Yet again, it’s back into the garage with a few things to sort. However, before that, here’s something interesting. You will remember that I was in a real race at Silverstone with a certain amount of position swapping going on. It seems as though the action was actually a little closer than I’d thought, as here’s a small battle wound…
Tag: Braking
Exhausting work
OK, I’m back. It’s been a while but we’ve been on holiday and I spent a week away at a conference which explains the lack of progress.
In fact, if I’m honest there isn’t really much to say anyway. After the Snetterton race I’d decided that I needed to sort the exhaust system out. I spent a while phoning around a few builders without any joy. I’d imagined that they’d all be twiddling their thumbs at this time of year. However, that appears to not be the case. So, after discussing it with Andy I thought I’d try something that I’ve been meaning to have an experiment with for a while. This is making my own exhaust. After all, it’s just a pipe and as Andy manages to make them out of a collection of mandrel bends, why can’t I?
Not quite what I intended
Oh well, that didn’t quite work out as I intended. We went to Snetterton last weekend for the next race in the RGB championship. I was hopeful that the new engine would do something useful, although wary that the bodged around exhaust wasn’t really going to help. Also, the car hadn’t been been on a dyno which wasn’t going to help.
Bar the shouting
It’s getting perilously close to the next race but barring a bit of shouting, the car’s now done. I wonder if it will work properly?
I took it up to Andy’s last week and he modified the old exhaust system to fit to the new engine. I think it’s ended up being a bit of a bodge, to be honest, but with luck it will work well. I do keep wondering if I should have had a complete new system built.
Bouncy, bouncy
Sorry for the absence, I’ve been away feeling sorry for myself as I’ve had human ‘flu, at least that’s what I think it was. No wonder it’s killed so many people if it makes you feel that grotty. Excuse me while I go and make myself another “paracetamol-based cold remedy”, as they are coyly described on the NHS website.
Pedalling along
I’ve tried to make a bit of progress with the horrific list this weekend. As usual, I seem to have made rather less progress than would seem reasonable. One issue is that it’s COLD in the garage. I hate this time of year…
Loin girding
Right then. The time has come to actually get this J15 finished. What would be nice is to get the car finished by the end of the year which would give me time to do some testing in the New Year. This picture is the car in its current state, sitting on the drive between the motorhome and the trailer while I used the entire garage for the Fury.
Bleeding progress
A bit more progress to report, again mainly around the J15’s rebuilt braking system. With the new master cylinders I’m going to have to use a different fluid reservoir. In particular, I need to mount the fluid higher up so as to be sure that it’s downhill into the master cylinder.
Backwards to the future
You may remember that I’ve all sorts of problems bleeding the J15’s brakes. Well, I finally decided that the pedal box I was using was designed incredibly poorly and had no chance of ever working properly. The only way to bleed the brakes would have been to take the master cylinders out and somehow arrange for them to be horizontal. Of course, in that position you can’t really pump on the pedal to get the air out. Although, to be fair, other techniques such as reverse bleeding are possible. However, getting the master cylinders horizontal was always going to be the core issue.
I thought you said you’d finished that?
Finished what? Well, just a moment and I’ll tell you. Up first, though, is a riveting photo of a wheel and tyre. This is a new A048R mounted on one of the wheels that I bought from Compomotive a while ago. I know it looks just like one of the Fury wheels but it’s got a different offset. When I took the car to Andy’s I had real trouble getting it on the trailer because the different offset of the Fury wheels I was using at the time meant that that track was 38mm wider than it should be.