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Chris, any tips/tricks on installing the crank seal? You mentioned not getting the depth set right the first time - did the seal leak from the beginning, or started leaking later on? I’m almost 1 year in on a new short block - not a drop of oil leaked since new and now all of a sudden I have a leak down low which is getting into the serp belt and making a real mess.RACE RECAP: CHUCKWALLA VALLEY RACEWAY WITH NASA AZ - MAD MAX DUSTERDOME
(RACE 3-4 2021 ST SEASON)
Following up an exciting first round for the NASA AZ region, we visited the fast Chuckwalla Valley Raceway in the middle of nowhere, err, Desert Center California. Weather was a bit windy to say the least – so much so that several sessions were delayed due to dust visibility. The track is 2.68 miles in length and 40 feet wide with 17 flowing corners and some elevation changes sprinkled in. Famous for "The Bowl", Chuckwalla offers a bit of everything. While this event was not a crossover event with NASA SoCal as it has been in the past, some Californian folk joined the NASA AZ regulars for some great racing! (and to show off all their money - woo).
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While initially beautiful, the wind and dust made for pretty miserable camping weather but I was able to get out to the track a bit earlier than my usual last-minute runs so I worked on the car with some last minute noise-enhancing (and hopefully power-enhancing) changes:
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I picked up some borla over-axle pipes/resonator deletes the night before (true 2.75" all the way back, there the oem pipes neck down to just 2.1" at the resonators). I did some last minute header wrap and installed them and was more or less ready to go.
Saturday:
Practice went fairly well on Saturday - though the Cali folk were pretty aggressive. Turned in some slow fielding laps but felt good about where I needed to be for the qualifying session. I did get a black/transponder flag but didn't give it much thought as I entered the hot pit lane to go across the timing scoring trailer to make sure they matched my TX number to my car - as its been an issue in the past (and something we talked about in the driver's meeting). Thinking I was set, I went on about my day.
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I was not set.
In qualify - I had a decently clean lap1, but again the TX flag came out again, indicating I wasn't getting a hit. I again pulled into the hotpit lanes to talk with the grid staff, wiggled my mylaps x2 transponder "racekey" (racer-money-relieving-device) and saw lights, so I re-entered. I was able to get one more lap in before the checker, but when I got back to the paddock, I showed as not having a time in qualifying, I would have to start from the back, despite having a mid-pack lap recorded on my telemetry system. I looked into why I was having this issue and found the culprit:
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The x2's racekey had broken off its retainer tab and could move off the contacts required to engage the transponder. They had already recalled this part once and the "fix" was to put this additional piece of plastic in the holder for the device, but I guess it created enough pre-load to snap the cheaply molded plastic. While x2 offers a warranty while you have their bullsh-t subscription service - it doesn't cover this. It was suggested to buy a new transponder (which I just renewed this one for 2 years). I found a replacement race key on ebay and hopefully soon I can see if it will work with my existing transponder. I rented one from the NASA AZ crew. Cliffs: NASA AZ awesome - Mylaps anything but.
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Starting from the back of the Big bore pack - I decided to try and make the most of it and go after whatever I could get - knowing that the top portion of the field would be way out of reach as the socal folk brought some heavy weapons to our blunt knife fight. Race was going well and I was picking up pace until the engine lost all power coming out of a right hander and sidelined me. I pulled way off track in a safe location so they could hopefully keep the race going without cautions - the safety crew came to check on me, but misconstrued my response to "are you ok" as being that the car was ok too... they took off and didn't come back until the following HPDE session, realizing their error. In the rush to get me in to the pit, my front bumper beam and tow hook were damaged as they took off a bit hard when setting up the tow strap. Bummer but was able to patch up. Once back to the paddock they dropped me at the impound so I could do my series leader duties, we had to dyno two cars. Unfortunately, I wanted to look at my car and get a bottle of water, but the requirements of the series kept me away from my car until dark. It was a pretty frustrating day - the competitors were fine on their dyno, but I was parched, exhausted, curious if I had windowed a motor, and the howling wind and dust did not help matters or mood. Eventually I was able to get back to my trailer and my car was waiting for me, the safety crew had pushed my car back for me to my stall (I compensated with many offerings of beer).
