After four years with Devon 4×4 as I.T. & Marketing manager, Tim Burt has decided it is time to move on to pastures new.
Due to the distances he has to travel each day, Tim was losing valuable time with his young family and felt it was time for a career change.
With every cloud comes a silver lining, and ours is that Tim is returning to full-time web design with a local company so hopefully he will continue to maintain the fabulous Devon 4×4 website in his new capacity. Additionally, there is a strong chance that he will continue to fly the Devon 4×4 flag competing with Jake in the red D4×4 90 at events throughout next year.
Liz and I would like to thank Tim for all his hard work and effort he has put in to Devon 4×4 over the last four years and would like to wish him all the best for the future.
Simon Buck
We finally managed to chop together a bit of in-car footage from the De-Cider. This was from one of the simple stages on Saturday. The object here is to get the two punches in the section, staying inside the taped-off area. There was a 15 minute DNF on this stage, but the completion time was not counted in the results, so there was no real rush to finish.
The sound quality is a bit variable, so our apologies…. and the normal disclaimers apply with regards to swearing, etc. !
Enjoy
http://www.devon4x4.com/public/Decider_In-Car1.flv
I didn’t think it would be possible, but the 2009 De-cider trophy really was better than before !
A superb site set the scene, and as we drove in to the camping field, the whole event already had the feel of a top-level international fixture. The hardware on display was equally impressive, with entries from all over the UK, Germany and the Netherlands.
Continue reading '2009 De-Cider – Saturday'»
Long-term readers of the Devon 4×4 newsletter and the off-road-team blog might remember that getting the 90 to the 2008 De-Cider was very much a last minute affair, with work still being done to the truck the night before.
Well, true to form, the 2009 event seems to be bringing with it chaos and calamity !
We knew we had to get the 90 through an MOT, but we weren’t too worried about it. It was generally up together and at the tail end of last week, Andrew (from the Devon 4×4 workshop) gave it a once-over and tightened up a few things.
Monday evening after work, Jake and I thought we would do a bit of prep work, check the winch, ropes, etc. no problem…. or so we thought !
Continue reading 'Decider Trophy here we come'»
It occurred to me the other day that I hadn’t posted anything on the blog about our open weekend. There will be a full report in the next Devon 4×4 newsletter, but I wanted to get a few words here as well.
We were a bit hesistant as the final preparations were made, we really had no idea what people would be expecting when they arrived. Obviously we wanted people to have a pleasant weekend and have something to see, but we didn’t want to try and be a full-on trade show.
From visitor feedback, it seems like we got it about right. We had a great mix of vehicles on display, some incredibly rare and some quite cool, along with a number of product displays from our key suppliers.
Matt, our resident chef, put on a hog roast on both days to keep people fed and the whole event had a great ‘feel’. Very relaxed and enjoyable.
We have to thank a few people for lending us vehicles, displays, etc. (sorry if I miss anyone !)..
- ARB
- Warn
- Arbil
- Lightforce UK
- All Wheel Drive Club
- Challenge South West (for all their help with the off road course and set-up)
- Veterans International Aid
- Duckworth Land Rover
- Allisport
- Rally Raid UK
- Land Rover Experience
A full gallery of photos can be found in the Devon 4×4 gallery. We hope to see you at the next one !
Well… we managed to get ourselves to round 5, leaving bright and early on the morning of the event after spending most of Saturday prepping the 90.
We had our shiny new tubular wings on the car for this event, and they proved to be *much* tougher than the metal they replaced. We took a few hefty hits on rocks and trees and didn’t even scratch the paintwork.
The 90 with its new wings
As far as the event went… it was pretty much another disastrous day. For some reason we just weren’t hooked up. We didn’t do anything specifically wrong, we didn’t make any massive tactical errors… we simply weren’t good enough on the day. It was a very frustrating event.
Continue reading 'Round 5 – there we were…'»
It only seems like last week that we were battling on the side of the hill at Clyro court, but a lot of time and a round of the Howlin’ Wolf has passed since then.
When we finished Round 3, it felt like we had an age until the next event, we knew we were going to miss round 4 due to attendance at the Land Rover World show and as such we reckoned on plenty of tinkering time on the 90.
Unfortunately, organising and attending three (count them !) Land Rover shows as well as our upcoming open weekend put pay to our best plans, and the huge “list of stuff to do on the 90″ sadly remains huge.
With a small number of days available, Jake and I set about the key jobs that needed to be done. Some basic maintenance like adjusting up the handbrake, tightening up a track rod, etc.
The main task we wanted to complete was sorting out the front wings. The roll and a few contacts with trees at the last event had left them beyond even our panel-straightening skills, so we bit the bullet and made a start on fitting a set of tubular front wings.
We’ll get some more detailed pictures of the conversion online in the next couple of weeks, but we still have a lot of building to get sorted out before the event on Sunday.
More updates will follow soon, along with some news from the event itself.
We were hunting around the archives recently and came across this little bit of in-car footage from the OBC Morocco 2007. Enjoy !
http://www.devon4x4.com/public/OBC_Incar_0002.flv
With the 2009 Decider Trophy well into the planning stage, someone sent this little photo montage from the 2008 event…
We’re looking forward to the 09 event… it should be a cracking one !
After the first rounds of Howling Wolf and the other events that Tim & I have done the front wings of the 90 have took a beating, been reshaped and then beaten again.
So we decieded to strip the front end down for repairs.
Our new sales team member Chris came to help too. Being a Land Crusier enthusiast he jumped at the chance to strip a Land Rover
Tim had a great idea to make a tip forward wing set
With that idea canned we stripped the front completly
The car is now stripped and ready for repairs
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