That was the name of the game today down at Brands Hatch, testing. The first time the cars have ever turned a wheel on a track, and indeed, the first time Goose – I mean Cougar / Hardy – and I had ever been on track.
As always there were a few problems. The first of which was getting both cars to the track with one trailer! But that was soon overcome with help from Frank Thompson, who kindly stored one car overnight for us. This still meant that it was a double-run on the way back… which is not much fun. Somehow I don’t think I will be able to persuade my Dad to do the same when we go to Cadwell.
Once there we headed out into the unknown with full tanks of fuel and slightly over-inflated tyres – we later discovered they were 32psi cold! But nevertheless the cars felt good, never mind the cockpit full of oil smoke I suffered 25minutes in. Yes that’s right, another problem, the front pulley had bored / melted its way through an oil line, still at least I did most of the session. Cougar had his own problems, session one for him was the beginning of the phantom-lengthening-clutch problem. He could hardly change gear by the end of the session…
After the great start we suffered we then had to do some fixing, which we did just in time for session 2. Session 2 was great, getting ever more familiar with the cars we were pushing them a bit harder, learning the limits etc. Surprisingly neither of us binned it, but were struck by yet more problems… For me it was a slipping clutch under heavy load, again after about 25minutes. Cougar’s phantom-lengthening-clutch problem returned, to such an extent that it was necessary to discover that the towing eye worked. As if that wasn’t enough Cougar also found out the life of his battery, and that the throttle sensor had come off…
With our work cut out over lunch, we set about trying to fix the cars, unfortunately we couldn’t get Cougar going again, but after adjusting my brakes and setting the tyre pressures I headed out for session 3. By lap 4 I had knocked 1.5seconds off my time from the previous 2 sessions, the car felt very good, I was even starting to be able to keep pace with some of the ZRs that were testing. But what do you know, the clutch began slipping again, accept this time it was so bad that I couldn’t accelerate at all. I then followed the trend set earlier in the day by Cougar and discovered that my towing eye works too.
With both cars unable to be fixed track-side we headed home. It was a shame as I’d have liked to get some more experience with the car and get the lap times down a bit. We believe we know how to fix them up for Sunday, but it’ll be tight! If we make it, I’m sure it will be a day to remember!
Who said racing was easy!
Maverick
There’s always somthing eh? Guess some mega nights are in order so best of luck chaps (after Oulton last year I know all about that!). Am keeping a distant eye on your progress. Will there be some Youtube footage to amuse the masses?