16th Sept Race

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Well we were back racing again yesterday after a 2 race gap whilst modding and upping the spec of the ibiza. It always seems no matter how long you give yourself to get the jobs done it always ends up to the 11th hour & rushing about. Same here this time.

Collected the car from Custom Code/JBS on friday evening, getting home at 10pm the night before the race. Not much time to go over the motor and check anything out other than on race morning itself, which is usually a bit hectic.

A few hose issues (popping off) were niggling on the way home, with tired jubilee clips not being up to the job of the higher boost levels.

1st thing when we got to Combe before scrutineering was change the known dodgy hose connections which had plagued the journey home for some mikalor (type) clamps from merlin motorsport. (ker-ching$$).

Off we go out for quali, sat behind keith murray a4 so was hoping for a good comparison of the new found power i have.... as soon as we go on the gas, keiths boost hose to his throttle body blows off so he pulls to the side... DOH! so I go on the gas and................ bugger me, where's my silly boost gone?? eh?

This was going to be fun... my cosmic boost was not coming... barely getting to 20psi before dropping up and down from 10psi to 15psi to 20psi and misfiring on full chat as well. Damn! so much for qualifying with new power & boost. Slower and less powerful than before. The meeting was an MG meeting, with a bunch of "older, more oil dropping cars" should I say... boy was the track oiled up. Well slippery as I discovered several times, cars going off all over, me on the lock stops several times when it snatched mid corner.

Aside from the power hike, the suspension was very different this time also, and this was the first time driven in anger, so no real idea what it would be like, or time to get used to it. 10mins quali is not a place to test. Anyhows its seemed ok, but I need to learn it. Its an improvement from previous and not too bad over the bumps despite the high poundage I am now running at the rears, with the fronts down a little on last time. Lots of grip in the tyres, but me too chicken to expore it on the day. Need more seat time in a stable package to get into the groove. I think now we have a good base tho suspension setup wise. We will have to see.

Upshot of quali with the weird missing and erratic boost was P19! with a tardy 1m22s lap time. Oh well, race will be interesting from back there.

Missing boost was traced down to of all things the vacuum pipe to the DV... which I know James told me to clip, but we had forgotten in the rush. Wired the hose to the DV with the loan of Mark Harrisons tools (thankyou) and drove off out of the circuit to see if all was back... and Woohoo, yep. sorted. Cosmic boost was back.

During the break between quali and our race (10.30am quali, 3.30pm race) we proceeded to buy a shed load of mikalor clamps to replace all the jubliee clips I had (old and new) just to ensure the hoses were as tight as we could get em. Many thanks to Tony & Nige for obliging is crawling around over and under the motor in doing this whilst I ran back & forth to Merlin exchanging clamps for correct sizes as we moved thru the system pipework.

Race time... out on the grid, back in 19th, great view of the start lights from back there, lol. I still always think its so closely packed on the grid, I am surprised we dont all crash off the start line. 5 lights count up then OFF, we go... I make an average start loosing out one place immediately to a pug 205 who had traction where I was spinning up.. Into quarry, boy is it busy... easing onto the gas, pass a couple out of quarry from sheer grunt, tiptoe thru chicane, again thru old paddock, pass a couple more into tower, and settle into a bit of space, chasing down the cars in front.

more of the same, laps go by I blast past the cars in front, now I have power... not 100% power as the n75 valve clearly seems to not like trying to control this turbo... fluctuating boost levels throught the race, but higher (and silly high at times) so power was there.

More than a few cars were blowing up, dropping oil, **** it ws slippery from quarry thru to tower, not knowing where there was or was'nt grip. A white focus was dead & oily smokey, as was a metro just further down by old paddock.

It was dawning on me that I could smell burning, but I could'nt work out if it was the dead smoking focus/metro's I was passing or something closer to home...

We were running driver to pits phone (bluetooth earpiece) so as I drove by I shouted over if they could see anything on fire on my car, as I could smell burning.. they could'nt hear me so another lap and me shouting down the phone, "I can smell burning, am i on fire boys!" - "no" was their reply...

The cabin looked a bit hazy inside, so something was definately amiss. Still blatting on and now in P8 chasing the 2 in front... more smoke inside the car now, definately me and it smelt bad.. 2 cars in front easy meat at the rate I was catching........ smoke in the cabin worse, window down to clear it, my left foot feeling hot too.. can easily catch the 2 in front and pass em I know, smoke... thinks.... race or catch fire.... [sensible pill kicks in] Damn... I pull in on next lap into pits. We had got up to P8 from P19 in 6 laps with plenty more to be had... but common sense prevailed..

I pull into the pits and the guys pop the bonnet up looking for flames/fire, but nothing obvious other than a milding glowing turbo housing (1st time I have seen it glow at all), but smoke inside was continuing... We though maybe it was the inner cv gaiter which looked like it was spitting out some grease onto the DP perhaps, but nothing looked alight as we could see.

