In reply to simon_C :
From the secret tire dealer. 
There is a post earlier in this thread somewhere about this. The tires are asphalt modified tires. Hoosier and American Racer both make tires that fit. Hoosier usually won't sell them to the general public, hence the secret tire dealer.
What size? They look bigger than my 27x10x15 slicks.
In reply to Dusterbd13 :
The wheels they mount on are 15" wide.
Oh wow.
I need to step up my game.
In reply to Dusterbd13 :
So basically 27 x 15 rears and 26 x 15 front
Late start tonight but I got four of the six tires I need to mount done. I think I'm finally over the hump where mounting tires doesn't feel like I am wrestling with them and losing. :-) My technique is getting good enough that I'm not drenched with sweat when I am done with a tire. This time I didn't even need to use the trick of a set of vice grips to get the tire started.
Mounted the last two tires (spare front and rear) tonight. I was getting low on valve stems so I decided to order some. I found a ten pack and was about to order it when Amazon showed me a link to a 100 pack. I don't really need 100, but the 10 pack was $10 and the 100 pack was $24. I've used up a few 10 packs since I started racing so I ordered the 100 pack.
I loaded the new tires on the trailer for the Mt Ascutney event this weekend. (Oh yeah and I remembered the car too.)
MEATS!!!!!! Good luck!!!!
Back from Ascutney II. This sign that was posted on the road tells you a lot about the upper part of the course.
The road isn't getting any smoother but we don't let that slow us down much. It was a good weekend for me. I was fastest on Saturday and second fastest on Sunday. I was taking a shot at fastest on Sunday on my last run. I'm pretty sure I had my fastest run on the lower half of the course but a braking problem bit me and I spun the car around in the road at check 6. Three times on Sunday the car started to exhibit a problem under hard braking. Suddenly it would pull to the right as if the right side of the car was braking a lot harder than the left. It happened twice on that last run and resulted in the car spinning at check 6. I'm not sure what is wrong.
But still it was a good event and even though Joey Kale beat me I went 99.7% as fast and that's not bad.
Picture of the car in staging.
And a short third gear launch video. I was running the 5.04 rear end gears for Ascutney and I used 3rd gear all weekend off the line. Then I shift once to 4th before that first corner. After that I don't touch the shifter again.
And here are the Sunday results
Points battle is close this year. It would have been even closer if I hadn't broke at the spring Ascutney.
Registered for Mt Philo today. I'm the only one registered. That was a bit worrying. I don't have enough fuel for 50 runs up the hill. But it turns out there was a problem with the online registration that was just fixed today.
Of course one of the problems the series has is we don't usually get enough people to enter Philo. We would love to see 50 cars but often it is closer to 30. That means SCCV often loses money on the event. That problem has been a topic of much discussion.
Update on the changes I made to the torque arm. Today I crawled under the car. (Looking forward someday to having a lift.) I checked nuts and bolts on all the suspension and steering. For once the torque arm bolts were not loose after an Ascutney. I think adding the hardened washers, fine thread bolts and nylocks fixed the problem. My guess is the washers are what really made the difference.
I did find half the bolts on the rear drive plates were loose. There are 8 bolts on each side so nothing bad happened. These too loosen up on a regular basis. The are easy to check as long as I remember. They are steel bolts into an aluminium wide 5 hub. So I can't really torque them down that tight. For now I will just keep watching them but I suppose a little locktite might be in order at some point in the future.
All the tightening I did to the front end before Ascutney seems to have helped. I didn't have any steering vibrations at Ascutney.
After lunch today I started looking at the front brakes. I pulled out pads one by one and cut some plywood pieces to replace the pads. The plywood is a little thinner than pads so as I used a big clamp to push on the brake pedal I could see each piston move and check that each piece of plywood was getting clamping. So two at a time I checked all 8 pistons. They all seem to be working fine.
While I had pads out I took a picture of the back of a pad. That gives me the exact part number of the pads in case I have to replace one in the future.
