Innovative cage design ideas

There are so many good cage design ideas here it's hard to know where to start.

I'm certainly going to copy that upper windshield bar so close that it touches the drivers head. It's important that the head firmly contact the cross bar before the belts have a chance to tighten up. Also during heavy braking, the driver can rest his neck, important for those long enduro races.

Note how close the knees are to the ironically names "knee bar". Again, important to have solid contact before the belts begin to tighten.

Now note the creative bends in the main hoop, sure, some sanctioning bodies may not approve of such creative design, but they are simply behind the times and don't understand how important looks are inside a race car.

Maybe this guy is looking for a co-driver for some upcoming event. Where do I sign up?

Fender Rollin'

The snow is just starting to fall, tomorrow's lapping day at HPR is a long-shot now. So I'll add a couple of pics of the fender rolling last weekend. I rolled the first side with only the tiniest crack in the paint. I took the same care on the second side and instantly caused a 6" crack.

Most of the focus is on the back half of the arch. This is where the tire is closest to the fender. I scraped all of the body-filler out and rolled the lip almost completely flat.

As you can see, even a large 255 R-Comp fits a full compression on both sides. It took about 2.5 hours. I helped to have two floor jacks when confirming that the tire fits as full compression.

This isn't good

A Winter Storm Watch predicting 10-20 inches of snow on Friday. Looks like the lapping day may be at risk.

Statement as of 6:39 AM MDT on April 15, 2009

A Winter Storm Watch remains in effect from Thursday evening through Saturday morning.

A chance of mixed snow and rain is expected for much of Thursday night before changing over to snow by early Friday morning. Heavy snow is possible over the urban corridor Palmer Ridge and western Weld County on Friday continuing into Saturday morning. Possible accumulations could range from 10 to 20 inches of heavy wet snow. Strong north northeast winds of 15 to 35 mph are also expected late Thursday night into Saturday morning.

High Plains Raceway

I drove High Plains Raceway a couple of weeks ago. I did their Friday Lapping Day the day before the first SCCA Regional.

What a great track. It is really technical, lots of elevation change and beautiful new asphalt. I drove over 5 hours including one 2+ hour session that was a tank of gas from full to empty. All this track time really killed the consumables. I burned through half a set of tires and half a set of front pads. I took the opportunity to change both -- I'm going to Dunlop Direzza Z1 Star Spec tires to gain better wet weather performance and instead of the Performance Friction 01 Compound (Which I love) I'm going to try the new 06 compound to get a little better wear and shift the brake balance to the rear by continuing to run PF01 in the rear.

I'm headed back for a full three days this weekend. I've got a new set of 255 Nitto NT01s if it's dry and a set of 245 Dunlops in case of rain.

NASA @ Pikes Peak

I did a one day NASA Instructor Certification event at Pikes Peak Raceway last Saturday. It was a really interesting event, highly educational, and really fun. The weather was really cold, 23F when I arrived a 7am and never climbing above 40 all day.

The car was a mixed bag. It ran well, and the off-season weight loss (180 lbs) is aparent. The new super-ergonomic combo of steering wheel and tall "Jaffster" knob is really comfortable.

Unfortunately the event ended early when the upper radiator hose came off and the engine pumped all it's coolant on to the track. I never saw or felt if happen, I just smelled the sticky-sweet scent of coolant, and pulled in ASAP. I was lucky not to loose the motor.

It appears to be my fault as the clamp may not have been tightened completely as I was a little nervous about crushing the aluminum radiator nipple. It took a while to replace the coolant and by the time is was refilled my last session was over. Ces't la guerre.

Gone are original LTW wheels that came with the car. It was really hard to let them go -- they are my favorite BMW wheels and really suit the car. However their staggered sizing made them useless for the track so I replaced them with another set of Kosei K1s shod with Nitto NT01s in 255/40-17. I looked at a lot of track wheels, but in the end the low cost of the Koseis in 17x8.5 trumped more expensive wheels in 17x9.

I've been running the smaller 245/40s and will probably need to roll the rear fenders a bit to fit 255s on 8.5 w/40mm offset wheel.

Snow

It's Friday morning, I have to be at the track for a meeting at 7pm tonight and there is almost two feet of snow on the roads. It's 9 degrees now heading for a high of 25 and tomorrow may get all the way to 40.

The idea of driving a 2900 pound race car 70 miles through the snow on 255 R-Comp tires is terrifying. Since I sold my street tires last week, my only choice is to borrow the wheels from the wife's 3 series. I'm not sure the 8.5" 50mm offset rears will actually fit since all my 8.5 are 42mm. Mostly I'm waiting to hear something official from NASA before trying to fit them.

I'm really not looking forward to driving in sub-freezing temps. I'll also have to add more antifreeze to the radiator to keep from loosing another.

