Day 1 was shortened and rerouted by some roadworks and traffic not unexpected on the way out of such a giant city. Now we have stayed in the totally rural area of Daihai, next to a lake in a modern hotel.

The day yesterday allowed us to get a final accuracy trim on the trip meter, now accurate to better than 1m. / Km. It also allowed us to get some useful fuel mileage calculations, 22.6 mpg – US gal, 26.9 mpg – Imp. gal or 9.51l/100Km. As with our lightness, probably the most fuel efficient car in the event.

We spent part of yesterday following an unfortunate Irishman that put three quarters of a tank of diesel into his 280 Mercedes, following him through some flat sections choking on his tailpipe, eventually passing him on the next modest incline. To the credit of the Merc, it limped about 60Km on its unvolatile cocktail and made it to the end-of-day check point, before the Irish crew went looking for a dump zone and some fresh fuel from the right hose.

Day 1 was also filled with long stretches of familiar looking landscapes. Tastes of the High Sierras, broadacre corn farming like Iowa and some beautifully constructed roads.

It was also punctuated with succinct reminders that western values do not prevail: poverty, absence of roads thru villages, a courtyard with a water handpump to the well and a Sat TV dish. And probably the saddest – a cart and donkey tug-o-war being conducted by two drunk elderly men flogging the donkeys with their whips as they struggled on cobblestones to best each other. This while traffic was blocked by an event in a town main intersection, and casually observed by a local policeman. Sad, but real and no doubt only the first of many less endearing sights we will encounter.

Status Report: Day 1. Poster: General BJMJ.

Just had an email through from Hayden at the start of the Peking to Paris event. It’s 8am out there (or it was when he started typing his message), and the rally has been delayed by an hour due to traffic on the local motorways. Everyone wants to see ‘those magnificent men in their rally machines!’

 

The weather is apparently very good. The photos show blue skies over the Great Wall, which the cars are parked in the shadow of. Note the tower and wall climbing up the mountain to the left: beautiful.

Apparently (bit garbled this bit), HB reckons Lola is both the lowest car and probably the lightest also. In the Guv’nor’s own words: “Even the largest cars have so much gear you can’t see out the back window. By comparison we have very little. On-road weight is a tad under 2500lbs with full tanks.” Good work Hayden!

The navigator’s list of jobs to do today looks like this: get rolling, shake off the Team Lola nerves and settle driver into a rhythm. In that order! I’ll add: don’t crash and don’t get lost.

Pretty cool getting live updates! Technology and massive overseas data bundles are a wonderful thing.

If you were wondering – yes that was an authorized blogcrash by Blogjack Masterjohn – AKA – BJMJ(4 star) – known by the tax man as Mr John Glynn.

Hopefully we dont tax John too much by posting scraps of rubbish from remote areas of the 14,500km Peking to Paris route that offer some kind of data connection – yet leave all the comprehensible clean up to John.

Mr Glynn made the mistake of declaring his hope to be rewarded with a hat like mine. Well to up the stakes and keep BJMJ focussed – I am putting that hat up as bounty for the job well done. Assuming that vintage hat can be carried from Peking to Paris, it will be one of a kind.

The 1993 GIO Classic Rally was an event in Western Austrlia that I entered with my brother Brett in a great little BMW 2002. We prepared the BMW at Windrush in Australia, the first full car build by Windrush. That hat has survived ever since and although slightly moth eaten and grubby – is a prize from another era of classic car events. The car has survived remarkably well after a couple of owners too and is still competitive in Australia.

Fittingly the BMW was wearing Campy’s, not as wide as the 12″ fatty that BJMJ is sporting below, but none the less, rare magnesium wheels that me and my wheel freak buddies lust after (Harold – you’re blushing)

This hat will be packed in the 356 like a coin on an Apollo mission – let’s see if it’s next adventure is a massive one.

Okay, I admit ‘kid’ is stretching the bounds of credibility a bit; I’m the good side of 40 and wearing the grey proudly. What the heck, it’s not my blog, I can be who I want!

For anyone who doesn’t know me, my name is John Glynn. I’m a Porsche journalist based in the UK. I write for some very nice motoring magazines (Motor Trend Classic, 911 & Porsche World, Total 911 etc) and maintain the Classic Porsche Blog at www.johndglynn.com.

One of the joys of my currently blessed life is having email access to my friend Mr Hayden Burvill, for inventive sum ups of topical events in his entertaining Aussie vernacular. Some days, it’s all that keeps me going!

