1985 BMW 318 Stage Rally Build - 1988 Porsche 924S Street Build - Sequoia Build

I noticed some pretty bad (by our standards) trenching going on at the start. I actually bounced up out of the front "tire pocket" on my last couple runs. Such things are unacceptable and unheard of normally, because the site owner won't tolerate that kind of abuse.

What we tend to do for starts (and I realize that this is getting increasingly OT for your project thread) to mitigate this even further is to have a changing start position. Five start cones are set up. First run, you start at the first cone. After everyone does thast run, that cone is pushed over, then you start at the second cone a meter or so closer to the timing hose, and then the third, and so on. This prevents the start-line hole effect.

Yeah, you mentioned that and I plan to suggest the "changing start line" to our organizers next time I talk to them. Our MA guys with launch control can dig the gravel starts a foot deep pretty easily. MR cars running after them are pretty hilarious to watch starting banging back and forth in the ruts trying to jump out. I personally hate it, so would like to see a moving start line.

We don't have a no launch policy so I am glad the surface held up the way it did because in day 2 in the dry I was dumping the clutch from about 7800rpm.

ok back to it. I'll have a complete write-up of the event tonight or tomorrow, depending on whether or not I decide to work on the e21 tonight.

In the meantime, here are some good pics that someone else took of the car

You've officially inspired me to do this... one of the tech's at my shop is going to let me build a car at his place over the weekends. Probably going to go with a focus hatch because of the over abundance of them in this area, as well as how cheap they are to get fixed with my employee discount lol. The other half is pretty convinced I should make an e36 rallycross clone of my e46 but..... Probably going to pick one up sometime in December. You = inspiration

I still cant get over how cool your car looks with that paint scheme, especially tossing dirt! I need to get my E36 M3 together and fix my front end/finish headlamps

fidelity101 wrote: I still cant get over how cool your car looks with that paint scheme, especially tossing dirt! I need to get my E36 M3 together and fix my front end/finish headlamps

lol. One of my non-racing co-workers asked me how I could have lost to "that beat up mazda." I was like "uh...because making a car look good doesn't make it go faster."

But yeah, I like doing the car art/graphics/etc when I have nothing better to do. I've found it's good for getting pics of it taken, and for making sponsors happy and such. The car's look is always a work in progress for sure.

The blue wheels and highlights were directly because our local pro photographer told me it looked too boring all black, and that I should add some color.

I got made fun of by another e30 driver at my first ever rallycross for my car being "too nice and too clean" haha..

Where do you find these cars? I love the idea of a RWD Rally-X car but up here Volvo 240's and anything with a BMW symbol on it, never get down to Rally-X $$$$'s.

I love RWD in the dirt, plus they are easier to pull with a Tow Bar.

I was buying RX-7s when they were $1000 cars, they are $3000 cars up here now so I am very motivated to repair any rust as it starts.

My next rallycross car will most likely be an Evo VIII, which will never really get down to that level. So I'll just need to reappropriate the "maintenance and repair" fund towards "buy the car" instead. Once I rebuild the engine and stop breaking transmissions, and get some tires that don't suck, rallycross should be pretty cheap again so I can throw the money into Evo Fund so I can be ready to pounce if/when I see one for $6-8k.

Knurled wrote: I was buying RX-7s when they were $1000 cars, they are $3000 cars up here now so I am very motivated to repair any rust as it starts. My next rallycross car will most likely be an Evo VIII, which will never really get down to that level. So I'll just need to reappropriate the "maintenance and repair" fund towards "buy the car" instead. Once I rebuild the engine and stop breaking transmissions, and get some tires that don't suck, rallycross should be pretty cheap again so I can throw the money into Evo Fund so I can be ready to pounce if/when I see one for $6-8k.

...I hope your Evo Fund isn't accrued in the same manner as your "buy cheap wheels from Josh Fund"

NGTD wrote: Where do you find these cars? I love the idea of a RWD Rally-X car but up here Volvo 240's and anything with a BMW symbol on it, never get down to Rally-X $$$$'s. I love RWD in the dirt, plus they are easier to pull with a Tow Bar.

IDK where you are, but locally a 325e in decent body/running condition just got posted up on our local e30 facebook page for $900.....

If you don't mind an M10 or M20B27 car (e.g. early e30) they're pretty easy to find around here under $2k. Same goes for Volvo 240s, though manual transmissions aren't all that common on those it seems.

Ok, now that I’ve had a couple days to reflect and chit-chat with the other competitors from last weekend’s Great Lakes National Challenge RallyCross, I guess it’s time for the complete event wrap-up (at least, from my point of view).

