Thursday, April 13, 2017

Rear Shock, Fuel Filter (and Consumption) and More!

Objective: 

Had the day off work. Kids in school, wife at work, day for the car! Went shopping. Got a 3rd brake light (LED), electrical cable and black tape to install this. I will feel safer on the track if people can clearly see I'm braking. From another store also bought some pipes for air admission and braces. So, the list of tasks I want to do before the next track day are (M = mandatory, O = optional):

  • (M) Replace fuel filter, drain fuel and fill with only 98 again;
  • (M) Replace failed shock;
  • (M) Install 3rd brake light;
  • (O) Install air admission pipes;
  • (O) Wrap the exhaust in heat-shield cloth;
  • (O) Install the difusor;
  • (O) Align the steering column so that when I go straight the steering wheel is not at 90ยบ.
Naturally I have other things I would like to do, like create a tunnel cover in black vinil with red pipping, to match the seats, and make the interior look nice. And make a boot floor to be able to store stuff on the boot.But those are long term projects, more important if I get the car road-legal that if it remains just a track toy.

After getting home, went to the garage and jacked the car up. Drained the fuel and replaced the filter. It was an easy job, just undoing 2 braces and doing them again, paying attention to the flow arrow on the filter. Picture of the new filter in place:
Took the chance to try to calculate the fuel consumption I had on the track this last weekend... I drained the tank before the track day and dumped 2 jerrycans, totalling 22 litres (it's a 10L thing but it can actually take 12l). On the afternoon of the track day added 10l and today I drained 8l (that I shoved on the tintop's tank). The odometer stated that I did 92km on this track day. This means it spent 24l in 92Km... 26l per 100Km. This is 11 miles per (imperial) gallon! Ouch!

Next task was replacing the shocks. Unbolted the top of the failed suspension. When I was taking the bolt out of the lower arm, noticed the bolt was hitting the rim. Had to loosen the rear wheel a bit to be able to take the bolt out.
Having it all out, separated the shock from the coil, moved the coil to the new shock, fitted it all back again, setting 5 clicks on the suspension (previously had 4, recommended by Steve; Phil's opinion differs and followed his) and raising the coil to the same height as in the right side. Phil advised me to change both shocks. As I was going to disassemble the right one I noticed I had put, back in 2011, the bolt in the opposite direction. I have already added an edit to that post... Having the bolt with the head towards the front of the car makes it hit the wheel hub or driveshaft assembly. I would have to undo everything just to take out the bolt... I gave up and decided not to change that shock, as it seems to be good. I guess that if later on I decide (or need) to do that side I'll just cut the bolt with an angle grinder and put a new bolt in, to avoid having to take it all apart...

Before calling it a day, tried offering the difusor to the car to see how it looked. It looks really cool! But installing the difusor will not be easy, not only because space is scarce under the car but also because it is too big to handle alone. I'll need one or two people to hold it in place at least until I bolt down two of the corners, under the seats.

Monday, April 10, 2017

Aries New Owner, Order From The UK, Documents

Objective: 

Probably I should have talked about this earlier but I wanted to have proper contact with Phil first... Who is Phil? Back in 2015, as I was dealing with Steve about my IVA, he told me he was selling Aries to another person. He would still be lightly involved, doing electrical looms and some odd job, but he was passing the business. He also said the new owner was a very nice and committed bloke. I didn't have the need to talk with the new owner, Phil, so I just followed the company on Facebook.

Phil and his wife race cars on the UK. Phil keeps a more active presence online. He has also shown interest in technologically evolving the car. Early 2016 he also bought from Andy Bates, from AB Performance, the production rights for Sabre G2. So now Aries offers the Locoblade seven-style and the Sabre radical-style cars. Aries and AB Performance, that now has only the Arion S2, have been working closely benefiting customers from both with evolution of their products. All in all, it seems things will be good with Phil.

What made me write about this now was that I needed the fuel filter. I also had one of the rear corners lower than the other, seems like a failed suspension. Talked with Phil and he was real nice helping me out. In the end I made an order for a difusor, rear shocks and the fuel filter. Phil also printed and mailed in the box a technical document I need on my third attempt to import the car to have portuguese plates. Now that I have an opinion on Phil, I feel I can write about the change. Photo of the box below, that neatly packed all my goodies.
The difusor is just for the looks. It's one of the new additions Phil made and placed on the catalogue. It will look really nice!

With the document Phil sent I now have, as far as I understood, all the papers that I need to import the car. Sent a scan to the person at the Portuguese Auto Club and he said it was excellent. I just need now to fill loads of forms (manually), prepare a binder with all the documents and take it to the Club to start the process... Will it be "third time's a charm"?

Saturday, April 8, 2017

Estoril Experience Day 2017-04-08 - The 4th Track Day

The weather was glorious! It was almost a summer day and I regretted not wearing shorts and not having sunscreen. My regular tow truck driver from S. Bica e Almeida picked me up punctually and drove us to the track. The kid rides in the back!
We arrived pretty early. Mr. Almeida had two other cars to pick up and bring to the track.

As before, had RaceChrono Pro running on the phone to capture speed and GPS positioning and the SJ4000 cam on my rollbar. When, as usual, I got home and was going to mix the video and track data I noticed the data was really bad. Seems that storing the phone on my trousers' pocket, that go under the dash, broke the GPS precision. The data was unusable. The videos will have no data this time and next time I'll have a different solution to ensure this does not happen again.

