The test run was intended to give us an idea of what the full run would be like, without leaving us stranded in the middle of some random European country without the things we need. I think this was a reasonable success, and did highlight a few shortcomings, but lets look at the good side first.
The packing stage was relatively straight forward. We loaded the cars up with pretty much everything we would need for 5 days in euro land to get an idea for how packed the cars would be.. the answer... reasonably.
The Cougar of our co-team Axels-of-evil has a cavernous boot; however it was filled half full before even starting with 4 MR2 wheels that Mike J was taking to an ebay seller up north (who turned out to be none other than Team Gavlars brother!) on the way back from the test run. Ignoring that, they would easily have had enough room for a pile more stuff without too much issue.
The GTO in comparison was a bit more snug. Not rammed to the gills (we could still see out the back) but pretty well stocked. We will need to take a bit of time refining what we actually need to take, and maybe drop a few things we don't really need, just to make things a bit more straight forward.
The seating position for the GTO was, surprisingly "ok" for the long run. I think it could still do with an extra inch of legroom, but if we can't manage that by moving the seats back, then I think we can cope.
So that's the positive aspects, now for the problems we encountered.
First off... Stuff we forgot. We need to make sure we do a list of stuff to take and make sure its double checked before we roll on the Wednesday (ideally well before then). We neglected to take pillows, towel, snacks for the road, camera tripod, and probably a few more things. We will try and get all this ready for "load-out test weekend".
The passenger seat position is ok, but legroom etc mean that some times knees contact the dashboard a bit too closely, and feet get stuck underneath. For a 5 day trip... I think we need to at least look at this, see if we can do something about opening it up a bit.
One of the biggest annoyances was storage. The car has quite a few storage locations, but none of them are convenient. We regularly required somewhere to stash things like the CB mic, camera, wallet, drinks, pens, etc... so I think we may be fabricating a storage bin array to bolt on to the dash.
Power was also a small issue. Currently the +12v power for the CB is pulled from a truly shocking "earth" cable installation. We will pull a decent 8awg cable direct from the battery and run a few fused feeds from that for things like sat nav, phone chargers, laptop, cameras etc.
Physically, the car ran OK, but we did spot some areas for concern. At motorway speeds there is a noticeable whine and vibration. This doesn't appear to be wheel / tyre related as dropping the clutch eliminates it, so it must be something nearer the engine.
A brief chat with the guys at MitsiArt suggests it could be a bearing on its way out, which would require an expensive rebuild of the gearbox, transfer box, or diff.... not ideal. Hopefully its functional enough to last another 3+k miles.
Lastly oil levels and pressure. Originally, when we got the car, the oil pressure was a little low. After the service, this returned to a sensible level, only to drop back off quite quickly. Looking online, it appears that the GTO pressure gauge is less than reliable, so the actual reading isn't something that is worrying me, however combined with an apparent lack of oil in the engine (as seen on the dipstick) there is cause for some concern. It may be this is directly related to the vibrations, in which case taking a load of oil with us may be the solution. The car has been dropped off at Mitsi again for another look over (as well as a few little bits we found), so we shall see what they say.
Phew... Big update... stay tuned for more shenanigans.
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