RaceDynamix .. Time Attack Club Pro 2010 .. Project

[BIG AL]

loving it

[dynamix]

All done, clean, polished, fueled and ready with a day to spare

Will get some good pics from Cadwell and some video from outside the car - didnt have time to organise in car video vbox unfortunately. Maybe for the last round...

A nice chilled out day tomorrow with just loading the car onto the trailer to do.

After a month and a half of work on it and all the various setbacks it is really good to be in this position

[BIG AL]

excellent news Duncan,good look for the weekend mate

[evilmoby]

Good luck this weekend, loads of work gone into it, you deserve a good un mate

[dynamix]

I love Cadwell.

First off huge thanks to Julian for giving up his weekend to help and to do all the little jobs (and slightly bigger jobs) that need doing on race day. Always there, willing and able to get stuck in to make it right. Also to Steve for pitlane assistance through the day. Lots of other thank yous to just get there in the first place:

Mark @ Lateral for engine parts
Paul @ Zen for engine building guidance and expert geometry set up
Steve Darley for bringing down fuel for the day for me and saving a space in the paddock
Daz Davies for his help during the day

Anyway, the day itself... we arrived fashionably late but just in time for scrutineering, signing on and briefing. A quick check over and it was out for the first warm up session. Julian and Steve headed down to the pit lane (the first of many trips down there laden with tools and part of a new fitness regine with that hill !). Running on low boost and on the 50% methanol mix, the car worked great til it popped a hose off behind the bumper (bound to happen) but a quick pit lane fix and I was back out to shakedown the car.

All was working beautifully and it felt planted to the road. I came out with the fastest time in club pro despite being held up on my flying laps and was generally pleased. Although most people arent on it fully on it in warm up, it was good to give it some beans to make sure the little gremlins were ironed out. After all it had only done 350 miles on the new engine !

Back to the paddock after the session and another nut and bolt check and prep for the practice session. Mostly it is hoses and dry sump belt set up for me in this but also a quick look at datalogs to see if anything nasty was happening. All was good and ready for practice.

Practice and car was good from the off then went uber lean half way through the session - really felt like the car was holding back. Looking at the logs it was running at just over lambda 1 at full boost !! hmmmm VERY lean and not good but was only doing it intermittently. Still came out with the 2nd fastest club pro time so again was pleased but yet to really nail coppice and charlies 1 right.

Lots of head scratching, checking injectors, wiring, hoses and then a change of fuel for qualifying to Sunoco Race E85 and it was fingers crossed that it was a problem with my saturday afternoon map for methanol.

A quick bleed of the brakes and re-attach the exhaust that had come undone lol and we were good to go



Qualifying was split into 2 groups to give us more space on track - this worked well and it was possible to get a full flying lap without getting held up. A great idea but should have been done in the final too (or instead) because the traffic in that was silly.

Car felt stronger on the E85 even though still not running full boost quite yet or full ignition timing ( i had taken a couple of degrees of timing out as a safety precaution to the lean running - a token gesture I know but it set my mind at rest)

This session ended with a 1.36.5 and 3rd place. My best qualifying position this year. With still more in the car and me for the final I felt good.



What seemed like days later we were out for the final - this time instead of 10 cars out - there were 16 and although that isnt many cars compared to track days, when there is such a mixture of speeds when cars are on full speed laps and 'cool down laps' at a far slower pace than was dictated in the briefing - meeting cars at the wrong part of the track is inevitable and impossible to judge a space big enough for a full flying lap.

So the first flying lap had to be the one. It was slightly cooler now and there was oil / cement down on the track from the previous session into braking at park and into chris curve braking too so tyres werent working right from the start of the first lap so had to go for a couple of hot ones. The first was fine and second better but not quite good enough so went for a 3rd full hot lap as the tyres felt good still and I hadnt hit my target time. I dipped into the 1.36's but not as quick as I had hoped and a missed gear in the mountain section cost me. Looking at sector times though it was still a quick sector.



A couple of slower laps to recoup and back on it again ... met Mr Lloyd in the evo halfway round chris curve and had to overtake at full power around the outside mid way through - a bit butt clenching but it had killed the potential for that lap anyway so time for another and again met someone halfway through the gooseneck again ruined lap. At this point I was in 3rd place but just at the death on the last lap Martin Byford pulled ahead of me to take the podium slot by 0.1 seconds.



I didnt know til I came into the paddock and saw Julian and Steve.

Never mind - I had a ball, beat some old adversaries and came away with a car in one piece ready for the next outing this weekend at TOTB.

To qualify 3rd and to finish 4th was a great result and my best yet in club pro.

Superb day !

Thanks to everyone that popped over to say hi during the day

[darren]

sounded a great day and a great result as well looking forward to seeing it in action at totb at the weekend

[BIG AL]

well chuffed for ya mate can't wait to see it at TOTB.

[dynamix]

Lady luck doesnt like me at the moment

First few launches for the handling circuit went like a dream with 5600 being the magic number to leave two lovely black 11's on the tarmac and me leading the handling course times overall at 11am.

I decided to leave it on that til the track rubbered in a bit better and have a dabble at the 1/4 mile to get my start and eye in on that. 1st run and the launch was spot on, change to 2nd good with a 1.6 60ft time but still on 1.8 bar boost. However and it is a big however, my throttle pedal decided to jam itself to the floor !!! So whereas I normally flat shift for most gears apart from 4-5 and 5-6 it decided it wanted to just rev like foook and scare the living daylights out of me and go on for a top speed run !!

I was looking down trying to see whey the pedal had jammed but then thought I would be better off looking at the strip and keep going til the 1km marker and hit the kill switch to kill the engine and try and bring the speed down.

Scarey scarey.

Knocked it out of gear and couldnt then get it back into gear - i think i warped the clutch plates or cover plate and had to jam it into 2nd and cruise back to the paddock and investigate.

After Julian and I bleeding the slave cylinder several times and adjusting what we could, spacing out what else there was (with limited experience of transmission issues on my car) there just was not enough throw on the mechanism to fully disengage and it was game over me for. Balls.

11.3 and 123mph (158mph standing km) was the time but there was much more in it - that will have to wait til i get a new clutch sorted though.


What a year .. it just has to get better !!

[BIG AL]

totally gutted for you duncan, it was yours for the taking mate.

car was looking spot on as well. Im sure it will all come good in the end though,

chin up

[dynamix]

I really dont think I could have won but I would like to think I could have been definitely in the running for top 10 by comparing times with the guys that were runningwhen I was in the morning.

Heyho - new clutch on its way shortly and we will have another go at Scooby Shootout.