Was there on Sunday but never got the chance to come and talk and look round the car. Seemed to go well up the hill[emoji106] We left when the heavens opened.
Nope, just 888s. There wasn't any real standing water. Videos to come later. Thanks Pity, would have been good to see you. I nearly left then, but hung around and had a couple of runs, so pleased I did.
Videos of my first time up the hill. 2 dry runs, then one wet run. [video=youtube;QALNL8kzYRs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QALNL8kzYRs[/video] [video=youtube;HTspXWXpCNc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTspXWXpCNc[/video] [video=youtube;tN1IiyEJgSA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tN1IiyEJgSA[/video]
The video makes it look narrower than it is, but it's not wide. It's not too different to Curborough to be fair.
Retro Rides 2015 I'd found about Retro Rides being at Shelsley a few weeks ago, and was really keen to attend, as I'm looking at options for racing next year. I also wanted to see how badly the car torque steered, as it's not the best on B roads. Too much throttle, and the diff and torque will try to throw you in the nearest hedge. However, the gearbox was with Mart getting repaired, and I needed to replace the tubular suspension arms as they'd bent again. A few weeks was plenty of time though. Right? Fast forward to the Thursday before, and the gearbox was in the kids' playroom, and the suspension arms were, er, somewhere. I had also arranged for the sign man to come around on Friday morning to fit the stickers that were going on the car. I got him to do it, as I'd ruined a couple on the front bonnet already. However, if I wanted to get him to fit the spare one I had to the bonnet, I had to fit the gearbox, so that I could remove the engine support and refit the bonnet. That was in the garage. Thursday evening I fitted the box with some help from John, and then refitted the bonnet. Friday morning the stickers went on, Friday evening I fitted the suspension arms, and Saturday morning I finished all the little jobs off. I then took it for wheel alignment, and it was ready. Ish. The camber wasn't that close, and the passenger side wheel isn't aligned properly, but it was fairly straight. Sunday morning I was up at 6:30, as I wanted to be there by 8:30 to avoid the worst of the queues. It wasn't too bad, but I had to park in the field, which was a long way from the pits. I bumped in to Jason (Mr Hillclimber) as he turned in to unload the car from the trailer, and then made my way down to the pits to see about buying a ticket for the afternoon session. However, it was now 9am, and they had a couple of no shows, so I was able to nab a morning slot. I hot footed it back to the car, but couldn't get up the wet grass with 888s on. They sent me down to the bottom of the hill, and let me through some tape. The marshals were fantastically helpful, polite but firm, thanks for giving up your time. Round to the pits, and straight in to the back of the queue. There were two batches of cars, and I was in the first batch, so literally went straight up the hill. I didn't have time to fit the camera. I was really nervous, but having spectated a few times, I was confident I knew where the track went, I just had to take it easy. The car was awesome. Shelsley is quite smooth, so it suited the car well. I was buzzing at the end of the run. As I was the last car up the hill, I didn't get a chance to get out the car to chat people. There was turbo charge V8 Morgan (I think, not sure), as well as a 1930s car that sounded ridiculous. We were all sent back down, so the second group could run. I parked in the pits under one of the shelters. Jason came over to chat, and we had a good catch up. Soon it was time for my second run. However, the car wouldn't start! It's been acting up every now and then, so the crank position sensor may be on it's way out. I've been meaning to pick up a spare from the office, but keep forgetting. This wasn't good. I got out the lap top, and had a look at the crank oscilloscope, but it was fine. After a few minutes, I noticed the fuel pump wasn't primimg. I swore at myself, and refitted the fuel pump relay, which I always take out as a security measure. The car fired up straight away, and I was again able to join right at the back of the queue. I pushed on a bit more this time, getting a better launch, but still leaving plenty of room for error. Again, I went straight back down the hill, so didn't have a chance to look at any of the cars, or chat to the other drivers. Chatted a bit again, and then it was time for the third run. As I queued up, I thought I'd try and get an afternoon session as well. They had a couple of slots left, so I paid up. I pushed a bit too hard off the line, so got too much wheel spin, and also didn't get great lines through the esses at the top, but the video shows a 36.X run, which I'm happy enough with for my first effort. I wasn't at the back again this time, so I had a chance to chat with a couple of the other guys at the top of the hill. I had a look around the 1930s car, which was a 2.4 litre 2 cylinder v-twin making around a 150bhp, and some 400lbft of torque. The valve springs were external, and the gearbox was open, literally directly under the seat. He lifted up a the cushion and a piece of plywood, and the engagement mechanism was right there. Bonkers. Back down the bottom of the hill, and into the pits. I then went to get some lunch. While I was eating, I could see down the valley, where a very big black cloud was visible. Hmmm, this didn't look good. Slowly the hill dissolved in to a white mist. I momentarily thought of running back to the pits, but decided not to bother, as I was under a gazebo. I'm glad I didn't, as the rain arrived moments later, and it was torrential. People dived for cover under the gazebo, and within 60 seconds everyone out in the field was drenched. I waited until it eased off, and then headed back to the pits, where I bumped in to Jon (foxy on here). We had a good chat. I've not seen him for years, but we'd been to the Ring a couple of times. I wasn't sure about running up the hill in the wet, as 888s and hard suspension don't lend themselves to wet tracks, but I decided to give it a go. There was a surprising amount of grip available, and I really enjoyed myself. I did a second run as well, and then decided to call it a day, as the rain wasn't going anywhere, and now had wet feet. I went to get a drink, and then bumped in to Adrian (Phat Ass on here). We had a good chat and catch up as well. He's started a photography/videography business, and had some amazing footage of cars launching off the line, including some of Jason's car. I then got my drink and drove home steadily. The car was brilliant all day, and I'm really excited about racing next year now. I still have a lot of plans for this car, but I think I'm going to race the Audi A3 instead. However, that may not be ready for the start of the year, so I may just potter about in the Golf to get used to things, and then get the Audi out when it's ready. If you ever think of going to Retro Rides, I can highly recommend it.
