March 15th Brooksville.

[Lava Speed 05]

I had a great time and enjoyed getting out and flogging the car without a single spin! Thank you tires with traction!

I of course didn't have the camera on for my two fastest runs, which were apparently still too slow. I will try and get them up today or tomorrow.

I should have the alignment redone for the 29th.



Sent from my DROID RAZR

[Loren]

Good event. Thanks for pulling together and making it happen, y'all!

Sent from my phone. Expect more errors than usual!

[ExecutiveHydra]

New suspension mods and tires on my car felt amazing. Now just to relearn how to drive the car! Great course and a great time as always!

[rab]

Thanks Paul for hanging out with me until the tow truck came.

[ExecutiveHydra]

Hey! No problem, Rick! Hope everything works out well.

[AScoda]

Stopped for gas a few blocks from home and when I tried to leave, the intermittent no-start got me again. I walked home and back and swapped out the coil with a spare I had. Fired right up. It was indeed a bad coil. Should be good now, though it still needs a tune up, even though it's only been 2 years since the last one.
(only a couple of thousand miles a year, if that)

[snookwheel]

We really enjoyed the course! It was one that drove even better than it walked. Great to see everybody again.

Scott

[AScoda]

Rick--tow truck? All well now?

[Solar]

We really enjoyed the course! It was one that drove even better than it walked.

I thought the same thing, I didn't think it would be at much fun as it was. The only problem I had was how to enter the beginning slalom and where to shift, other than that I really enjoyed it.

Drew, I hope you found your problem, those EEC-IV ignition systems were known to cause the problem you described. The car would start and run fine, then no start, after sitting it would start again, the main cause was the ignition module on the side of the distributor. I use to keep a spare module in the glove box of my Mustang because I've seen so many fail.

[rab]

Rick--tow truck? All well now?

My alternator went toes up.
Looks like the "new" alternator the original owner put in wasn't very good.

[Loren]

How 'bout some Event Results?

Lots of newbs at this event. It seemed like everyone had a good time, hope to see you at more FAST events in the future!

[jbrannon7]

Fantastic course. Was bummed that I coned my last and fastest run of 44.6, and then even more bummed when I got home and found the batteries had died on my video cameras just as I pulled up to the start for that run.

[Loren]

Glad to hear that so many people enjoyed this course! (and, yes, I know that not everyone did) I stole it from Ron Rice. It's a condensed version of a course he designed a few years ago.

Just got the Season Points updated. It seems that a lot of classes have a driver with a solid lead in points... and some serious battles going fro 2nd! Four points events left in the season...

[jaball77]

Fun course once you got through the first slalom!

This run was exciting... I hit a cone early and decided to see how aggressive I could be the rest of the way. That led to me botching my 3-2 heel/toe downshift and pitching the car sideways. I managed to save it and still had a 46.8 raw time. That tells you how much time I left out there on my other runs. http://youtu.be/Y6ZUV8YW-M8

This was my best run of the day - 46.5. http://youtu.be/mtY6Xjf5yRE

[snookwheel]

I'll be tinkering today to try and figure out what our fuel issue is, hopefully just a filter.

Here's a couple vids from our runs:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Emv6gnQPsI

Mary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbfrkZyuaXM

[jaball77]

I'll be tinkering today to try and figure out what our fuel issue is, hopefully just a filter.

Here's a couple vids from our runs:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Emv6gnQPsI

Mary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbfrkZyuaXM

Weee, little hairy through the finish! Looks exhausting to drive haha.

[Loren]

Stuff left behind at this event:

One tire pressure gauge in a fancy zipper bag, left on a table.

One folding chair, some sunscreen and some sort of carpeted cover out of a car, left in the grass.

Several egos found near the bottom of the results.

[snookwheel]

Weee, little hairy through the finish! Looks exhausting to drive haha.

Unfortunately, I tend to make it harder than it should be!

[Jamie]

The challenge to the slalom on yesterday's course was twofold. The entry was from an odd angle -- you had to make a hard left right out of the lights, then a hard right to get around the first cone. Even more, it was so close to the start that where to make the 1-2 shift was a real dilemma -- a very short shift right out of the starting lights (bogbogbog), or pick up some revs and shift in the middle of the slalom. Plus the cute visual trick of an expanding (space between the cones increased) slalom coupled to a Chicago box...combined, they made a single slalom that expanded towards the middle, the contracted again. (We talked about this in the afternoon novice walk.) That expanding aspect made it possible to do the 1-2 shift in the middle without upsetting things too much...tried it both ways, and still haven't decided which was best. Interesting feature.

[Loren]

The challenge to the slalom on yesterday's course was twofold. The entry was from an odd angle -- you had to make a hard left right out of the lights, then a hard right to get around the first cone. Even more, it was so close to the start that where to make the 1-2 shift was a real dilemma -- a very short shift right out of the starting lights (bogbogbog), or pick up some revs and shift in the middle of the slalom. Plus the cute visual trick of an expanding (space between the cones increased) slalom coupled to a Chicago box...combined, they made a single slalom that expanded towards the middle, the contracted again. (We talked about this in the afternoon novice walk.) That expanding aspect made it possible to do the 1-2 shift in the middle without upsetting things too much...tried it both ways, and still haven't decided which was best. Interesting feature.

Things never drive quite the way you intend them to at design time. Of course, this course idea was a retread from a course Ron did a few years ago. I started with that, and condensed it down to make it about 200 feet shorter in an effort to shorten the "start interval" time to ensure that we all get maximum runs. Condensing it also put the elements a little closer together and made the course a little slower, and a little more "technical".

The first turn off the start, and the slalom were both loosely defined on the course map. (cones are about 4-foot diameter on the scale of that map... so EXACT placement of any cone is an approximation) But, my intent was to set the first cone such that we had a significant turn right off of the start to avoid a "dragstrip start" (easier on clutches, tires, axles, etc... and a little less of a disadvantage for underpowered cars), which was accomplished. I think that part worked well. The first turn in and of itself wasn't difficult, and achieved its purpose.

The slalom on Ron's original course was a 75' spaced slightly "hard offset" slalom. With the condensed space, I couldn't leave it at 75' without taking out a cone or two. And I wanted to leave the number of cones the same. So, I opted to make it a 62' (1.5 blocks on the map) straight slalom. But, then a couple events back we decided that it was easier for timing if we put the start line out IN FRONT of the trailer instead of next to it. So, I had to tweak this map to move the start line out by 25' and give up a little bit of space. The result was a little less room for the first turn, and I had to make the slalom a 50' slalom. I know a 50' slalom is pretty tight, so I added some "easy offset" to it and let it go.

When we set the course up... Drew initially set up the first turn VERY easy (dragstrip start) and had about 4 feet more offset on the slalom cones. A Miata could have damn near straight-lined that slalom! Not at all what I wanted. So, I moved the first apex to "make it count", and moved the offset in quite a bit. It worked okay... but I think about another foot of offset on the slalom and maybe a LITTLE less of a jog to the left for the first turn would have been ideal.

Oh well, that's the fun of autocross... always a new challenge!