Bit hectic...

Life has been a little hectic over the last couple of weeks with the new baby and I bought another (yes, another) cab that has needed quite a bit of work on.  This has meant that you've been without updates for a couple of weeks. 

The new baby has made me truly treasure life and before this turns into the usual slushy wushy "I love my kids" don't wory.  I do love my kids - 3 boys  - but they drain every day, hour and minute from your life.  I wouldn't change them for the world but right now I seem to be operating on auto-pilot with nappies & vomit every angle.

Also, I've been a bit busy at school, well eveing college but Gruff likes to imagine me in a school boys outfit which is just a little weird bearing in mind I'm intending to spend 5 days inside either a small box on wheels or in a tent with him.  Never mind.

Lets move a little swiftly on.  I'm intending this to only be a little update as kids to feed, bottles to sterilise, bums to change and things to do. 

With the exception of 1 graphic, the car is as prepared as we can get with the sponsors we have.  It could squeeze in a couple more if needed so as ususal, if you're tempted, please let me know.

I trundled down to see Ed to collect a couple of bits and it seems like he is a busy busy man.  So for those of you that were trying to get him to do your graphics, sorry, I took all his free time and frustrated him to the point I don't think he wants to do them anymore.  He is looking forward to the rally and like the rest of us,when he talks about Scumrun, he turns into a big eyed child on Christmas Eve.  If the organiser is like this, it's gonna be fun.

I used Juliette the Scumrunner to go down and see him and this was his first glimpse of our pride and joy.  As I rounded the corner I saw him double check what he had seen and I swear I saw him giggle just a little.  I think he likes her.  He did ask if it got many looks when being driven "especially with that exhaust" and yes it does. 

Mainly from schoolboys (explains why Gruff is keen to drive) and the local hooped earinged, side pony-tailed, velour tracksuit wearing, buggy pushing, chain smoking, tat' sporting chavettes that seem to live near me.  I took the brother in law out for a test flight (he's 15), and he was amazed at the amount of "State" (no idea what that actually means - yoof speak for totty I think) that were giving him the eye simply being in it.

Whilst thinking of exhausts and noises, Joe - What have you done???  If you follow the link to the right that takes you to Bugsplats Blog, you will see that he has decided to tame his exhaust.  He has put a suppressor on there to take the edge off his battlecry.  He does use a lovely set of words, which I'm going to use here as they made me smile:

[quote]One day I will fit the turbo that is sat in my loft, but until then ill just have to compensate with the noise of the ridiculous exhaust system.

However and this leads to my reasoning for this post, it is a little too ridiculous. People ask me "is that road legal" I reply "depends", they reply "on what", I say "whether I start the engine or not"[/quote]



What else has been going on?  Well, the new cab was a nightmare and not quite as up together as I would have hoped, but fixable.  It's the 1.8Si which means it's only half a second slower to 60 than an RS2000 with a top end pretty similar.  I spent most of yesterday getting soaked to the skin swapping the torn and battered roof for a new mohair one.  Now the roof is fixed, I've recarpeted it and put seats back in and it's quite a pleasant place inside.  Knocked some dents out, polished out some scratches, but still loads more needed to do before I'm proud of it.  On the up-side my multicar policy went down  Strangely I now have 3 cars on that policy but the overall premium went down when I added the new one (called Hobo Jo.  It's lived an abandoned outside life for 2 years and the previous owner was a lovely woman named Jo so HoboJo has joined Julian, Juliette and Diego the mondeo on my drive).  It is starting to look a little crowded out there right now.

Ooooooh, I nearly forgot.  We have a new official sponsor.  Voltz energy drink are wonderful wonderful people.  Not only did they agree to sponsor us, provide their own graphics, give us free energy drinks but they're also giving us some T-shirts with joint branding.  How cool is that?  They have promised us a sizeable donation as well and I'm hoping that comes in soon just so I know I dont need to chase them.

Finally for this little bit, I'm arranging a meet up on route to the Brands Hatch shenannigans at Clacketts Lane services.  For those teams that read this, all the details are on the scumrun site in the forums.  Or contact me for details floppythrottle@live.co.uk

Gruff's March words of wisdom

I've let Gruff get literary as he is bored and he's having another go at doing the blog.  This is only a brief interim entry and normal Tuesday update will be coming (on Tuesday ish) with loads of pics as got the camera and phone working with the laptop again.

