A place to show off my futile attempt at autocross and the like. Lets just hope the car holds together. http://mydrive.roadfly.com/blog/Polishrifle/ en-us Webligo BlogHoster So I was on my computer this morning and I realized that I hadn't made an entry in a while. Which at least is not my only entry in 2008...ahem...Andy. Part of the blame lies on my past semester of school. But I graduated last month so now I am remembering what free time was like. As far as the car goes the new setup is still going well. The first autocross of the season was great, it was the first time I have really gotten to see what the car was made of. It didn't feel all that different, but to have power so much lower in the rev range, to have added grip from the LSD, and to have a steering rack that makes it humanly possible to keep up in a tight slalom was great. And now that I am in SM things are a lot tighter than they were in DSP. Garold is still my competition, but I have a bunch of really fast guys up here in SM to compete with. Somehow I got lucky at the first event and won my class, probably due to the fact that I just happened to have the fastest clean run. All of us in SM had faster times, and my fastest would have only been good enough for second place, but thanks to our orange friends, things were different. Aside from the racing I am now the god father of my nephew Adam, which is also why I missed the second event, but some things are just more important. And I will unfortunately also miss event three, but once again, it will be more than worth it. I leave for Monterey, CA in a couple of days to visit a friend in the Air Force. And as I'm sure most of you are thinking already, I am already planning on going to Laguna Seca while I am there. I should even be able to get a free hot lap! So don't worry, pictures will be a plenty. http://mydrive.roadfly.com/blog/Polishrifle/1512/ Last Saturday I actually had the day off from work. So I decided to make the most of it. I went to the 100th Chicago Auto Show, and right from there hit the 2008 International Motorcycle Show. Not much to say, I found them both to be disappointing for the most part. Must be the "been there, done that" mentality. But there were some highlights, So onto the pics.One of my favorite cars of all time, rebornNot a huge Mopar fan, but it looked mean, and the Hemi orange looked good on itThe Yes Roadster...a little to busy for meWhere I would like to beOh Yeah!Pimped out Duc (the wheels are CF!)Suprisingly comfortable (for a sportbike)Another interesting DucatiSexy MVThere is more talent in this man's sweat than I have in my whole body http://mydrive.roadfly.com/blog/Polishrifle/1474/ Well, I have hinted and mentioned for a couple months now that an engine swap for my beloved car was in the works. I am happy to say that it is complete! The whole process started a couple months ago when Alex asked me if I wanted to go in with him on ordering an engine for our cars in the name of saving on shipping costs and the overall cost of the engines themselves. I whole-heartedly agreed and the engines were ordered. Not too long afterwards the engines arrived at his place, only to discover that one of them was full of water...needless to say it was toast. So after a little coercing by Alex to get them to ship a replacement engine, a new one arrived. Then began the process of freshening up the nice B18C sitting in his garage. Over the next few weeks, when we both had a free evening, I would head over to Alex's place and we would work on getting it ready to drop in my car. We had a few hiccups along the way, such as a dented oil sump, but we (mostly Alex) trucked though it and had it ready to go.Then it finally came down to the actual swap process. I had a weekend day off and we got a good amount of the work done: old engine out, old steering rack out, new steering rack in, new engine in, etc. Alex was gracious enough to let me dive his hatch while my car was under the knife during the next week or so. We got everything else in shortly afterward, including new suspension bushings up front, and the car buttoned back up enough that I could drive it home. I'll tell you that first drive down the block was thrilling, but there were a couple of issues to work out such as a really annoying surging idle, a missing torque mount, and a radiator fan that did not want to kick on. I made it home that night (more like early morning) without issue other than a really crooked steering wheel, and drove it for a little over a week. After Christmas I was able to get back over to Alex's and finish up with the few loose ends. Idle fixed, fan problem sorted out, and torque mount on I headed home that night and finally got to confidently push the new engine. I had a grin the whole ride home....and still do.I love the new engine, the LSD trans that went with it, and the overall feel of the car with all the little things we did while we were at it. I can't wait for the new autocross season. Street Modified here I come.Alex, I can't thank you enough for everything you did for me and the car, without you this would not have been possible. Thank you.And since this little story is worthless without pictures, here you go.BeforeDuringObligatory "stand in empty engine bay" pictureAfter http://mydrive.roadfly.com/blog/Polishrifle/1465/ I had some time the last few days and I got around to making a compilation video of the recently past autocross season. I think it turned out better than the one I made last year. Let me know what you think. Enjoy.