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  2. drKorf
    It is $40 for each additional crew member. I'm not going to this race. I'm interested to see how many people show up for it though.
  3. vtjballeng
    #307 Not Banned Yet Recap: As some of y'all may have heard, we were ready to roll and were doing some testing 2 weeks before the race at Summit Point Shenandoah. An element under the car was set incorrectly and dragged in the carousel, punting us off into the wall. It was a low speed impact into the wire wall at 26mph and into the concrete at 13mph yet the driver walked away with a concussion. The drivers head did not appear to bounce on the frame and the g forces were low. Our guys pulled together to get the car back in one piece for the race and we made it to the race. @Wyatt was able to push ahead to get an early lead for us. We had a wing brace failure as some of our guys who didn't know any better repaired an older brace with plastic sleeved cable. We should have replaced it before this race but didn't and it cost us some time. We had another alternator go. Heat, oil exposure, & vibration killed this one and we'll be crafting solutions to those issues. Our quickest mechanic was in the car at the time and it took almost 20 minutes to get all the parts, tools, etc together and fully affect repairs. Our drivers were having some trouble modulating the brakes as we were running longer lasting brakes and tires than typical for this 24hr event. The result was excessive flat-spotting by some drivers. The last driver in the car flat spotted them to extinction with a full blowout. These tires are normally good for 40hrs of racing, so the issue was pretty severe. We also had complaints of noise and fumes as our muffler was spewing it's packing material. We didn't take this seriously enough and found that our fuel rail had cracked. It appears it cracked due to a cantilevered fuel pressure sensor & block undergoing above spec vibration and fuel line weight. The leak sprayed onto the manifold, into the valley of our engine and then dripped back down the transmission. It then traveled across the exhaust with non-flammable lava rock based wrap which probably saved us from a major fire. We had just purchased a second hand pit box and had gone through much of our spares to get rid of obsolete items, etc. One of our guys removed the 2 spare fuel rails we have taken to every race because fuel rails don't fail . We took our lack of flammability as good fortune and called the rest of the race after 10.5hrs.
  4. ChumpScott

    12V Defrost units?

    ChumpScott replied to sporqster's topic in Technical Discussions

    OK, again, for those with the Frost Fighter, it looks like I can just use fused/relayed wires and standard insulated connectors and no need for the controller, correct?
  5. Ray Franck
    Yeah brother you never know ,cherish the time .
  6. red0
  7. Klenk
    RIP duck. If only I had known when I saw him on Friday.
  8. FlorahDorah
    We swapped out an engine from a Jetta in the paddock of Chuckwalla using our gas jug wagon and blocks of wood to raise the engine. Fortunately you can pull the front sub-frame free of the rest of the car. Still don't know why that Harbor Freight wagon didn't collapse under the weight of the engine. Adversity!!
  9. Slugworks Paul

    Aftermarket bumpers/body parts

    Slugworks Paul replied to Slugworks Paul's topic in Technical Discussions

    That was against the rules. It had to be (I believe) similar appearance (surface area, form) and similar thickess. In practice I actually witnessed a team get told that they couldn't skin the side of their car with sheet steel (even similar thickness) and were forced to buy a full set of doors, gut them, and then tack the skins to the side of the car. It was ridiculous. Of course I guess I'm not surprised that MR2 guys could do whatever (all while their base value plummeted) Yet another case of extremely selective enforcement, I guess.
  10. CBraden

    Another tire question?

