Well this weekend we have two races at rockingham, and I find out that my name is not down on the list, I paid the monies over a week ago, but it appears I slipped through and was missed out, but a quick call to BARC (www.barc.net) and all should be ok, and I should get the tickets etc tomorrow, but I can not help feeling it was a close one and I could of gone there and been refused a race because my name was not down.
Lightened the boot, and brought a cat bypass tube…
Everybody else in my class has lightened the boot by removing the inner skin, and just running with the metal outer skin, this is fully in the rules, and gets them about a 5kg weight advantage over me, so it was out with the angle grinder this weekend and I removed the hinges and inner skin from the boot, so the panel that is left, is now held on by 4 aero catches (needed these as my car is kept outside and want to keep a little security). My bonnet is also lightened a little, but there is still more to come from this, the side parts of the inner skin are still attached, this should be rectified shortly.
Also whilst contemplating what to do with the exhaust (most places I have called are giving a 8 week lead time on getting an exhaust built for the car), so I found a car replacement pipe for the 318is, but it was going to be £130 delivered, so I did not know if I should try or not. But then on Sunday morning whilst checking the said cat replacement tube on ebay, I noticed the same part, but second hand (1 month old) so I put in a best offer, and brought it for a more reasonable price than the £130 for the new one)
Hopefully this will arrive on Thursday, so I can fit in the evening and check the car still functions ok. The next plan about the exhaust will happen after this next race, as I need to see how much extra power this modification does offer, this will be a comparison with the other racers lap times, and when they try to out drag me on the straights (which there is a long one at Rockingham)
Brands Hatch race report…
Well it was a strange format for the race this weekend, we had the 2 rounds on the Sunday, but the qualifying was Saturday evening. The car felt good in qualifying, and I managed to record a time only 2 seconds behind ‘John Brabbin’ and just 7 seconds adrift from ‘Tim Sweet’ so I was very happy with this, and was looking forward to the race.
Unfortunately I received bad news in the morning when I awoke, one of the other class ‘d’ drivers had pulled their back, and it was causing them a lot of pain, so reluctantly he was going home and not racing.
This news meant that there were only 3 drivers in class ‘d’ and as this was a trophy round (they were giving trophies for the first 3 places in each class) I was sure to receive a trophy.
The first race I started well, but towards the end of the race the rear of the car started to get a little more lively, and was unnerving going through ‘Surtees’ and into ‘Mclaren’, and one time I did slide onto the grass, but no damage done from what I could see.
The second race there was incident involving a few cars in front of me and I had to pick my way through the bits of cars that came together on ‘Paddock hill bend’, I think about 6 cars were involved in the incident and as a result did not finish, after this incident my car did not feel right, but it could of been a continuance from the previous race, as my tyres were sticky, but it felt like I had no grip at the rear, and this shows in my times, I was nearly 5 seconds a lap slower on the second race.
So the jobs this week are to replace the catalytic converter on the car with a bypass tube, and also maybe replace the exhaust system if I find a lighter one. Also I need to check out the rear hub as there was a humming noise coming from the rear when I went around ‘Mclaren’, although this could of been from the tyre contact on the track. Also I am going to look at lightening the bonnet and boot, this may involve removing the hinges and mounting them on pins, but I need to think of security.
New sponsor, Opie Oils…
We have got a new sponsor on board, they will be providing us with engine fluids and ancillary parts that go together with running a racing car, their name is Opie Oils
Donington race report…
Just got back in from an exciting 2 days at Donington park race track, we had rounds 9 and 10, with the qualifying early on saturday morning, the first race in the afternoon, and the second race on sunday morning, just before lunch.
This is a circuit not like the others I have driven so far, as its not a converted air field (East midlands airport is close by, as we had planes flying over whilst we were trying to sleep)
Croft and Pembray are converted from old runways, and are very flat, Donington on the other hand is a purpose built racing circuit, built after the success that Brooklands had early on in the last century. With it being purpose built it has a undulating circuit, and they are currently performing upgrades on the facilities and track, with the arrival of the Formula 1 championship there next year. They have already altered the prices of sausage and egg butties according to one of the other competitors.
There was the opportunity of getting in some extra testing on the friday, but the price for me was a little steep £400 for the day, or £290 for just a half day. So the first time I drove round the circuit was for the qualifying session.
Qualifying went well, I was overtaken early on by Ralph (74), but I managed to stay with him, and with the help of a class ‘A’ car that overtook him, I managed to get by, and started to improve my times (with Ralph pushing), I managed to qualify in front of Ralph for the first race, and would be lining up along side John Brabbin (77), we had Sean (71) and Tim (75) in front of us.