Before I pass this over to him, I just want to say a MASSIVE thank you to DodoJuice again for donating their car care package for us to raffle off in aid of Dreams Come True.  Every £2 donation we receive via the justgiving site gains the donor a raffle ticket.  so a £10 donation for example is 5 chances. 

Whilst in thanking mode, I met up with Ed @ Scumrun today, and he has rattled out a batch of graphics, steered me in the right direction in terms of placements required and generally amused me for 30 minutes or so of my life.  Nice guy Eddie - hmmm sounds familiar.

Over to the Gruff:

Hey all Gruff again....

Well as it's been a while since my last masterpiece I thought it was about time I donned my writing cap and sculptured another piece of literary genius.

Well not long left to go until the scumrun and let it be known I am really starting to look forward to the adventure, 4 days in a car with Savage is going to be once in a lifetime event (well until next year at least).

We took the car out for a spin this afternoon as I have not driven it since the new exhaust was put on and there is a definite difference in noise to the old girl.... The sound system is out of this world but we are undecided on the first tune to play as we leave the ferry in Calais, I did mention barbie girl by aqua but savage wasn't too impressed with the idea....

All in all I am very impressed in all the man hours mr Savage has put into polishing the car with DODO juice car cleaning stuff, well worth the money in my opinion lol...

  

In all honesty I could bitch about the bloody awful relentless sticky things he put on the wing mirrors without even asking me, who actually drinks the stuff as it tastes like rat wee, it's beyond me lol but in all honesty mr Savage over the last few months has put his heart and soul into getting the car up to scratch, finding the sponsors and pretty much doing everything else involved in the rally even though technically it's not a rally as far as the insurance companies are concerned lol.

Anyway people that's enough from me so please please give some money for this charity as it's such a well worth charity...

Take care

Gruff 

Loads Going on...

What's been going on?  For starters, we have a new baby.  He came into the world weighing approximately 25 Big Macs (including garnish, not including packaging) and he is lovely.  So I've been a little unable to spend too much time on the car.

Other important news, we have 2 new sponsors on board.  We have Sheeepwear bespoke & customised clothing (http://www.sheeepwear.com/) and we have DodoJuice (more on them in a little bit).

Sheeepwear (yes, thats the right spelling) have thrown some cash our way for a bit of advertising on the car.  Obviously the general logo will go on there but they also want to have the wing mirrors (yay).  To be fair, I don't know too much about the company but after a little research I've found that they do the club shirts for a Ford owners group and I know what fussy gits they are, so you can be assured the quality is good.  Get in touch with them for a quote for your stuff.  Has to be worth an email if you're looking to get clothing sorted?

A lot of time has been spent on cleaning the car and getting it just right, but now we have reflections galore along the car.  Having washed it, clayed it, polished it, pre-wax primed it, put 3 coats of wax on and a protective mist layer on as well, it is gorgeous.  This looks like no other 16 year old car I have seen.  The finish is glass smooth, all the light swirly marks have gone and I am incredibly, incredibly impressed.  The bulk of the products used came from a company called DodoJuice (http://www.dodojuice.com/).

I was so impressed with what a bit of DodoJuice can do, that I emailed them. I explained the scumrun, and that they rock and fawned a little over their products, and asked if they may consider teaming up with us for a spot of advertising. Well, Dom @ Dodo is a lovely chap. DodoJuice are donating the following car care package to us:


1 x Born to Be Mild Car shampoo
1 x Basics Clay
1 x Basics Clay Lube
1 x Lime Prime
1 x Blue Roo Applicator
1 x SN Fingermitt Applicator
1 x PH Pro Panel Wax pot
1 x Fantastic Fur.


I considered taking this all for myself but they are sending me a seperate batch of goodies which means... The above is up for grabs.

The car care package listed above, will all go to ONE sponsor of the car. Also, we have 2 cases of  Energy drink (12 bottles per case), which again we will put into the raffle as an additional 2 prizes.

Every £2 donation made between NOW and APRIL 14th on the www.justgiving.com/floppythrottle webpage will earn 1 raffle ticket. On April 15th, we will get an impartial to draw the winner and I will get it all sent out to YOU(?). If you donate more than £2, then additional tickets will be allocated to you for every additional £2 donated.

I appreciate that this is read in a lot of countries, but I will only be posting out prizes to UK addresses as otherwise it will cost me a fortune.

