High gears and hillclimbing

Finally got the white PI back on the road after a few months hiatus... about 4 actually which is a bit embarassing but fixing my 2500 up with megasquirt EFI and Herald clutch fixing has taken precedent. Its not as if parts of the car haven't done some work as the new rebuilt LSD did about 1500 miles in the back of my everyday 2500 to run it in.

Back on the road the white PI was showing some worrying rear end steering issues which I had noticed at Collie before my diff broke but had put down to wierd diff things. Anyway it was still there and turned out to be loose and/or stripped 3/8 unf nut and bolts holding the rear outer shackles on ... OOOP's.

Soon fixed, but it shows the need for aviligance on a 45 year old car with more than twice the designed power and torque.

One side effect of the new 3.45 ratio diff, STR053 Sprint CR gearset and 225/50 x 15 tyres is I have a 1st gear good for 60+mph and second good for 85mph.
This feels pretty good for the open road but on a tight hillclimb with 1st gear hairpins and lots of tight area needing throttle steering it was not really much fun.

Anyway I decided to have a go at the TSOA Jack Hills hillclimb today and did OK with a 69.5 second run (fastest times were in the 66-67 range with a 5.2 TR7 V8 leading) but everyone was using (proper) first gear and I was lugging away in what was a higher gear than most peoples 2nd gear. It's a testament to the torque of engine that I did as well as I did really but it was a bit of a struggle

No excuse really though and I am intending on solving the issue with Stag ratios and 205/50 tyres. This will give me gear speeds of 43,61 and 93 rather than 61,85 and 108, at 6500rpm