What’s the verdict? Are you bottomed out over 5mph from the massive
d
o
w
nforce???
What’s the verdict? Are you bottomed out over 5mph from the massive
d
o
w
nforce???
In reply to jfryjfry :
I was told that one of the pro drivers said he could definitely feel the downforce on his runs.
Ok, long overdue post - the challenge:
Before leaving, we almost finished our list.
But we figured a few more hours of sleep before a long drive was more important than the corner balance effort.
We drove uneventfully to Auburn Al and got in in time for a really nice home cooked meal and some great conversation. We did tarp over the open windows (mostly so no one would be tempted to reach in and grab one of our slicks or spares or something) while parked overnight. Also, we looked at the front suspension as we had a creaking we could hear as we drove. And to our 12 plus hours on the road selves it looked like we had broken the shocks. One had lost the bottom bolt, and both looked to be bent like they had bottomed out. SHOOT!
We decided not to worry about it and go to sleep.
Next day we got on the road figuring that the car could still ride behind (flat towing) with blown shocks. If we replaced them, we thought we'd likely just bottom out the new pair and ruin them too. So we drive.
On the way down, I frantically checked a shock spec website looking for shocks with similar top and bottom mounts but slightly shorter than what we had. Found that the rear shocks on a 1980 Corvette would fit the bill. And the pep boys one exit down from the hotel had them in stock. For $40 each. So we stopped there on the way to the hotel. We also picked up the bolt we needed.
Upon arrival at the hotel, Ian got to work on the shocks. We learned 3 things:
1. We had not fixed the rattle that had been happening all summer that we thought was the header banging on the a arm mount. Oops.
2. That the radiator had taken a rock on the way down and was showing signs of weeping. Dang it.
3. That the shocks were not bent or blown at all. Phew.
So Ian replaced the shock bolt with Stampies help, I fixed the rattle by asking Andrew Nelson what was rattling and watched him identify it and fix it with a prybar in about 63 seconds.
And we decided with eaataidetim and others that the radiator was either gonna hold water or it wasnt, but it wasn't coming out of the car Thursday night.
So we got on to applying our visual package (4 10ft x 1ft rolls of vinyl in different colors cut into 4x4 inch squares placed in a hockey stick configuration on the car and on the end of the wings). We cut all the squares on the drive down with dollar store scissors - we both quickly learned that driving the rig was much better than cutting. We also stained the wings. We had a great time sitting with poopshovel figuring out how to throw "wood is good" into conversation as often as possible .
Next morning was the race. We had our breakfast, drove over to the track, and started the long process of attaching all of our aero to the car (we flat towed with the wings inside the van). Stampie helped a great deal here too, as well as nonack and a few others.
We passed tech and decided to get a run in. Car was bogging in the corners. And the motor died and wouldn't restart. Grr. We had fixed these sorts of things earlier in the summer so we wouldn't have to do it during the race, oh well.
So we swapped the battery with the one in the minivan (luckily the were the same, but dangerous move to potentially wreck your tow vehicle battery). And went back out. Bogging worse. Two of six autocross runs gone.
At this point Dallas had come over to help with the bogging. He noticed the fuel pressure was reading 0 (that'll do it). We checked the fuel pump was running, and then we started adjusting the pressure regulator. We did get the pressure to come up, but the gauge was now bouncing. Hmmm. Oh well, maybe a junk regulator. We got fuel now, send it!
Still bogs. Probably worse than before. Crap. Now we're adding fuel even though we know the tank shouldn't be empty, and we start dicking with float bowl level and timing and all sorts of other things we had already tuned correctly. We should not have been doing this but we weren't thinking straight. I took it for the 4th run. Worst bogging yet.
Pressure was on now. We wanted to give the pro two runs to learn the car before our last scoring run. Nonack mentioned to Ian that the bouncing fuel pressure seemed really wrong. We thought about that for a minute and decided nonack was probably right. So I ripped out the fuel filter while stampie collected the leaking fuel in his armpit. (Thats taking one for the team!!)
BAM. THAT was the issue. Can ran great now, but we had to reset the fuel pressure, timing, float levels, etc. Running out of pro driver time.
