BRZ Rally Car

Other than typical cleaning and underbody (it's time for new plastic, again) I've been doing a bunch of messing with the coolant trying to triple check that we didn't have a mysterious high coolant level for any reason other than general heat:

The harbor freight coolant combustion gas tester says it's fine, the pressure tester a friend lent me says it's fine, and now that it's been thoroughly refilled and bled the temperature never went over 210F with the scanguage plugged in and driving it full speed up the biggest hill around here.  I'm going to call it good unless it does something else alarming, and I replaced the radiator cap just in case.

New hill record for Drifting Drive? Absolute record for the hill is held by Roger Penske in a Porsche RSK.

In reply to TurnerX19 :

That's probably the most enjoyable hill in the immediate vicinity, although not the steepest. I do like imagining what it was like as a real hillclimb back in the day.

We lost a header nut during the last rally, so fresh copper ones it is:

Changed oil and air filter, spent a bunch of time cleaning dirt out of the various heat exchangers, hammered the skidplate back out, made fresh plastics:

Still need to heat gun the leading edges and tape them back up but it always feels good to have the car mostly refreshed after an event.

I finished the stuff mentioned in the previous post, drove the car a bunch, and put it up to check some more stuff once the other one was off the lift:

This part isn't exciting but it's important- rechecking anything that's lost its' paint stripe and marking it again:

So far so good.  Overmountain is in less than 2 weeks. 

Hoosier finally hit their august production time and I now have a bunch of tires I ordered before STPR:

New rear pads, again:

Stage video review has reminded me of just how much handbrake and mid-stage tarmac (so no real opportunity to adjust bias forward) this upcoming rally has; I ordered these while we were checking our old notes.

Overmountain Rally TN

Tow/Recce

We had notes (from when this rally was called Bristol Forest Rally) so we had touched those up using video ahead of time.  I was feeling halfway decent for the first time since being sick all summer, and was mostly recovered from a motorcycle accident a few weeks prior.  With a little help, the truck was packed, and I got the car loaded up with enough time for a last minute simulator session:

The tow down was uneventful, and we got settled into our airbnb with Dylan (Wicked Function) and a crew of Pat, Tim, and Cam- Bukky and DJ (Possum Hollow Racing) would show up the next day after some last minute prep.

We got up and out early the next morning to recce the Newport stages, which were all new for this year- but they were full of the character we were used to from previous Bristol years, very twisty, some tarmac, some elevation, plenty of cliffs and rocks.

Once done, we got back to the house for notes cleanup while Tim and Pat swapped an axle seal on Bukky's Fit:

The next day was similar, but even smoother since we had previous notes to go off of.  We were excited, and got through a full video review that afternoon in perfect weather:

Everything ready, we hung out and relaxed a bit:

Overmountain Rally TN

Day 1 (Saturday)

We towed the car down to Newport Fairgrounds and had a long parc expose before things kicked off for the day- this rally ran with 2 minute dust windows from the start so things were pretty spaced out.  We mostly tried to stay out of the sun and conserve energy, but still managed to talk to lots of rally friends and met J.A. Ackley making the rounds with his camera.  After a few hours, it was go time and we headed out to the first stage of the day around noon.

SS1 was Wasp, and it was an 11 mile twisty thing with lots of places where a mistake would send you plinko-ing down the side of a mountain- we didn't push super hard here, just getting back into the groove, and the attrition on this stage (actually, for all of day 1) was WILD with cars off or broken all over the place.  We still managed the fastest regional L2wd time here, and were feeling good, though.

SS2 was supposed to be Weaver's Bend, but it was canceled due to issues with the course cars- bummer because this one is super fun with an interesting tarmac section covered in tight bridges at the end.  The rally had a reroute already planned in case this happened, so we followed the alternate instructions to get to the next stage.  This rally had lots of these clever solutions, including these signs at each stage start:

SS3 was Big Clifty, and it was a lot like Wasp but tighter, rougher, muddier, and downhill for the majority of the scary stuff.  Bukky beat us by about 6 seconds here, putting us in a tie for the lead in regional L2wd down to the tenth of a second- this would become a theme throughout the rally, as his Fit was faster through the tight downhill rocky stuff, and we were faster on the smoother parts and the uphills.  Somewhere in here we passed Richo and Michelle in their Lexus on the side of the road, having missed their braking point and gone off but OK.  Back to service for a quick tire rotation- we had started with used tires on the rear, and once they were cooked off we swapped the fronts to the rear and put new fronts on; this was our technique throughout the rally.

