OK, try again....

The last post was 'On the way back', and that was in 2014.  So, now it's on the way back!

The car has again seen little use for a few years, as kids and a job very close to home (with speed bumps in the parking lot) meant it really didn't see the light of day.  But this weekend it got a run, finally.

But not without some work - started it up with a new battery, and it spat flames and stalled a lot.  Quick call to Frank and a basic diagnosis was made - bad fuel.  Petrol sitting in a tank goes off apparently, so a quick trip to the local auto store and $100 of jerry cans and pumps later, all the old fuel was out and 5 litres of Shell's finest was in.

But, of course, the lines were still fouled and the injectors still clogged, so after getting it going again, I proceeded to endear myself to the neighbours by doing laps of the block with a car that sounded like a machine gun*.  Constant backfiring, missing cylinders and everything, and I had to keep the revs up to stop if from stalling out.  However, a few laps later and it all cleared itself, so went for a drive up the coast.

A beautiful day, others out in their weekend  cars or bikes, lots of people waving at me.  Ah, it's back ;-)

Oh, and I now have a job in out past the airport, so a nice 45 minute drive against traffic each way through a tunnel. So it may make an appearance at work this week....

* Mind you, I live about 2km from an army live firing range, so everyone around here should be used to this sort of sound.

On the way back

So, after quite a few months, OK years, off the road and in storage, the Birkin is back!  I've passed it back to Frank for a bit of a birthday.  The final list isn't in yet, but it looks like new tyres and alignment, cleaned up injection system, full oil change, brake fluids, and a general once over. Plus it's getting a bath.

What this means is it will be back on the road over summer for a few runs around, and looking to get a few sessions in over 2015.  So perhaps some motorkhana work, and maybe, just maybe, if I can get up enough courage, Barbagallo.  But we'll have to see.

So, if there's anyone at all still watching, stay tuned...

Trolley jacks

I've been a bit quiet lately - the car has been in storage, as I moved to a new place with no room for the car! I've since moved again, and now the garage has enough space to keep the car as long as it's parked sideways ;-)

So, rather than spend 30 minutes trying to manouver the car in increments, I'm going to get some trolley jacks for Christmas. These will allow me to move the car around the floor easily, and get it up against the wall.

Hopefully, this all means more time on the road, and more time at the track....2011 should be a better year for the Mosquito.

Not a bad result

Finished the race with all parts of the car still attached, unbent and undamaged. Had a lot of fun, although there was one section where they got their timing completely wrong which meant a 45 minute wait in the sun for a 40 second run.

So the results are back - 13th overall, and 1st in class. That said, out of six cars, two broke down and one withdrew. On the other hand, if we didn't have a Clubman Class, then we would have been in the "All 1990-2009" class, which I would have won as well. So I think I'll be a bit smug about that.

I need to get the video off the camera and edited, then I can post it. I'm yet to pick up my perspex with matchbox car glued to it as my prize, though....

It's been a while....

...but that's because I haven't been driving much this year, which is a shame. However, I'm getting back in with a bang - hopefully metaphorically speaking.

I've entered once again in the Fabcar 1-Day Classic , which was a lot of fun last year, and should be again this year. New co-driver as well, with my sister Kathy strapping into the passenger seat.

The entry list includes 6 clubmans (5 Birkins, 1 Westfield), plus the usual assortment of Evos, Rex's and Skylines, plus other assorted stuff. There's also the usual set of unsuitable cars, such as a Monaro, an HSV Clubsport, a Subaru Liberty, a Subaru Legacy, a Ford Falcon and even a Holden station wagon. Should be great fun if nothing else.

So, I should have a whole new set of video and tracking information over the coming week or so.

Results from the PowerBox

You can see in the videos from the previous Motorkhana I had a small box mounted on the windscreen. This is a PerformanceBox, a GPS-enabled device that captures all sorts of real-time information on your driving. For example, it will record:

1. Speed
2. Direction
3. Rate of turn
4. Distance travelled
5. Radius of corner
6. ...and many more

The use is that I can objectively look at what I'm doing in the car in far more detail than my memory, or even the video, provides.

