Here are some pictures of us in this great country, because there is more to life than racing alone - maybe that’ll change once I start getting some decent results 
I must say, even though this place rocks and I’m enjoying spending time with Rachel (she’s here for the year), I am looking forward to Cadwell Park when I get back.
First off, the changes to the cooling system worked very well. I’m now thinking of adding another ram air intake to serve the oil cooler as this seems to be the next weak link in the chain.
Qualifying
An oil hose split on lap 3 and sprayed the entire engine bay. Amazingly I managed to limp back to the paddock. I should have taken a picture of the engine bay but I had other things on my mind at the time! Anyway, cleaned up the mess, repaired the hose, refilled with oil and the car was ready to go again. I qualified 22nd in the 1st race and 23rd in the 2nd.
Race 1
I made it halfway through the race, overtaking and still catching those ahead of me until, on the pit straight my gearstick fell off! Yes, my gear stick fell off!! I can only imagine I never checked it after assembly and it’s been slowly undoing itself over the last couple of months. DNF
Race 2
1 or 2 laps into the race and I’m starting to get into my stride, but once again, on the pit straight the car starts spluttering and dies. Immediately I know I’ve run out of fuel. I forgot to calibrate the fuel gauge!!! DNF
A weekend dogged by silly errors, but it’s all once step closer to running a reliable car, so I can’t complain especially as I’m going to be in New Zealand for the next few months and can’t work on the car.
Cadwell Park next - in July - Where I hope to get a true indication of the cars performance.
First on the list is the cooling system which really didn’t do its job very well at Snetterton. The radiators have been moved to the front undertray and mated to the inlets so they’ll trap every bit of air coming in! I’ve replace the long straight runs of hose with aluminium tube, added a bleed screw at the front and insulated the exhaust headers as they do run very close to the coolant hoses.
The rear wheel bearing issue turned out to be just that the flange on the end of each of the half shafts had come loose so something to keep an eye on there. The roll bar has also been replaced with one without a weld in the middle of it.
So I’m all set for the next test day er.. I mean race.
The cars first outing gave mixed results. Lets get the bad news out of the way first - I finished second from last - and that was only because the person in front of me spun off on the final lap!
I had major cooling issues. My crazy cooling arrangement just didn’t work (the temperature reached 130°C) but, you can’t win them all so back to the drawing board there.
I also noticed I had a huge amount of movement at the rear wheels like the bearing had worn out - after one race though? Will have to investigate further.
Although the car wasn’t fast at all, it did give me the confidence to take the bomb hole, coram and riches flat without any drama so I think I have a good base to work with. So, back to the workshop for some tweaks and roll on Brands Hatch.
01 Feb 2009: Front tow hook complete.
16 Feb 2009: Rear tow hook is on its way!
23 Feb 2009: Complete!