Back out for the same loop again, and Wasp as SS4 was a little more slippery than the first time but I was really starting to feel decent in the car and be able to push a bit.  Bukky got us by .4s here.

This time we got to run Weaver's Bend for SS5, and it was just as fun as we'd hoped- the narrow, bridge filled tarmac section at the end was especially excellent, but the gravel parts of the stage were smooth and interesting too.  We put some time on Bukky here to retake the lead.

Joshua Luckadoo photo:

SS6 was Big Clifty again, and it was even nastier than the first time, with some real mud and lots of migrating rocks.  On a downhill hairpin, Roberto's Fiesta (Sara's other usual ride this season) was upside down but they were OK, and yet again lots of cars were off or damaged.  We were somewhat conservative here, with our time dropping us back to .3s behind Bukky and DJ.

Then it was over to Newport Speedway- an oval track, in a rally, with jumps on it, for the head to head super special.  This was freaking awesome, here's a layout to give a general idea:

So cars would start on opposite sides (SSS7 A and B) and run a two lap race where you could tell who was ahead by who hit their jump first.  We raced Bukky, naturally, and actually made up over two seconds by really pushing it on the banking, putting us in the regional L2wd lead going into the next day- and then we all watched the faster cars (reverse order all the way up to Pastrana, Semenuk, and the WRC guys in attendance) do their thing.  It was awesome!

Towed back to the house, and got some much needed sleep before an early morning the next day.

Overmountain Rally TN

Day 2 (Sunday)

It was difficult to get more than 4.5hrs of sleep with the schedule, but we were up before the sun and off to parc expose again:

Parc, then a long transit out to SS8 Jacob's Creek, which I would call the definition of the type of stages this rally has to offer- tons of tight stuff, some rocks, some loose gravel, some grippy dirt, good amounts of elevation, and the ever looming threat of vehicular tree plinko if you went off the side.  I was feeling really good right from the start, and we pushed pretty hard out of the gate- the reward was the fastest regional 2wd time, a loose rear bumper, and a whole lot of greenery stuffed into the front of the car:

I ziptied the bumper back on, noted that we'd lost a skidplate bolt, and we lined up for SS9, McQueen Gap, another typical stage for this rally but with more elevation and a scary fast, loose downhill section right after cresting the highest point.  We pushed hard again, and were again rewarded with the fastest regional 2wd time.

Trevor Lyden photo:

The exhaust got louder at some point here, and the rear tires were almost done again, but it was time for the biggest, best stage of the rally, a 20 mile monster called Hellbender for SS10.  It starts with fast tarmac, then transitions to smooth, cambered, and even faster gravel, then progressively gets rougher and tighter with another highly committed narrow tarmac section towards the end.  We pushed as hard as I've ever pushed here, including trips north of 100mph and lots of late braking, put another 10s on Bukky, and fully cooked our rear tires.  Back to service for some fresh ones.

At service, it was quickly discovered that the exhaust had multiple broken hangers and was pushed almost into the fuel tank, so Cam and I dropped it with some assistance from Tim and Sara and straightened it out reasonably well before reinstalling it with a lot of baling wire in place of hangers.  Baling wire was also used to secure the loose part of the skidplate, since the bolt was snapped off in the hole.

We did the tire rotation with fresh fronts again, and headed back out.

On SS11, Jacob's Creek, I was doing a lot of rock dodging and trying to keep my compromised exhaust on the car... and Bukky was doing the opposite to catch up, taking 14 seconds back and suddenly making the race very, very close again.  With our lead chopped back down to 2 seconds, we decided that conserving the car was no longer the priority.

On SS12 McQueen gap, we took every risk that seemed reasonable and managed to keep the exhaust still mostly attached, taking back that 14 second gap and then some.

Trevor Lyden photo:

The final regional stage, Hellbender SS13, was unfortunately shortened, and we had to transit the early part of it and start from what was mile 12 or so- this still made the stage a bunch of technical gravel with a skinny ribbon of bumpy tarmac for a mile or two in the middle, though, and it was still really fun.  We pushed hard yet again, snagging the fastest regional 2wd time just barely over Bukky, who we knew would be going as fast as possible too.  We stopped next to Bukky and DJ after the finish, checked times, laughed about the awesome battle we'd just had for two days, and transited to the final control together.

The result was good, obviously, but I was so happy to finally have a rally where we were able to really compete instead of dealing with my illness, and to have had such a great fight with friends the whole time.

