Due to the rather interesting start to the season PB Performance will be missing from the second meeting of the year at Castle Combe (7th May). The engine is going to be rebuilt by XRT Race Engineering and the team will return for the following meeting on the 28th May stronger and faster!
How did it go?!
Having set up camp on the Sunday afternoon Monday morning was a relatively stress free, if a little early (5.45am) set off for the race circuit. The day itself dawned in much the same vain as the test day, in that it was unseasonably warm and sunny. This time on the way to the circuit I was thinking to myself “this is too good to be true” that though would later prove quite valid unfortunately!
The need to leave so early for the circuit was due to the fact that for this season the Castle Combe Racing Club have devised an excellent new initiative involving promoting it’s three “home” championships to the public. The Formula Ford’s were the “chosen ones” to be the featured championship for the first meeting of the year. This status meaning that we were the first race of the day and therefore the first qualifying session of the day and indeed the new season. Once at the circuit the team (aided by myself once I had signed on) began the process of setting up all the equipment that we would need for the day and giving the car a check over ready for scruitineering and qualifying. The thought of the car going through scruitineering was one that had been playing on my mind in the weeks leading up to the first race weekend, as if it failed for any reason it could spell the end of the race day before it have even began! As it transpired there was no need to worry as the car sailed through scruitineering with no problems, we were ready to rock and roll!!!
Qualifying was scheduled to start at 8.40am and with engines not allowed to be fired up before 8.30am due to noise restrictions. I was very glad to see some more friends and helpers turn up just before we were about to push the car down to the assembly area. I was strapped into the car (no chance of doing it myself in that little cockpit) just before 8.30am ready to fire the engine up at 8.30 on the button to allow some heat to build into the engine’s oil and water systems prior to the noise check. Noise check passed we were ready to go. With Castle Combe Racing Club being as efficient as they are at exactly 8.40am the rather large que of Formula Ford’s was sent into the pitlane ready to be unleashed onto the circuit.We were only sat in the pitlane for a matter of seconds before being allowed on to the circuit, which is just as well because for those few seconds I felt the nerves really begin to build for the first time that weekend! With my laptimer still not working I would be relying upon Granville, his trusty mobile phone and my pitboard to see what lap times I was or indeed wasn’t producing!
Out of the pits then and it only took until Quarry on the first full lap to see a car spin first one way then the other in front of me, I almost came to a stop to avoid the gyrating car but at least avoided it was! Then just a little further around the same lap (Tower corner to be precise) I found yellow flags and a car imbedded in the tyre wall. I was starting to realise at this point that with so many cars on track and the rustiness of the off season still present this was going to be a rather fraught qualifying session! So it proved to be as on the following lap after negotiating the yellow flag zone at Tower at a safe speed Approaching the next corner (Bobbies) a fellow driver attempted a rather advantageous or should that be plain mad lunge up the inside only to to find himself unable to stop and go careering across the grass and off into the field! Luckily I saw his lunge out the corner of my eye at the last minute and was able to cut across the grass in the middle of the chicane to avoid the potential clash of machines!
After this series of near misses I managed to find a little bit of relatively clear track with only a few cars around me, now I could concentrate on driving! Once I did begin to concentrate on the driving and not just surviving I found myself amazed with the difference that the new wheels and tyres had made to the car. I found myself being held up by the cars around me and itching to get into some really clear air to see what the car and myself could do. Unfortunately this was not to be as going through Old Paddock corner for the tenth time, attempting to negotiate the other cars I found myself hung out wide on the “marbles” with the car dancing around underneath me. Okay, I thought to myself I’ll just back off, get the car settled and regroup. Unfortunately in attempting this I selected first gear instead of third! Unsurprisingly the little pushrod engine didn’t really like this request and made it clear by producing a noise akin to a terrified cat! Upon hearing this I immediately shut the engine down and pulled the car off to the nearest marshal’s post.