1st leg - 9h00 to 9h20
Opening the track, I felt really well. I had been practising at home with my wheel and peddles on the rFactor2 simulator. Tried to apply a bit of that on the real thing. Did 5 full laps plus the warm-up and the coold-down (incomplete) laps. The most important thing is that the car now revs correctly and goes to the limit!!! So I was able to go to the 174km/h (phone GPS metrics, Digidash says 168km/h)! And on the first leg I was able to beat my best lap time! It was previously 2m52s and I did 2m39s! This was wonderful!
After the leg I met friends on the paddock and hanged out with them the rest of the day. They had a box and invited me over. They were running on a different group so we were not on the track simultaneously. Their first leg was red-flagged and shortened because of an accident where a Caterham collided with a spun Porsche.

2nd leg - 11h05 to 11h25
Another great session! I was feeling really well! Sometimes I would over-do it and make a mistake (failed brake, mostly) but after a couple of cooling corners I was going at it again! Made my best lap of the day on this leg: 2m36s! Unfortunately, when I was looking for my best lap I missed that one and considered this one the best lap, at 2m37s, making the video for it. I don't feel like redoing it all now.
Besides doing the best lap, this leg allowed me to do 6 full laps. The best lap is the first full one, from 2m59s to 5m35s on the full leg video.
Comes lunch break, I put my SJ4000 cam charging to be sure I had enough juice for the rest of the day.

3rd leg - 14h00 to 14h20
During lunch a friend asked me if I minded taking him along for the ride. Sure, hop in! First time I had someone with me on the car! It felt a bit different on the corners, can't say it was slower. This leg netted 5 more full laps.

My wife came for a bit between 3rd and 4th sessions. She brought with her the jerrycan. Digidash was saying my deposit was at 0%!!! So we dumped in 10 more litres... It seems the car spent a bit over 20 litres per 100Km... I'll be more precise with the numbers when I dump the tank again, check the odometer and do the math... Two good photos to represent the day below.

4th leg - 16h55 to 17h15
There was a huge crash with a Ferrari on the end of the straight having the brakes fail and hitting the tire barrier at 200Km/h. Seems the car is trash now. People were not hurt, fortunately.
This meant that that session was red-flagged and the following one started a bit later. It was a special leg just for a club and they gave them near full time. So people from our leg went later to the track and knowing it would be 15m instead of 20m and there was a yellow flag for the last third of the straight until after 1st corner. The organisation was taking 5m from each remaining leg of the day to compensate the time it took to rebuild the barrier and clean after the crash.

The problem was that I staid on a queue, with the engine idling, for over 10m. When I got to the track, the car felt a bit odd. After doing my first full lap, the leg was red-flagged because of a car spinning and throwing lots of gravel on the track. As I was on the queue, still not knowing if we would be allowed back in or not, started thinking about all the crashes of the day. About the Mercedes that almost crashed on my rear on this last leg. That my day had been great, why keep pushing? So I waved, went out and onto the tow truck heading home. Don't know if the leg was still allowed back in or not. I did what felt right and I'm happy with the decision.

The video for the last session

All in all, it was a wonderful day for me. Its a pity I didn't have the RaceChrono software running perfectly. Next time it will be different! Yes, next time! I bought insurance at DuoSeg for the 3 scheduled sessions (8 April, 2 July and 10 September) and now I can't miss them! The organisation opened up for registrations on the 12th and I signed up straight away! So...
Objective:

Saturday, April 1, 2017

Cleaning the Carburetors

Objective:
(post written on the 14th April, encompasses 4 sessions of around 2 hours each)

As written before, the car had issues on high revs and did not reach it's maximum speed. The most probable reasons where old gas (95 octane with almost 2 years mixed with new one half/half), clogged fuel filter and/or dirty carburetors.

Throughout 4 sessions I took care of draining the fuel system and cleaning the carburetors. The fuel filter was not changed as I didn't get a replacement timely. Started by pulling the carburetors out of the car, repeating what I did to remove the vacuum pipes, but this time also taking out the throttle cable and the gas pipes. Took it to my work bench, covered with an old towel. The idea was that if any small part was to fall, it would stay on the bench instead of ricocheting and rolling away.
Following step-by-step the instructions on the Haynes manual for the Fireblade bike, I took away the plastic cover from one side of the first carburetor. Pulled the diaphragm out and disassembled it also.
Then turned the carburetors around, took the metal cover on the other side, exposing the floating bowl and the needles. Removed everything.
Using the carburetor and injector cleaner from Wurth, and following the instructions on the can and scrubbing with a toothbrush and using compressed air to blow dirt around, got it all cleaned up.
Then it was just a matter of reassembling and moving to the next carburetor. The book clearly recommended doing one at a time to avoid mixing parts. Each one took around 1h30m to do... I did this without buying a new rubber kit to replace existing rubbers, o-rings and seals. I should be able to reuse them, no? I was... But carburetors 3 and 4 missed a specific o-ring on the idle needle. Well... If it was working without them there, it should keep working, no?

When all were clean, reassembled the carburetors on the engine. Before connecting the pipes, used the fuel pump to drain most of the deposit, throwing the gas on the deposit of the tintop. All connected, more gas on the deposit, this time 98octane quality fuel, started the car... It works! But the choke now floods the carbs; can't use them. Seems those missing o-rings are needed and all worked before because the clogging prevented the flooding... Did a couple of other odd jobs and added a second jerrycan of fuel on the tank. Put gas until the Digidash said it was 100%. Don't know how "full" that actually is but I didn't want fuel spilt on the floor... The tank should take 23 litres and I dropped there 22 litres. I was ready for the next track day. And it was just in time!