<object width="425" height="355"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/ERoaF8YPCas&rel=1"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/ERoaF8YPCas&rel=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="355"></embed></object> http://mydrive.roadfly.com/blog/Polishrifle/1423/ So I realized that I haven't been giving many updates this summer. Therefore here is the latest.After the good showing on my birthday in July, we had three more solos: one in August, one last month on the ninth, and the last one this past saturday. In August it was wet as many of our events have been, and I did well for myself. But on the way out of the lot and on my way home I noticed an odd noise that sounded like metal bouncing on metal. Less than a minute later it sounds like something lets go and I pull over at the very next driveway. Come to find out the thing that "let go" was the nut holding my AC belt tensioner pulley on. So after a couple of minutes I get it out of the way of my other pulleys before something worse happens. However in my haste to get it free and head home I misdiagnosed the pulley to be my alternator pulley. Thinking that, I drove home with all electrical devices off, only used my wipers when absolutely necessary, and prayed my battery had enough juice to give my engine sufficient spark to make it home. I was relieved when I got home and realized that is was only part of the AC system. Next comes the September event, and we finally have an absolutely beautiful day. I got put in the extra class and got trounced on again, but as usual I had fun. The highlight of the day came when some lucky (and wealthy) guy pulled up in his brand new GT3 to check out what we were doing. Seeing this car in person just proved how little pictures can do it justice...but here you go anyway.Then, just this past saturday we had our last event of the season back at good 'ol Portage High School. The course was great, and it was fast. My car was very nuetral and I was constantly throttle steering to keep it pointed in the right direction, almost as if it were wet out. And despite a spectacular spin on my second run and cones on nearly ever other run, I did much better than I thought. After looking at my video I was very happy to see that I was finally getting close to the cones again, impressively close. I am still waiting to see the final results but I think I beat my arch nemesis Garold, which would make the last event oh so sweet.As far as my car goes it is finally starting to show its age and the abuse I put on it. I just changed my wheels and tires today for my winter duty ones and while I was under there I noticed some wetness on the ends of my steering rack. Add that to the slight oil consumption my engine already has, plus a few other small odd noises and rattles my car has. But what can I expect, it has over 140,000 on the odometer, and I beat the piss out of it with a raised rev limit (which is a bad idea), but all in all it still runs well and starts up every time. Honda has a customer for life...I just have to be in the market for a new car first.That gets me to my last point, I just the past few days have all but purchased a new heart for the Civic...a slightly larger dual overhead cam heart. Add a faster and beefier Integra steering rack to that and you have a practicly brand new (and faster) car. If this all happens all I will need is some minor bodywork (to eliminate the Honda-rot), a fresh paint job, some new sliders for the rear brake calipers, and maybe some racing seats and my car will be better than new. And maybe even at that point I will finally consider the car done. That would be a wonderful feeling. As for now thats all, I should be writing again in about a week or two with with news of exciting new hardware, and if I have some spare time I will make a season compilation video. Until then "drive fast and swerve." http://mydrive.roadfly.com/blog/Polishrifle/1420/ I've realized that I haven't made a new entry in a while. Well a lot has happened , which is a big reason why you haven't heard from me.In late may I competed in INR's event #2, and since it was my first event of the season, I was rusty. I was placed in the "extra" class since I was the only one in DSP. Needless to say I got trounced on. But it was fun as always and it helped me get the cobwebs out. Next thing was an upgrade, a pair of factory replica foglights. They work well and look stock. Intallation was a breeze, the hardest part was cutting the holes in the bumber for the lights. The only thing left to do is to get them properly adjusted. Then in June I arrived to another wet autocross at Portage High School for INR event #3. It was a blast in the wet. Because of some higher speed sweeping turns and a fairly fast slalom I spun out twice in quite a spectacular fashion taking dozens of cones with me. When I was not watching the landscape spin through my windows I was actually in great control, and I had forgotten just how satisfying throttle steering could be. And thanks to the rain letting up just before my last heat, I got some much dryer runs wich lead to a victory for me in the extra class, which is quite a long shot. But one of the best parts of the day was a friend of mine who showed up, rode along with many of the drivers, and ended up getting about triple the seat time that I did. She was grinning from ear to ear the whole time she was there. Fast forward to this past weekend. Saturday was the usual fun time, I raced well (much better than I had earlier this year), but still got destroyed in the extra class placing eigth out of ten. I was plagued by the two chicago boxes on the course all day, and I almost ran over a cornerworker who, for some reason, decided to run and get a cone just as I was coming around the corner. But the real joy was on