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Video from the race:
Sunday:
Went over the car and couldn't find anything wrong - did as much as I could in the dark and in the morning bypassed the onboard surge tank, cleaned the crank trigger sensor, did a crank relearn and checked everything once more. In practice, it was again so dusty that there were times you were going over a hill blind as if a car had been off track creating huge dust clouds with zero visibility. The Cali folk were again impatient (a recurring theme), but my car ran well, outside a minor hiccup I was able to run it very hard for the whole session. In qualifying, there was basically one lap of clean track and I was able to put the car in the top portion of the field.
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One minor issue was that I had corded 6 of the 9 Michelin S8M's I had brought to the track - so we made the decision to last minute flip a tire to put the slightly corded edge inside on the rear where it wouldn't see much use for the race. However, I did run out of time and forgot to bleed down the tire, so as I ran to grid and got in my spot - I recounted all the pre-checks before the race, and realized we probably still had 60psi in the tire! I pulled off grid and went back to my stall, and luckily the NASA AZ director of instruction happened to be by my stall airing up his tires and I was able to get him to bleed down the tire for me - just in time to watch grid be released. this was a mixed class split small and big bore race with 36 cars, and I was able to tuck behind the small bore / spec miata group. I left about 2 turns behind them to allow them a clean race start - already a half lap behind the big bore folk, and as the green, err rainbow flag flew for them I allowed 4 turns before I started working my way through the pack. I was dead last, but I thought I'd at least run the car hard and see if I had fixed it. Well, come to find out its sorta fun starting dead last and picking up 25 spots. A big highlight was that I came up on a ST4 mini cooper driven by Ricky Johnson towards the end of the race - he usually is very pleasant in letting me by (something I've chided him before). Well this day, he took that advice and nothing came for free - we had a full lap free-for-all with 7 position changes and some close racing. I had to use a miata as a pick down the straight to make the pass stick. While I had a huge power advantage, his mid-corner speed was slightly higher than mine meaning he could get back in front of me and kill off momentum as needed.
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Sunday's video:
The battle with the Mini:
So far for the season, this has put me in decent shape in ST2 -
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so while its a bit of conflict of interest, I'm going to race to the end and see if I can get some more embroidery done on my champion's jacket. Daytona (NASA 2021 Championships) is looking bleak from a budget standpoint - work has not been going the way I had hoped (company is evolving in a way that has less of a need for me). However I'll try to do the local races and am at least able to keep the program afloat.
I've not had time to go through all the maintenance on the car (as I've been stuck behind a desk), but here's the list of what I'm trying to get to:
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- I
nstall and integrate an AIM Solo DL with all the mustang engine parameters with my racecapture system, writing custom CAN integration (using the smartycam output)Move my fuel pressure sender to the railreinstall the meziere water pump - having tested it to be equal in performance to the normal coyote pumpfront end repairs (new tow hook - thanks Capaldi Racing!), fix air ducting damaged a few events agochange oil- change transmission fluid
- change differential fluid
Change coolant/water- new rear pads
Change a leaking front crank seal - I didn't get the seal depth right the first time- new front rotor rings (thanks @OPMustang Tim and crew!)
Clean up all the dustReinstall the surge tank (since now I can collect more useful data on it)- Build a new splitter as the plywood one is nearing its end
repair the transponderClean the air filter- b
uild a new better front camera mount to reduce vibrationAlign the car, the front toe is off and its costing me performance, not to mention make adjustments as indicated by my tire temperature data
So far I've changed the front seal and worked out the software side of the AIM integration. I have events the next two weekends back to back so some of this will get put off for a bit. Until next time.
Perfect, thank you! Are you still running the Gen 2 balancer?I didn't set it in enough the first time, I just used a mallet and a large enough socket to drive it in
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Hey Chris - hope you feel better soon. Just had a qq - what's the CANbus TPMS system you're referencing? Is this a stock part you're putting back in? Or something aftermarket?End of year report ( NASA AZ ST2 at AMP CW/Oct, CCW/Dec):
The last couple events were a mixed bag, I'll summarize it along with some changes to the car and updates:
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AMP October:
CW, 2 Wins puts me in a pretty good lead in the region, both wins were uncontested as my competition all had issues in practice or qualify.