I said drop the hood, I'm getting back out there to at least finish and get my signature, so back in, belt back up, and head back out driving past the red light at the end of the pitlane.. ****, did I just do that? oh ho.... check mirrors, cars approaching I stay slow and on my side of blend line, but I cocked up and should'nt have run the red light.. Off I proceed, and continue for a lap and chequered one greets me on the next.. oh well a finish, and an additional spare lap to cool things off from heat soaking. When I pull back in, a marshall hands me a still smoldering piece of sound proofing stuff with silver backing which had fallen off the bottom of my car when I had pulled into the pits earlier.. Its the stuff the car has by the bulkhead close the the DP area.. Hmmm well closer look there will confirm that I think. More heatshielding/wrap req'd. (nothing on DP is wrapped at the mo)

I return to the paddock and Tony tells me I ran the red light and the official wrote it down and went running off to tell someone. Woops.. couple of minutes later, I get called to clerk of the course.. Oh dear!

Up with the clerk, he calls me into a room and I say to him "I ran the red light at the end of the pits did'nt I", "yes" he says, "yea I am a complete **** for doing that", "yes" he says, "saves me telling you that" he says. lol. I told him I was a bit distracted from thinking I was on fire, but it was no excuse and was sorry.. "you wont be doing that again then will you" he said, to which I obviously said "nope" & "sorry again". Thats fine and off I went... and got my signature and no endorsement either. Phew!

Well the result was dead last, lol, but the cars performance was step changed. Qualify well and race trim, it bodes very well for a great last race in a few weeks time.

The cars scarey.... acceleration and traction is superb, despite the power its running, so I am pleased the spec I came up with has met with a tractable race car on road tyres. Some fiddling to be done on heat management, N75 or other boost control valves which can cope with my boost levels and we're now able to compete I think with the best of classB cars. Not the complete package as handling remains worse than the top cars, my own driving remains under parr in not knowing or feeling confident in it yet, but for now I will stop the suspension fiddling, and try to get more seat time to hone the driving to the package. Its a base now I think to consolodate on for a bit.

I have to say big thankyou to Custom Code/JBS, James, Kev et al, nige, tony for all their help before and on the day. I cant do it on my own, so big thanks from me.

Overall well pleased, ok not with the result, but better to not have lost the car from fire (I was thinking of poor Paul's scoob when it cought on fire a few races ago when mine was smoking) so consider myself lucky.

cheers folks.

see you next time

Bill

Its a shame you had to come into the pits for something that turned out to be nothing in the end but like you say its better to check than to leave it and risk your motor going up in flames,sounds like the cars getting better and hopefully you'll get the minor niggles sorted and be able to get out there and put in some good finishes,good luck

Its a shame you had to come into the pits for something that turned out to be nothing in the end but like you say its better to check than to leave it and risk your motor going up in flames,sounds like the cars getting better and hopefully you'll get the minor niggles sorted and be able to get out there and put in some good finishes,good luck

well it was smouldering so I think I did the right thing. Stripped some bits off it yesterday to have a look see and saw I have nearly melted thru both water pipes to turbo, so pulling was the right thing to do. relocation of pipes, some more heat shielding etc and of we go again in 3 weeks.

Where's the last race Bill?

Where's the last race Bill?

Castle Combe again (its their c'ship)

Sat 7th October is season finale

No help etc, but, speaking as an ex-(due to geography)marshall myself, if the pit exit is on the racing line, then it's in the wrong place, and if there's a blend line, the lane should only be closed in pace-car related situations.

Of course, that said, I also think that persistently putting wheels over the white lines at the trackside should be a drive-through offence!

pit exit has blend line and is close to racing line, on fastest section of circuit, so they choose to apply the red light, which I forgot... Stupidly tho, the marshall who operates the light is nowhere near the light, which does'nt help things. You cant see much when strapped in a race car, let alone to look out for whoever in orange is operating the thing. just my opinion, but the marshall operating it should be next to it in view to help things. I missed it knowing as I passed it I had goofed tho, so no excuses I cocked up, fair and square, but then was eagle eye'd on the mirrors to not pull out onto track until the cars had passed and I ensured I stayed within blend line.

oh well.. live and learn, but I agree with you on its application... your suggestion makes more sense to me.

Did you check for any loose bolts in the gearbox..........take no notice.

Did you check for any loose bolts in the gearbox..........take no notice.

you lost me m8.

:confused:

I did find all my inner CV bolts were loose on the drivers side driveshaft tho... which is scarey to think about.

All done up super tight now.. (cant think why they all came undone..)

Lots more heatshielding on there now and heat wrap on strategic parts of DP.

Found a problem with the internal wastegate which might explain the boost control fluctuations I saw too, so will have to see on that score. Sort of fixed I think for next race, but new exhaust housing needed really as its made to not be servicable! DOH!

I've seen people lose mandatory pitstop races (not at CC) because they had to follow a red light system like this.