We wanted to test the new front suspension / radius rods on the Civic before Wild West, so we took the car out to the “Under the Wires Rallyx” in Cle Elum, WA.  The soft dust/dirt/silt surface got chewed up pretty quick, but we were able to put the suspension through the paces–passed with flying colors.

We were doing well, sitting in 3rd overall going into the last run of the day.  About a quarter of the way into the run, we came into a pretty long right-hander, which required a fair bit of steering input.  We ended up grenading the left front CV joint, a problem with many front-wheel drive rally cars, but something we’ve particularly struggled with on the Civic / Integra.

Frankly, we weren’t sure that we’d have nearly the same problems on the Civic, due to the much lower horsepower motor that we have in the car.

The good news is that we’ve come up with a solution that should solve the problem once and for all.  The bad news is that we were not able to implement it before the Wild West Rally this upcoming weekend.  We’re hoping it won’t be an axle-breaking rally due to the less technical nature of the roads in Eastern, WA.

We’ll just have to wait and see.