Please remember to mail me at floppythrottle@live.co.uk with your email address once you have donated so that I can notify you if you win.  Alternatively, if you are a member of FEOC-UK (FEOC), Escort Cabriolet Club (ECC), PassionFord (PF) or Escort Evolution (EE) put your user name in the comments box together with the site initials and I will get hold of you through those sites.

How much more incentive do you guys need to donate £2?

Yesterday (Tuesday) we crept over the £500 donation marker.

Moving on a little, we had a worryingly low response to my plea for Floppy Throttle emails.  I had 1 which can't be shown without me upgrading this to reflect adult content, and a couple of good submissions from Doug S.  I'll give it a couple of weeks longer then post what I have received. 

With a bit of luck, I will get an email from Ed in a little bit to let me know the bulk of the new vinyl is done and I can go for a bit of a drive down to meet up with him.

The sound cabinet is coming along nicely and I reckon that another couple of days graft and I should be finished and ready to pass it over to MRB Carpentry to do the sexy little touches.

Due to my iPhone being a little bit poo, I am struggling to upload pictures, but once I get that sorted, then normal visual aids will be restored.

There is a lack of flow in todays update, but I think that it is due to new baby causing lack of quality sleep.  I'll be back on the ball next week.

DRAFT NOTES

Well, this should end up being the third update of the week.  Hopefully I will post this one up on Tuesday and not before, but who knows.


Let's get straight to it.

The gutter sealant seems to be working it's magic as so far we have no further moisture entering the car.  This makes me happy as little creature comforts like carpet can be put back in.  Once the carpet goes in, then the bit that used to house the back seats can be turned into speaker housing and the boot can go back to being a boot.

I have now got the waterproof bags turned up so thats something to be chuffed about as important things wont go soggy if it rains whilst we are topless, and I had a surprise this morning from the postie. 

I approached a few different energy drink sponsors by email and post and figured it would be another set of knock backs.  But no.  In amongst marketing junk about internet banking and other pointless stuff, came a package.  This package contained some artwork.  And some freebies.  Woohoo.  I'm just in the process of trying to persuade them that they want to part with hard cash for charity as well.   Lets keep our fingers crossed.

In terms of sponsorship graphics, Ed has come up trumps and mailed me this evening (Friday) to say he is 90% done.  A couple of issues which hopefully can be solved easily and with a bit of luck, by the time you read this, there will be some more graphics on the car including some official scumrun ones.

Today I have removed some of the old ones that were "place holders" in readiness and the boot is looking pretty naked and the generic name stack running down from the door mirrors have gone.  They're not going to be naked for long though as their places have already been taken.  We are running low on space available, so NOW is the time if you want a logo or name on the car.  Mail me the details and we can fit you in hopefully.

The Relentless logo's have gone from the wing mirrors.  I have mixed feelings about that.  I know it is a faceless company and it has a cool logo and advertises loads, but I figured they might want to help out.  We're not a huge event and I know they will have a dedicated budget for sponsorship / advertising. 

However, I also know that they sponsored a local guy to ride his BMX and give him various freebies and incentives and that irks me a little.  They pay someone to ride a pushbike, but they won't help out on a charity rally with 100% of the donations going to terminally ill kids.  I'm afraid I'm going to have a soapbox moment here and if you don't like it then tough.

The Relentless beverage is manufactured and marketed by the Coca-cola brand of companies.  The Coca-cola group is, as you will be aware, a multi-national, multi-billion pound company.  I do realise that they must get thousands of sponsorship requests and charitable giving requests weekly and I know we are not that special in their eyes and that they can't respond positively to all applicants. 

But, we are offering something that pushbike dude doesnt.  We are non-profit so everything will go to the charity.  We are also offering brand placement in a rally that spans many countries, is followed on Sky TV, has numerous magazine articles and features based on it, a subsequent mass DVD release on sale at outlets such as HMV, and to be honest, we rock.  Would it have been so hard for them to throw a case of fizzy wizzy at us, a couple of T-shirts maybe or even just throw £10 in the kitty?  No. 

And for that, I have the hump.  What gives me the hump the most is the gloating I am gettting from Gruff.  Bugger the charity aspect, sod the advertising bumpf, what I really wanted them to sponsor us for is because it would irritate the hell out of Gruff having to drive a car branded by them.  In summary, any other company turning us down I could live with happily, and the amount I have spent on their stuff in the last few months more than covers any donation they may have given.  Sorry guys, I'm switching brands.  Lets see if I can get a deal going with these new potentials, they may end up with me in their camp.

