Jan Woien and Jan Erik Hansen’s Alvis had a great rally, eventually finishing 2nd in class and 17th overall after 22 days of hard driving from Halifax, Nova Scotia to San Francisco, California. We look forward to seeing the car back in the workshops for a good clean up and some servicing / repairs before they head off on their next adventure.
Here’s the last email update from Jan, sent to us at the end of the rally:
“The car is delivered for shipment back to Europe, and we are home again.
The rally was quite an experience. 6000 miles in three weeks. It’s a huge country, most of it unpopulated. As you can see from the results, we ended as 2nd in class. But considering the 55 seconds we dropped due to rhs front wing coming loose on a regularity, the result is not bad at all.
We changed oil twice, had it greased once (could have done more…), changed sparkplugs once. Apart from the carburation, the engine ran perfectly throughout the rally (but with a noticeable and expected loss of power in higher altitudes). The new tonneau arrangement was a great success, can be improved further with more functional fasteners to the car. No electrical wiring problems after you tidied up the wiring at the rear. But we had to replace the battery – it gave up in the heat in Nevada, and would not recharge. Caused some anxiety and problems to get hold of a replacement, but we made it in good time before we were due to start in the morning.
The issues with the front wing have already been reported. Seems like the weight of the mudflaps was too much…
I’ll send you the usual summary of issues to be looked at later. We managed to clean the car before the last two rally days. So although not perfect, at least it’s better than it was after Argentina 😉
Thank you for excellent preparation work. It is not obvious that a 1935 Alvis runs without major problems through 6000 miles in three weeks. It goes to show that if we together work on and agree on the necessary preparations and we don’t trash it too badly, there is no stopping us. For sure this is something of interest for your other customers too 😉
Like I said earlier – “Probably the most reliable Alvis in the world”
Thanks to you, Merv and all the rest at Earley Engineering!”