On the podium, a long held grudge finally played out- Sara had absolutely doused Bukky in champagne at snodrift last year, and he was out for revenge:

And with this, we won regional L2wd, regional 2wd (including Open), and we locked up the Eastern Regional L2wd championship, although Sara is technically ineligible due to her national events this year.  Dylan and Zack won the regional overall, with Andrew and Julia (Bit by Bit/Rustbucketlegacy) taking third overall, an impressive feat given that last year this very event was their first ever rally.  Dan and Eric (War Weasel) were just behind them too.

And on the national side, Richo and Michelle managed to pull off the National L2wd title despite their whoopsie on day 1- reentering and finishing from there was enough to lock it in for them.

Back to the house for shenanigans and good times, including Adam Brock (volunteering as CRO for this event) dropping by to join the fun.

I wish we could do this every weekend, I feel like I'm finally getting decent at it.  Huge thanks to the organizers, volunteers, friends, competitors, and the many many people who blur all of those categories together.

Congratulations!! Looks like an aweseome weekend.

Well done.

Some more awesome photos from....

Andrew Wolbert:

Zachary Kitz:

And a whole pile from Trevor Lyden:

Rally action shots of this car will never get old. 

That makes me think, are you considering a new, wild color scheme/livery for the open car? I like black cars, but that epicness needs some flash to compliment it. 

In reply to AWSX1686 (Forum Supporter) :

I really like the rainbow gravel tread that I painted on my helmet- maybe something along those lines but not sure.

In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :

A euro-style racing stripe in the gravel pattern would look phenomenal...

Car is washed for the first of many times and up in the air for a damage assessment.  Skidplate has seen better days but that wire we put on it was still holding:

The exhaust is going to need some serious reworking:

The diff temp reached an all-time high, probably not a good thing.  I've ordered a cheap finned cover from ebay:

I have a bunch of tires that look like this now:

And whatever we tapped with the rear bumper appears to have cracked this vent- these should go anyway, they don't do anything useful and are always a potential dust/dirt/mud/water intrusion hazard:

Struts cleaned and regreased:

This one is bending a little each rally but it's near the top so I'm going to live with it for now:

Welded a nut to the remaining skidplate bolt to extract it from this subframe brace thing, and then applied hammer to re-straighten it:

Repainted the rockers and various underbits that got gravel blasted- rustoleum professional is great at this, my prep is just powerwashing the dirt off:

And moved the car to give the truck a checkover- any time we use the truck for recce I make sure to go through it and make sure nothing is broken, even at 20mph rally stages can do some damage and it's better to discover it at home than on the next tow:

Thanks for the entertaining write-up.  Congrats on another great rally!

In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :

How are the new springs on the tow pig working out?

In reply to Recon1342 :

They're excellent- towing is smoother and we bottomed out a lot less on recce, loaded with all our stuff. We cooked one of the rear Bilsteins but that's probably reasonable for the 40k of relatively exciting use they have on them.

Congrats! Thank you for the recap!

Dropped the diff:

Everything looked fine in there and the solid pinion spacer seems to be keeping the backlash where it should be:

The cheapy ebay aluminum cover seems pretty well made, except for two things.

1- this splash shield for the vent had nothing to keep it from rotating, so I bent the corner in so it couldn't self-loosen since it only has one fastener:

2- the plugs in the bottom (presumably for a cooling loop if needed) came with crappy o-rings and no locking mechanism, so I opted for an excessive amount of loctite thread sealant instead.  If these loosen or leak at all I'm going to figure out something better to keep them sealed:

The fins on the cover take up some more space so I had to extend the diff skidplate:

A new temperature sticker which will hopefully never get as hot as the old one, and we're good to go:

Replaced the reverse light switch since it was getting really finnicky:

Remade the whole center section of the exhaust- it now stays 2.5" for about 2' more than before, then necks down to 2.25" and does the fun wiggle into the pancaked section that has to go under the subframe:

Doing fluids and filters, discovered some greenery all the way in the air filter- this seems like a bit of a nothing, but I've really been working on cutting into the weeds where it's safe to do so so it's nice to see that I'm doing it enough to collect some samples right in the middle of the car:

Also found something slightly disconcerting- a crack near the driver's side lower control arm on the subframe.  I think this was from the same rock that did in the exhaust, but if I see a single other indication that the rear subframe is fatiguing I'll replace the whole thing:

Welded it up and will keep a close eye on it:

And cleaned the interior- we collected plenty of dust at this one:

With Sara off at LSPR this past weekend, what to do with a championship winning rally car?  Grocery runs, obviously:

And how'd Sara do out at LSPR?  Well, despite a string of drivetrain issues for the Fiesta this year, they managed to snag second place in the national L2wd championship, primarily by winning the power stage at nearly every rally they competed in!