petrol disc cutter, and we then modified and welded in a roll cage from another car. The sides from the pick up bed were pulled down on top of the wheels to protect the suspension in the event of any contact, and Jonny decided a big gay wing of some sorts was required.
So after a quick trip to the scrap yard, he returned with a Mondeo rear spoiler, and as a bonus found a Seat Cordoba rear bumper, that we attached as a front bumper with huge self tappers. Jonny was really getting into the Japanese drift car vibe, so felt a gash paintjob was in order. Out came the bright green paint, and some random Japanese words stuck on the side to complete the look.
Tom had set his mind on an A team replica van. So the team installed a bull bar from a Frontera or something, and some spot lights added along with the red stripes, to complete the look. A roll over bar was installed, and safety harnesses.
That was it for the build day, so after a weekend break we headed to Bovingdon stock car oval to see what carnage we could cause in these little Rascals.
Having never driven these cars, it was a bit of a gamble as to whether our theories about suitable drift modifications would actually make these 995cc powered little cars work.
To assist the vans in overcoming traction, a large water bowser was used to wet the track. Tom was first out in his A-team van replica, and after a few short bouts of under steer, he came round the corner in front of us on the lock stops full on broadside. He then span out, but it was one hell of a sight seeing such a ridiculous looking thing actually drifting.
After a few more practice runs he really seemed to get the hang of it, doing the whole corner on opposite lock, and exiting right up against the Armco at times.
So then myself and James judged five qualification runs from Tom. The pressure was obviously on, as the first two runs saw almighty spins resulting in 0 points. On the third run, the entry was faster and much more aggressive. We saw him hit the lock stops, and hammer the power, and to our surprise, the van defied all laws of physics, and held it's line perfectly. I take my hat off to Tom, as that was an absolutely awesome run, that totally deserved the 95 points that James and I awarded.
So it was Jonny's turn now in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Rascal.
Much the same as Tom, his initial practice runs were equally challenging, and as Jonny got more aggressive trying to get the back end to stay out and under control, he cut the corner a little close, lifted the van off it's wheels a couple of feet, and brought it crashing down to burst a tyre, bend a rim, and snap our modified steering mechanism.
This could have ended the day, but the guys from Cecil’s Renta Rookie crew were here, and they weren’t about to let a small thing like that cause problems. They lifted the Rascal with the crane, and removed the snapped pivot arm, and whilst I drove one of them to find a local welder, the other parts on the van were repaired. We returned within 30 minutes with the freshly welded part, and after another couple of minutes, Jonnys ride was back on four wheels and raring to go. It appeared the impact had bent a little more than we initially thought as the front camber was now borderline ridiculous, but no matter. Onto Jonnys competition.
The first of Jonnys qualification runs, saw a vast improvement. And by the 4th run he was flying, pulling off a best scored run of 90 points, which I think he was quite happy with.
This meant it was time for the twin battle part of the competition, known as Tsuisou in Japan. It didn't really work in the format that you would usually see in a drifting competition as we were short on time, so Tom and Jonny decided the aim of the game was to continuously hammer it around the circuit occasionally sideways, but always within inches of crashing into each other. The results were nothing short of hilarious, and the pièce de résistance, was Jonny once again getting a little too familiar with the speed bumps on the inside of the corner, and gracefully tipping the green monstrosity onto its side. Round of applause from everyone sir!
After some great driving by both presenters, in some surprisingly capable little vehicles, it was a nice note to end the day on. However that wasn't to be the end.... Tom Ford span up the little A-team van into a victory set of donuts. Very impressive. Then he went onto a victory lap, and only a few meters in front of us went for the one handed, arm out the window drift.
He got it sideways, stuck his arm out, the car then bit into the tarmac, so he went to get it into oversteer the second time with his hand out of the window again. The van then went up on two wheels. Tom brought it back down by counter steering, but the counter steer put him 90 degrees out to the way he should have been going. He went head first straight into the Armco barrier.
The front screen was ejected, and our hearts were in our throats as we ran over hearing the engine screaming past its rev limiter with the car completely stationary. The engine actually exploded just as we arrived at the car. Tom was conscious, but it was immediately obvious that his legs were trapped, which he calmly but slightly urgently confirmed.
The battery was immediately disconected, and with the help of Vaughn, the biggest of our mechanic friends, Tom was pulled out, and laid down for the on site paramedics to attend to..
I've just heard from Jonny, that Tom spent the night in hospital, and has more x-rays and an operation today. He broke every toe in his right foot and fractured the foot. This may seem quite horrific to some, but if you had seen the impact, and saw the inside of the Rascal, you like me, would consider that getting off quite lightly.
