A pleasure to have a report on the HE-powered Moynes/Kerr E36 tarmac rally car for all to enjoy, written by co-driver Jon Kerr:

So the Hack Engineering Ltd and Ecumaster UK-supported E36 Rally car of David Moynes and Jon Kerr finally got to hit the Bovington Rally stages last weekend. After a very long drive down to Dorset on Friday, the car was presented for scrutineering. This was a nervous time as the car has undergone a full ground-up rebuild this year and this was the first event. The chief scrutineer reported that the car was “perfect”, which was a great relief and high praise indeed. Saturday at the venue, the team set up the service area for the car and service van ready for the first stage at 1pm. Seeded at car 29 out of 76, we would be running up with some high profile cars and with some fast cars behind us also. Dave and myself haven’t had any time to test the car properly or even drive it in anger so the first stage would be a baptism of fire. Normally we are quite slow starters, getting the feel of the car and the grip levels before really pushing so we were massively surprised to find that we had completed the first 4.5mile stage 11th fastest! Stage 3 was a bit untidy and saw us drop a couple of places but we managed to hold an overnight position of 13th place.
The car was parked up with all the other rally cars in parc ferme overnight ready for the Sunday run of 8 further stages. Sunday’s first two stages were in the same direction around Bovington camp as Saturday, so only a few minor changes in the stages to navigate. Once again we managed to hold our position chasing down a very powerful Evo 4 (car 10) and keeping a very nice Evo 6 Group A car behind us. Stage times showed that we were consistently quicker than both of the Evo’s. Stage 7 was the first of the reversed stages , so a quick re-write of the stage notes and we would be back out again. We started off well and we were going very quickly into a fast right hander followed shortly by a tight double chicane. At this point Dave had left the braking a few metres too late and we locked up, hitting a rather large water IBC container, pushing it some 20m down the stage. Fearing the worst to the front of the car and the nice new HE S50B30 engine, we continued cautiously, checking all the vital oil and water temps, pressure etc. The car was misfiring slightly and was hesitating so we decided to miss our stage split and go into service, thus receiving a stage maximum time. This would ultimately put us near the back of the pack. Once back into service, the damage was checked and surprisingly it wasn’t as bad as the impact would have suggested. Broken Headlight, front grille, cracked bonnet and broken front splitter. We got away with that one! The engine issue was diagnosed as a loose connector on the lambda sensor which was causing erratic readings when it was checked on the laptop. Problem rectified and we were ready to go again. Stage 8 went without any dramas and we posted a decent time. Stage 9 was cancelled due to a Darrian having an off at a double bus stop chicane, and it then subsequently caught alight destroying the whole car… No one likes to see that and we were the first car to stop at the scene, flagged down by the marshals who were frantically trying to put out the fire. The crew were all ok and could only stand and watch the car was engulfed in flames and ultimately destroyed. Stage 10 and 11 were cancelled due to the previous incident and only stage 12 remained. We completed the rally without further incident. The car and engine were absolutely fantastic, then engine just pulls and pulls. We managed to keep pace with some very good cars all day, surprising a few!
We had lots of very nice complimentary messages throughout the day of how good the car looked and was presented – not bad for some weekend warriors in a garage somewhere in Kent 😊. A massive thanks must go out to Ben Koflach at Hack Engineering, we must have really tested his patience at times! Greg at ECUMaster UK for fitting us in at short notice on a Sunday for mapping and getting the best from our HE S50B30, our mates Dan and Gary for building a brilliant car and servicing all weekend. But for the stage max, we mixed it with some very good cars, having not been out for nearly 11months, myself and Dave did ok . It has the potential to be a top 10 car, which we never really expected when we set on the rebuild journey. Thanks to everyone for building our ultimate driving machine 😀

Thank you to Rallygallery.com for the photos!