Right, that's moan over with about the cock-a-cola group.  For now.

Removing the vinyl graphics proved to be easier than I was dreading, as just needed a hair dryer and thumb nails.  Not a scratch on the paint and they came off a doddle.  I'm really rather looking forward to the new ad set going on.  We are trying to keep the layout as close to the 1994 Lakes Rally car as possible, just with updated sponsors.  Only a few days (hopefully Monday, but more likely Tuesday) until we start looking battle ready.

I haven't had a chance yet to look at the window but should be a quick job.  Means that the door card has to come off.  Without referring to anything, I can tell you...  2 screws in door jam, 2 screws where door meets bodywork otherside, 3 screws at the base, pop door pull and there's 3 screws in there, 1 in the door pocket, then undo the retaining screw in the actual handle, slide cover over and off and lift the door card up.  I have had those door cards off so many times now it is unbelieveable.  I am however very grateful that it is electric windows as retaining clips on a manual winder are a git.

I've had a couple of people ask about Ian and the Jag and as far as I aware, he's taken a day off to crowbar and hammer it back into roughly the right shape, then get the tracks sorted and see how it goes.  I'll update here but otherwise, can I suggest opting for an Escort Cabbie mate?  loads going cheap this time of year but leave it much longer and the prices start to soar.

What else have I got to share and delight you with?  Well, the stickers that FEOC-UK sent look pretty snazzy.  I've placed one under the tax disc / cabby club on the windscreen, one center at the bottom of the rear window, and one either side of the cabby club gel badges beneath the rear light clusters.  Looking nice I reckon.

Oh, and the new "Ford" badge turned up.  I say Ford badge, I mean FloppyThrottle badge in a Ford font the same size as our original  front Ford badge was.  I took the original one off and applied this one and something unusual happened.  Nothing sinister or freaky  like the car turned into a dragon and started to hump my leg, but close.  Generally I either like something or I don't. Simples.  I neither love this or loathe it.  I can't say it's not what I was expecting because it is precisely as it was designed (by me).  I can't moan at the quality as it is just right.  The texture and dome feel right and the size is perfect.  But strangely I feel it isn't quite....  I don't know.  It looks as I imagined it to, and it's not wrong, I'm just not sure if I like it or not...

I mailed the image to Gruff and asked for his thoughts and he is pretty much the same as me - unsure.  I think it will grow on me.  Anyway, if you like it, and want one for your car, let me know.  Background colour can be changed, images added, Font altered, text colour and wording changed (maybe you want a FEOC-UK?), pretty much anything is possible.

It's now Saturday night and I've been flicking through various forums.  I do this occasionally to find out other peoples views on the world - it gets my warped mind wandering.  But nothing warped to let you lot in on.  What I have come across that may or may not be of interest are 2 seperate things.  Firstly, Ian - he of the stacked Jag - has managed a feat that only Lazarus is purported to have achieved before.  Yes, the Jag has risen from the dead.  A few bits bent to roughly the right shape, couple of new tyres and the rear of the car is soon to be held together with gripfill.  I swear 90% of the cars in this rally seem to be based on filler of some description.

Other thing I stumbled upon was a thread on FEOC-UK regarding car cleaning.  Generally I have a hunt in a bag that I keep in the shed and find a bottle or two of gunky shampoo and slap that on the car, and after 5 minutes I admire my handiwork thinking it looks like it just left a dealership.  Turns out, the slightly streaky semi clean look isn't actually clean.  I have been stunned by "matman" and his ability to clean a car so I am on a mission.

For a full clean it seems that a lot more than 10 minutes total is needed, so here's the theory for a clean car:

You need to wash your car with shampoo as normal.
Then get a lump of special clay.
Spray the clay with clay spray.
Spray the paint with clay spray.
Rub clay on spray.
Rub clay on spray in the other direction.
Wipe off leftover spray.
Apply a pre-wax goo to remove imperfections and swirl marks
Wipe off excess goo
Now it needs a good polish.
Polish it.
Buff off excess polish.
Apply a decent wax and leave it for 20 minutes to allow withcraft and chemicals to do their thing.
Buff off excess wax
Nearly there.
Time for a ciggy and a coffee
After a minimum hour,
Apply a little wet look wax
Buff off wetlook wax
Admire car.

That's going to take me some serious hours as I intend to do the whole lot by hand as I don't want to be buggering the decals and logo's, but I do want the car to look as good as possible.  Once I've done the scummer, I'll do Diego, then Julian.