Sometimes I really hate living in Colorado.

2009 Open Track Schedule

March 28 Pikes Peak NASA Instructor Clinic (Done)
April 3 HPR Lapping Day (Done)
April 17 HPR Lapping Day
April 18-19 HPR NASA Instructor/HPDE
April 24 HPR Lapping Day
May 15-17 Pueblo NASA Instructor/HPDE
July 11-12 Pueblo NASA Instructor/HPDE
August 8-9 Hastings NASA Instructor/HPDE
Sept 10-13 Miller NASA Nationals
Sept 27 HPR NASA Instructor/HPDE
Oct 31-1 HPR NASA Instructor/HPDE

Radiator Solution

After coveting the Zionsville Competition Cooling kit, I've decided on a more budget friendly solution. Bimmerworld offers a self-branded all aluminum radiator for much less then a Fluidyne or C&R. It claims to be identical to the OEM radiator so can be used with the stock fan shroud and overflow tank -- not my preferred solution but it is much easier (and much less expensive) than installing the Euro overflow tank or engineering another solution.

My new, low cost plan is to keep the stock fan shroud, trim it back so that it really only holds the new OEM overflow tank. The trimming is to make room for a 16" SPAL electric fan that will attach directly to the radiator core. Not as elegant as the Zionsville solution, but it costs less then half as much.

I also ordered a Stewart high-performance water pump, colder 75c thermostat, thermostat housing, and OE hose kit.

I'll admint some buyer's remorse right after ordering, I tried to cancel and order the Zionsville. For good or for bad Bimmerworld had already boxed and shipped the order. Looking back, I'm glad to have saved the money.

Preseason Preparation

Three weeks to the first event so, Saturday morning I dusted off the car and started it up for the first time this year. I used a Battery Tender all winter with my new Odyssey battery and it worked perfectly and started first turn.

A brief warm-up and quick trip to the big traffic circle and a couple of slippy/slidey laps and back to the garage to check it out. The puddle slowly forming under the nose of the car was not a good sign.

A closer look showed it the be the typical BMW radiator failure where one of the plastic end caps starts leaking where it attaches to the aluminum core. Shit.

So Sunday morning I started to pull the radiator and associated components. The first major problem was the the fan clutch was totally frozen to the water pump shaft. Any one familiar with removing a fan clutch know that the trick is to hold the water pump pulley while turning the nut on the back of the clutch. So after 3-4 attempts with increasing violence and ever larger hammers, we know have Scott swinging a 4 Lb sledge at a pair of Park Tool 32mm headset wrenches and I'm folding the pulley with a 10mm wrench on one of the pulley bolts and a 24" cheater bar on the 10mm wrench. I don't know how many safety violations that is, but it's a lot. about a second later the cheater bar of course slips, and my middle finger takes the full force of the following swing. Ouch. I don't think it's broken, but it sure does hurt.


I ended up removing the water pump, pulley, and fan clutch in one piece and cutting the water pump shaft with a sawzall.

In doing so I discovered that the same jackass mechanic that installed that fan clutch with super-human strength (and no anti-sieze), also installed a new waterpump with a plastic impeller fully confirming their total mechanical incompetance.

I now need to decode how much radiator to buy to replace the stock one. On one hand I could simply buy another stock water pump, radiator, overflow tank, fan and fan clutch. this is about $500. For about $1000 I can get an all-aluminum racing radiator with an electric fan and save a little horsepower . Finally I could go all out and for $2000 get the racing radiator with a complete Euro M3 oil cooler built in.

I've never had any cooling problems with my car, so I'm not sure an oversize radiator is required and the Euro oil-cooler is really just a nice to have.

I've got a bit more research before making a decision.

Bangle - Gone!

Yippee, the moron responsible for the pathetic BMW design of recent years is leaving BMW and the auto industry.

The press release reads like a love fest, but Bangle's stay at BMW has been rife with conflict. Contrary to the release Bangle had little to do the the design of the Mini (much of which was designed external from BMW). His first catastrophe was the 7 series. What a train wreck! He also mangled the 5 and 3 series. The only car he designed that isn't a total disaster is the 6 series. It's only a disaster from a couple of angles.

BMW fans will note that the shift away from his ham-fisted (sorry edge-flame-polished) design began a couple of years ago when he moved/was moved from day-to-day design. Note that the new M3 (which actually looks OK) was completed after he was sent upstairs.

So, we BMW fans can only hope that the scars he leaves behind fade quickly.

Real barn find

1937 Bugatti Type 57S Atalante found in a garage after 40 years. Could reset the record for most expensive car ever auctioned -- but the economy may cause it to fall short. Still among the best looking of all Bugatti.

