How Erebus turned around wreckage in two weeks

On September 11, Will Brown’s damaged car lay stricken in Erebus Motorsport’s Pukekohe garage.

On September 14, the car returned from New Zealand.

On September 28, Brown and Jack Perkins pushed it to its limits at Winton Motor Raceway.

In a fortnight, Erebus went from Bathurst despair to full steam ahead.

It marks the latest in a line of impressive Erebus rebuilds, although none had as much at stake.

Such was the damage to the chassis after the 56g impact, that doubt was cast over the Greg Murphy/Richie Stanaway wildcard.

Brown and Perkins could have been moved into the spare, which was set aside for the Kiwi duo.

However, Erebus not only turned around Brown’s car, but ran its regular #99 entry and the wildcard on Wednesday.

Key to the rebuild was sending it to Mount Gambier, some 460km away, where fabricator Jimmy White repaired the chassis on the jig.

Erebus cut the damaged rear off the car before sending it to White.

After six days on the jig, the repaired and painted chassis returned to Erebus’s Dandenong headquarters.

Some 33 bars were replaced on the chassis, which was turned around into a complete race car in four days.

All up, the car travelled 3770km from flatbed truck to track - 2600km from Auckland to Erebus HQ, a 920km round trip to Mount Gambier, and 250km from Erebus HQ to Winton.

“The rebuild process of car #9 has been a huge task,” Erebus CEO Barry Ryan said.

“It was just second nature to the boys, they just got straight into it after it was unloaded off the plane from New Zealand.

The team got stuck in after the chassis returned

“We got it to Mount Gambier, it spent six days there straight.

“Only 10-hour days, not crazy days, just to keep everybody fresh.

“Jimmy, our fabricator, did an awesome job.

"Basically, we had to cut the whole back off the car, weld it all back together properly on the jig.”

The community spirit was alive right after the crash, with rival teams extending support to Erebus.

However, Ryan said at the time that Erebus was committed to keeping everything in-house.

Ryan said the car ran faultlessly on Wednesday, proving the work by Erebus staff had been worth it.

The next step is ensuring Erebus is competitive in Bathurst, given the team’s speed last year.

Perkins on track on Wednesday

Brown scored provisional pole last December, with Brodie Kostecki and David Russell finishing third.

“A lot of guys supported us with getting parts and making sure we had everything when we needed it,” Ryan said.

“We never really waited on parts, that was an important part of it.

"When it got back to the workshop, it only took like four straight days to turn it around.

“The boys did an awesome job and it’s just like a brand new rebuilt car again.

“Ready to go to Bathurst… faultless on the test day. We’re ready to go.”

Cars will hit the track at Mount Panorama for Practice 1 on Thursday October 6.

Tickets for the Repco Bathurst 1000 are available on Supercars.com and Ticketek.