Time for a scatter shield.
Time for a scatter shield.
are worth a thousand words..................
Would everyone believe I only stopped driving when another ball joint broke mid autocross run? Front end landed hard enough to crack the radiator at the mount. (Minor... already fixed it).
New clutch is getting here tomorrow, ball joints already replaced, tore the transmission down and found why it started popping out of 2nd gear was because the fork pads are gone.... probably because the clutch wasn't disengaging properly and I had to ram it into 2nd. I have spare parts for that.
Extra bonus.... picked up a second transmission Monday. Now I can build a spare to keep in the race trailer.
Up and running! Packed up and ready for the Waumandee Hill Climb tomorrow.
Heck of a day yesterday. Morning sessions were cut short due to rain and lightning. I was course working at the time and did my best to stay dry.
Rain stopped in the afternoon and held off just long enough to finish the day. With gravel, water, leaves, acorns, etc all over the course from the weather it was as much about caution as speed. Plenty of places where grip levels changed on the fly and this is a course you do not want to have an off.
My last run was my fastest by far and while there was time to gain I knew before the top it wasn't worth it. I felt like pushing any harder was just going to be a bad outcome.
Finished up with the 5th fastest time and less than .3 sec off of 3rd place. 1 and 2 were a couple seconds ahead and drove hard. They were .2 apart and ran times I did 2 years ago on a dry and clean course.
I've been putting in some work on refinement now that the race season is over.
Car needed some love after a hard season.
Figured out I could run tail pipes under the rear axle without any issues other than forcing me to move the fuel filters and pump. Which I needed to anyway to get the surge tank plumbed in and a lift pump hooked up.
I knew front wheel bearings were a bit toasty so those got replaced. The steering shaft supports were loose during the hill climb which I found out after getting home. First try it had a tight spot. Second try it's adjusted good.
Also been adjusting the tune after noticing lean misfire during cruise.
Then I drove it....and WOW is this thing down right pleasant to drive now! It's 400 percent quieter inside with tailpipes back on, it's running smooth and not trying to die coming up to stop signs, no wheel bearing noise, steering is the best it's been all year.
I've also got the dash tac to work for the first time in years. Will be getting the rugged radios intercom moved to the dash with quick plugs so it's all more integrated and easy to use. Need to do some wiring under the dash while I'm there too.
Dropped the coil overs off at Viking Performance last week for a refresh. They've been working great but after 2 years of thrashing the hell out of them I felt it was a good preventative maintenance item to get them looked over.
In other news: I bought the CHEAPEST running and driving golf cart I could find!
So...that means a new video series
Wow, nice driving on that hillclimb! Glad to hear the refinement is paying off
It's insane how expensive golf carts have gotten. In my area the small towns (kind of all at once) street-legalized them a few years back and that didn't help at all.
In reply to GCrites :
Yeah, I kinda got talked into this by a few buddies. One was really pushing for it cause he now has several. I think he got a little upset when I got this going with less than $800 in it when his cheapest one was $1500 not running. Anything actually nice was way out of the budget I would be willing to spend.
Back onto Cutlass projects. I've gotten the coilovers back from rebuild at Viking. One was so damaged it had to be replaced. Viking said...and I quote: "you are very hard on equipment" , "we've never seen one broken this way before". It was the drive front that had the ball joint snap off as covered in the Waumandee video. Aparrently it pretty much balloned the inner tube. Viking said that could only happen upwards of 4000psi....
Anyway I built a master cylinder brace this week only to inadvertantly discover that the front end of the car is still a wet noodle and is flexing all over the place with minimal provocation. Here's that video...and a follow up fix with a big engine bay brace will be coming.
If you've been following along with the Golf cart build also here are the last two vidoes in that series.
Spent the last couple days building a removable engine bay brace. Screwed up several times, tried to save it, then start all over. Came out pretty good I think. Installs and removes easily.
Coming soon. Another complete redesign of the front suspension....
Got around to building a new power steering pump bracket this weekend. Old one I made 5 years ago and it's been bent, cracked, and repaired a few times.
Decided to draw it up and CNC it at work on my day off. I'm really happy with how it came out.
New bracket is thicker, has pressed in spacers, tighter hole and slot dimensions as well as looking way better!
Nice work Cody!
Whats kind of pump is that?
In reply to gsettle :
GM type 2 is the style/type of pump. Widely used as the base for aftermarket pumps from lots of different companies
This one is Jones Racing Products. Setup for flow/pressure/engine rpm needs of a road race application.
Nice. Do you run a cooler? I run a factory tube style one currently with a stock GM pump but have been considering plumbing it to the (un-used) oil cooler ports in my radiator.. Do you think that'd work ok?
In reply to gsettle :
I use a finned tube style cooler and is been enough for me. Helps that my pump is setup for what I'm doing. However I've been worried about if I need more cooling, but no problems yet.
The stock pump without a cooler exploded after an hour of track use by basically boiling the fluid and melting seals.
I may be wrong but I wouldn't plumb to the radiator oil cooler because it'll automatically mean temps can't be lower than a bit above coolant temp in the radiator. It gets used for oil due to the need for some heat to be in oil for best performance of the oil. I've not come across any such thing in regards to power steering fluid. So I would think there's no reason to have the temperature be higher than the lowest you can keep it. Especially with how fast things fail when they do get hot. A performance/higher temp tolerance fluid goes a long way too.
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