UPDATE: The car sold today (7 Feb 09) for 3.4m Euro ($4.4m USD) well short of the pre-bid hype. Still a spectacular find.

Race of Champions

On Now (Live)

Honda calls it quit

In a stunning announcement, Honda is closing the shutters on it's Formula One program. One can only wonder it the Max and Bernie single engine lunacy had an effect, or if this is just another sign of the times.

I hope Button finds a seat next year. Barrichello was probably toast anyway.

Happy Anniversary

Today marks the 4-year anniversary of the first post on this blog.

Man up, Yo.

After reading about it on my favorite bike-blog, Bike Snob NYC, I decided to test the manliness of my blog with Genderanalyzer .

According to the smart computers over at Genderanalyzer, there is a 89% chance that all this is being written by a man.

My other blog, which I share with my wife gets a "likely female" but produces a 50% score. This thing seems pretty accurate...

Dewalt Impact wrench

This thing rocks. On Saturday I installed snow tires on Kathy's car, rotated the tires on my 3/4 truck and swapped wheels on the M3 so I can sell the LTWs. That's 72 lug nuts including 32 that were torqued to 125 Ft/lbs last fall.

The Dewalt just ate it up and asked for more. It can easily remove lugs bolts when the wheels are off the ground. It's got plenty of power and makes quick work of everything I've thrown at it. When reinstalling wheels, the "rocker" trigger is nicely variable so it's easy to snug-up bolts without over torqing them.

That said I also got to use the 18v Snap-on and talk at length with a guy who owns one. As nice as the Dewalt is, the Snap-on is the best tools available. It produces well over 600 ft/lbs when removing fasteners. In fact the Snap-on is the only wrence designed specifically to remove fasteners. The Dewalt and the Milwaukee are both designed to drive-in fastners with the same power that they are removed. The Snap-on produces twice the torque when removing fasteners than when installing which is perfect for automotive applications.

So If you can part with 5-large for a cordless impact wrench, then grab the Snap-on. If your're thinking more like $300, then the Dewalt is a good choice.

of cordless impact wrenches

This is a must-have tool for any open-tracker. I borrowed one at Miller and was shocked at how quickly I swapped all four wheels -- I'm pretty sure it was less than half the time required using a breaker bar.

I've been looking at them ever since and recently decided to get one -- here is what I learned:

1. The biggest, baddest, cordless impact tools out there (Milwaukee 0779, Snap-on CT4850HO) cost ~$500+ and can generate well over 350+ Ft/Lbs when removing fasteners, more than enough for wheel bolts.

2. For about $300 there are a few wrenches that generate 250-300 Ft/Lbs.

3. Below that are wrenches that generate ~100-200 Ft/Lbs and are probably not suitable for wheel bolts.

4. Some vendors sell wrenches that look alike but have very difference performance -- compare model numbers.

I chose a 18v Dewalt, Model DW059k-2, which generates 300 Ft/Lbs and uses the same battery as my cordless drill-driver. I paid $277 (with a case, charger, and two batteries) from Amazon and received free-shipping. I needed to replace the batteries in my drill driver anyway so it was like spending $100 on the wrench. I'll have it in a couple of days and describe what I learn.

Fall Update

I got one more day in after Hastings, a single NASA day at Pueblo. Work and travel conspired to keep me off-track for at last 3 local track days.

Now, with no events until next year it's time to start thinking rebuild. I'd like to fully rebuild both front and rear suspension with new coil-over springs, bars, shocks, chassis reinforcements, and all new bushings. However in light of the current economic condition, maybe I'll scale back a little bit. Other than that, this winter I'd like to weigh the car, remove the air-bag system, and install a removable steering-wheel.

One thing I had to do was replace the battery. The date indicated that it was 4+ years old so I wasn't surprised it died after the car sat a couple of weeks. I replaced it with an Odyssey PC680 -- which is pretty much a big motorcycle battery -- in a really cool battery-box designed by Russ Wiles and available from BimmerHaus in Boulder.

Learn more about the box and battery here

This removes ~25 Lbs from the trunk and I think it changed the rear ride height a little. 2900 Lbs. here I come.

Hastings After Action

Hastings was great. I wrote something about it on my personal blog here

Not discussed there is one of the highlights of the event, the Saturday night "Bacardi Bus" ride. The bus is a modified School bus used to take Corner Workers to the flag stations during events at Hastings. Most of the original seat have ben removed in favor of used furniture -- couches, love-seats, old car seats. Adding to the fun, they are not attached to the bus.

On Saturday nights, after a couple cold, malted beverages, the bus is loaded with unsuspecting drivers and workers, and sent out on track. The driver goes much faster than you would think a school bus would go on a race track.

As you can see from the in-bus photo, we are tracking to the apex in a full-on deluge.