Sunday. Since the events were back to back, we ran saturday's course backwards. And for some reason I figured out how to take the chicago boxes. Add that to the fact that I actually had some company in DSP, and I had a good battle on my hands. Most of the day he was about a few hundredths faster than me, but somehow I was able to drop more and more time to take the win by about four tenths. I was really excited, I raced well, I had good competition, and it was my birthday. On a side note, after the race I went and played in a softball game where I was three for three with an in-the-park home run, and we won by slaughter rule. It was a great day, happy birthday to me!Here is a little picture I snapped after the Sunday event, you can see the new foglights I installed http://mydrive.roadfly.com/blog/Polishrifle/1382/ This past weekend was spent preparing my car for the new season. I had some brake issues to work out, namely installing new speed bleeders. When I did the brake upgrade a little over a year ago I got a set of Russell speed bleeders. They were junk, one ended up stripping (had to use vise-grips to get it off), and another I simply could not use because it would not seal at all. So I put on a set of Speed Bleeders brand bleeders, and they work perfectly. Since I had the car in the air and the wheels off I investigated the (lack of) wear on my rear rotors. it turns out that a couple of the sliders on the rear calipers are frozen, so only the inside of the rear rotors are wearing properly. Unfortunately that will have to wait, but at least the rears will still lock under hard braking, so I'm not too worried. I also did an oil change on both the bike and the Civic. And when I was home yesterday I put my summer tires back on. We'll see how well they perform, since last season the grip was fading because two are bald and the other two are not far behind. New tires have been ordered, but will not be in on time for this Sunday's solo. In any case it will feel good to beat the piss out of my car again. http://mydrive.roadfly.com/blog/Polishrifle/1366/ This past weekend was the 2007 Indiana Northwest Region's National Race at Gingerman Raceway. As a member of INR I went and worked a corner as I have in the past. As always I had a blast, and the weather cooperated too! There were some great battles in a few of the classes, especially Spec Miata. The car count was a little lower than we were hoping for, but a few of our racers were national champions and runners-up. I took a bunch of pictures during the Friday practice and a few on Saturday and Sunday when I was not on a corner. So I�ll let them speak for themselves.Just because you are a rich bastard and can afford a really expensive race car doesn't mean you can driveThis car is about as close to being a mustang as Jeff Gordon's car is to being a Monte Carlo.Oh look, someone broke their $125,000 toy...I have no sympathy, although I bet he doesn't like the fact that I am taking his pictureMy fellow cornerworker, Leon, just after waking up from a little nap between sessionsOne word: FASTDespite being a purpose built race car, the rules require Spec Racer Fords to have the 1.9L engine with the stock airbox out of a Ford Escort. Even after tuning these engines barely make over 100 HPBut just because your race car is powered by a Ford 4cyl engine out of an Escort or Focus doesn't mean it's slowAnd one of the coolest cars I saw all weekend was this absolutly perfect replica of Herbie, I stumbled across it when I stopped in some random small Michigan town for a bite to eat on the way home on Sunday. The guy even got a copy of the old California plate that it had...wow http://mydrive.roadfly.com/blog/Polishrifle/1344/ Thanks to my roommate who is a film major, I finally made a little highlight video out of all that video I have recorded in the past two seasons. The quality looks poor, but it only looks that way on YouTube, the original version looks far better. Enjoy! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTw2nz8RRn4 http://mydrive.roadfly.com/blog/Polishrifle/1329/ I am in such a good mood today, it's in the 50's, I'm on spring break, and all thats missing is an autocross. The first warm day of the season usually makes me feel like this, so much so that I even got up at 8:00 am despite no school or work this morning (those who know me know that is quite unheard of for me to do) and got my bike running. I then immediately proceeded to take it for a ride. Therefore, I figure this is a good time to review all my new gear since I now have some actual experience with it. I finally picked up my new Moto GP Corkscrew jacket exactly one week ago in the middle of a snow storm (I live in the midwest). The fit is great, nice and snug with all the armor in the correct positions, venting is superb with the majority of the air entering via the perforated leather panels on the chest and arms (nearly chilly with the liner in on a 55 degree day), and the armor is good. I had previously purchased a set of hard plastic armor to replace the dual density armor in this jacket, but upon inspection this jacket does not accept it because it attaches and stays put in a different way than how Joe Rocket does it. But not to worry, upon inspection I also found that the dual density armor is far superior to the foam stuff that Joe Rocket uses. Moto GP's armor is a hard rubber on top of soft rubber, which is why they also call it dual density, but it is just as good in my opinion as the hard plastic stuff. So the plastic stuff went into my old Joe Rocket textile jacket since my friend will probably be using it this year. http://mydrive.roadfly.com/blog/Polishrifle/1301/