I have a couple of bits I want to sort before the weekend. My wife and kids are away from Wednesday to Sunday, so I have some time to myself. Part of that willl be used to work late, but I should be able to get these bits done as well. I've ordered some Mk3 5 stud wishbones to move the wheels forward. This is how they were when I was running the tubular suspension arms. I'll need to modify them to fit the 4 stud ball joints, so will see how far I get with those. If I do get them done, I'll be able to move the top mounts to give me some more steering axis inclination. I want to measure the scrub before and after. I'll just do this by turning wheels and seeing where the marks on the tyres are. If I can't get the arms fitted, I need to sort out the alignment of the pax side arm. In the rush to get the car together, I didn't get it straight, so the wheel sits back in the arch. I've been meaning to Velcro the ECU and cover down for months now, so will get this done this week.
So, Curborough. I'd planned on doing a bit of work to the car, but didn't get around to anything major. Saturday started far too early, as the neighbours decided to party until 5:30am. This meant not much sleep, and an early start. I was third at the track, even after stopping for fuel. I was looking forward to the day, as the car has been more and more reliable. I wanted to play around with suspension settings, and had a good starting point to work from. The first couple of runs felt very ragged, so I used the 4 morning sessions to get used to the car and track. I chose tyre pressures based on previous experience and monitored them after each run, and then left them as they settled. I started at 24 cold on the front, and settled on 28 hot. The rear I kept around 28 as well. Despite feeling very different, each run was within 0.25 seconds, so I was consistent. The car had zero mid corner traction, and I was really strugglng with understeer. After lunch, I wanted to experiment with left foot braking. I'd never tried it much, and wanted to use it to both add temperature to the front brakes, and also see if i could use it to help reduce the front understeer mid-corner. It would be fair to say it takes a bit of getting used to. First run after lunch, and my first lap was going really well, I'd had a good run up until the last right hander. I then braked with both feet, but also both pedals. Needless to say I didn't make the final corner, and almost ended up in the bushes, but managed to slow down enough to miss them, and get back on the track at the top entrance. Second run, I got the whole lap right, until I needed to change to third coming down the straight, at which point I stamped on the clutch. Oh, that's the brake pedal still. Nope, can't change gear like that. Oh well, two wasted laps time wise, but lots learned! During the rest the afternoon I played around with damping. After a bit of advice from RobT, I softened the front and rear damping. It was full hard all around, so I went down 5 clicks. There are 31 in total. The car was better mid corner, but it was now oscillating when using the curbs. This meant the damping was too soft for the springs. I tried a few different combinations, and the car was better. The rears were now maxed out, but the front needed to go higher on the damping. This means that I have reached the limit of the current suspension, so I will need to look at the next step later in the year. With the suspension tweaking finished, it was time to play with wheel offsets. Changing the front offset will alter the scrub. I had run no spacers until this point on the front, and 5mm spacers on the rear. After chatting to Gurds, I went to 10mm on the rear. For the first time ever, I was able to make the rear move in the long right hander before coming on to the straight. I then added 10mm spacers to the front. The initial on power traction was better, but then it got much worse. By now it was nearly the end of the day. A random conversation with Gurds and Ram suddenly highlighted that every single FTD was done in the first three runs of the day. Both mine and Gurds's quickest time of the day had been our third run, and I had noticed that this was always the case for me. I also realised that Prawn's quickest time had been his first lap of the day, which was after lunch. The only thing that had changed since then on where the set up was now, was tyre pressures. I quickly softened the fronts back down to 24, and upped the rears to 32. I went out and ran an identical time to my quickest session of the morning, which pleased me no end, as I'm usually a good half second slower by then. At the end of all that, I'd managed to secure second fastest time of the day, and also a new personal best around Curborough. I'd also finally managed to beat Prawn, so a productive day personally. However, Gurds has massively raised the bar, and I'm even further behind him than I was before. A massive thanks to RobT for bringing his scales along. I finally got an accurate measurement of the car, and it weighs in at 897kg with roughly half a tank of fuel. Front to rear weight split is 68/32 which was expected. However, the LR to RF is 51%, which is pretty good. Actual values are: LF: 299 RF: 311.5 LR: 154.5 RR: 131.5 I'm quite pleased with that, but it can all be improved. I have no other track days booked this year, but am hoping to squeeze in a weekend day before the end of the year. I'll upload the videos tomorrow hopefully.
great write up GoKarts are a good way to get a handle on the left foot brake, it takes some getting used to.
