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Road Atlanta rain omitted for clarity
10Dec22; Sat. LeMons Road Atlanta. Chilly. Misting rain. Jamie has the coffee pot and propane heaters going. He is not driving this race. But this time its not due to court order or popular demand. He’s recovering from a heart stint.
101 cars are registered and ready. We are Class C as usual. The Blitzwagen fires off reluctantly but soon settles into a stable idle. God bless Kadron Solexes.
We’re running 44mm throttle bodies, 36mm venturis, and 170 mains. We are using engine #2 (56750).
At the driver’s meeting, everyone becomes aware than at least a third of our drivers are rookies. Rain, rookies, and Road Atlanta. What could go wrong?
Johan and Slick
Johan is out first. He lasts just ten minutes and has to be towed in. Jamie and David quickly discover the 3-4 cyl side rocker arm assembly has come loose at the cyl #3 stud. Jamie had used a half-width 8mm valve adjusting nut there rather than the full width, and it has failed. Not enough thread surface. But it was fine up until now, with a couple of races behind it.
Repair is not possible. The pushrod is hammered and it seems like the cam lobe is broken. While we are learning all this (and hoping to fix it), David is trying to fish out three valve lash caps that went down the push rod tubes into the case. By removing the oil plate and strainer and using a magnet on a piece of wire, he recovers all lash caps.
But to no avail. We go into engine swap mode. Engine #1 is rolled out of the trailer and its protective cocoon of plastic wrap stripped away. The backup engine is complete, direct plug and play.
Justin, David, and Jamie struggle on a rocky, uneven hillside to r&r the engines in the misty rain. They have jacks and stands fore and aft under the car trying to square it up, but on reinstall, the engine studs get jammed and precious time wastes away as we push, pull, and cuss the car and engine together.
Finally, we get it all together and smooth Dr. Steve (aka Slick) takes over, back on track, and hope returns. The brakes, handling, and power are excellent.
Justin goes out next, everyone committed to 1.5 hr stints. Fearless motorcycle racer that he is, Justin sets a good 2.04 lap in the wet. We have clocked a little faster here before, but this is rain and brand new unscuffed tires.
Engine #1 is identical to #2 except for 34mm venturis. It makes a difference. The 34mm vents gave us better low end.
Identical means the same 94m pistons, 78mm stroke, same heads, same 40x35 valve sizes, same cam (Engle 125) and same 1.25 rocker assemblies, and same 9:1 compression.
There have been a few crashes, on the track as the rain increases and the rookies splash through. Back in the paddock we actually hear one asking another “What’s the story behind the yellow flag rules?” You can actually watch track traffic accordion like on the interstate as rookies slow down in groups and rubber neck at spin outs and fender benders.
Finally David goes out, being careful in traffic, but we start to develop trouble again. It’s either misfiring or fuel delivery. A couple of pit stops and wire checking and head scratching sessions traces the trouble to ignition. The crew finds the distributor cap’s center interior spring-loaded carbon button has broken. A cap and rotor change seems to fix the problem, and we finish out the first day still under our own power at the checkered flag.
11Dec22; Sun. More rain, more cold. Car on the track at 0800. There is no sun, just a soggy, gray, wet (but still just above freezing) December morn. After yesterday, as we plan out our driver schedule this morning, they are near a mutinous “Not it!” attitude.
One of our jokes is why do we have so many helpers belt the driver in. The answer is to keep him in there in case he changes his mind.
We keep logging laps until 1000 hrs., running back through our four drivers. We’re way behind in laps. During the next hour or more of quiet time, which is imposed so as not to excite any churches in hearing range of Road Atlanta, we can’t even idle the engine to keep diagnosing the ignition breakup. Too much snap crackle pop. David and Jamie demand in he future we lose the 009’s and get the newer V8-looking wide cap distributors. I know a junker 009 can be bad, and have nice trouble-free cast aluminum 009 clones for the Ghia engines, but here today with what we have is ridiculous.
At noon the race is resumed. We are just flat losing power because of the ignition. We pit and swap 009’s. It helps but still snap crackle pop.
At 2:00pm, fate steps in. In the never-ending damp-wet weather, Johan come charging under the bridge at the top of test-your-courage hill, and does a slip&side, spinning, long down hill power dive to the white and blue painted concrete retaining wall.
The Blitzwagen hits hardest on the left rear corner. The rear wing assembly shatters and flys away and the stinger gets smashed off.
See the left rear corner? It’s not there anymore.
Johan is okay, and later comments, “The road let go of me.”
Once the Blitzwagen is towed in, all hands are on the job, pulling off loose bodywork, stitching odd panels together with tie straps, bolting on a new stinger. Soon we are back in the race.
The engine is protected by a square steel tubing cage.
At 5:00 PM The cold wet race is over. The Blitzwagen’s wounds are more superficial than serious, and a couple of those oversized V8 capped billet distributors is in our future.
We finish with 227 laps completed, too much time lost in repairs. The most laps overall (348) were logged by an A Class BMW 328.
And in the first week of February 2023 we get to do it all again at Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham AL.
