Track Diary

Snetterton Test August 2009 with Mark Hales for Telegraph/Octane Feature

Telegraph Article

Mark Hales : Top driver / enthusiast / creator of “how to drive” series of instructional DVDs - journalist and driver for Nick Masons tenths collection.

I had enquired with Mark about a test / feature on the f1-67 a while back and with seasons end fast approaching it was decided to get together at Snetterton and try and get some set up done on the car and some constructive feedback from someone who has driven more historic era cars than anyone I can think of - however the best laid plans do have a habit of falling apart and even before we got to the track things went pear shaped as the original test day schedule was changed and only saloons were going to be out on the chosen day - with no alternative available at short notice the circuit kindly allowed us to use the lunch hour which left us somewhat short on Time - sadly also the new shocks we are waiting for had not yet arrived so we had to use the soggy/rock solid units.

With very limited time things then got worse as Mark was badly delayed en route and this left us with less than no time to prepare, specifically with comfort issues which were very much apparent as soon as Mark got his feet down at the pedal end - previously our foot size record was held by regular driver Tim Gray, who had always managed to drive the car comfortably despite size 12 feet! However Mark has now determined a new record and this lead to a problem with fouling his toe end on the lower side of the pedal box bulkhead which made us reconsider driving the car at all - with some limited pedal adjustment Mark decided to give it a go and with the clock ticking went out for a few laps after which a quick toe adjustment was made and then continued to fire in some faster laps eventually lapping at under 1min 16secs, a great achievement considering the pedal issues - time soon ran out and post test discussions determined the following :

Things we're already working on...

Shocks too soft - bottoming front shocks too easily - double adjustable Trakspax on order lengths carefully revised

Front anti roll bar - fitted but no Time to set up on day.

Seat back angle - mk2 chassis already has a changed rake angle for drivers back greatly increasing comfort / driving position.

Lower edge of dash close to top of legs of taller drivers - dash now remade and clearance now increased by 30mm.

Twitch!

Last time out at Donington park noticed a small twitch at the front end when power lifted off/ braking at end of back straight, the only change from previous settings was bump steer changes made - it would appear that the moving of the steering arm position has actually messed up the toe settings in bump - will check that there are no fouling issues under full travel between rod end/steering arm - will look at this again and reassess.

Other things we learned on the day…

Gearing - the theoretical top speed of the car is 180mph, this is never going to happen anywhere but Bonneville! - by changing the top speed to around 160 mph this would help keep the engine in its power band much better, even at Snetterton where there is the UK’s longest straight the higher revs were not being achieved in fourth - investigate different crown wheel and pinions .

Gearshift - Mark suggested a pivoted type gear linkage rather than the direct solid rod type installed to give a better feel, whilst the “non direct” approach can be tricky to engineer properly I tend to agree and will investigate pivoted rod/cable linkage options.

Increase front bulkhead clearance by at least 25mm for the ample footed driver and modify to improve clutch footrest - fair point and easily amended on production chassis.

Find a decent dyno to get the engine to full potential power, the idas look great but have proven to be difficult to get set up well as most of the old school boys are retired/dead by now and the knowledge scarce, have been to 2 dynos already with varying success - will investigate other options, a simpler and cheaper alternative would be to investigate a single 4 barrel carb/inlet - upside is a much simpler set up and installation and £1300 saving against the quad weber set up, downside is the looks! Will try and set up a dyno operator over the winter to do a back to back setup with both options and gauge the performance/reliability benefits of both.

Front suspension geometry - check settings re front camber control in roll, will recheck when new shock lengths installed, pretty sure this is down to starting ride height being too high (somewhat compromised at present with front shock lengths/bottoming issue), will look at again once lower ride height achieved/ARB installed.

Summary

All in all a very interesting day with lots of useful feedback despite the limited time and very much looking forward to getting Mark in the mk2 and spending a day working on set up with him to get the handling optimised, a good way to go into a winter rebuild period with specific goals re modification/improvement.

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Trackzone day at Donington Park – August 2009

Objective: Establish running noise levels with new back boxes, circuit limit 98dba drive by.

Donington Park has one of the most rigorously enforced noise limits ( despite being all of 100 yards from a busy airport ), having fitted the new stainless back boxes the only way to determine whether the levels are ok is to go and try it - upon arrival there were several “you’ll be putting that back on the trailer pretty soon” conversations with the marshals, as usual there was a large amount of positive interest in the car.

We took the first session in stages running at 4000/5000/6000rpm to establish a noise reading on each of 3 laps which resulted in a very acceptable peak reading of 92dba, given that each 3dba difference represents half the noise we are substantially within current noise levels and surprised more than a few people by spending the rest of the day at full revs with no issues at all except my neck muscles wearing out too quickly.

Despite the shocks being returned to Leda and being charged for the privileged of having them modified (to what should have been the original settings) they are still nowhere near to what I would like, effectively the first 15 clicks do hardly anything and then the last 5 clicks take the settings from soft as cheese to hard as hell, which limits the adjustability somewhat, not impressed at all - it seems my 15 year quest to find a consistent/decent shock manufacturer continues! Otherwise another trouble free day and great to run out at Donington for what might be the last time before the circuit is turned into a building site for the (theoretical) 2010 British GP “improvements”

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SPA July 2009 RMA TRACKDAYS

Objective: its Spa! Enough said.

From the first time that the car ran it has always been in the back of my mind to get to spa and try out one of the greatest circuits in the world with the f1-67 - RMA run two track days a year at spa and with the second in October (despite the car not being sorted in several respects) the decision was taken to go anyway rather than wait another year, getting there was a straightforward drive from the channel tunnel, you can tell when you’re near to the circuit as suddenly your tow car behaves like its lost half its cylinders and the mpg goes under 10 ! The gradients and length of the hills are something else and that’s just the motorway.

Organisation at the track was very capably handled by Graham and his team, having done the slow walk/drive lap to check out the basic circuit features it becomes apparent very quickly that the track is simply in another league, at 4.3 miles long it is nearly twice as long as Snetterton! With at least twice as many corners and staggering gradient changes throughout there is an awful lot to learn here and the eau rouge incline is so different from the TV perception of a “bit of a dip”, when you turn the hairpin the view straight ahead is amazing, the descent/rise is like nothing else. During the day we slowly raised the pace as we learned roughly where the corners were! To get any real idea of how to drive a decent lap here would take a very long time, having not been to a “new” circuit for many years it felt like a first season all over again and by the end of the day I still felt like a complete novice and cannot wait to have another trip over, with a little more circuit knowledge this place can only get better .

During the day the engine felt somewhat sluggish but coupled with limited circuit knowledge and a very busy day I thought no more of it, upon checking back at base it appeared that the throttle stop screw had wound itself out somehow and had limited the throttle opening to about 40 %, with hindsight that was perhaps a good thing as given full power might just have resulted in a quick trip into the woods whilst trying to remember which way the track turned next!

Overall a fantastic trip and looking forward to the next opportunity to try the circuit with full power/decent shocks/improved seating position in the “mk2” prototype which will be built over the winter using all the knowledge we have gained this year to refine the car.

Overall a fantastic trip and looking forward to the next opportunity to try the circuit with full power/decent shocks/improved seating position in the “mk2” prototype which will be built over the winter using all the knowledge we have gained this year to refine the car.

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