The first race was a different experience, I got a good start but managed to get overtaken by Ralph, who had a excellent start, but I was managing to stay with Ralph and John, I was feeling confident, and we went around the lap closely, this picture did not remain for long, as Dan Stringfellow (3) was facing the wrong way on the entrance to the start finish straight and Stephan Lanfermeijer (55) collected him on the way through, so this caused a red flag incident and the race was stopped.
When we were put back on the grid, we resumed the qualifying positions, so it was like a clean slate, I got a better start this time, and managed to get in front of Ralph and was following John closely, but then Sean had got past Tim and John also managed to maneuver himself past, I did not see what happened, but Ralph and myself were starting to fall back a little from them. This did not last for long as there was another accident at Redgate, so there were yellow flags being waved around this corner, so this slowed the field down a little, although I was still in front of Ralph, I was feeling a little pressure from him, but I was confident I could stay where I was, after the second time we passed Redgate under the yellow flag, the race was stopped, this time we were lead off the circuit and the race abandoned.
When we got back to the paddock we had a meeting about driving standards, and were then told the race was still on but would be now only 8 laps, and in 30 minutes. This meant that I needed to get back into the racing gear, and get the car over to the assembly area (we were a reduced grid due to the accidents in the first couple of starts) there were a couple of retirements from this 8 lap race, and it also included a stop and go penalty for one car, but I think we all came home, and in the paddock the cars were being prepared for the second race on sunday.
We had 2 green laps on the second race, I think this was due to some of the cars not being on the correct marks on the grid, so they sent us round again to line up in the correct locations. The start that I got was good, I managed to pass Ralph, and felt that I was moving in on Sean, but then the car seemed to loose drive, and the engine revs climbed but I did not feel the car being pushed forward, and then I say John and Ralph pass me by, and it felt there was nothing I could do. When I went round Redgate, there seamed to be no drive from the gearbox, but then on the Craner curves the drive returned and I was able to push on, although I had lost some time, I wanted to push as best as I could, at the end of the race I was just 10 seconds behind Ralph, and I was very happy with this result.
Although its not over yet, as when I returned to the pits, I noticed that my car was loosing water (it was on the under-tray) so it looks like my waterpump may be starting to fail (car 77 had a waterpump failure on the saturday), and to get my car more competitive for the next race at brands, I need to look at getting a proper exhaust, as the car currently has a factory system on it.
Tracked down the wiper problem…
After the last race and my wipers failing on the out lap, I needed to track down the issue before the next race (this coming weekend)
Just as luck would have it when I started to investigate, the wipers worked fine, and I could not locate any problem with them. Whilst I was in the area of the fuse box though I thought I would continue to remove the redundant relays, I still had the heater, front fog light and another couple of relay that were no longer needed, so I started to remove these.
Whilst I have pulled out the relays, and any fuse that I thought would not be needed, I needed to check all the operations of the car (lights, wipers, starting it…) Just when I did this the only item not working was the wipers, this was lucky, so I started to trace the issue again, what I noticed was if I pushed down on the fuse the wipers would function, so I looked more carefully at the fuse that had been tested fine about 2 hours previously, when looking at it closely, there was a hairline crack in the fuse, this obviously was the issue, and explained fully why it was only happening some times.
I still continued to remove the redundant wiring from the car, and also started to remove some of the reinforcements from the bonnet and doors, this total weight was about 10kg, so thats a good reduction from my weight of 1207kg when I was at Croft. Just need to trim out about another 130kg’s or start to go on a diet, as the minimum weight for the class is 1050kg, and at least one other competitor is under the 1100kg mark.
Races for the remainder of this season…
We are about halfway through the season, and there are 10 races left (5 meetings)
- Donnington park
- Brands hatch
- Rockingham
- Oulton park
- Thruxton
Croft race report…
Well this was going to be a long weekend, as you may of already read it did not get off to a good start when my rental van was deemed uninsurable due to the fact I wanted to tow something with it, even though it has a tow bar fitted.
Once the transport issue had been sorted we set off at about 16.30 on the friday afternoon, it soon became apparent that the new trailer was going to have difficulties with speed ramps (due to it being very low). There was nightmare weather, traffic and pretty much every roadwork in the UK was in our way, we arrived at Croft circuit at 23:20 and was greeted by the sight of Ralph’s car on the back of his trailer (he had got there about 1 hour before us)
Next to pitch the tent, we did not stay near Ralph as he was parked on tarmac so off we went to find some grass to put the tent on, there was grass what they do not tell you is the grass is put down over hardcore, so you have a very small amount of earth to hammer the pegs into, but the tent was put up.