The lesson of the day was that safety must always come first, and even if you think you surely couldn't get hurt driving at such a low speed. Anything is possible with these lumps of motorised scrap metal.
Safety was taken into account in the build of these cars, but all it took was a small mistake and contact with the Armco at an absolutely perfect angle, to end up with a night in hospital and eight weeks on crutches. .
They already had the chosen vehicles, and when they told us what they were, we did have a little 'pause for thought' moment. When thinking of a suitable start point in the build of a drift car, a Bedford Rascal is not one of the first things that come into your head. Infact, I'd pretty much say that it would never come into your head. But so be it. The producers had chosen the vehicles, and we were to attend the day of building these drift cars in an advisory role.
That day was the very next day, in Eastbourne at the workshops of the well known stock car racers Cecil's Rent a Rookie. These guys are a wicked group of lads, and their skills developed from building stock cars over the years, were definitely going to come in handy in this build.
We were split into two teams. Presenter: Jonny Smith with myself (Driftworks Phil Morrison) as the drift car advisor, and a team of three of Cecil's Renta Rookie mechanics.
The second team was Presenter: Tom Ford, with Driftworks James Robinson, and again three mechanics.
The builds were to be kept separate, so neither presenter knew what the other was building. Myself and Jonny had a Vauxhall Rascal pickup van as our base, and James and Tom had a full body Bedford Rascal. Both primarily the same vehicle, but with a slightly different look.
Tom had already set his mind on the look of his car, and set about it with a can of red gloss paint, and some masking tape, whilst James and the renta rookie guys decided on some of the more (dare I say) important modifications to the suspension and chassis. James and I have spent a long time working together on our own drift cars, so although we were not allowed to confer throughout the day, it was obvious that the core ‘drift car’ modifications were going to be similar.
The list goes:
1: lock the back wheels somehow, in this case weld the differential
2: make the suspension low and stiff as we know this type of vehicle has a real tendency to roll
3: See what we could do about giving it some more steering angle.
4: Do some tarty stuff
1: Differential
My guys had the diff removed from the rear end and welded up within 30 minutes. Not bad considering it's a front loading diff, meaning there isn't a back plate to remove, so you can't weld it on the car. James's team had theirs done in no time as well.
2: Suspension
James chose to advise using lowering blocks to bring the back end down, so his guys used some 2 inch square section tubing to weld onto the leaf spring and axle. A very effective and quite safe way of lowering a live axle vehicle.. The front coil over spring suspension had three coils removed to even things up.
I used a tried and tested stock car technique of Oxyacetylene torching the leaf spring to bend the metal, while three fat blokes stood on the bed of the pick up (one of those fat blokes being me of course). It's a pretty effective way of lowering a car quickly, and once evened up left to right, we removed the bump stops and it sat very nicely approximately four inches lower than standard. I also took three coils off the front suspension.
I decided that our Rascal drift car now needed to have some negative camber on the front wheels. So we chopped the lower arms with a big grinder, and welded in some plate and rod to extend them by 25mm each side, and adjusted the tracking to neutral again.
3: Steering angle
The Rascal has quite a weird steering mechanism, It's kind of like a steering box, but uses a rack to push an arm that pivots and pulls the track rods left and right. It has incredibly weak steering angle as standard, so after a quick think, I decided that we would chop one side of the pivoting arm, and add a length of metal, making it longer, and therefore giving it a wider sweep, pushing the track rods further.
James came up with an idea for his that did the same thing, but the opposite way. He moved the mounting point where the rack connects to the pivot, making it shorter, and again giving it a wider sweep. Both very effective ways of getting more steering angle, but neither really recommended for long term use, as mine involved welding onto a cast arm, and James's drilled into a weak section of the cast arm.
4: The other bits
In our Rascal, the cab area was obviously quite small as it's a pick up. We also wondered how we were going to get a roll cage in there. The easiest way to solve both of these problems was to just lop the roof off. So out came the petrol disc cutter, and we then modified and welded in a roll cage from another car. The sides from the pick up bed were pulled down on top of the wheels to protect the suspension in the event of any contact, and Jonny decided a big gay wing of some sorts was required.
So after a quick trip to the scrap yard, he returned with a Mondeo rear spoiler, and as a bonus found a Seat Cordoba rear bumper, that we attached as a front bumper with huge self tappers. Jonny was really getting into the Japanese drift car vibe, so felt a gash paintjob was in order. Out came the bright green paint, and some random Japanese words stuck on the side to complete the look.