These are PolyMatrix E compound which makes sense. Here is the temperature VS torque chart:
The E compound has good response cold and it doesn't vary a lot due to heat.. For hillclimbing that is pretty important. Running a track event you probably start out slow and can use the brakes a couple times at less than a max stop to get pads up to temperature. But hillclimbing you start out cold and some places like Ascutney I'm using the brakes hard at the first corner. I want a pad that works well even when it is cold. Nor do I want a pad that changes a lot when it warms up since then the braking effort will change a lot between the bottom and top of the hills.
The BP-10 looks even better since it is closer to linear. It does fall off at higher temps which is I think why I didn't use it.
So what was the brake malfunction causing the spins?
759NRNG said:So what was the brake malfunction causing the spins?
Haven't found anything yet. I did test the front pistons hoping I would find one that was seized but no luck. I'll test the rears next then if I don't find anything I will probably start disconnecting lines to flush them out. Probably try flushing out the calipers as well by removing the bleeders. Maybe there is something in the lines that plugs things up. I've also been thinking of looking for pressure gauges that install on the caliper. Someone said they exist then I could check pressures side to side.
In short I still don't know what is going on.
I checked the pistons on the rear brake calipers this morning. They all move, nothing seized up. Since the pistons are the only moving parts there isn't much else to check there. I did check the mounts for all the calipers and everything is tight. I need to get some more brake fluid to do a good flush of the entire system. Maybe there is some garbage in the lines.
But to make me feel better I ordered two of these:
Strange Brake Pressure Gauges P2360
These are brake pressure gauges that screw into the bleeders on the calipers. So I will be able to test if I am getting equal pressure side to side.
Sometimes having a race car just seems like and endless series of part orders. Started flushing and bleeding the brake system today and found out that the first four bleeders no longer bleed. These are speed bleeders by Russell Performance. I like them because they have an internal check valve that makes bleeding a one person operation. However it seems that after years of being on the car the internal check valves are seized up. So I placed an order for 8 of these to replace all the bleeders on the car.
I can see why these die after a while. Every time the car gets wet these little bleeders will fill up with a mixture of water and dirt in that spring area. I'm sure it eventually leaks past as well. So years later when I next have to bleed the brakes it's just one solid corroded mass.
I'm actually not sure how long the existing bleeders have been on the car. I know I replaced them in 2009. I might have replaced them in early 2014 but my guess is not. I think 2014 was the last time I bled the brakes since that is when I put the car back together after the rebuild from the 2013 Ascutney crash. They worked then.
Hmmm looks like the people at Russell Performance are smarter than I am.
Here is another picture of what I ordered.
Notice the rubber caps that go over the bleeders. I didn't have any caps on my bleeders. Either I didn't get any or much more likely I just didn't put them on. They probably fix the problem I had. I bet if I search around I'll find these little caps. Sometimes it is all about the idiot who doesn't follow the installation instructions. 
KG your only human ,but a darn entertaining one . Third gear burn outs ROCK!!!! Don't be so hard on yurseff 
759NRNG said:KG your only human ,but a darn entertaining one . Third gear burn outs ROCK!!!! Don't be so hard on yurseff
Really I'm mostly laughing at myself.
I'll be using 3rd gear at Philo. I really should try to charge the GoPro for some more video. I hope we have some good weather at Philo. I've got better tires that ever for Philo since I bought new tires before Ascutney and I've been running good times this year. I'd love to beat my personal record there.
I'd love to beat my personal record there. And scare all the little carz and forest critters!!!! Good luck, and hey is butchster gonna be there ?
In reply to 759NRNG :
Lol, Philo is one hill where the little cars have an advantage so I don't scare them as much. The road is just too narrow. And the time I killed a rabbit wasn't even in my car.
Haven't seen much of Butch lately so I doubt he will be at Philo but you never know. He has been saying that retiring from racing is probably in the cards in the next year or two.
Doing the Dragon this weekend?
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