Bedford 3rd August - the bad...
Note - I'll always be honest even when it goes wrong (It has taken a month to write this!). Hopefully people can learn from my mistakes as I've learnt from others
Without doubt the worst track day I've done and that includes the one where the engine blew up on the first lap!
As mentioned above I made my way up from only 6 miles away which was nice. Missed the sighting laps whilst prepping a few things. Once I was ready I went out on my first laps with a lot of apprehension and at the first corner the back tried to swap ends with me. A little confusing but I put it down to the new set up and cold tyres etc. Got to the hairpin onto the back straight and it happened again.
I slowly drove the car back to pits where I was met by another driver saying liquid was gushing from the back of the car. Didn't take long to work out this was fuel!!
I took the car over to the trailer area and jacked it up to find fuel everywhere. This puzzled me for 1 minute...…. until I took the fuel pump cover off and found a puddle of fuel above the fuel pump. I tried to remove the pump but didn't have the right tools. Fair play to the MSV mechanics in the big warehouse who lent me some massive grips. Turns out for some reason I'd left out the rubber O ring. I don't know how this happened but it did. My mates with the race cars had brought the race van so the only option was to silicone the cap in and let it dry (obviously I didn't have a spare O ring). This took time and with pretty much the whole morning gone I ventured back out.
Excellent the Clio now was handling as it should do...……….. for one lap when the front wheel arch liner bracket started fouling the wheel. Another trip to the pits and this soon got bent out the way.
Third time lucky and low and behold the Clio worked fine for the three laps mentioned above, happy days!
I only did a few laps as I wanted to check everything after the morning issues and the fact this car has literally been rebuilt. All look well so we had lunch and I looked forward to finally starting to turn some proper speed around the track in the afternoon.
Lunch done and out we go. The Clio's feeling good and we're warming up until braking into the hairpin at the end of the back straight when during heavy braking the Clio lurches right and the steering drops to the left.
Driving the car back it felt horrible. I got back to the pits and I'm met with the two front wheels pointing at each other. The other wheel is straight in this photo
I'll abbreviate a lot here but basically the rear camber adjustment bushes I run had moved. I couldn't move them so to combat this I shortened the steering rack arm. Not ideal but I need to drive the car home remember!
To the eye it looked good but I know ultimately it's not ideal. All this messing around left me with 30 mins of the trackday left. Remembering the car is out next at the Ring I took it back out just to put some miles on it remembering it had a new gearbox, clutch, etc etc. One more gentle lap and guess what...….. same again!
Toys out the pram time and I packed up and went to the in-laws for dinner. After dinner I drove it home gently and parked it. It drove like s**t.
After washing it the following day I pretty much knew what was wrong. Remembering i'm not a mechanic, race car builder etc I didn't clear the powder coating off of the subframe etc where the suspension mounted. School boy error!
With my head not in it, family holiday, 3 weeks solid working in Ireland and generally no time due to family and work I parked it and contemplated setting fire to it (I almost did this at Bedford ironically!)
Fast forward a month and I took it to the mechanics again to have all the bits removed, cleaned up and the alignment re done. I can't tell you how happy I am to have to spend money on re doing what I should have done correctly in the first place!
Drive over to the mechanics (8 miles) and I can't be arsed with it TBH.
However I picked it up and it didn't take long to relise with the wheels pointing in the right direction this little car awsome!!
So its back and more great news................................ the Ring trip is off. I can't justify it ATM with COVID, the bloody F1 booking the day before so no tourest days before the trackday and taking a still unproven car but........................
I'm off to Snetterton 12th October and it's a track I can't wait to drive in this car. Remember I did a track day and a race in the blue Clio but at this time the blue Clio didn't have many fancy bits on it. I really enjoyed the track so can't wait to take C5EAD and finally put some decent miles on it (if it doesn't rain and it works!)
Trackcars = emotional roller coasters*
*and money pits