Toet 5

MSA British Hill Climb Championship
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Willem's News 22nd May 2006

Key events – Barbon and Harewood Double header.

Am writing this at home the weekend following Barbon and Harewood – sorry, first available time I had to write this.

Summary. We made some progress last week towards a more reliable package and towards improving engine starting and response but there is still a gulf between where we are and where we need to be, mainly with the engine – no-one expected it to be an easy problem to solve and it is not disappointing us by being simple!!! We’re also gradually adding weight to the car in order to make things reliable, which is eroding potential performance, but for the moment that is all quite necessary and also a secondary issue. The short term problem remains controlling all those horses (power), especially when combined with the enthusiastic driver. We had 2 7^th places and a 6^th out of 4 possible attempts (driver enthusiasm took care of the last attempt) and this means in terms of the championship that we’re very clearly looking at sorting things out for next year. The travel from Switzerland and the balancing act between work and play is also proving a delicate issue. This means we’re going to focus squarely on getting the package to work for us and worry less about getting immediate results.

So I’m starting to skip a few rounds. This will allow some time to begin to sort out the car a little, save some money and more importantly allow me to concentrate on work and on learning the language here a little more. A nice side bonus is the discovery of some really great (mountain bike) single tracks very close to home – wonderful!

More details

Pre event testing on Friday morning happened with driving duties being carried out by Matt Manderson with Bill, Neil, Steve, Gareth and Marc present for the test. We succeeded in setting up some real anti lag with improvements in mixture as well, but when it came to the event we had to take it off because the light throttle control was just too approximate and the heat generated under the engine cover was just a bit too high (more on that later). The starter proved to be a bit problematic as well but this problem was solved by Ark Racing whose MD (Nick Beere) came across from Silverstone and supervised the start procedure himself. He then supplied a fully rebuilt starter to Neil late that evening, which meant we had another new starter ready for Saturday morning. It was magic. The electric “booster” fuel pump which Bill installed in the week before Barbon did the job of giving us fuel pressure whenever we needed it and the new starter (now giving about 5 kilowatts at 24 volts) when combined with the pair of truck starter batteries that Bill put together means the engine is now being spun over at over 1200 rpm and starts almost instantly. Well done on that front boys – I think we’ve understood and just about sorted out how to start this beast.

The lads arrived at Barbon full of optimism, which was great to see. The one predicted potential little difficulty was the weather. The forecast for both days was pretty poor with rain or showers forecast. We soon discovered another little problem. When we were trying to manoeuvre the car to the line I found it incredibly difficult to control and it kept stalling (something I normally don’t have trouble with). I did finally get it off the line and up to the top of the hill but in a very slow time as it was like a switch in performance – I was having difficulty modulating the power. At the top of the hill another teeney weeney problem manifested itself. The hotter exhaust set light to the bodywork so when I arrived at the top smoke and flame were exiting from the rear of the car. The marshals acted with their usual speed and efficiency and emptied a powder extinguisher onto it before I could stop them (given that we’re on Methanol, water would have been better) which solved the immediate problem but gave us another. We didn’t get our second practice because following the clean up of the powder (which is corrosive so we had to clean it thoroughly) we had a misfire with water in the plugs which took some time to solve.

With practice gone we had little choice but to back track to a non anti lag system to see if that was more controllable, which it was. I qualified midfield for both runoffs and scored a 7^th and a 6^th. Not useful scores if you wish to challenge for the championship but useful if you wish to just retain some sort of top 10 number.

We all jumped in our cars and trucks and headed for Harewood for the following day’s event. At Harewood we tried something else. Starting with the engine map from Barbon, we did a baseline practice run with two engine ramps in second gear (engine ramp is running the engine in one gear flat throttle over a wide rpm range) one from medium rpm where we had boost and one from lower rpm where we had no boost. We then fitted a different plenum with longer trumpets. This felt intuitively to have helped the mid range and the fuel mixture suggested that at certain rpm we were a bit lean which suggested that we were getting more gas into the engine. I’ve yet to see an overlay but it felt to me that the mid range power was better too. Another back to back is almost certainly needed but we look to have made a small improvement there. We qualified reasonably well but then the rain came down and with all that power lack of grip isn’t a great help….. I got a seventh in the second runoff but failed to qualify in the second wet qualifying after a couple of excursions. We got ourselves packed up a bit early instead which worked at least for the boys getting back on the road for the long journey home and for me to get to the local airport for my flights back home to Switzerland (no direct flights from the area that late on a Sunday or early enough on a Monday).

We haven’t really worked on car setup all year but this isn’t a drama because we have to first get the engine working a little more under my control. The potential to get plenty of power certainly isn’t a problem!!

Next event on the calendar is Gurston Down. I’d have loved to go but we’re not and I’m planning to catch up a bit more at work and to do some more studying of my German. I’m also planning to spend a bit more time with Sue enjoying this spectacular country we now live in.

Thanks to Bill, Colin, Steve and Tony of Force (www.forceracingcars.co.uk); Neil, Gareth and Jo of Pride (www.PrideEngines.com); Duncan, Martin, Nicholas, Paul, Steve and Tom at PiResearch (www.piresearch.co.uk); Geoff at Cosworth (www.cosworth.com); Nick Beere at Ark Racing (www.arkracing.com); Marc Amblard, Matt Manderson, Richard Marshall and Paul Edwards (www.edwards-hospitality.co.uk) for advice, help and support.

PS. Spent some time on the mountain bike at the weekend and found a few spectacular trails. They’re a bit steep (literally) for amateurs like me but great fun (and that way you take them slow!!). A bit too technical for the tandem with lots of steps and tight turns too which is a pity. By the way, some of the cows here really do have bells here in Switzerland and Sue also took a photo of me being a “tourist” for a change – showing that I really do live here! (As you can see from the attached photos!) It was such a great evening that we turned off the TV and went for a bit of a cruise up to the Bachtel (our local hill) to take in the wonder of the view. The photos don’t do it justice but you should get the idea. Worth a visit especially for the views, the walking and the mountain biking if one is feeling brave (and we even have spare bikes!).