For example, in my last post, I was talking about how I needed to brake 15m before the corner, to scrub off 20kph to turn in at 80kph. But was I doing that? Not really....

From the data, I can see where I started to lose speed, where I started to turn, and the distance between the two. I can also see the speed at which I take the corners. What I can see is that I start slowing 40m before the turn instead of 15m, and I'm doing about 40kph through the turns....

Now you're probably thinking - what a clown, he doesn't even know what speed he's doing in a corner. To you I say - fair point, but there's a lot going on right then. All my limited brain power is focused on keeping it in the right direction.

Another interesting thing is I'm not braking hard enough. Looking at the rate of change in speed, I would expect to see a linear curve going upwards, which is the rate at which I can accelerate, which is a pretty straight line up to the 100kph max for the circuit. However, the brake profile is about the same pitch, just opposite. I would expect it to be much, much steeper, as I'd expect to be able to scrub off speed faster than I could pile it on. As they're the same, I might take a look into the brakes and how I'm using them.

You can also overlay results from one lap onto another, so you can see where I'm braking later, and the overall effect on speed, and where I'm coming out of corners faster. Once you get the hang of the software, it's actually quite interesting seeing what you're doing.

I get the feeling it would be a lot better on a closed loop like Barbagallo, where you cross a start finish line repeatedly, so you can get a number of contiguous laps.

March 8th Motorkhana

Ran another one of AEM's Motorkhana events last weekend. And with my best result yet - came 5th overall. About bloody time too. The car is too good to be running in the 20's. It's just a shame the driver isn't there yet.

I have to say, however, that 5th place was earnt mostly through not stuffing up, and the car basically behaving itself. All the other Birkin drivers had their dramas throughout the day. Frank's gearbox wasn't happy moving to second (leading to some interesting gearchanges), Conrad managed to go straight past a turn at full throttle in third, necessitating a rapid reverse back onto the course, and Tim had a shocking first round. He managed to hit a cone, then turn his engine off with his knee hitting the key, then overran the garage. Mind you, this was his first attempt at this event, and his final run was the 10th fastest of the round.

You also have to keep in mind that the timing is done by hand. I came ahead of Frank by 0.2 seconds, which is 0.05 seconds per run over four runs. Now you cannot tell me that someone with a stopwatch is that accurate.

Round 1 was the usual 'getting to know you' run. A bit of oversteer, which is becoming standard for my car at the moment, and needs some looking into. I also found the new tyres a bit glassy still, so the first run scrubbed them up well. The comment I got coming back in was that I was braking far too early - a few pointers of where I should be braking, a few 'you must be bloody joking' comments later, and I had a plan in mind.




Round 2 was where I implemented the plan. I think I did what I was supposed to. It all becomes a bit hard to follow, really. Unfortunately, my main evidence was going to be the video, but there's no sound this time around and therefore I'm not 100% sure of where my braking points were in reality. I know they were supposed to be around 15m before the turn, which when you're travelling at 100kph (my little Performance Box doing its thing), is half a second before the turn. In that time you have to brake, upshift to second, and begin the turn. Personally, I can't believe that's right, but I look at the video and it seems to be correct.

Mind you, I'm not stopping for the corner, so all I'm really doing is scrubbing off enough speed to make the corner. So for some of them it's probably just knocking off 20kph, as I can take some of these bends at 80kph.

The key difference was the time - I dropped 0.9 seconds from one run to the next, which is actually huge, and worth several places over four laps. Unfortunately, I forgot to set the video on this run.

Rounds 3 and 4 - well, pretty much the same, really. Just focusing in on braking points mainly.





Again, a lot of fun. Each time I get out of the car I'm shaking from the adrenaline, and I'm exhausted at the end of the day. I don't know how people do hours of racing.....

I'm going to have a look at the results from the Performance Box and see what my braking points are like - what speed to I drop to, where was I quicker etc. There may be some insights there, or perhaps just too much data for me to cope with.