    CBraden replied to espog's topic in Technical Discussions

    This is a cut and paste from another thread, but thought you might find it useful: We tested this on an admittedly outlier car for Champ (close to 10lb/hp), and found that on two very different courses we got similar results when comparing 225/50/16 on 8j vs 255/40/17 on 9.5j - the 255's are significantly (roughly ~1.5 to 2s per lap) faster. On a really bumpy track with somewhat rough braking zones in a couple of spots, we expected the much lighter 16 inch setup to be closer or faster, but it wasn't. The lighter smaller 16 inch wheels felt smoother and tracked better on the bumpy track, but lap times were still worse as the 17 inch setup provided more lateral grip in all the turns, acceleration should have been better on the 16's but it is very very subtle to the point of not being able to see it easily in the accelerometer data.. Given the ability to fit and afford 12j wheels it would be fascinating to test 305/335 to see if the lap times and wear improved further, but packaging and budget aren't going to allow that (at least for us). The larger 17" wheels/tires grip better, and last much longer, our testing has pointed to the larger setup in every quantitative measure, subjectively, some things are better on 16s, but for racing, there is no question for our application. Interestingly because of the wear rate of the 225s, the larger tires are cheaper to run in 16/24 hour events because we can get a full event from them, where we can't expect same from 16's. I am not at all sure that on a Miata you will see the same results as wheelspin and braking are not as big of a factor in tire wear on a <200lb car, and any hit on acceleration will be more noticeable (maybe - I was wrong about being able to see a difference in our tests on that). Based on our tests and articles on the topic, I would be inclined to think a 225 on a 9" rim would go ~1 sec/lap (245 on a 10 even more so) faster, but not sure if you will see much benefit on an 8" rim. Probably lose some steering feel and the peak grip would likely have less steep approach and drop off. 225 on an 8" for us felt smooth and a little less connected / it muted the (lower) peak grip vs the 255 on 9.5.
  11. Jab31169
    I may or may not have given that car the number 1 sign after it dive bombed me into 1 and came close to not making it. I saw ya, would of let ya get around pretty easy.
  12. Jab31169
    Man...what an experience, not the one we were looking for but we looked adversity in the face and kick it in the junk like a bunch of bad mother...you know what I'm talking about. Our trip started on loadout day when the running lights on the trailer decided not to work. Attempted to troubleshoot but no joy. Still, we got the trailer loaded up Wednesday night so we could leave out earlier than we planned Thursday so we could spend the night in ATL. Got up Thursday and headed for VIR. Arrived around 3:30pm, met up with the renters and got our game plan together. Got the trailer unloaded, and it was then when I realized our garage number was 13...and one of our pit lane rooms was number 13....but we press on. Grab a bite at the Oak Tree Tavern and head back down to the paddock which was jamming. Props to Racebar guys, you put on a hell of a show. I dont know who the RV with the sound system was in the back of the paddock but you guys were jammin out as well. Great atmosphere for sure. Most of us went to bed early while visions of top 15 danced in our heads.... Wake up at 6am and get started moving into pits and getting the car ready for practice. Had plans to get our 3 renters in the car so they could feel it out. We spent the time between daytona and now rebuilding the motor and diff. We also had to change both front brakes a few days before the race as they were pretty much locked up. So we sent our crew chef/head honcho Jack out to test the car. He comes in complaining of a womp womp womp noise and thinks its driveline related. I don't find anything making noise but I did burn the crap out of my arm. I also find a very large oil leak off the front of the motor. We change the vanos line and send out the next renter. Black flag after 3 laps and renter comes back in. Oil still leaking, cam position seal is just not there. We also put a new seal on the PCV off the valve cover. Both of those seem to fix our oil leak issue. Everything else seems to be great. Our ringer renter says the car feels great and feels much faster than his previous stints in the car (Previous motor had ZERO compression on cylinder 3). Practice ends and we head to the drivers meeting ready to start our race. I felt really good about finding the leaks and getting them under control before the race. Mike picks pretty close to the worst number for pole and we are starting 88th. Cant win them all I guess. We get our ringer renter in the car and send him out to start. Green drops and he starts making up spot after spot. Throws down a 2:22 and we are pumped. Top 15 for sure!! We get comfy in our chairs and start thinking about strategy and how we can keep this going. At lap 8 we've moved up to 32nd and we are still climbing. After 10 laps of racing we get the call you never want to get..."motor is down on power and making a terrible noise". He brings it into the pits and we pop the hood, no new vents are in the block, everything looks as it should. Oil seems a bit thin...real thin actually. Tell him to start it and drive it back to the garage...it wont start and it sounds like marbles being shaken in a can. We got it pushed back to the garage and start pulling the valve cover off. Everything looks good that we can see. Drain the oil....has a little bit of magic dust in it and the smallest layer of water on top. Seems the headgasket failed and let some water into the oil and we had a main or rod bearing failure. We start pulling plugs and we find out that one of the valve cover washers has fallen right on top of one of the spark plugs and its the perfect fit to keep you from getting the plug out. Takes us an hour to finally get it out and it was about at that time we were just about to call it quits and drink every beer we had. One of our renters, who is from Charlotte, mentions off hand he has a m50 at his house on a stand. We were told the motor had 230,000 miles on it, the original head gasket, but it rain when it was pulled. I see that crazy look in Jack's eye and I know whats about to happen. We send one owner and two renters to retrieve the motor/stand/and hoist while jack, myself and one renter stay back to get the car ready for the transplant. Just the drive is a 3 hour round trip and they also have to stop for other items we need such as oil and a pilot bearing puller. its probably close to 2:30-3pm when we get started pulling the front end off the car. We have the old motor ready to come out in less than an hour. We start prepping everything else for the transfer. They show up with the motor at 8:30pm and we get it unloaded and start pulling the bad motor out. Get everything swapped over and have the new motor in and ready to start at 11:45pm. Fires up the first crank and that glimmer of hope is back. We were garaged with the Chandler school teams and they were great. Those kids were asking great questions and telling even better stories. I had to apologize a few times for our terrible language but they were very understanding and I think they cheered louder than we did when the motor started. We send the renters upstairs to get ready and we button up the rest of the motor and get it ready to rock. We ended up back on track at 12:28am in 96th place and we kept our fingers crossed. We start ticking off laps and the motor runs like a top. Burns a little oil but hell, its running. We make it through the night with no major issues. One of our renters was so tired he forgot what fog looked like and kept calling in talking about dust in certain parts of the track. One renter ended up getting a little too hot and had to cut his stint short. Our third renter did great and was nice enough to let us know every time he passed the cobalt in his stint. Our pit stops were pretty relaxed and we just took our time. Tried to stay out of the way of the really fast guys and not mess up anyone's race. I got in the car sometime around 7:45 and I was really tired. The first few laps I felt kinda of lost but I pulled it together and had a great time. Hated to see the SRI car take that hard hit at south bend. That felt like the longest yellow ever. @Rapido Had a great time playing lead/follow with the hugh jass miata until his brakes gave up a bit. @Snake @MoparBoyy@Snorman Also had a good time playing with the Inactive car as well later in my stint. Saw a lot of good driving, saw some bad stuff but its to be expected after 22 hours of racing. I had a few clean laps and put down a respectable time. I was 4 seconds faster than last year so I felt really good about that. We put our last owner in and told him to take us to the finish. At the end, we had clawed back up to 70th place and it felt great. We put in a ton of work and got everyone seat time. That post race beer never tasted better. All it all, it was a great trip and a great event. We still have yet to fully complete a 24 so congrats to those who have, it is most def very hard to do. We had a great team of renters who rocked out and rolled with the punches. Im really glad we decided to keep the rooms til Monday, no way we could of loaded up and driven back. We ate lunch/dinner and crashed out before I woke up and drank some beers and talked poop with @pintodave while we got to see all the sweet IMSA cars rolling in. @Huggy I'll bring more beer next time or you can just come down to Barber and we'll swap some more. Thanks for a great event guys! See ya at Barber!! TLDR: Motor exploded, We Replaced it, We Rock
  13. Ray Franck
    I'm hearing ya ,not the only thing that will change on that car . Not in the rule book but as a saftey issue it will be addressed..
  14. Today
  15. SonsOfIrony
    Looks like a lifetime ban may have been an underreaction. If someone dies due to some belligerent off track behavior that could easily mean the end of any chance at renting that track ever again, and looks bad for all amateur endurance racing series. Not to mention the possibility of hikes in insurance and track rental costs that would surely trickle down to entry fees.
  16. Rokk
    I do all my own maintenance for mine and friends vehicles. I've built several cars, lots of motorcycles. No welding experience. Pretty much anything else from body work to engine rebuilds I can do. Driven over 200 autocross events, countless trophies. Done about 10 HPDE weekends in both a 2008 STI and a 2008 M3. In the advanced class with Chin motorsports At barber, PCA and ReZoom. No open WTW experience, but thats why I am here. Looking for it. I do have about 6000plus hours on simulators at various tracks around the USA. Ranked top 14 nation wide on GTS currently. Your welcome to look it up. I have track experience at NCM, NOLA, Raod ATL, Barber and Sebring. Live in Memphis TN, but willing to travel for race weekends or build days if needed.
  17. Rokk Rokk joined the community
  18. jmcfarland

