Glen updates?

[Greg Amy]

tGA's "fun" was an aftermarket intake cam gear breaking (Billiel driving), lunching the whole top end of the engine. We got the head off an hour after we got home, minimum two bent valves and wiped out cams and rockers. Pistons have no physical divots, but if we have to rebuild the bottom end we're done for the year.

Blethan was fighting problems all weekend with putting the power down. They traced to a bad diff, changed out the diff Saturday to a stock part, but still had the problem Sunday. Watching the Pro-IT race from Turn One Sunday I respectfully suggest the problem is a slipping clutch, not a rear end or tires.

John VanDenburgh showed up with his new-build Audi Coupe, but couldn't get it to rev in the test day. They went home Thursday night (John, I still owe you for the UC, thanks for bringing it!)

Dan Jones walked the Pro IT field. No contest. Nice battle for 2-4 overall behind him. Ben Phillips had a hell of a battle in the Pro IT, looked like fun. He made a KILLER inside/outside pass on a lapped car, that one got my hair standing up!

Nat walked the field BIG TIME in Saturday's qually race, lap record times from what I heard.

Weather was damn hot on Thursday test day, but tolerable the rest of the week. Almost downright pleasant in the AM Sunday.

Seneca Lodge and Roosterfish Brewing have some good micros on tap...

GA

[joeg]

HOT--Sunday morning actually rained a bit.

[StephenB]

Blethan was fighting problems all weekend with putting the power down. They traced to a bad diff, changed out the diff Saturday to a stock part, but still had the problem Sunday. Watching the Pro-IT race from Turn One Sunday I respectfully suggest the problem is a slipping clutch, not a rear end or tires.

As Greg mentioned I had problems hitting the gas and it wasn't just because I was scared It was weird... I could turn left and apply full throttle basically at turn in, but if I tried to turn right I could barely touch the gas at all and something would slip. The car was also very loose on right turns when I applied the throttle but felt great when I turned left. I got a ton of great suggestions as lots of people stopped buy to give us some ideas. We changed the entire suspension including taking the sway bar completely off. Nothing changed. We (I) was convinced it had to do with the rear end. The rear we put in the car during the build is the mazdaspeed 5.12 rear end and it was originally on a car that was hit extrememly hard in the right rear. So long story short I figured it was broken and had the guys drive out with my spare diff from home, then spent 3-4hrs changing the damn thing... shitty job that will go much faster next time! When changing it we noticed a bunch of axle grease from the inner joint. After some reflection we realized that the rear end we just replaced the mazdaspeed one with was from an automatic which we think is an open diff. We also realized that the axles we had were out of the car that diff came out of and maybe just maybe the automatic ones are different then the manuals... not sure on that yet but they do have different part numbers. In the end the diff from the automatic acted exactly like the original one, fine in left turns but horrible in right turns. Greg and Dick had the suggestion that maybe it was a clutch which it does feel like, but I am not 100% sure since it is honestly only right hand turns. At this point we have no idea but we are going to be ordering some axles for $400 bucks each (That my wife is thrilled about) and see if they are different.

The other issue we had was that I could smell gas and it seemed to use a ton of it! During warm-ups we used 4 gallons of gas. then in the race after 20minutes the car started to sputter. I thought the gas smell was from over filling it but I am not convinced. We are going to take the tank out, inspect it and all the lines then possibly put a stock tank back in it. This one was modified for a quick fill system compliant to continental challenge rules. We possibly could have damamged this in the build process and gas is just something I am not willing to fool around with. I chose to end my race early and take some pictures

Overall it was a fantastic weekend for me. I got to drive a car that I put together with my friends and it actually drove! I got to do 130mph and not worry about a speeding ticket in a nice controlled environment and for a few laps I had a great battle with Ann in her BMW M3. Plus being in the Watkins Glen area with family and friends is my dream vacation

[kevin22]

I wouldn't worry about the fuel issue. I own one of them. I only get 12-13 mpg. they are terrable unless you really try to conserve fuel.

[lateapex911]

Stephem care to guess what my lowly POS RX-7 gets for racing MPG? If it helps, I makes 125WHP or so, with 104 lb ft of big neck snapping torque.

[mossaidis]

Cough... some of us get 7-9 mpg... 7-9! And my little 1.6 revs to 7600 rpm only. Cheers!