Here are 2 images of what gets achieved after a few well spent hours courtesy of "matman" (6 hours of polishing)

 ...and Neston Vasey (after 2 Fridays of grafting, this is what happened when it rained on the car):

Lets see if we can get some life back into the scumrunner.

As we have been having some semi-decent weather for a couple of days I have made a start on the sound build.  Finally.  I know I put it off like a fatty puts off a diet but the time has come to stop the sub from sliding around in the car every time I enjoy a corner.  The thought of re-laying a carpet in the car isn't appealing right at this time for 2 reasons (well 3 if you count lack of enthusiasm);  I'm enjoying the sparse look, and when I do lay it I want it to be able to flow nicely with the fleece I am intending to cover the enclosure in.

 So I have drafted up how I intend it to look and made quite good headway for me. 

After a swift measure up I figured that although the enclosure will be off center I have got the actual woofer central in the car. I've attached some sturdy timber to both the sub and the car using some fairly heavy duty corner brackets to build a base and having had a look through the shed I found an unused wardrobe door in there to use as the base of the storage area.  I know there is an obvious question right there and I truly would love to share with you why I keep donor parts for furniture but too long and painful a tale.  Maybe another time when there's less going on I will share that with you.

Anyway, the base is now sturdy, I just need to throw up some outer frame work then the master carpentry comes into play to finish off the fitment before the fleece gets stuck on.  I am not a master carpenter by a long shot, indeed my efforts are generally tragic at the best of times but I like to use whats to hand.  I have a rather fetching coffee table made out of leftover decking and ballustrade to prove this point.

Before I go any further, I would really like to take this moment to remind ALL of you that read this, we are doing everything here for charity.  All parts, mods, improvements, (now) printing costs and time come from us as every pound you donate goes straight to the worthwhile Dreams Come True charity.  I have fitted a donate now link to the top and bottom of this blog and if you are struggling to donate £2 due to not finding the button, there is a link right here: www.justgiving.com/floppythrottle For those of you that have donated, regardless of amount , I thank you.  Gruff thanks you.  A very large amount of terminally ill children thank you as whatever you did, just made their lives better.

If you have been following the blog from the start and haven't yet donated even after reading all my words and seeing all my tantrums and victories, and have no intention of donating (not through hardship, or personal reasons, you're just tight) then I think you're a tosser.  Gruff thinks you're a tosser.  And a very large amount of terminally ill kids wish they were healthy enough to see adulthood, bang on your door and call you a tosser themselves.  But they can't.  A small £2 donation via the just giving page will turn you into a provider of smiles for these kids.  For less than the cost of 10 fags, they can have a little happiness shine on them.  Where else can you achieve non-tosser status for the price of 2 lottery tickets?  Please.  We have so many people following the blog yet so few donations. 

This is the serious bit and they don't come up that often so pay attention.  If you had a relative or friend, maybe a neighbour that was terminally ill, wouldn't you give them a couple of quid to help the quality of their life?  Well, thats just it.  The charity is based in Midhurst which I know a lot of you are near, but help kids out nationwide.  Do you know all of the residents in your area?  It's not impossible that the donations we are raising may be helping a child near you.  Please cough up.


Right, thats my serious moment out of the way for a few weeks I reckon, so time to get silly.

It's not often that I ask much of any of you, but I know a lot of you that read this are spread across the globe, and that got me thinking.  Me thinking is never a wonderful idea and when I start on the global way of thinking it's probably going to go downhill.  But here goes.  I'm curious how many of you will humour me in this request.  Not a lot is my guess, but let's find out.  I want emails.  I want you to email me at floppythrottle@live.co.uk  the words "Floppy Throttle". 

Not too much to ask is it?  well, that's only half of it.  The words Floppy Throttle can be written in the sand on a nice beach, etched into the back of someones head, tattoo'd on your being, on a piece of card held with a landmark in the background, made of parking tickets on your car, created from your ability with photoshop / corel / windows paint, however you want it to be.  I just want some of you lot to contribute to the blog.  Obviously if you stumble across a model with floppythrottle written on her body, that'd be groovy too.  I'm really just interested in a) how many of you will actively do this and b) how weird you guys are.

I promise whole-heatedly that any sent to me will be shown on here (subject to potential legal comebacks), and whoever sends in the best three can have their names on the car so they can travel through Europe with us.