The event was held in Hebron, Ohio (outside Columbus) across from an NHRA dragstrip, where Ohio Valley Region (OVR) usually runs their events. While most of the competitors were from the Great Lakes Division (running from Ohio up through Michigan, I think), five of us came out from DC region – Jim and Mike Golden in their GC 2.5RS Subie, Josh Sennett in his bmw 325e turbo, and me and Nick.

Nick coming was kind of a “deal” I made with him since we’re tied locally in points and there was a WDCR event on the same day. I would have had to skip it and drop that event, and Nick could have gone and won it easily without me there and gotten the points. He didn’t want to drive his e28 all the way to Ohio so I offered the co-drive of my car since I know he’s fast in it (see: last local event where he beat me in mine after his car broke). That way we both drop that local event and remain tied.

So we loaded up the trailer and the Sequoia and did the 6-7 hour haul through the Blue Ridge mountains (which was uneventful except for 15 minutes of torrential downpour where we couldn’t see 10 feet in front of the car).

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/aa1-1.jpg

Upon arrival we had a chance to quickly walk the course in the evening to get a feel for it. Since we run in DC on gravel, this grassy course was kind of foreign to us, and it would prove to be foreign to me for sure. Ran into some other guys from GRM at the site and had a beer, then headed to the hotel to sleep.

The next morning it was cool in the 60s, and the grass was soaking wet and soft – promising to be very slick. We did the course walk a few more times (with sopping feet) and then one course drive-through at slow speeds, where it didn’t feel all that slippery. There was a random-draw for start order, which proved to be pretty crucial as the course dried out quickly once we tore up the grassy areas and cars ran through it. I’ll caveat by saying that I don’t like the way the draw was done overall, rather than within each class. That meant the classes got broken up with rwd, fwd, and awd cars running throughout the head. As luck would have it I drew #4 (out of about 30 cars) so had to go very early in the heat when it was still grass and still very wet. Most of the other MR class cars were much further back in the run group, which (looking at times) proved to be pretty advantageous as the course dried out very quickly once runs started. The course was VERY long and curvy, with a number of turnarounds. It was actually a great course, one of the most fun I’ve ever run.

As to the MR class competitors, they consisted of Evan Arthur (last year’s national runner-up) and Chris Hastings driving Evan’s turbo Miata; Pete Remner (a perennial top national and divisional driver) in his RX-7; me and Nick in my car; Josh in the turboETA; and Kevin Schmidt and Pat LaMontagne from Detroit, driving Kevin’s RX-7.

So my first run started and it was clear that the course was much slicker than expected. First runs have been my downfall for a number of events over the last couple seasons as I tend to be over-aggressive and trust my traction more than I should. I would normally have backed off, but with such a strong field in MR I couldn’t risk going slower than the rest of the class so I pushed it.

Too hard:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZQJAHczTiU&feature=youtu.be

Yup, got outside the line in the deeper wet grass and couldn’t recover it. By my count I lost about 12-13 seconds getting back on course, which was pretty sucky since it essentially put me out of the running for the whole weekend, or so I thought. On that run I was 125 seconds, while the fastest cars that didn’t spin were 113-115 seconds being more careful.

As a bit more grip developed throughout the morning, I slowly clawed my way back into the competition with some good runs, and my 5th run at 101.92 seconds turned out to be the fastest in the class for that session. But I was still a good ways behind the leaders. Meanwhile, Evan had one really sloppy 4-cone run that prevented him from running away from the pack for the morning.

Pete getting it sideways

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/10150564_514906915307524_210919253355939609_n.jpg

The morning course, and my fastest run:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gi7MAzSJkLE&list=UUZDzORFSilgFFHMqcT8uyIA

another fast run from inside:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHBKN0tRKhA&list=UUZDzORFSilgFFHMqcT8uyIA

In the afternoon, we basically ran the same course but with one section cut out so it was somewhat shorter. As it had dried out, the Mazdas got faster and Chris and Kevin started putting down some fast times. My times were pretty good but nothing special. No major mistakes though. Nick kept running consistently and he and Kevin were neck and neck for the lead after Saturday. Evan had an electrical issue at lunch so he had to take some runs in Pete’s car (which were similar in times to Pete’s runs), and Chris took some runs in Josh’s car (also pretty fast) . Unfortunately Josh had some overheating issues, which we’ll talk about in a bit.

Evan getting down some turbo power

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/10606398_514906875307528_3578615965355706052_n.jpg

By the end of the day Nick was holding on to a several-second lead over Kevin and Pete, and I had managed to get back to within 5 seconds of the leader or so after driving with nothing to lose.

So as it turned out, Josh had broken both motor mounts and his engine shifted to the left, causing his fan to get caught on the shroud and mild overheating. After asking around the other competitors and making a fruitless run to Advance auto, it was clear that nobody carries 1980s bmw parts in the middle of Ohio on a weekend.