    Mazda Protege $2950-just lowered

    jmcfarland replied to jmcfarland's topic in The Source for Cars, Parts & Services

    Since the car is not in my immediate possession (at my buddies house) here's what I do know.1990 Protege LX1.8 DOHC 16 valve Escort GT HeaderJust installed a 2.5" exhaust with free-flow resonator and racing mufflerNew batteryNRG suede steering wheelNRG quick release Adjustable coil-over sleeves with unknown strutsOne complete set of racing wheels and tiresSet of mounted rainsI think 2 extra wheelsKirkey seatFront camber adjustersWeapon R cold air intakeI do have a transponder that can be negotiated into the deal at extra cost.
  19. Bill Strong

    Official - 2018 Thompson Speedway 12-Hour

    Bill Strong replied to Bill Strong's topic in Race Events

    updated
  20. chip
    well that may be true, but this one a doctor/drugs/booze can't fix...
  21. Doc
    Chip...You have far more issues than that my friend...😅
  22. Doc
    I take notes. A man has to know his weaknesses.
  23. chip
    Did anyone have any issue with the rear window decal on the Tic Tac car? I found it almost unsafe when following very closely as you could not see thru the car. I would have to pull to one side or the other when setting up to pass to check for traffic ahead of us.
  24. FlorahDorah
    You did remember!
  25. Doc
    Yes, he was doing a piece on the Racebar team. He has a video series on FB called "What We Do"
  26. Huggy
    Hey now, I offered you and chance the opportunity, can’t help it if your too chicken or busy doing some other poop like defending freedom or whatever.
  27. Hurljohn
    I cant help it if he spells his own name wrong Doc..
  28. FlorahDorah
    Yes someone doing a documentary? @Doc and @TAlexander interviewed him, but I'm sure Doc won't remember too much - being pretty much sleep-deprived. Hell I can't remember much and I'm not sleep-deprived, just old.
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