Whoops...

Even people as perfect as myself make errors from time to time and I just made one.

You will see the title for the last update is "draft notes" or something similar.  Well, thats because every update is called Draft notes until it goes live.  I clicked the wrong button and now next Tuesdays update is alive.  Just means that I need to update twice (well three times if you count this one) this week.

The publish blog button is right next to the save button, and as the postman has turned up, I saved the blog.  Except I didn't.  I published it.

For those interested in what the postman brought, well I'll tell you.  I got some lego (which means the sorry we missed you card isn't lego), I got a batch of junk mail, the FEOC-UK stickers have turned up and so has my new Ford badge.

Once I get the badge and FEOC's on, I'll upload the images onto here, but that can wait til Tuesday.

So this mini update is: whoops, didn't mean to publish the last one, FEOC & Badge have turned up, and I have no idea what is waiting for me when I go to the Post office to collect whatever is there.


Savage.

DRAFT Notes

Well, we have finished our mini poll and it seems that the animated Lara Croft beats the rest hands down.  The discussion started when the wife argued that Betty Boop was far more attractive than Jessica Rabbit.  Obviously she is in the wrong, I just needed some impartials to prove the point.  Quite a lot of apathy going on as only a few of you voted, but if we take a swift look at figures, the Lara Croft doubled the votes of J.Rabbit, with Betty Boop a near 3rd.  I am very surprised that the caramel bunny didn't get even a single vote.

Onto more important things now, the car.  It's Tuesday and I've just come back from a test thrash.  All seems ok with the exception of the drivers window now.  I haven't had a chance yet to look at it , but pretty sure one of the runners has snapped as the window goes down fine, but going up, only the front edge of it is happy to raise.  I will try and have a look at it tomorrow.

Providing Mrs Savage doesn't give birth.  I'm expecting the pitter patter of feet any time now.  If she drops a calf in the next couple of days then that causes a couple of problems in terms of spending hours tweaking the car, but sure I can fit in a little tweakage.

During todays drive I did notice that the exhaust note may get just a tad on my tits along lengthy stretches of motorway.  Until now, I haven't done a dual carriageway run further than 5 miles or so before going to play on the A & B's.  Today I only covered 15 miles ish in a straight line up the A3 (Portsmouth - Petersfield) but the tone of the exhaust at  (*ahem*) 70, makes you partially deaf when you exit the car.  You have to pop your ears to regain your senses.  This wasn't helped by moving the sub from the enclosed boot to inside the car.  I did have the amp set up so that midrange power came through to the 6x9's and rears without being drowned out by the bass.  However, now the sub is where rear seats should be, there is a definate fight between bass and melody that melody just cannot win.  Time to change settings.  With the exhaust and stereo fighting it out, it is just too much.  I need to get something sorted swiftly to take it back to pleasant.

Just in case I can't figure out another option, I've just bought a set of ear plugs, that should muffle the exhaust to manageable levels but allow speech etc to travel through to my hearing fine.

Dont get me wrong though, the twisty roads are still awesome fun, especially with that exhaust going up and down through the ranges, I just need to set the ICE to cover the exhaust note on fast dull patches.

A completely seperate note, I am quite a patient chap, but I'm struggling with the time being taken on producing the vinyl graphics.  The work we are getting from HSP is perfect in quality but taking far too long to produce each logo, so we are out-sourcing.   Before anyone takes this as a moan or a mark against HSP, the work they have carried out is superb and we are eternally gratefull, but as they haven't charged us a single penny, not one, I feel bad giving them a weekly chase for a freebie. If we were paying market rate then I have no doubt the work would be turned around in a few days.  HSP are wonderful people, but we need to crack on now, time is no longer a luxury we possess.

 I have mailed at least a dozen or so companies and no-one actually seems that keen to do any work.  Gits. 

You might remember Vinyl4U being mentioned last time as good quality and incredibly fast, so I mailed Kate with the images for the last 21 graphics needed, and asked her for her best price.  She came back to me with £60 including delivery and reckons it will take her just a couple of days from receiving the go-ahead to us receiving the graphics, so thats cool.  At the same time, I mailed Ed @ scumrun  HQ and asked if he might know some local, quick friendly printers.  He got back to me today to say he's away but back Wednesday, forward him the details and he will have a look and see what he can organise.  Cheers Ed.

