Second racing update...
Well, things never go smoothly, do they? After the race party, we went to work on my car over at Tim's place. We un-winterized it, reconnecting fuel lines, batteries, radiator hose, filling up the water... clutch line, steering fluid, you name it we topped it off and/or hooked it up.
Then it came time to try to start it. I had had problems at the end of the fall when I tried to fire the car up one last time before winterizing it. It turns out the starter mounting was a little "rigged" - forcing a "straight bolt" starter into a "staggered bolt" mount. We worked on it and worked on it, but weren't able to get it to consistently turn the motor.
We headed over to the track for the practice session in hopes that the parts guy would have the right kind of starter. He didn't. :( My day ended early. I didn't even unload the car. I did, however, manage to gouge up my vinyl floor in the trailer and ding up the tool chest by forgetting to strap it to the wall. Doh!
I headed home and prepared to do the best I could. I bought a starter at my local Speed Shop and tried to get it to work. It didn't. I bought a starter from a central Illinois parts company, and instead of trying to install it and tearing it up... I got rescued.
The guy I bought the car from and his father used to do the racing thing together. But when the driver found out he was going to be a daddy, he decided he was either "in it" or "out of it" as far as racing was concerned. So he sold off most everything but some tools. He and his dad really enjoyed working on the car together, so when I talked to him about some of the challenges I had, they encouraged me to bring the car down to Villa Grove where they could do some work on it. I picked up a new flywheel, brought my new starter and - on my birthday - loaded up the dogs after work and drove the 3.5 hours to Villa Grove. We pulled off the old starter and flywheel, then I unhooked my trailer and drove back to Lockport, returning home at about 1am.
The following Saturday, I drove down to Villa Grove and picked up my now-running racecar! :D
(It was more complicated than that... when we first tried to fire it up, one of the starter bolts just popped right out, so we replaced it with a longer one. Then I drove the car down an alley and worked to get it into high gear, practice putting it into reverse, etc. It doesn't drive at all like a street car.)
So, from Villa Grove I loaded up and drove another 3 hours to Boswell, IN - home of Kamp Motor Speedway.
I was all alone at Kamp, which proved to be somewhat intimidating. I hadn't a clue what I was doing. I wheeled out the generator, but then the plug for the trailer didn't fit the outlet on the generator. :P I got everything out, though, and got into my fire suit. I fired up the car and let it run for a bit, checked my tire pressures and headed out to turn some laps.
My laps were enjoyable and for the most part uneventful. I stayed down low to keep from screwing up the other five drivers on the track. It was a wild sensation seeing Tommy Kroll (somewhat famous around here) go around the outside, about two stories higher than where I was running. One guy I saw had spun out early in the session, and then I saw him go tearing around me a few laps later. I had a feeling he might be out of control, and I was right. He looped it not a half turn ahead of me, forcing me to think fast. I hit the brakes, but.. they don't work quite like passenger car brakes.. And then I realized I was about to stall the motor cause it was locked into gear. So I got back on the gas and tried to whip around him to the right. I looked as best I could to see if anyone was coming, but you have very limited vision inside the racecar. As soon as I got around the guy, I swung back down to get back out of the way. At this point, I think I got some mud on my tires, and I swung back and forth probably three times, spooking the drivers who were moving along outside me. One made a motion with his hand, but I got things back under control. I later went to him and explained what had happened and how that was my first time on the track. I apologized for spooking him, and he said not to worry about it - everyone had to start somewhere.
So.. I turned my laps. And then I found out I had a problem. There was oil leaking from the back of the intake manifold. A neighboring racer helped me diagnose it and then loaned me a tube of sealant to try to "patch" it up. I did just that and let the car sit before going out to turn more laps.
The second set of laps, I had a tough time getting started. First, I wasn't paying attention while putting it into reverse (have to lean on the shifter handles to keep them from making contact with the driveshaft) and the driveshaft caught the shifters.. caused the interior sheet metal to "lurch" and the engine to stop. I got out and checked things over, determined nothing had broken and fired it back up. When I got out onto the track in low gear, I tried to switch into high and couldn't get it to go. Then I couldn't get it to go BACK into low.. so I was coasting to a stop in turns 3/4. The push truck was just pulling up behind me when I finally got it to go into low.. pulled away and easily shifted into high. :P
When I got back into the pits, I had some good news and some bad news... good news - the oil leak appeared to be mostly stopped. The bad news - I had managed to knock the reverse shifter lever loose which is probably why I was having a tough time with the gears.
I waited around a bit - nervous about backing my trailer out - and took some photos before departing. It was a long drive back to Lockport, and I spent probably the first hour and a half just calling anyone and everyone I could think of to tell them about my first laps in my racecar.
All in all, I can't begin to describe how great it felt to finally be turning laps.
Some pictures:
BEFORE LAPS -
Right Rear
Left Side
Left Front
Left Rear
The Money Shot:
AFTER LAPS:
Finding the oil leak..
Lots and lots of oil leak...
Not lookin' too shabby!
Though the right side is quite dusty..
And, the whole kit and kaboodle that I put probably 600 miles on in one week purely for racing...
Truck, trailer and racecar...
Hope you enjoyed!
-asa