Saturday arrived, and we completed items such as getting the transponders, signing on, attending the new drivers briefing, and generally hanging around until qualifying.
As this was my first time at this circuit and the first time I had driven the car since the rear suspension was altered I was a little apprehensive about what was going to happen, but we all went out there and I qualified second from last, with just Ralph behind me, although I did think that he overtook me on the straight approaching tower bend.
The first race was later on in the afternoon (originally the last race of the day, but they slipped in a extra race, that only a few cars opted for), I got a good start but was early on the brakes for the first corner, to avoid getting tangled up with the other cars. but when we came out of the second chicane, Ralph was able to out drag me up the straight, and I could see that his car was marginally quicker than mine in the straight line. I stayed in that position until the end of the race, but I now had some experience of the circuit, and was eager to race again.
Whilst I was in parc ferme, the other cars were getting weighed, for compliance of the rules, they normally do not weigh the class ‘D’ cars, but I requested to have mine weighed, with the setup at present, it weighed 1207kg, the minimum weight for my class is 1050kg, so I need to loose nearly 160kg from the car (and some of that could be from the driver).
That evening we walked the track, and looked at all the corners in detail so I would have a better understanding of the circuit on the next race.
We woke early on the sunday, to ensure we got the tent packed up before the racing started, but it started to rain, and it kept raining, so it would be my first wet race. I checked over the car, and all was fine, when it came time to go to the assembly area we all trundled off. My problems started when we were called out of the assembly area to go round the circuit for the formation of the grid. My wipers were not working, I did pull and push all the wires on the column but that did not work, around that lap, I was considering the options. Do I start the race? Will the wipers work when the race is started? Should I abort the race? By the time I had got round to near the start finish line, I decided to pull in and abort the race, I informed the marshals of my decision so the others could get on with the race.
I took my car back to the trailer and loaded it on, whilst the others started the green flag lap and, then proceeded to start the race. The race had been going for only 3 laps when it was red flagged, due to one of the cars dropping oil all around the track, causing dangerous conditions for all the other drivers (it was not intentional, and was a mechanical failure with an oil cooler)
When they restarted they had only 8 laps to do, and it was an exciting race to watch from the pit lane, but I would of preferred to of been in it.
Until the next time, at Donnington Park, when if it rains I will have wipers.
Plans nearly wrecked for croft…
Well I got up early today to go and fetch the hire van, when I got to the rental office, I was informed the van with the towbar was not there, it was about 20 miles away in Reading, it was not the end of the world, we discussed what to do and came to an agreement that they would pay my train fare and I would go over to the other branch and pick up the van from there.
Now it would not be that simple would it, I then got asked why I wanted that particular vehicle, I mentioned it was the one they had with a tow bar, then I was informed that there insurance was invalid if I towed anything, so I could not rent it.
Now I have a sign on meeting tomorrow at 11 o’clock and no way of getting the car (thats already on the trailer) to the race meeting.
After phoning about 5 van rental places with no luck, I phoned the race organiser to break the news that I would not be attending, unless I could find a way to tow the car to the circuit. He informed me who he rented a van from, but when I called he had rented the last one, but they told me another firm that may have one, they did not, and to cut a long story short, after about 4 other rental companies recommended me other firms (due to them not having anything to rent with a towbar for this weekend) I spoke to Delta self drive in Egham and they had a few available.
Now if you know the transport system in England, its not simple and for me to get there, would be a mission, but as I was still in the rental office that had let me down, they could see the problem and kindly offered me a lift to the other rental office, so I could get the van.
So for a simple 10 minute job of picking up the van, it took me four hours, and numerous phone calls to get one.
But now we can go and race.
Got some wheel studs…
Got some wheel studs today from www.rallydesign.com they are supposed to make it simpler and quicker to remove and refit the wheels, as you do not have to hold the wheel on whilst you move the bolt into position.
They are simple to fit, when you have the wheel off, insert the stud (the end with the lowest quantity of threads in first) where the bolts would of been its best to use some locktight so they do not come out when you remove the nuts. To get the studs in tight place two nuts on the exposed end so they touch, and using a spanner tighten the stud into the hub, to remove the nuts you use two spanners and turn them in opposite directions to loosen the nuts.
You have to do this twenty times on a e36 BMW due to each wheel having 5 bolts. I would of got them all done but it started to rain, and I only managed 2, So i finished off the rest the next day. The stud sticks out from the nut, I have done this as in the future so if I need to fit some spacers to widen the track, I do not have to swap the studs for longer ones. I could of got really long studs but these 60mm ones are perfect.