23Racer

It is such a nice day today, that I called Dave up and asked him to come over to work on the wee beastie.

If anybody recalls, we were having an ongoing issue with detonation that kept rearing its ugly head. It would run very well at Shannonville, but start detonating after a couple of laps at Mosport then get worse and worse as long as you ran the car. So last fall, I went back to basics and started checking things out on the car. What I found was that the CAS was in 1 tooth off and that we had cranked the adjuster all the way to one end, plus backed the timing back to about 16 degrees to try to compensate. As well I found a couple of vacuum outlets on the bottom of the bodies had come off.

So over the winter, I pulled the ITB's off, pulled the intake off and started work. On the ITB's I reattached all the vacuum lines with new ones, blocked off the unused ones again, shortened the Power Brake Booster port and cleaned everything up. On the intake, I ground all the welds smooth, trimmed the end of the intakes so that they were all equal and smooth, planned the mounting face and polished it all up. Then I redid the heat shield to provide more clearance. Everything was ready to get the car out and running.

We tried to start the car and it popped a few times, but wouldn't fire. We putzed around a while, but it wouldn't fire, so we were like WTF? It ran before we put it away and all we did was clean things up. So in desperation I put a set of the plugs a borrowed from Jim Kutschke in the car. Bang it fired right up ( I will call you on thursday to pay for them, thanks a bunch). We trimmed the timing back to a safe 20 degrees leading and a generous 5 degree split, then adjusted the air/fuels to a 13.2 range. The whole engine note is entirely different. The car just crackles, it has a gentle bridge port lope and will idle smoothly at 1100 rpm for the first time. Throttle response is incredible and it doesn't heat up idling. It ran for 30 minutes and we only had to turn the fan on once. There is minimal smoke out of the tailpipe and the plugs looked great after the run.

I am extremely charged right now as for once everything is making sense and the car is reacting in normal and logical fashion. I need to go out of town for a few days this week, next week I am in Montreal, but the week after I am going to try to get some time on a chassis dyno to work the final tuning out and put down some numbers. I (fingers crossed as I have been here too many times before) think the engine is sorted out, I have the new 3 way shocks ready to go on after a bit of welding, we have the bump steered spindles finished and they will go on as well and the new Continentals. The car should be substantially faster this year versus the last few and I am gathering pieces to finally convert the car to 4 piston front brakes, LOL.

I am just feeling very fine today and want to get out on track, like yesterday. I feel 25 again.

Chomping at the bit with monster spring fever,

Eric

23Racer

Here are 2 crappy cell phone pic's of the bodies. A fair bit different versus last year.

2Fierce

iTrader: (7)

sweet progress!

bring it to cayuga??

R.P.M.

iTrader: (3)

I REALLY want to see dyno numbers from this.

Redshft

iTrader: (1)

Great to hear. Really encouraged that it sounds like you have it running right. The first start of the race car in the spring is always a sweet feeling.
Haven't had mine running in 2 years. I think it's just about time to get it done. You have inspired me.

HalifaxFD

iTrader: (18)

Its about damn time!!!

CS13B

iTrader: (11)

wicked wicked wicked... where do you want to run this?

23Racer

Joe, you have been monster patient and it has been driving me nuts that I haven't been able to get the thing running cleanly enough with the ITB's to pull some numbers. The only numbers I have are from when I borrowed Al's Holley setup about 4 years ago. At that time we pulled a misfiring and rev limited (7800 rpm) 184 rwhp. This time, its ***** to the wall and lets see what it does with 9000 rpm at hand and proper air fuels and timing. What is also cool is that at an idle of 1100 rpm and water temps of 200 F, the engine still develops 30 lbs of oil pressure and 110 at 3000 rpm.

We are looking at doing a couple of CASC Time Attacks with it, if we can find a class. We are also looking at running a few GT Challange races with it, including the 3 hour in the fall and looking at towing down to Mid Ohio for a NASA race weekend or 2.

I don't know how to describe it, but up to now the car would pick up revs cleanly and quickly, but now it picks up revs like a light switch. Idle to 7000 and back faster than I can type the words. The exhaust seems to pulse out harder, if that makes any sense.

We will have to see after the dyno runs, but I think they will be a bit better than before and I really believe that we have the timing finally worked out. Now when you hit the starter button, it just leaps to life without any starter time.

Pretty excited after today, drove by Shannonville on my way to Cornwall. There is no snow and its going to be almost 20 degrees this weekend. Hmmmmmmm...........

Eric

CS13B

iTrader: (11)

say... if you can't find a class in CASC, CSCS will put you in Unlimited RWD with slicks. If I recall reading, you're not a fan of the series but it is definitely growing, and the more serious support it gets from serious racers... the more serious it will become. lol.. if that makes sense.

Bwek

iTrader: (4)

let me know when you go to dyno this! im assuming you're going to TAG as its just around the corner

Casual_John

iTrader: (8)

Good Luck!!
Now dyno that sucker and post some numbers