OK so on Thursday 28th I drove to Bedford picked the truck up and then drove another 140 miles to Swindon to pick the car up, as soon as we had the car loaded we took the truck with car in it round the back of an industrial estate and where we fired the car up in the back of the truck, I know not ideal but we needed to know she would run.
So after a night in Swindon a quick bit of shopping then off to Shaky to set up camp, Dave and Lorni were on there way down as well.
So with the car out ready for Saturday and a couple of refreshing drinks we called it a night...but what a night dam it was cold, Dave even got up n the middle of the night and went for a spin in his car just to warm up.
Number one son and crew chief Steve, turned up early in the morning, he wanted to run the car up properly and sort out the timing and mixture before my first licencing attempt.
We seemed to have got a handle on it she sounded great, very angry, we pulled her out ready to go into the pairing lanes, I had to tag on the back of the Wild Bunch as I was doing observed runs, but! there was an accident, one of the motorcycle riders came off her bike although it wasn't fatal it was still a nasty one so it took some time to clear the track again ready for action, but just as the track was cleared....down came the rain and the snow, yes I did say snow...
The weather cleared up but then just as the track was nearly dry..yep down it came again, So the Race Director called it for the day so after all that work and effort we didn't get to make a run, couldn't be helped of course but dam it was so frustrating, but we did get a show of sorts in the afternoon...
Boy did it rain so that was Saturday done, Sunday started bright and sunny after yet another freezing night this time we had ice on the inside of the trucks screen. We fired the car up got her warmed up, this is proving to be a bit of a problem for us, keeping heat in the engine that is, I might just go down the road of oil heaters, anyway after another long delay due to another accident involving another motorcycle we got the call to pull down to the pairing lanes, so I was the last car to run in that particular qualifying session, she fired up I drove her round to the water trough hit the throttle and...big delay and she bogged big time didn't spin the wheels up I took her to the line and again hit the throttle on the green but...bogged again, I took my foot off the peddle and she sped up, obviously something was still not right and of course that run would not be counted towards my licence.
So back in the pits Steve started fettling he richened her up and took some timing out we fired her up then this young guy walked over and started talking to Steve who then started adjusting the barrel valve anyway to cut a long story short I would like to thank Christian from Nick Goods Super Pro team for hearing the car running far to rich and wandering over to help Steve get it right. But...and there is always a but we found we had a leaking crank shaft oil seal, we ran around trying to find the right bits and pieces, thanks Darryl from the Chemical Reaction team,in the end we fitted our old timing cover which had a seal already in place but we missed the second run.
We had some visitors on Sunday Phil my other son and his better half Katie and her three children..looks like the next generation are getting ready to take over.......
Daniel
Harvey
Aimee
So after a not so cold night on Sunday, Monday dawned a little over cast again we warmed the car up and then we pulled her down for a run, into the burnout and once again we didn't get the wheels to spin up I was so disappointed I just wanted to back her right up shut her down and get towed back to the pits but Steve motioned me to the line, well she took off like a scalded rat, still not running right mind but we got the wheels up for the first time ever....
I know it doesn't seem like much but believe me after the year we have had that was as good as running a 7 Steve and Dave met me at the first turn off and I had a grin a mile long on my face and so did they, back in the pits and now knowing we are going in the right direction Steve did a little fettling ready for the next run which was going to be a full run with chute to get my licence signed off but we pulled the car out got the call and we made our way to the paring lanes,
But that was as far as we got as once again the weather beat us, but this time we didn't start packing up feeling down oh no we were happy campers for a change.
Brilliant shot thanks to Tog at Eurodragster for this photo
Ok so the weather won on this occasion..what next? well after a long chat with Steve we have decided to take a step back and just get the car to some RWYB's until we are happy with her performance, then we will go back into competition I am desperate to get her running right for Dragstalgia where I hope we can show off the cars real potential, both Steve Dave and myself know what the car is capable of running we have just got to get her there, the Company that Steve works for are not being to helpful with letting Steve have the time off..Holiday.. for some of the meetings this year so a step back looks like the right decision for now.
We still have some work to do on the car, re torque the head gasket, replace the crankshaft oil seal and put the new not weeping timing cover back on, we need to replace the half shaft seals as well. And we still have a new chute to fit, so its still going to busy here at Slimline Racing.
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