That Ruled.

I had my best race yet and Snowspeeder ran like a champ for most of the race. The trip from Salt Lake was smooth sailing and got to enjoy the company of both Joe's Snowspeeder team and thh Knights Of The Round Track. This was among my favorite racing events.

Rain poured as we set up Friday, but skys cleared in the afternoon and we had great weather for the rest of the weekend.

During the race I accomplished my goal to keep the car on track and out of the penalty box. I probably deserved a couple flags for two wheels off and passing under yellow, but the workers either missed them or were too busy with more serious infractions. I felt great about my relaxed, defensive driving, and even managed to hold our team's fastest lap until Randal got his next turn.

Joe's car was pulling strong and the suspension felt perfect.

Mid-Sunday though, problems started. First we burned through our front brake pads and wrecked a caliper. Paul had a whole front hub/brake assembly for us and we were back out in minutes. Then Joe came in with a shaky wheel that turned out to be a rear axle snapped at the hub. The wheel was only held on by the brake caliper holding the rotor. I'm sure this was cracked back at an Altamont race and finally gave completely. Another spare from Paul again had us back on the track in minutes. Then we started overheating. We saw a lot of air under the cap and it looked like there must be a decent leak. We borrowed Eyesore Racing's weed-sprayer coolant injector and hooked it up the way we did in V-RAM at Buttonwillow, but this didn't help as much this time. Unfortunately by the time we recovered from our final overheat, the checker flag was flying and we were not allowed back on course to cross it. Dang!

Oh yeah, the officials noticed mid Saturday our transponder was not working. Shit. It would have been nice to have all of our lap data and to know how we actually placed. With a few hours of our most consistent driving unaccounted, we finished 78th or something. We'll try to figure how many laps to add and make a corrected guess at our actual finishing position.

We didn't get to pit by Team Eyesore this race, but we did have Snowspeeder, Knights, Killer Bee, and Free Range right in a row. It was also great to have the Nerd Herd MR2 and the Cannonball Bandits Corolla FX16 on the other side of us. As always all the teams I met were great.

A couple notable entries at this race: Team Diplomatic Immunity with a V12 Mercedes. They ruffled a lot of feathers with such a blatant cheater that was valued at $130000 when newish, but it was so over-the top I had to applaud them from bringing such a wrong car. They weren't very competitive so no harm done, and the organizers exercised the claiming clause to discourage anyone from trying to pull a stunt like that again.

Also there was another motorcycle powered econo-box (like the Geo Metro-Gnome project) and my fave at this race: A dinky Honda Z600 powered by a Magna V65 engine.

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New Buttonwillow Tech

A few people have asked for pics of our air scoop and on-board cooling system re-filler. Here are close-ups.

Fabbed this scoop from a cardboard box and attached it with sheet metal screws and washers, packaging tape, and a those two steel rods that originally supported the front wheel fender. It worked great and survived at least 4 off-road excursions.

When our overheating issue returned at the beginning of day one we considered our options. We decided to suffer through the day refilling the cooling system as needed implement a fix in the evening. After watching Paul do a 7 hour head gasket job only to still have overheating issues, we decided to it would be better to find a more effective way to refill and bleed the cooling system than tear the engine open.

I'd seen Team Eyesore's weed sprayer with a pressure fitting on their cooling system and suggested we copy them. Randal took it a step further and mounted the bottle in the cab so we could refill on the track. The pressure bottle feeds through a ball valve and into the heater circuit on the engine. We would pump the bottle a few times on the front straight and if we thought the engine was getting warm, we opened the valve for a few seconds. Not really a solution, but certainly an effective temporary fix. We didn't overheat again during the race!

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Buttonwillow Summary

How was Buttonwillow? Great! More details to follow but in a nutshell:

Joe and Randal left the Snowspeeder home for this race and drove V-RAM with me. We were also joined by Dan Barnes, a friend of the Eyesores who we met at Thunderhill last winter.

Overheating was not resolved. The new water pump helped but we were still getting air in the cooling system. Saturday Randal rigged a weed killer spray bottle to our cooling system (little idea we borrowed from Eyesore) and strapped it into the cab. We could pump water into the system while driving down the front straight. It worked GREAT and we didn't overheat once on day two.

We stayed up until 1AM replacing our pogo-sticks with new struts. They were an immense improvement.

I rigged a cardboard radiator scoop that was surprisingly durable.

We melted our ignition coil Sunday afternoon leaving Joe dead on the track right in front of the observation tower.

(That's all I have time for now. Pics and more details to follow.)

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Reno Fernley Race

We left Salt lake about 5:30 am. The drive was a breeze.

I never get used to the comedy, creativity and chaos found in the paddock. Being new to 24HL, my team was overwhelmed.

We got through tech and BS inspections without a hitch, set up our pit, and once the track was closed to cars we walked the course.

Joe's team had a great start. The starting flag dropped with them in second place. The moved up to #1 and held it for 25 laps. After that they started to see some of the weird ignition problems they had seen at previous races.




Like Thunder Hill last winter, our pit neighbors were Eyesore and Free Range. I was with my own team Volatile RAM and Joe was there with the Snowspeeder. Also Paul's car and team Knights Of The Round Track were there. Unfortunately Paul's car fried some bearing test day and didn't get to race.