Car notes: Transmission sluggish to shift when warm, laundry list of items needing fixing increasing
Changes: Cortex axle set at highest RC, used 18mm rear bar, Cortex LCA's using BMR bearing spacers and LCA brackets
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Chuckwalla November:
Budget and exhaustion got me, skipped this event. Tage Evanson ties for lead in regional ST2 championship with 915 points
Car notes: add 2 units of BG MGC to transmission to hopefully resolve shift issues, Accusump air charged
Changes: New AP Racing front brakes, CANbus TPMS system installed, cleanup of camera mounts, lowered steering wheel height to fix nagging shoulder pain
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AMP December (one day):
CCW, I arrive after some long delayed flights coming back from New York. I test negative for Covid, but end up being positive, leave the event sick - in qualifying the accusump system failed putting about 8 quarts of oil all over the interior, exterior of the car and my safety gear. Its raining heavily, but I try my best to clean it up, call it a day. Tage starts the race for the ST lead, but declares a "fun run" to leave the championship at a stalemate
Car notes: Transmission still sluggish to shift when warm, laundry list of items needing fixing increasing, accusump explosion caused significant damage to the interior, brake lights and some other electronics failures noted. New brakes work fantastic
Changes: none
As it stands, the regional championship will come down to some runoff gag at the awards ceremony, so cross fingers its something I have a chance at. I've been down with Covid for more than a week and its hit me hard, unfortunately I cannot attend to the damaged race car - right now much more than just walking the house end to end is exhausting for me.
Some of the big changes have been the cortex goodies and the AP Racing ENP brakes from @OPMustang Tim . We haven't been able to fully setup the Cortex gear due to some hardware issues with a LCA bracket (the replacement is in production but a few weeks away still), but the goal is in 2023 to get some testing time on the car to fully set it up since its basically a 100% different car from the beginning of the year. Not sure of the season's plans, but I'd like to open up to some new tracks, and revisit the crime scenes of the past (Laguna, COTA).
The brakes are something else, they're a bit smaller than the 380x32mm OPM S550 setup I used before, but the improvement in pedal feel and consistency and the consumable life improvements in racing conditions make this a hugely transformative upgrade on the car. The ENP RadiCal 9668 caliper has an amazing finish which is bonus, but I chose the system after working with Tim and the team from Essex/AP. I spoke with many brembo dealers and none were interested in earning the business, and technologically, I believe the AP solution to be more advanced and more economical.
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I'm still learning to drive the Cambered Rear axle, but every time I'm in the car I find more confidence and trust in the system - the huge payoffs are on throttle exits and the midcorner speed capability, the car is much more stable and predictable with significant increases in rear grip. Next year looking at the front may be a thing, but for now I just need to learn to drive this car and determine what I have to do with it in terms of being competitive in the new more restrictive 2023 ST2 rules.
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Thanks for sharing! I've been looking for similar options. Looking forward to how these workout for you. If you have good experience with it, I'll have to give it a shot as well!Tire TPMS
The TrailBrake TPMS systems offer tire pressure and air temp. Available in external and internal sensor versions.trailbrake.com
This unit, which I can use to stream to my racecapture system, uses thread-on sensors so I can do all the normal rotation and cycling of wheels
There’s a couple pics of the heads and cams above but I’ll upload an album soon. I’m actually hopeful they can be salvaged. I put everything to a dial indicator and the cams are still in clearance spec and turn smoothly, only the passenger exhaust shows any sort of meaningful wear (all the cap pictures are of the exhaust on that bank).
The retainers look great, so I think if I’m lucky I can knock a few thousand dollars off this list.
On the dry sump bit - I’m researching but for now I don’t plan on running again in 2023 and maybe part of 2024, I’ll start planning what to do with the car in the summer after I get a financial plan together.