[CRallo]

with a number like 12-14 from an RX8, I'm assuming that he means on the street... That would be amazing for track use!

[mossaidis]

with a number like 12-14 from an RX8, I'm assuming that he means on the street... That would be amazing for track use!

Thanks Chris for, once again, pointing out that I am... "dense" and I should not be posting to this forum, especially with trollers like you and tGA, at anytime earlier than noon.

PS. in the name of trying to contribute, I will try to post the NARRC ITR/S/A/STL and SPO/ITE/etc and ProIT results.

[SPiFF]

tGA's "fun" was an aftermarket intake cam gear breaking (Billiel driving), lunching the whole top end of the engine. We got the head off an hour after we got home, minimum two bent valves and wiped out cams and rockers. Pistons have no physical divots, but if we have to rebuild the bottom end we're done for the year.

wow .. sorry to hear.

[Rabbit05]

Greg,
I'll catch up to you at some point this year for beer money...

All in all, I got some laps in with the new Coupe on Friday's test day and well, its super down on power. We went through and checked all the timing , marks , adjustments, ect... I am thinking its probably fuel system related. To my own fault I have reused a lot of older/used fuel system parts and I think that's the culprit. So we packed up Friday night and headed home early Saturday morning.
But it did move under it's own power, stopped/brakes worked , and I got my log book with only a couple easy fixes to do... I wish I could of made the race...but all in due time, once I get the bugs worked out.

[benspeed]

tGA's "fun" was an aftermarket intake cam gear breaking (Billiel driving),

Dan Jones walked the Pro IT field. No contest. Nice battle for 2-4 overall behind him. Ben Phillips had a hell of a battle in the Pro IT, looked like fun. He made a KILLER inside/outside pass on a lapped car, that one got my hair standing up!



GA

Thanks for the props! I think I lost some hair over the weekend

[dj10]

the big WOW was Thiele with a 2:12.6 in qualifying - yes, not a misprint!

I second this Ben! Nice time Rob no matter when it was done!

[StephenB]

Some follow-up on the RX8...
I came in because the car started to sputter and wasn't running well at all. I could smell fuel and thought I had a bad leak or something... Not the case. The car had a 3/4 of a tank of fuel. We did drop out and replace the tank today and found the source of the smell. I did run it out of gas on Friday and it acted the same as it did in the race which is why I thought I may have had the gas issue. I did have bad plugs which I have now replaced. I also replaced the fuel pumps just in case those were an issue. I am really hoping it runs better, I am heading up to NHMS to do some testing this week. If anyone has any ideas on the sputter issues (after 20min at race speed) let me know.

The other issue with what feels like wheel spin is still a bit of a mystery and my largest concern at this point. I see tons of $$ being spent to figure out what the issue is and I am hoping to figure it out before all that $$ is gone! I am hopefully dropping of the "racing" rear-end on Monday to be looked at. At this point I have no idea what could be wrong with the car. We put it on the lift today and double checked all the suspension and everything appears to be fine. We also did cross weights and they all came out good. I did not drop out the transmission since I didn't have time ao I have not checked the clutch. If the diff comes back without any known issues then I will try to look at that then. I would love it If a few of you wouldn't mind watching a lap or so of the attached video and give me a few ideas on what may be wrong.


[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sz4ooW4geQQ[/ame]

Just added a Youtube video of a few laps of me during qualifying. I was chasing down Dad Please don't give me a hard time about driving! This was only my third time driving the car and only the third session the car was ever on track!

If you watch all the way to the end you will get to see Dan Hall having a little fun

Stephen

PS: I never did find any info on photos for the weekend but I did see a lot of photographers on track. And YES if anyone gets a photo of me shooting some flames I will probably buy it

[robits325is]

It sounds like the clutch is slipping.

[StephenB]

It sounds like the clutch is slipping.

Agreed. BUT why would it only do that in right hand turns? It doesn't do it in a straight line or in left hand turns at all.

[Eagle7]

If that was wheel spin your Dad would have seen tire smoke.

[Gary L]

Agreed. BUT why would it only do that in right hand turns? It doesn't do it in a straight line or in left hand turns at all.

After watching your video, my guess is that you replaced one open (or broken) rear end with another open rear end, ergo the same result. If that was a slipping clutch, it would happen in LH turns as much as RH. For that matter, it would have happened while going straight... and in any case you sure as Hell would have smelled it after that much slippage, gas fumes or no.