 SANTA POD EASTER THUNDERBALL
Santa Pod 2nd - 5th April 2010
This was the season opener, the first big race of 2010. After last weeks horrific testing where we threw a cylinder and tore the gearbox to shreds we were hoping for the gods to smile upon us.
The wild buch were fielding a strong entry of 9 cars, with a lot of track time planned before final eliminations. Unfortunately the Friday was a washout, at least we had the RV to sit the rain out in the warm and dry this time.
Come the Saturday we were rareing to go, the engine sounded very sweet, probably the best ever. Adam pulled into his lane and produced a very strong burnout, on reversing something was definately wrong. He shut down and was pushed back. When we got back to the pits we started the diagnostics, one exhaust was stone cold indicating that #2 was not firing. Electrical tests were OK, we took the rocker cover off and to our horror the pushrod was bent. After removing the head the valve was also bent and broken. Probable cause, Valve bounce - (Note to Adam... Dont keep it on the red light for so long in the burnout!!!) A round trip back to the workshop where we had some spares. But not the right ones. In the end we decided to use hydraulic lifters with standard push rods with stock steel rockers on one side and Solid lifters ball/cup rods witrh Roller rockers on the other to get us into qualifying. It worked, didnt sound great but we got a run and we qualified. Come the eliminations, the car was really not well, Adam warmed the tyres and did well to keep the car running, into stage, the light went green and .......... she bogged. Adam completed the run with some acts of god allowing us to get 5th Place in the Real Steel series and 6th Place in the MSA series. We achieved far more than we thought, massive credit to all involved in getting the car back together.
Still no sign of the new engine, so we are breathing new life into the old lump. Back to the workshops for new double valve springs, and full rebuild.
Thanks to all the Santa Pod Crew and Marshalls for their efforts in getting the track prepped after so much rain.
Next outing is the May Bank Holiday MSA event at Shakespeare County Raceway
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Easter Thunderball 2010