HB is about to depart the US, to take part in the last great global motor race: the Peking to Paris Rally. P2P is a marathon 37-day trek across the Mongolian wilderness. Hayden is going for gold in a Porsche 356 prepared by WEVO, with my fellow Bergmeister (and ultimate orange 911 enthusiast) Steven Harris behind the wheel.

In the absence of the resident blogmeister, I’ve been tasked with the online housekeeping, which I am only too happy to handle. One day, H may bestow a hat just like the one he is wearing above upon me but, until then, I’ll bask in the glory of tidying up his iPhone blog attempts from the other side of the world.

Stay tuned for regular updates and pics from the road. The plan is to follow the boys over the course of the next 5 weeks, whereupon Jamie (Lipman, chief photographer to the WEVO dynasty) and I will gatecrash the end-of-rally celebrations in Paris to get the full story, see how many pounds they lost and make sure we’re all still friends! I have high hopes.

Safe driving Hayden and Steven. Here’s to a truly great adventure!

The Race Case System is one of the many 915 upgrade products we have developed at WEVO. This system allows for otherwise scrap 915 transmission cases to be remediated and returned to service in better than new condition.

The most recent new 915 delivery from Porsche was in 1986, some 24 years ago! With the 915 used in such great high mileage road warriors as the 911SC and 3.2 Carrera, we see transmissions that have been used (and abused!) in a way that is well beyond the test conditions originally explored by the factory.

By Porsche enthusiasts globally, the 915 transmission (“nine-fifteen” in the USA or “nine, one, five” in English speaking nations) has become loved for it’s lightweight, simplicity, broad model year application by Porsche and suitability for track work. Having said that – there are several accepted weaknesses in the 915, here I will focus only on how the transmission casings themselves are re-worked by WEVO to revitalize them for an ongoing future.

I covered some amazingly dodgy efforts to cure this issue on an earlier blog post. Sad and ignorant work performed at the expense of an uninformed customer.

The core issue with 915 transmission cases is the location and fit of the shaft bearings. The 915 contains 6 primary shaft bearings, 4 roller bearings and 2 thrust bearing. The 4 roller bearings are press fit into their location – arranged with two bearings carrying each of the input (main) shaft and pinion shaft. The location dowels on the case joint faces in conjunction with the accurate location of the bores and perpendicularity of the case faces are key to these shaft bearings being arranged in parallel and co-axial. Mileage, heat, lubrication and abuse all lead to a loss of the intended bearing arrangement, then exacerbating the worn condition and further reducing the performance of the transmission – a degradation spiral.

SOME 915 HISTORY AND COMMENTARY;
As a generalization I can say that the Porsche 915 pressure castings are beautifully machined pieces with very high accuracy. This is a real testament to the manufacturing efforts of Porsche as a small volume manufacturer. To put his in context, in 1972 when the 915 was first introduced, Porsche delivered a combined total of 911T, E and S models ~ 6000 cars. This equates to just 25 transmissions per day for the production year.

From 1972 to mid 1977, the Magnesium alloy 915 transmissions were manufactured with a cast steel insert, co-cast in the location of the pinion bulkhead bearings of the final drive housing. This created a durable precision armature to manage the location and fit of the pinion bearings. The roller bearings are installed directly into this steel insert.

During 1977 the effects of a corporate technical mandate that initiated from research in the Porsche Motorsports division, lead to the replacement of all Magnesium alloy components with more durable Aluminium alloy parts. This was particularly evident in the pressure cast casings for the 915 transmission and the engine crankcases.

From mid 1977 the Aluminum alloy case 915′s prevailed. The steel insert was no longer co-cast in the pinion bulkhead of the final drive housing – the roller bearings were now installed directly into the aluminum bores in the housing.

From 1984 and the introduction of the Carrera 3.2 motor, the 915 final drive housing was altered to accommodate a small OD roller bearing where the input shaft is carried in the pinion bulkhead of the final drive casing. This 55mm Ø bearing (930 302 391 00) is taken directly from the 930 series transmission. The smaller OD allowed for the narrow bridge of material between the two bearings to increase in cross section by about 300% – I presume in an effort to improve stability of the bearing bores in this particular area. The previous 62mm Ø bearing (999 110 032 00) rarely shows any sign of problem, underwriting my opinion that the smaller and more expensive 930 bearing is a packaging decision related to the integrity of the roller bearing fit.

There were other subtle variations to the casings, such as the mounting of the clutch guide tube, the input shaft seal, shift rod bearings, speedometer provisions etc. - all interesting – but for another expose.