PIR Sept 2nd

[DarthChicken]

Frankrizzo and myself went to PIR for the lotus club day on Friday. Unfortunately, Frankrizzo's car chose that day to kill off the brake switch on his car. I confirmed this by shorting the wires together at the switch - lights on! But I was traveling light and didn't have all my normal tools I take to the track with me that day (track is 20 miles away.. it felt weird driving 30 minutes to a track day, and being home before dinner), so there was no taking it out and throwing rocks at it to make it work (which worked for me at ORP two years ago when mine decided to quit on me).

My car, on the other hand, ran damn good. First session I was getting misfires if I gave it full throttle. At first I thought it was knock - the 76 station at PIR is gone, replaced with an Arco station. Yes.. I put 92 octane arco gas into my 350whp baby. It LOVED it

I turned the boost down 2 or 3 psi, and it was awesome the rest of the day. My problems with the turbo coming loose on the manifold seem to be over, I've got the sucker held on with Rutland 77 (a masonry repair goop rated to 2000 degrees) and some brackets that you bend the tabs on the ends up against the nuts, so they can't turn. This is the first track day in 3 years I haven't had to deal with that problem, I was ecstatic every after every session - yup, 4 nuts, yup nothing's moved, yay! No overheating (max coolant temp was 215 degrees), no oil consumption, just massive butt kicking all over the track, lol.

2nd session I played with a lotus 211 for probably half the session. He had Hoosier A6 tires on the car. He'd pull away from me in the corners (I'm running R888s) and I'd reel him back in on the straights. We eventually got into some traffic, and his lotus buddies did some blocking for him. Point by only passing.... bastards. I tried catching up by braking later and later, with predictable results - got the car sideways in the chicane one lap (caught it, full opposite lock, but I caught it) and 3 laps later just about blew the chicane completely, LOL. Got the black flag pointed at me for that one, so I eased up.

3rd and all sessions from there, not even the 211 could get away. Either the tires were finally warming up, or I just found my groove, because nothing was standing in my way. Well.. ok the palatov Dp4 was still waxing me and everybody else out there, but nothing else could touch me. THIS is what having an atom is all about, I was loving it. Hit about 140mph indicated on the backstretch as well, so didn't have to contend with cars catching back up because of aeros on the straights, I owned them there as well. MARVELOUS! I was actually lapping some cars in a 20 minute session!

I pulled my plugs tonight, and sure enough, I should have changed them after my miller motorsports trip to Utah last month. I gapped them before my dyno tuning session to .028" (which I was told was too wide for the amount of boost I was running). That gap has grown to .034" through erosion, WAY too big for 24psi of boost. Obviously at this power level, plugs are going to be a consumable.

The important part is - no oil, or pieces of piston stuck to the plugs. I may have a front wheel bearing issue at this point, and possibly a leaking axle seal as well. But the car is holding together at around 350whp, on pump gas, so I'm pretty happy.

[FrankRizzo]

OK, as my contribution to the community, I've done a bunch of digging.

Should you have this issue, and want the part, it's a "Goodridge BL Banjo Bolt 3/8-24 Zinc". Part # 03-6036.

And BEST of all, should you be on the road somewhere and have one fail, you can get them at your local Harley Davidson dealer.

NOTE! They're about a 1/4 inch too long, and will have to be cut down, presumably with a vise/hack saw combo, or something similar. But this IS the part.

[Gage]

Thanks for sharing the experience Darth. It sounds like you had a great time.

[DarthChicken]

OK, as my contribution to the community, I've done a bunch of digging.

Should you have this issue, and want the part, it's a "Goodridge BL Banjo Bolt 3/8-24 Zinc". Part # 03-6036.

And BEST of all, should you be on the road somewhere and have one fail, you can get them at your local Harley Davidson dealer.

NOTE! They're about a 1/4 inch too long, and will have to be cut down, presumably with a vise/hack saw combo, or something similar. But this IS the part.

Or... if you had a 1/4 spacer and an extra copper washer, you could use the part straight off the shelf.

[FrankRizzo]

Or... if you had a 1/4 spacer and an extra copper washer, you could use the part straight off the shelf.

OK, Yeah, makes sense. I just ASSUMED that it needed to be that length more for pressure reasons. But thinking about it, considering the size of the hole, the length of the barrel SHOULDN'T affect it that much. Might have to head to Lowe's or Home Despot and see if I can find a spacer. I dunno, might just go completely crazy, and go to a REAL hardware store.

As always, suggestions are welcome!

[FrankRizzo]

Got the spacer, and the washers, brought them home, hooked it all up, leaked like a sieve. Put the spacer and the washer on the OLD one, and saw that it perfectly lined up with the end. Put those on the NEW one, and hack-sawed the end off, put it in, and boom. Fixed.

[bolus]

get your new push rods on yet?

[FrankRizzo]

get your new push rods on yet?

YES! There truly was nothing to it. It took about 10 minutes a side. The most time consuming part was getting the "sandwich" of pushrod, and 2 washers inserted and lined up inside the bellcrank so that I could get the bolt back through.

[bolus]

cool, well that's about the difficulty of doing 99% of the work on an Atom so consider yourself a atom mechanic now.

[FrankRizzo]

OK, just got back from "real" track day #2 @ PIR. Less white knuckled this time. I'm finally catching up with the car.

Expect videos (with crappy sound ) later.

Question! Does anyone ever use 5th on track?