RACE DAY
I got up just before 7am. Had breakfast, packed some tools and hit the road. The club grounds are just over an hour from my place. To be honest I was petrified. It's a LONG time since I've driven the car a long distance. Longer still since I've been on the freeway with it. I pulled over twice to check things, chiefly the smell of oil burning on the headers. I think the case is weeping around the join and the oil pump a little. Nothing serious though. I also filled up with fuel close to the club grounds. I noticed a few things. Firstly, the tune is a little too rich. Seems I've been tuning with a dodgy wideband for a while. I need to calibrate the new one again and then I'll be good to go. Secondly, the 2 lawn chair cushions I put in the seat made the world of difference to my backside. Pulling out the passenger seat lightened the car and made packing tools that little bit easier.
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On arrival I unpacked, entered and had the car scrutineered. The official had me tighten my battery strap (by wedging a stick in it. No joke) and the screw holding the fire extinguisher bracket on. As he looked through the engine bay he commented, "this isn't standard".
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As per usual, one member of the club was horrified I'd be dirt racing a vintage car. I'm used to this now, but I still don't have much patience with it. He said to me, "my father would be in tears if he could see this". I replied, "Well, your father can cry. Coz it's a car and I'm driving it. That's what they're meant for". I find it ironic that people think nothing of historic track racing with these sorts of cars, but get on the dirt and everyone gets all bent out of shape.
Before we started racing I asked a few guys from the club what the track was like. The answers I got concerned me a bit, "pretty rough". However, it transpired that the event organizers had taken the smoothest paths through the property and we'd be racing on them. Either way, I'd be "driving to the conditions".
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We did a recce run of the track at the beginning of the day. 95% of the track was smooth and pretty good driving. Even on the recce, I could feel that car was going to be easy to throw around. At the same time I could see lots of fist sized rocks, gravel and sticks. I was very relieved I'd been so paranoid about damaging the oil system.
The first and second runs were pretty reasonable. The only issues I had were in the very tight sections of the track. Hairpins stacked on the hairpins in chopped up, sandy soil. That and my handbrake was not working. Across the day, I worked on the handbrake. By the last run of the day it was finally working well, but I was still having issues with understeer in the tight stuff.
By the end of the day, I was driving the car as hard as I ever have. I pegged it in 1st, 2nd and 3rd gears. One of the guys said the sound of the blowoff valve was, "the last thing I expected from it". I felt confident about scandinavian flicks in some of the more open corners. I slalomed it sideways through a few places even in 3rd gear. Bear in mind, my back wheels have about 1 deg of positive camber and the front is neutral with no castor shims or anything. I was also racing on my street tyres with 40/30psi rear/front. These are cheap, mud and snow tyres, 165/85R15. It should have been an understeering pig of oblivion. But it wasn't. It was balanced, measured and surprisingly, soaked up the bumps. I say surprisingly, because I was terrified I'd rip something off the car. After every run, I went round the car checking oil lines, the front radiator, etc. No dramas. The front of the car is probably 4" off the ground. Crazy stuff!
But how quick was I? Werl... not much.
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This was the quickest car of the day. A Mitsubishi Mirage... with an FTO 2l V6 that revs out to 9,000rpm. It's got Evo suspension and brakes, a full cage and a very able driver. It sounds like a Porsche race car and smashed the next fastest guy (My friend's Datsun 510) by 2 secs. The whole course took around 3min to complete, but he was way under that. There was another FTO engined Mirage there too, but it didn't come near him. I was down the slow end of the field, for good reason. I was trying not to destroy the car with not enough ground clearance. As the day progress 30 cars chopped the surfaces up more and more. By the last run I was really picking my way around things. Some places I was more confident but I had to quite careful.
I've come home feeling even stronger about putting a stock front end back in the car. Even with adjusters wound right up, it's still too low. I'd really like to go crazy and build a rose jointed front end like this one...
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Either way, I want more height, camber and stock width. I don't exactly know what to do with tyres. There's not a lot of room or options and I already have the smallest steer tyres you can put on 15" rims.
The other thing I struggled with through out the day was getting off the line well. One time I rolled off the line like a Nana. Seems like I can't quite get the hang of keeping the revs up. I also found that on handbrakes turns where I didn't have enough speed the motor wasn't as strong as I thought. I drop the clutch in and the motor would just bog down, but I got used to going back to first. I think I need to load it and rev it up to get the boost before dumping it. I'm also not convinced the handbrake is working as well as it could. Truth is I'm missing my turning brakes from my old buggy, although I don't know if they'd have helped a lot today either.
At the end of the day the engine bay looked like this...
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The line wrapped in white rag on the left is the breather for the turbo oil drain. I had it under the car next to the gearbox, but I was concerned it would spend the day sucking in dust. Very glad I did now. Everything else is a little dusty but not to bad. The sock filter will need cleaning.
A few other observations...
1. I wore earplugs on the way there and back. With the sump guard and everything else, it's pretty noisy. I could still hear the radio though.
2. I finally feel like I "trust" the car again after all the dramas I had with the turbo leaking. Today, I just pulled the intercooler and wiped any oil out of the piping before the event started. There wasn't much in there. I've haven't checked it yet, but I drove pretty sensibly on the way home.
3. The oil temp sensor is finally giving me a decent read out now the sump guard covers it. I had 75degC on the free way, but it never got hotter than about 60degF the rest of the day.
4. Below about 100km/h, the intercooler system works really well. It just cycles off and on as the intake temp goes up and down. I was really concerned the front skid plate would ruin the airflow. Instead, I think I'm getting a gurney flap effect and it's dragging air through from behind.
5. I'm pretty sure the fuel smell I've been getting after boost is the gas cap leaking. I checked the cap on the way home and it was damp with fuel. I reckon venting the tank is going to sort it out. I might put a new seal in it too.
6. Even with the cushions, my butt was almost numb by the end of the drive home. I need better padding!
7. I drove home through a beautiful sunset. I felt tremendously relaxed and thankful for the car and the day. Sorry, this sounds sentimental but with all the dramas with the car I was genuinely concerned going today would be a mistake. Instead, I had a really good day. Only one other car was driven there, raced and drove home again. Everyone else had trailers. I can't afford a tow car or a trailer (and they would be wasted on me with time constraints). But how awesome is that for a 61yo car?! So the whole thing was an adventure and I feel tired, but refreshed. Isn't that what our hobby is about?