Had the keys to pro driver. Tell him about the car and that everything works but the trans is E36 M3ty. Car goes out, slow, dies on course. Oh no. 5 runs gone. Bring the car back in and learn the car got stuck in first gear and died on course while trying to shift. Wouldn't restart.
So we nursed the car back to life in the pro driver staging lane and put the same driver back in. "Launch in second and don't touch the clutch after that" i even put the car in second for him after he got strapped in.
He clicked off a 46.9. ftd was 43.9 I think so within 3-4 seconds of ftd on basically one try using only second gear. We went from dejected to thrilled in a single moment. We went back to the pit to remove the aero in preparation for the drags.
A short while later we discovered that our nitrous line was burst. Crap. Luckily Patrick and Calvin Nelson has enough spares to help us out (I have your stuff guys I'll mail it to you soon). We added the drag slicks, did some final checks, and grabbed dinner.
That's a lot for now I'll add more to the story later.
That's a lot of excitement for one autocross session!
In reply to Robbie :
It was fun hanging out you guys for the weekend. The best part was seeing how your two personalities are different but y'all just meld together into a team.
I did not realize you were having so many issues, but glad you worked through them.
slowbird said:That's a lot of excitement for one autocross session!
Too much excitement, if you ask me!
Stampie said:In reply to Robbie :
It was fun hanging out you guys for the weekend. The best part was seeing how your two personalities are different but y'all just meld together into a team.
Thanks! Ian absolutely is a good influence on my wrenching/ racing.
stafford1500 said:I did not realize you were having so many issues, but glad you worked through them.
Me too. We were getting really beat up emotionally about it before the 6th autox run. High highs and low lows. But you keep working and eventually something will fall your way.
That's the racing "spirit" haha
Well, had a very long post all typed out and then lost it because my phone ran out of battery right as I was hitting post. Grr.
We left our two heroes shortly after the autocross. Next step was preparing for the drag strip. Off with the wings, on with the nitrous! And drag slicks.
We also had to fix the headlights, so while Ian connected the bottle and nitrous line, I worked on figuring out why headlights that worked a few months ago were now inop. Fortunately I was able to quickly diagnose the issue as a missing fuse. Not blown, mind you, but missing. Who does that? Take a fuse out, look at it, and leave it out? Maybe put it back in the wrong spot? Either way, I didn't think I was that dumb but I'm pretty much the only person who could've done it. Either way, easy fix. I just grabbed a different fuse from another position in the box and used it. (Maybe that's the habit that caused the issue in the first place... Couldn't be).
Next hurdle was the nitrous. The line was leaking. Doh! Luckily we were able to source a couple of short pieces of line from Patrick, and a union from Calvin to get function and not leaking again. Ready for drags we went and enjoyed some BBQ.
After BBQ we got to watch some really awesome machinery (both high and low dollar) destroy some rubber. Nice. After that it was time to see what the AMC could do.
I doned the firesuit and we strategized that making a couple easy passes just to get a time was the right thing to do before nitrous. So I went to the line for my first run. I did an easy launch, basically taking off like I would at am agressive stop light. I was too late on the 1-2 shift and hit the limiter for a moment. Doh. 2-3 shift was good however and I was super stoked to see a 14.5 with a 2.1 60 ft.
Next we decided to go after a harder launch. If we got the 60ft time down we knew we could be really fast when it came time for nitrous.
Warm slicks. Prepped track. 3500 ish rpm of Ford 302 anger. And dumped the clutch. Came roaring out of the hole, and I nailed the 1-2 shift. This was going to be a fast run. I was excited. I got ready for the 2-3 shift, then disaster struck. The shifter was stuck in 2nd gear.
Like pull with both hands stuck. Like sword in the stone stuck. The car was going to finish the run in 2nd gear. So I coasted down to the finish. Grrr. But the 60ft was 1.9, so that might have just been worth a 13, totally NA. Which would have been sweet.
Anyway, back in the pits we checked the shift linkages, thinking that might be the problem. Nope, definitely stuck somewhere inside the trans. Well, with that we had to call it a night and go watch some jags hammer their rear tires.
Interestingly, when we moved the car to the concour pavilion at the end of the night (after it had the opportunity to cool), the trans came unstuck, imagine that.
More later:
