Classic motor show - NEC

pablo · Post by **pablo** » Thu Nov 11, 2010 11:15 pm

This event has been on our radar since the beginning of the year but with all the recent set backs and missed deadlines we had decided to take some of the pressure of us and not post about it.

Friday 29th October
Alan went over to StreetRacers and stripped down the old engine.

Saturday 30th October
The club secretary (XR4Register), was over at StreetRacers and had a good look round the car. Later that day he phoned Alan to say that he wanted the car at the Classic Motor Show....No pressure there then.

Friday 5th November
Alan and Gordon rebuild the engine, installed it and got it running.

Tuesday 9th November
I went over with Alan to collect the car.

After a short but blustery drive we arrived at the NEC at 19.15 to get the car on the stand and cleaned. On our arrival at the stand we had a pleasant surprise, a bottle of spray 'n' shine had been left for us. (waterless car cleaner). I wasn't expecting it until the morning;)

I spent the next 30 minutes going over the car and have to say, i'm impressed the car has never looked so good:drool5:.

Some of the cars in our hall...it's like taking a walk down memory lane. Old skool fords, mk1 Astra GTE, Lamboghini Mira's, Ford Corsairs, Metro 6r4's.
The gutting part is the lighting in the hall...it's shite and taking pictures with a basic camera is crap.

Friday is press/corporate day so neither of us will leaving the car all day. Then sat & sun are the public days.

A full show report will be done with pictues.

Fast Eddy · Post by **Fast Eddy** » Fri Nov 12, 2010 9:19 am

Well done guys. Glad this went ok for you.

Eddy

Post by **Ben** » Fri Nov 12, 2010 9:44 am

Nice work chaps

Post by **Stuart** » Fri Nov 12, 2010 6:55 pm

I look forward to the full report

Onwards and upwards guys

Mr Fletcher · Post by **Mr Fletcher** » Fri Nov 12, 2010 8:02 pm

best of luck guys:thumbs:

pablo · Post by **pablo** » Fri Nov 12, 2010 9:03 pm

I was hoping for a quiet day, a day without Alan baiting Gengis. The whole of the set up last night Alan spent baiting Gengis to come on track against him, Alan even offered to use his GT:boxing_smiley:.
Luckily they called a truce for today:hurray:

The day started with me getting to Alans for 07.15, from there we took the the train to the NEC. We were on the stand by 08.00 and time for a cup of tea. We palnned to give the car a quick clean then take a quick look around before the doors opened.

On our stand were 4 cars,
Xr4x4 cosworth powered - 352 bhp
Xr8 5.0Ltr v8 - 260 bhp
Xr4x4 supercharged - 236 bhp
Xr4x4 2.9 Twin turbo - 516 bhp (with nos)

Our stand was right next to 'Dream Rides', for a donation of between

pablo · Post by **pablo** » Fri Nov 12, 2010 9:19 pm

Throughout the day camera were flashing away at our car and it was called a cosworth, RS200, RS500......everything but an XR4x4. It made us laugh watching people head to the back of the car to see what it was, only to find no badge on the back:smilielol5:.

The funniest part of the day happened towards the end of the day, when a very nice gentleman started to talking to us about the car. To our surprise he asked.

"Do you drive it flat out on track"

"Yes"

"Do you have to rebuild it after every day"

"This car we've just built, but the last one no...."

"Do you loose a lot of power towards the end of the day"

"No".........Somewhat surprised by that question.

After he left we were talking about it and only conclusion that we could come to was that he must have bought an ELECTRIC car and was using it on track:smilielol5: and as the batteries ran down the car slowed down:smilielol5:. I did ask Alan to go and ask the bloke what car he had but we were just laughing too much to move:smilielol5:

Post by **Stuart** » Fri Nov 12, 2010 9:25 pm

The Escort with the Union Jack on is superb

It must have given you a great deal of pride to have your car there, on the stand and amongst those other cars............were you and Bart relaxed about the whole thing, or were you getting agitated about anyone clambering it? (Or wasn't it that sort of show?)

pablo · Post by **pablo** » Fri Nov 12, 2010 9:33 pm

Completely relaxed mate. So much so that Alan even managed to fall off his chair and almost go crashing through another clubs partions

The public can get right up to the cars.

pablo · Post by **pablo** » Sun Nov 14, 2010 9:05 pm

What a weekend......long days but well worth it. With the MPH show running alongside the Classic motor show and the public able to move between the two really helped to swell the numbers and it did.
There wasn't a quite moment throughout the day and we even had to take turns to have a fag break:sifone:.

The overall response to the car from the general public was far beyond our expectations, we are totally over the moon with the way the weekend has gone for us. We even had a couple of Time Attack competitors come up and speak to us, who loved the look of he new car.

A big part of this weekend was about work, promoting our sponsors as well as ourselves and again this went far beyond our expections.

During the day if any kids commented about Bart's crash helmet we would let them hold it whilst their parent took a picture of them standing next to the car and this seemed to go down really well, especially with the parents.

Alan will be uploading some pictures as soon as he can.