So we improv’d by taking my spare Condor Speed Shop UHMW solid M42 mount (which is about twice as tall as the M20 mount he needed) and cutting it in half with a hacksaw. Four people sawed for about 20 minutes, and we broke the blade 3 times.

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/aa20.jpg

But in the end, we got it ghetto-rigged and he was good to go

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/aa22.jpg

So on to day two. The course was reversed with some changes. I needed to make up some time and it was going to be difficult. I laid down the 2nd-fastest times for the first two runs, but Pete was almost 2 seconds faster (I do hate running clockwise, lol) and was on the verge of taking 1st from Nick and Kevin. But then he de-beaded and had to take a bogey time, essentially putting him out of the competition (or did that happen late on the first day, I forget). Meanwhile, Josh continued to have problems with his car and eventually just bailed out for a while.

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/aa10.jpg

As we came down to the last few runs, Kevin and Nick were fighting for the top spot and I was a few seconds back in 3rd. Nick hit a kind of plateau in his times and couldn’t seem to go any faster. Kevin kept putting down really fast runs and I kept pace and was within a second of the lead. Then I got a cone in the slalom, which is something I NEVER do (I love slaloms), which knocked me back to 3 seconds again.

On the last run I was down around 1.5 seconds to Kevin and ½ a second to Nick. With 3rd place guaranteed no matter what I did (short of de-bead), I decided to go for broke on the last run. Nick put down another decent run around 80.4 seconds. Then Kevin also put down a run around 80.5 seconds. Driving all-out, I pulled off a 79.3 on the final run (clean), which leapfrogged me in front of Nick by ½ a second. But left me ½ a second behind Kevin. So that’s how it finished, with the top three separated by 1.01 seconds after almost 1,500 total seconds of time over the weekend.

Evan ended up around 30 seconds back thanks mostly to his cones and having to drive Pete’s car for a few runs, but was running times just a shade slower than mine all day. Pete ended up about 100 seconds back primarily due to his de-bead bogey and I think a partial spin once he was out of it. The rest of the pack was a ways back due to various driving issues and mechanical issues. Chris didn’t drive Sunday, which is too bad. Would have been interesting to see if he could have taken Evan’s car to the title or not.

I’ll also mention that the Golden brothers from DC took 2nd and 3rd in stock AWD class, which was a good finish but I’m sure they’re disappointed in it. Lost to a WRX.

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/DSCF3651.jpg

All in all, it was a great event and was good to finally see how we matched up against some of the best MR class drivers in the country. Also got to meet a bunch of cool people, hang out, work on cars, drink beers, and talk shop with a lot of national-level guys.

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/10523213_10204752381992130_4316791598481907200_n.jpg

Next year the GLDivs are in Detroit area so we probably won’t haul that far, and Nationals this year are in Nebraska so that’s a no-go. Northeast National Challenge is at WDCR’s home venue in a few weeks, but I have to go to a wedding so can’t make it. I think Jim Spoth may drive my car in that one, and Nick will be back in his e28. Sucks I can’t compete for the title on my own local surface, but that’s how life works.

Oh, and Pete bought my old beat-up e21 wheels for $100. In quarters.

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/aa15-1.jpg

Of interest, Pete is one of the favorites to win Nationals, according to SCCA’s website

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/pete.png

Overall, happy with how the car performed and held up with no mechanical issues whatsoever. In fact, Josh had to drive my car 7 hours home (which I don’t envy) since his car was still having issues – so I put it on my trailer and towed it back to my place.

So that’s it for now. Good times, and I have a few ideas for the car coming up (nothing too big, don’t’ get too excited), so stay tuned.

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/DSCF3596-1.jpg

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/aa34.jpg

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j85/irish44j/aa28.jpg

Great writeup. Thanks for sharing, that looks like fun.

irish44j wrote:

NGTD wrote: Where do you find these cars? I love the idea of a RWD Rally-X car but up here Volvo 240's and anything with a BMW symbol on it, never get down to Rally-X $$$$'s. I love RWD in the dirt, plus they are easier to pull with a Tow Bar.

IDK where you are, but locally a 325e in decent body/running condition just got posted up on our local e30 facebook page for $900..... If you don't mind an M10 or M20B27 car (e.g. early e30) they're pretty easy to find around here under $2k. Same goes for Volvo 240s, though manual transmissions aren't all that common on those it seems.

I end most sentences with eh!

In Canada and a decent Volvo can still fetch $3-4K. BMW's can occasionally be found around the $1K mark but they have multiple issues normally at that point.

