The Brumbyrunner Project

Willie · Post by **Willie** » Mon Mar 10, 2008 8:47 pm

Brumbyrunner, this is truly a weapon! I have been following your progress for some time now and it never ceases to impress me how great a job you have done with this beast and your commitment to your original plan - well done.

I wish you all the best when you get to race it - I'll be rooting for you.

BrennyV · Post by **BrennyV** » Tue Mar 11, 2008 10:06 am

looks great! those rims are a dead ringer of my old sparco sp2's on my old wrx

Clearwater99 · Post by **Clearwater99** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 1:03 pm

may post a suggestion for the car

put another spare tyre on it .. Deserts like to eat tyre's ..

I have been living in one for the last 3 years .. one spare in the desert .. just don't cut it ..

just my worthless 2 cents ..

brumbyrunner · Post by **brumbyrunner** » Thu Mar 13, 2008 12:50 am

Clearwater99 wrote:may post a suggestion for the car
put another spare tyre on it .. Deserts like to eat tyre's ..
I have been living in one for the last 3 years .. one spare in the desert .. just don't cut it ..
just my worthless 2 cents ..

Yeah, I know what you're saying and it is good advice.
I carried 2 spares in my old RX and out of the 4 Finkes I entered, I never got a single flat. It's something that's on my mind though and can easily be remedied.

Thalass wrote:Wow... awesome.
So when was that race in WA?

What?
You mean Hyden? It's at Easter time.
But I'm not going to it.

Willie wrote:Brumbyrunner, this is truly a weapon! I have been following your progress for some time now and it never ceases to impress me how great a job you have done with this beast and your commitment to your original plan - well done.
I wish you all the best when you get to race it - I'll be rooting for you.

Thanks Willie, the level of commitment has its ups and downs. If I had a 9 to 5 job, 5 days a week I might be able to speed up the development work.

I have been following your progress too and see you have left our great state.

It must have been hard to part with your L. Not many around as clean as that one. I had a long hard think about buying it myself.

D3V1L · Post by **D3V1L** » Thu Mar 13, 2008 1:46 pm

got any videos of the beast ??? would lourve to see it on the move doing some work:D

dave

Thalass · Post by **Thalass** » Thu Mar 13, 2008 3:02 pm

brumbyrunner wrote: What?
You mean Hyden? It's at Easter time.
But I'm not going to it.

Aw, oh well. Next year, then. You'll have the whole of the WA group there cheering for you!

YouTube · Post by **El_Freddo** » Thu Mar 13, 2008 5:16 pm

Thalass wrote:You'll have the whole of the WA group there cheering for you!

Plus the rest of us in any race you enter mate!

Bennie

brumbyrunner · Post by **brumbyrunner** » Thu Mar 13, 2008 5:24 pm

D3V1L wrote:got any videos of the beast ??? would lourve to see it on the move doing some work:D
Isn't there a couple of video links on this thread?
dave

I was hoping to have some incar footage but got ripped off by an incar camera supplier selling rubbish gear and and haven't got around to sourcing new stuff yet.

Thalass wrote:Aw, oh well. Next year, then. You'll have the whole of the WA group there cheering for you!

I'd love to go to hyden. By all accounts it is a great event and would really suit the Brumby. We'll see how this year pans out and might try to get there next year. Need to budget 5 grand for the trip.

Clearwater99 · Post by **Clearwater99** » Thu Mar 13, 2008 7:20 pm

hope for the best ... prepare for the worst

Willie · Post by **Willie** » Thu Mar 13, 2008 7:56 pm

brumbyrunner wrote: Thanks Willie, the level of commitment has its ups and downs. If I had a 9 to 5 job, 5 days a week I might be able to speed up the development work.

I have been following your progress too and see you have left our great state.

It must have been hard to part with your L. Not many around as clean as that one. I had a long hard think about buying it myself.

Yes, we have left the Territory. We miss it quite a bit, however all our family are on the eastern seaboard and it will be good for the kids to get to know their grandparents, aunties, uncles and cousins.

We got to see quite a lot whilst posted up there - the Pajero saw plenty of off road work getting us to some pretty special places. And the XT Forester and XR8 got to stretch their legs a few times on the unrestricted roads (before the limits came in, of course).

That posting was originally for 12 months - four years later we get to leave! Got to love those promises the army keeps spinning to us!

Selling the RX Wagon was a hard but necessary decision. By the time it was sold, she was running really well (thanks to Steve at Rising Sun in Adelaide) and most of the problems ironed out. I had wanted an RX converted wagon ever since I sold an RX in 1997, and thought it was time to get one. That one had all the bells and whistles and had alot of money poured into it by it's previous owner. However, with a new house purchase, the posting down south (they would only pay to move one car plus the one we drove out) and ever increasing work commitments, it turned out NOT to be the right time to buy it. We live and learn, I suppose. (and pay for the privelage)

I have plans to get "something else" in the future. Leaning towards a lifted Liberty / Outback next time - need the extra space and have seen some great examples on here to whet my appetite. The XR8 will need to be sold first and the "right" car will need to be at the "right" price.

Sorry to rabbit on a bit - and hijack your thread - back to the greatest Brumby on earth now ..................

