Never mind the trackday car

[drjim]

It's a trackday Baur!

Going to Oulton tomorrow, spent all of "my" time over last 3 weeks doing jobs on the slug. Seat refitted on sliders, T7 design heater fitted, rear demister wired in, fuel sender installed into tank. Various bits sorted out. On Tuesday the battery was flat, so I left it on charge. At work from 9AM till 130AM yesterday so this morning I went out and turned the key. Starter not turning.

Looked at everything I could think of, even went and got the starter off the spare block left down at my old workshop. Nothing doing. Eventually discovered 12V coming up the black starter wire even if not connected to anything at the starter end. Can't get solenoid to click at all on either starter so suspect the permanent 12v feed has jammed them. I suspect that as the car had to stay out on the drive for the last two weeks, water has got in through the fibreglass bonnet/bent holes and has shorted something out. Need a known good starter and do some rewiring I think.

So what am I doing about Oulton, going in the Baur. I'll stick the Minilites on and see how good the colway inters Mark had fitted to them are. Weather forecast is for sun again tomorrow so I'll have the roof down! Would rather be there in the full on slug but I'll just go for a relaxed laugh type trackday instead.

Will let you know how it goes!

[e21-Mark]

I'm sure it'll still be fun Jim and that's what it's all about.

[Jeroen]

+1! Have a great day, keep her on the track and hopefully we'll see some nice pics after!

[Duracel79]

And there's me thinking I'm the only one working hard on the track car this week. These things are sent to try us, but you'll still have fun in the Baur with its 2.5 .
I'll be at Snett tomorrow hoping to pass the noise limits so I can have some fun.

Ben

PS GoPro has been fitted so we may have some footage over the weekend

[Jeroen]

Yeah give us video! You too have fun tomorrow!

[drjim]

Well the trackday was pretty good fun. Bearing in mind that apart from the rear subframe bushes all the other suspension rubber is 31 years old the handling took a bit of getting used to. 2.5 was plenty powerful; realising I was in a powerslide as I went round cascades was fun, as was the car snapping the other way when I lifted off a bit then wobbling all the way along the following straight (front shocks also original AFAIK). It sounded fantastic when I pressed the loud pedal, trackday with roof open is to be recommended.

Did about 125 track miles, but around 2.30PM I found that I was getting awful steering wheel judder under braking which just kept getting worse, pads are DS2500's and plenty left, discs look OK too so I concluded my 30 year old front suspension arm bushes were no longer suitable for trackdays, they certainly had a lot of movement in them. Although the judder wasn't noticeable on the way home, the stress of hard braking on track has accelerated their demise.

I also have a problem with the fuse for the fuel/temp gauge blowing, couldn't see anything obvious on the wiring but I'll have another look over the weekend. Need to figure out what else that fuse supplies.

I've emailed the photographer that was there and will try to get some pics posted soon.

[e21-Mark]

Glad you were able to have a fun day after all.

[Jeroen]

Minor issues, as long as you had a fun day! Work to do and back on track lol

[drjim]

Not sure I'll take the Baur on track again, ride height is about 5cm more than the slug, body rolls like mad (or rather like a normal car), I slide around in the seat, and my leg kept banging against the door handle/winder. Need my stripped out coilovered solid suspensioned track beast back! However following my 6 pot trackday I am back to thinking how mental it would be with an M52 in...

[problemchild75]

few of my mates were there yesterday i had to work (2002 on shake down for racing next weekend ,e46 m3 and couple of e36s) how did std brakes hold out at Oulton?

[drjim]

Didn't know they were your mates. Tried to look under bonnet of 02 but they shut it just as I got there from other end of Pit lane. Looked very fast. Good driving standards from the BMW crowd, not so much the clios and civics.

Brakes were great, they were originally on the slug 323 calipers with ds2500 pads.

[problemchild75]

yeah its a good pal in the 002 its a m10 on twin webbers built at Lester Owens.

[drjim]

Tony Gorman I think his name is. To show how small a world we live in, about 4 years ago he was storing his e36 track car in my workshop!

[problemchild75]

Yes that's him I went on the RICO rally with him accross Europe last summer. Which track car was it? The ex demon tweaks m3 or the 3.0 m3. He owns autotech the BMW specialist

[drjim]

I think it might have been purple, apart from that no idea - it was under a cover on a trailer at the back of the unit which was warehouse sized so you had to have a good reason to head back there.