I can't remember if I mentioned I have ordered a new cover for my phone, but I did.  I have managed to find a company that will print any image onto a cover for your phone.  It's a hard protective case and it turned up today.  I opted to have a photo put on and to be honest, it looks stunning.  Better than I could have anticipated.  If you are looking to get hold of a snazzy new cover for your iPhone 3, 3GS or 4, then give me a shout.  Currently looking at £30 plus postage but for that you can have any photo you choose (subject to the usual copyright blah blah blah) put onto a superb hard case.  If I can generate enough interest I might be able to blag a bulk discount, so email me if you're tempted.  Here's mine:

Maybe a photo of the wife and kids, or a car, or your pets, or that stag weekend stripper you took back to your hotel and ruined for all other men.  Any photo you want can be put on there together with words, web addresses etc...  If you are a member of a forum and have a "sig" then thats do-able, or if you have a few photos you want as a collage, let me know and I'll see what can be crafted.  I know this appears to be quite a chunk on the phone cover, but I really am gobsmacked at how god-damn good this has turned out to be.  I know you can pick up snazzy covers for £5 or less from the market, but they're common - go bespoke.  mail me if your interested and I'll see if we can arrange a better bulk price.  floppythrottle@live.co.uk

I have a few other examples of what they can do and these are as follows:

Having been to B&Q, I hopefully have a cheap but workable solution to the rear window leak.  I have delicately resealed the rear window with a flexible drain silicone sealer.  This is designed for fixing exterior gutters and drainpipes but it's the only sealant I could find for exterior use and in black.  So, I have done my nest to produce an evenish finish using a cartridge gun and the back of a teaspoon. Who needs expensive tools eh?

In terms of advertising, and raising awareness of the plight of the Floppy Throttle I have been in contact with the local news teams today and got a sniff of interest from the Portsmouth News.  By a sniff of interest, I got an email from them saying they've had a look at all the details and passed them to the reporter who deals with our area.  Maybe, just maybe, we can get some pics into print.  This is where I hope that the graphics for our lovely lovely sponsors turn up before the photographer does.  That's providing their local wordsmith gets in touch to arrange something.  Also waiting for some replies from varying other publications that I sent out today and hopefully get some coverage there too.

In other aspects, Relentless (remember that effort) have yet to reply, I'm still awaiting the FEOC stickers although the guy who posted them emailed me after reading the last blog quite surprised they arent here yet, my shiny new Ford badge has been dispatched and I got a sorry we missed you card today from royal mail (but thats for some lego I ordered - probably best not to ask).

I see from the FEOC-UK site that Varnie has been following the blog, so quick name check and a public nag - Hello mate, finish your alloys :)

It's now Thursday morning and I had a bit of an email exchange with Ed last night.  He is a little busy (un-surprisingly) but will try and squeeze in our graphics run in between fixing his gearbox and printing 300 or so tshirts, hats etc... and before he goes off on his holiday in a weeks time.  After a bit he mailed me to say he had a look at the vinyl he had received for whatever project he is currently on and they had sent him the wrong stuff.  Down side - Ed can't do what he wanted.  Up-side - He now has an unexpected clear day so he will try to get our sponsors sticky stickies sorted asap.  Woohoo.  Came in at £50 for what we are after and he can tweak a couple of bits that the others were struggling so happy happy.  As it happens, his workshop type thingy is less than half an hour from me, so when the graphics are done, I think I'll go introduce myself and collect them.

Thought of yet another expense last night...  Waterproof bags.  We are aiming for roof off for the whiole rally, but things tend to get wet if it rains.  So I have just grabbed a couple of waterproofed  "record bag" type things to keep all our important bits (passport, licences, tickets, insurances etc) dry.


It is 11.15 on Thursday morning.  I have checked my emails and I am a very disappointed young man.  The reason for this is simple.  Relentless have emailed me and effectively told me that they want no part of this shenanigans and they will not assist in any way shape or form.  My heart is a little heavy as a) I like Relentless and b) Means Gruff can go Mardi Gras happy as Iit means the cool logos on the mirrors have got to go.  Bah humbuggery.

Does your company want to advertise on the mirrors?  Well does it? 

Also in my email inbox was a lovely message from somebody named Sarah Cowdrey.  That name will probably mean nothing to you lot, as it meant nothing to me.  However, Sarah is Community Publisher for Havant people.  She is aware of what we are up to and would like to write a story.  I know it's not front cover of Hello magazine, but it feels pretty damn good to get some interest.