Mark Jr started the race for us. He reminded me of me at my first race with his enthusiasm, and spinning out of control off the track. [sniff] I'm so proud.

Mark Z drove our second leg and our over-heating problem from V-RAM's first race last year returned and plagued us the remainder of the race. It took us out of competition, but with the pressure off we could just relax and have fun.



We all managed to take few black flags. The Judges were very generous to us though and usually just sent us to switch drivers and

Eyesore finished first place overall. I attribute their success to a brilliantly innovative car, fantastic driving skill, an organized pit routine, and me letting them sit in my chair. With all their track effort they are also have a great time. This race it was Elvis costumes and a pink Caddy theme for the Franken-Miata.

Toward the end of day two I was t-boned by the Let It Ride CRX in the apex of the first uphill turn. I saw them in the penalty box after that but didn't see them on the track again. I wonder what happened to them.

Mark Jr and I decided to stay in Reno for a night before heading back. On the way there I spotted a bunch of kids jumping jumping in the river off the freeway and had to pull over. Next Fernley race I'll definitely be going for a dip again. We hung out with a few of the Eyesores, decided Salt Lake strip-bars aren't all that bad, and slept in before the drive home. Success.

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24HL, Thunderhill 08

Things of course melted down into a frenzy of activity during which there was no longer time to photograph or blog anything. But here area few observations and ideas regarding the 24 Hours Of Lemons 12-08 Thunderhill event:

Getting to the race early is great. The Snowspeeder was well prepped, giving us time to relax, meet other teams, take photos, check out cars, run some test laps, etc. Don't underestimate how much this improves the entire experience of a 24HL.

If the track has good facilities, camp. This is economical and looks fun. So far I'm finding track town motels cost about 200% what similar accommodations in similar hick-towns. If you book early you can take the edge off. Teams were grilling, drinking, hanging out, playing Gran Turismo... I think it would have been a blast to camp at the track.

We had great pit neighbors. Free Range Racing, another MR2 team on one side, and Eyesore, 24HL veterans known for great cars, competition, and themes, were on our other side. Being able to rub elbows, swap tools, and share snacks with both of these teams raised the experience another bar.

There were 5 first gen MR2s in this race:

• 12th place, Lil' Smokey and the Bandit, 77.
  
• 16th place, Nerd Herd, 08 (with a spiff 20 valve JDM 4age motor).
  
• 17th place, us in the Snowspeeder, 03.
• 19th place, Pole Position, 3.
  
• 70th, place, our pals with Free Range, 80.

People are figuring out what great cars these are. Funnest on the track I'm sure.

Our race went well, but black flags were our weak spot. We only had one mechanical issue, a minor cooling problem that was resolved during a penalty. The only thing that kept us from a top-10 finish was our 4 black flags. Randal and Joe were both very clean this race but each managed to attract one flag. I had 2 flags with a little contact jockeying for position day 1 and I spun right off the track on day 2 after a tire chnage. We pulled a great fuel/driver change under a course-wide stop and we were able to keep the car rolling nearly constantly for most of day 2. Our fueling system is very effective. The car was fast and reliable. We didn't have any major repairs. Everything was pretty much dialed. I expect Joe and Randal will be a top 5 car at Reno in May.

Chart of our position by number of laps. The gaps were black flag penalties. Brown was Randal, red was me then Randal but couldn't tell when the driver change took place, green is Joe, and purple is me.

As always, the race was extremely entertaining to spectate. I witnessed a car veer of course then come back across the front straight on 2 wheels and hit the wall, the Faster Farms Chicken car flip completely over coming to rest back on all fours, a 944 Porsche over-cook a chicane spin off course at about 90 MPH, I missed the flames but saw the driver scramble out of a smoking VW Scirocco that had caught fire, and countless other exciting events.

We had 2 entertaining penalties from black flags. Randal got the "Bob Ross penalty". He got to wear an Afro wig and paint a landscape on the hood of the car. After spinning off course I earned a three-legged hike the entire length of the paddock and back with another deviant driver, made worse with the fact I was past due to urinate.

There was an incredibly cheap dyno service at the track and Joe got the Snowspeeder in just before close for one pull. After all the work on the engine we had high expectations, but the results were a only 93 horses. Randal tweaked the valves a bit more and we ran without really know the final effects, but what it comes down to is that the car has more than enough power to go spinning off the track if you're not careful.

The Thunderhill course is a blast. After only two previous races on the Altamont (RIP) bumper-car ring, T-Hill's vast stretches of wide, fast, curves, plus the stomach-lift as you dip out of turn 5 were fairly daunting. Test day and the first part of my first leg of driving I was pretty conservative. After about ten laps under a yellow flag though, I finally loosened up and let the MR2 do it's thing. The whole first half of the track is very MR2 friendly. It sticks to the big smooth sweepers and could usually inch past heavier cars there, and on the tight elevated turn 5 we could usually just go in hot and out brake everyone on which ever side they weren't. I had a grin-cramps when I turned the car back over to Randal.

This is the first time I wasn't too tired and busy at 24HL to goof off a bit Saturday PM. We had a few beers while we cleaned up, then bumped into the Eyesore team at pizza.

My leg is sore. Joe's brakes could use a tune and I guess I was really romping down hard on the pedal. My lower right leg is very sore and painful when I put pressure on my right big toe.

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