Back from New Orleans Race... early :(

Yea... not good news at all. But alas... let's start at the last update.

Car was running well and all looked good prior to departure. "New" engine was running a lot smoother then the old motor and seemed to have a bit more power. We loaded up and headed out on our 8+ hour drive.


We arrived Thursday evening and got the track with our other team (Team ClubGP). Rented an RV spot so we had power and water, etc. and enough room for both our teams to park our trailers, the cars, etc (thanks Adam). We unloaded everything Friday morning and got setup for the test day (also tech day).

Brick and I did a few laps each in the car, and everything felt pretty good (although I still had some issues shifting into 4th w/ the trans linkage... but Brick didn't have any problems). We went through tech and made it through with out too much hastle (being through it before helped alot!).

Matt and Al showed up and did a few laps each as well. Then Brick took it back out for a few more laps, and after only a couple, came back into the pit with a bad sounding rattle coming from under the hood.

We pulled the valve cover, nothing obvious. Pulled the plugs... all looks fine (probably running just a little lean). So, decided to drop the lower cross supports and the oil pan. Well... there is our problem. Seems we lost a bearing with all those bits in there :(

So... here we are, the night before the 2 day race starts... done. No luck on finding and swapping another motor in time, so we ended up packing up Saturday morning, watching our other friends in Team ClubGP for a bit, and limping home to lick our wounds (and lighter wallets).

Good news for Team ClubGP... they not only finished the race (after using JB Weld to fix their motor!), they ended up with 5th place, and a $1K prize from the judges.

I have pictures here and here.

We leave Thurs AM!

Well, tonight we will be organizing items for packing, and then pack up the trailer tomorrow in preparation for leaving Thursday morning on the ~8 hour drive to the Lemons race! See some of you there!

Less than 2 weeks!

Car is ready mechanically... just a few little items left to do, like our new hood graphics, change our car number, etc

Had a meeting yesterday with the ClubGP Team (we are convoying and sharing tools/pit) to try and get our schedule, packing list, etc organized. Made progress on it... but more planning required!

Progress and Problems

Sorry again for not keeping up with the updates here!

We got the new seat and race harness mounted and installed, and finished up with some little items with the engine swap. Dropped the car to do it's first drive under load since the motor swap, and the car wouldn't move. Forgot about a little issue we had at the last race at the end of our racing. For some reason, the car wouldn't move very easilly going backwards... driving OR pushing.

Well, after some research Thursday night, we figured out the problem. As odd as it is, the driver side bearing/hub seems to have moved about 1/4" in on the knuckle. This was causing the rotor to drag (and wear badly) on the brake caliper bracket and part of the knuckle assembly.

Brick hit the salvage yard on Friday and picked up a driver side complete knuckle assembly (with bearing, hub, etc), a caliper bracket, and I ordered a new rotor. At today's work day we seemed to have all the parts needed to fix the problem.... or so we thought.

We swapped the new complete knuckle about an hour before the rotor was to arrive at the parts store. We tried putting the axle nut on, and quickly realized that the one we picked up (had to replace due to rounding off of the original one) was the wrong size! So.... I called the local dealer (before noon) and got a new one on order ($2.05), but it won't be here until Tuesday :(

So... things are looking good, but as always... things creep up and getcha sometimes.

More Progress!

I'm a bit behind on Blog updates, sorry. Had a few more work days since we pulled the motor.

Brick and I dropped off the trans downtown to have them check it out and possibly replace the synchro's. Apparently it wasn't needed, and they fixed a few minor settings inside and said all should be well.

Then we spent quite a bit of time finding items that we needed to move between the old motor and the Camry motor we were putting in. A lot more parts needed to be swapped then you would think, but all were taken care of.

Big thanks to Brick for all his work (many times by himself) on getting the motor into the car and finishing up other items needed to get it running.

It runs! Seems like we may have a vacuum leak somewhere, but otherwise running smooth.

Old motor was filled with water when we cracked it open

Work has resumed!

The new team started work on the car today. We pulled the header & AC compressor off the "new" motor since we don't need AC, and the header was for the Camry.

We then started pulling everything we needed to in order to pull the old motor out of the car. We started about 10:30am and just finished up at about 2:15pm. Engine is out!

Next on our list is removing the transmission and then swapping required parts between the motors.

Some pictures are below, and more are here.

    

Back from the Race!

A little delayed... but been swamped since getting back!

Well, the race was definitely fun, but neither our team or our other team finished the race. Our other team threw a rod about 1.5 hours before race end on Day 1. Our car started over heating just before that.

Oil was good and we didn't see any leaking fluids... but each time we checked the radiator, it was just about dry. Twice we saw temps on the block of almost 600 degrees, and the aluminum head 400 degrees (sigh). We called it a day about 20 minutes before race end on Day 1.

It was determined that the head gasket was toast, and at this point we may have a cracked head as well. In the morning of Day 2, we figured we'd top off the fluids and try and get a few laps in. No such luck... We called it a day and the end of our race as well.

Here's a shot of me on the track... 3 wheels are better then 4 on the ground, right?



I have more pictures here, and even more of The Cursed car getting crushed here.

Looks like both teams have some work to do for the next race!