Tom had set his mind on an A team replica van. So the team installed a bull bar from a Frontera or something, and some spot lights added along with the red stripes, to complete the look. A roll over bar was installed, and safety harnesses.
That was it for the build day, so after a weekend break we headed to Bovingdon stock car oval to see what carnage we could cause in these little Rascals.
Having never driven these cars, it was a bit of a gamble as to whether our theories about suitable drift modifications would actually make these 995cc powered little cars work.
To assist the vans in overcoming traction, a large water bowser was used to wet the track. Tom was first out in his A-team van replica, and after a few short bouts of under steer, he came round the corner in front of us on the lock stops full on broadside. He then span out, but it was one hell of a sight seeing such a ridiculous looking thing actually drifting.
After a few more practice runs he really seemed to get the hang of it, doing the whole corner on opposite lock, and exiting right up against the Armco at times.
So then myself and James judged five qualification runs from Tom. The pressure was obviously on, as the first two runs saw almighty spins resulting in 0 points. On the third run, the entry was faster and much more aggressive. We saw him hit the lock stops, and hammer the power, and to our surprise, the van defied all laws of physics, and held it's line perfectly. I take my hat off to Tom, as that was an absolutely awesome run, that totally deserved the 95 points that James and I awarded.
So it was Jonny's turn now in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Rascal.
Much the same as Tom, his initial practice runs were equally challenging, and as Jonny got more aggressive trying to get the back end to stay out and under control, he cut the corner a little close, lifted the van off it's wheels a couple of feet, and brought it crashing down to burst a tyre, bend a rim, and snap our modified steering mechanism.
This could have ended the day, but the guys from Cecil’s Renta Rookie crew were here, and they weren’t about to let a small thing like that cause problems. They lifted the Rascal with the crane, and removed the snapped pivot arm, and whilst I drove one of them to find a local welder, the other parts on the van were repaired. We returned within 30 minutes with the freshly welded part, and after another couple of minutes, Jonnys ride was back on four wheels and raring to go. It appeared the impact had bent a little more than we initially thought as the front camber was now borderline ridiculous, but no matter. Onto Jonnys competition.
The first of Jonnys qualification runs, saw a vast improvement. And by the 4th run he was flying, pulling off a best scored run of 90 points, which I think he was quite happy with.
This meant it was time for the twin battle part of the competition, known as Tsuisou in Japan. It didn't really work in the format that you would usually see in a drifting competition as we were short on time, so Tom and Jonny decided the aim of the game was to continuously hammer it around the circuit occasionally sideways, but always within inches of crashing into each other. The results were nothing short of hilarious, and the pièce de résistance, was Jonny once again getting a little too familiar with the speed bumps on the inside of the corner, and gracefully tipping the green monstrosity onto its side. Round of applause from everyone sir!
After some great driving by both presenters, in some surprisingly capable little vehicles, it was a nice note to end the day on. However that wasn't to be the end.... Tom Ford span up the little A-team van into a victory set of donuts. Very impressive. Then he went onto a victory lap, and only a few meters in front of us went for the one handed, arm out the window drift.
He got it sideways, stuck his arm out, the car then bit into the tarmac, so he went to get it into oversteer the second time with his hand out of the window again. The van then went up on two wheels. Tom brought it back down by counter steering, but the counter steer put him 90 degrees out to the way he should have been going. He went head first straight into the Armco barrier.
The front screen was ejected, and our hearts were in our throats as we ran over hearing the engine screaming past its rev limiter with the car completely stationary. The engine actually exploded just as we arrived at the car. Tom was conscious, but it was immediately obvious that his legs were trapped, which he calmly but slightly urgently confirmed.
The battery was immediately disconected, and with the help of Vaughn, the biggest of our mechanic friends, Tom was pulled out, and laid down for the on site paramedics to attend to..
I've just heard from Jonny, that Tom spent the night in hospital, and has more x-rays and an operation today. He broke every toe in his right foot and fractured the foot. This may seem quite horrific to some, but if you had seen the impact, and saw the inside of the Rascal, you like me, would consider that getting off quite lightly.
The lesson of the day was that safety must always come first, and even if you think you surely couldn't get hurt driving at such a low speed. Anything is possible with these lumps of motorised scrap metal.
Safety was taken into account in the build of these cars, but all it took was a small mistake and contact with the Armco at an absolutely perfect angle, to end up with a night in hospital and eight weeks on crutches. .