Anybody run a 318ti (the shorty version), they seem like they might be fun?

Main problem with the 318ti is that they are worse than an e30 and worse than other e36s:

1. They have the M42/M44 engine, so same power as an e30 318i (or a bit less, actually I think), but weigh more than an e30 318is

2. They have the e30 rear suspension, whereas all the other e36s have the better e36 rear suspension, which is better.

IDK, most cars in the $1k range, BMW or not, have "multiple issues" lol...

Since I'm a numbers-cruncher, a few other interesting notes:

First, apparently OVR at normal events drops the worst run from each heat. In national competition no runs are dropped. Nonetheless, just for fun Evan posted up the total times with worst runs dropped:

HICKEY, JOSH 1,164.36

SCHMIDT, KEVIN 1,170.57

DRYMALSKI, NICK 1,173.92

REMNER, PETE 1,185.71

ARTHUR, EVAN 1,196.46

LAMONTAGUE, PATRICK 1,264.94

SENNETT, JOSHUA 1,328.56

So, that again shows how much that spin killed me. Oh well, that's the breaks.

As to the rest of the times, here are the session totals:

Saturday Kevin: 971.7

Me: 972.7

Nick: 967.2

Evan: 988.0

Pete: 972.7

Pat: 1045.7

(leaving out Chris and Josh since they had DNF runs due to mechanicals)

So, pretty damn even on Saturday with the four fastest total times within 5 seconds of each other.

On Sunday AM: Kevin: 487.1

Me: 486.7

Nick: 492.7

Evan: 505.1

Pete: 573.6

Fastest single runs of each session: Saturday AM: me (2/10ths faster than Pete's fastest run)

Saturday PM: Pete (1.3 faster than Kevin's fastest, and 2.3 faster than my fastest).

Sunday: me (by 1/1000th of a second over Kevin's 2 fastest runs, lol, and 0.8 faster than Nick's fastest run).

Not sure what any of that says about our driving, but what the hell....

At least since 2011, the fastest RWD Modified cars have been RX-7s, Miatas, and 3ers.

2011 nationals: epic 3-way battle between RX-7 and E30 325 2012 nationals: all Mazda show 2013 nationals: Miata vs. E36. Came down to the wire, man. TO THE WIRE!

Yup, and from looking around different regions that pretty much seems to be the case as well - though I've seen a good number of MR Volvo 240s and a few z31s at the top of events as well (though they seem to mostly be out west).

Guess that's mostly the list of sporty cars that are still widely available for pretty cheap (enough for people to beat them up rallycrossing), since the RWD toyotas and Nissans seem to get hit with the Drift Tax and us cheap rallycrossers won't pay it, haha.

I still want a Volvo 240 wagon with LS power and lexan for total sleeper rallycrosser :)

Rubber boots are one of those "rallycross box" things. They keep your feet dry in wet grass in the morning. They keep your shoes mud free when working. Cheap, useful. Keep them in the box.

Normally it isn't a problem, but my Gore-Tex hiking boots are a bit past their expiration date and not so waterproof these days, haha.

I had a dry set of shoes for when it was time to drive.

Our venue doesn't have any grass to speak of, so not usually an issue

Some of the locals who didn't show up pedal an S13 Nissan around the course. A NOTCHBACK, at that. That's like super hard to find.

I would absolutely love to rallycross an AE86, and still kick myself over noy buying the SOHC notch 5-speed for $100 when I had the chance. This was before drift tax happened in the US, and before any car was worth $500 in scrap value. I still want one but something like that in the same condition would probably be 100x as much. Might as well buy a Capri at that point, because really a Capri is a long Escort and an AE86 is a Japanese Escort.

re: wet... I brought my old soon-to-be-retired work boots for course working and walking, and a brand new 10-pair pack of socks. Changed socks every time I changed shoes, because putting on different shoes with wet socks sucks. At super muddy events, I always forget to duct tape trash bags on like poor-man's hip waders.

yep, I had like 10 pairs of socks with me and 3 pairs of shoes. My co-driver didn't have as much foresight, and wore the same shorts for 3 days and wet socks all day, lol.

Well I registered for Nationals so I guess I have to go now. Blown shocks and missing bumpstops won't hold me back this time. I keep thinking how nice it would be to just get a E36M3 on snow tires and drive to events in comfort, win SR and drive home.

^^ I'd be lying if I said that thought hadn't crossed my mind once or twice as well.

good luck!

EvanB wrote: Well I registered for Nationals so I guess I have to go now. Blown shocks and missing bumpstops won't hold me back this time. I keep thinking how nice it would be to just get a E36M3 on snow tires and drive to events in comfort, win SR and drive home.

Didn't you just get those rebuilt?