Cheers,

brumbyrunner · Post by **brumbyrunner** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 8:52 pm

The gearboxes I am getting built are slowly coming together.
I found an Albins gearset with the ratios I wanted at a good price. Turns out 3rd needs replacing which sours the deal a little but can't complain with the price I paid. They are going into a Lib case with a Torsen front LSD, 20kg Viscous centre LSD and 4.44 diff. These gears are the lowest (numerically higher) that I have ever found and should still give me a theoretical top speed of 137MPH at 6500prm in 5th, horespower permitting.
The second 'box is from an STI RA which has the lowest factory gearset I have found. We are adding billet selector forks, 20kg centre, front Suretrac and 4.44 diff. I'm keeping this one as the spare. The gearing will end up a little higher and may suit faster courses.

vincentvega · Post by **vincentvega** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 8:58 pm

whoa thats some serious boxes! kickass

Outback bloke · Post by **Outback bloke** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 8:58 pm

So did the 1st and 2nd gears end up being Albins? Or did you have to get some new ones? Have you been given a delivery date for your boxes yet?

(How's Mrs Brumbyrunner going?)

brumbyrunner · Post by **brumbyrunner** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 12:10 am

BYB-01 wrote:So did the 1st and 2nd gears end up being Albins? Or did you have to get some new ones? Have you been given a delivery date for your boxes yet?

(How's Mrs Brumbyrunner going?)

At this stage "we" think they might be Albins due to them not being any factory ratio. Rob wants to send them down to have them IDed just to be sure. Due to that, it will take a few more weeks at least before I see it. The good news is that the spare 'box should be a ready to take home with me.

That 4.44 "box you gave me had a broken reverse and 1st was about to go too!

Mrs Brumbyrunner is still waiting.

maxxair · Post by **maxxair** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 1:25 am

B> this is an older shot of my front susp. with the screw thread strut. King?? springs. the helper shock is removed (the canister goes in the hose clamp).
you can just see the Rod end for the custom susp (sky blue) instead of radius rods she has a double rod end setup(silver), with pipe welded to a hacked off end of a control arm for the ball joint taper. UGLY stuff ATM, but a good idea i think. ill be changing to Orig for RWC then Customizing it back like it is, but with quality and att to detail. unlike her previous owner.

brumbyrunner · Post by **brumbyrunner** » Sat Apr 05, 2008 12:14 am

You know, that looks like a std MY strut leg with a thread turned into it. Does that sound likely? I was planning to do this myself at one stage but I don't have a lathe and you can buy the threaded section off the shelf and just slide it over the strut. I put my long travel MY struts on hold after making the move to Crossbred and the benefits of Liberty struts and modern brakes. My prototype 11" travel stuts are on the board here somewhere.

I can't see the need for a rod end on the lower wishbone. It only moves in a single plane and the original bush is cheaper and a lot more durable. On the other hand, you could get less binding at extremes of travel with a better designed joint where the radius rod mounts to the radius plate. I would like to replace that bush setup with a mount similar to the one on the crossmember. It would have to be very solid though, to be stronger than what is there now.
In stock form the radius rod is designed to fold up first, then the wishbone bends at the crossmember, where it's not plated. This prevents damage to the rest of the componants, and I've seen it happen a few times, but a new design would lose this capability and something else, like the chassis rail, would have to give.

On a more pressing mater, it would seem that my Albins gearset is not complete and we are faced with either abandoning the Albins stuff for now, using a genuine 1st/2nd or buying new 1st/2nd gears from Albins. The Albins gears are a couple of weeks away so may be too late....

My RA 'box has had it's fair share of dramas too with the syncros being an odd, hard to source size. I think we've got this sorted out now and the 'box should be all finished and ready to go next week. I'm going with billet selector-forks in this 'box as well so they won't be the weak link.

brumbyrunner · Post by **brumbyrunner** » Tue May 06, 2008 11:22 pm

Been a while since an update and I've been busy collecting parts.

The RA "spare" gearbox and one of my rear diffs are now rebuilt. I picked up my 15" forged alloys, 4-spot front brakes & 2-spot rears. Also got some of Crossbreds good suspension bushes and an L series rear swingarm to replace the torsion bar.
My front struts have been built. We had a problem with the strut design being too short for the amount of travel that I wanted so we had to lengthen the strut another 40mm to fit it in. I couldn't extend the driveshaft any more than I had already so decided to move the top of the strut tower up 40mm instead.
These struts are huge! 80mm body with 255mm travel.

Wilbur · Post by **Wilbur** » Wed May 07, 2008 9:47 am

Very very very nice mate. Dunno about you, but I'm getting real excited about this race. Dead keen to see this thing hammer around the prologue.

brumbyrunner · Post by **brumbyrunner** » Sat May 10, 2008 9:12 pm

Passenger side strut tower is all finished. I will try and do the drivers side tomorrow. Not looking forward to making the bonnet fit around all this steel.

Suby Wan Kenobi · Post by **Suby Wan Kenobi** » Sat May 10, 2008 9:27 pm

Well done Stuart looks like a nice job, cant wait to see it in Alice.