Once the car had been towed back to the paddock after qualifying I barely had enough time to tell the team what had happened before I had to sprint to the drivers briefing. Throughout the drivers briefing all I could think about was the car and indeed what damage had been done to the engine. After the drivers briefing was over it was with an air of intrigue and trepitadtion that I returned to the team awning! When I got there I was greeted by the sight of Granville holding aloft three rather bent pushrods! This didn’t bode well for the state of the valves that they are designed to actuate.
Once the news that the engine was indeed in rather a sorry state had sunk in I decided it was time to try and do something about it! Despite Granville and others telling me that it was highly unlikely that they would be able to repair the damage in time for the race, and even if they could coble an engine together it would probably run closer to the spec that it ran in it’s orginal home (1960’s Ford Escort’s) than a race engine. I decided that after all the effort that had been put in to get the car to the first race meeting and the fact that there were many guests present I would put my charm and communication skills to the test and scower the paddock in search of the parts needed to get the engine back in to a state that would at least see it run!
I spent the next 2 hours or so running around the paddock begging and borrowing parts from other teams, whilst always subconciously keeping an eye on the time as that grid walk which the car was due to be part of was looming ever cloer and ever larger. It wasn’t until 12.15, when all the other cars were now on the grid for the parade was I finally forced to admitt defeat! I had managed to get almost everything need but ended up one exhuast valve short! So it was with very heavy feet that I trudged up the stairs of the control tower to see the race director to inform him that car 57 would not be able to take the start due to “technical difficulties”!!!
It was a bitter pill to swallow after all the work that had gone in to this and doubly so as it looked as if the car was going to prove a lot quicker than expected. This setback though had made both myself and the team even more determined to prove ourselves. Although the team will now be forced to miss the May 6th meeting while the engine is rebuilt we will be back on May 28th with potentitally some exciting news!
Watch this space…
Thank you very much to the people below for helping and supplying various parts in a vain attempt to repair the engine:
> Steve and Erling Jensen
> Wayne Poole
> Wiltshire College
> Hamilton Motorsport
> Steve Chapman
How did it go?!
Shorts and T-shirt in April, what’s going on?! Although I was hoping for dry weather for the first run in the car I could hardly have dreamt of the un-seasonal like treat that we were presented with. Travelling to the circuit through the morning mist in a tow car bought and a rather OTT trailer hired but only the day previously I found myself beginning to wonder if this weather might be an omen for a successful test and perhaps even, dare I say it a successful first race meeting! Well part of my thinking was right anyway…
After months of graft we finally finished the car at 10pm on the Wednesday night. With not nearly enough quality shuteye my Dad and myself were up bright and early on Thursday morning ready to load the car on the trailer and the tools into the tow car. This supposidly simple task turned into a minor pantomime for a little while as, due to a combination of a frosted windscreen and (one can only presume) early morningitus an unknown gentleman proceeded to drive into the side of the trailer whilst we were loading the race car! Apart from that the loading and travelling to the circuit passed without a hitch, once that is we had woken chief mechanic Granville from his slumber in our pre-arranged meeting point just off the M4.
Once at the circuit we unloaded the car and gave it a little clean and check over, still no new bodywork that was promised, so a rather tatty red and white car it was that was to be given it’s legs for the first time. The team’s chassis engineer (Matt Rivett) had his own dramas en route, his van refusing to do what was asked of it so he was a little late. Once Matt was on the scene the car’s ride height was set and a base setup was applied.
The car took to the track for the first time with Pat Buss (that’s me) behind the wheel at approximately 10.30am for just a few laps to check everything was ok and to bed the new brake pads in. Once this short session of 6 laps was completed the car was then taken back into the paddock for a “once over”. All of our hard work, it seemed had paid off as the car showed no signs of anything leaking or components trying to make a bid for freedom!
The rest of the morning was taken up by myself running in the car for another 30 minutes to become familiar with the car and to get a “feel” for driving a race car again (boy it’s been a long time). By the end of the mornings running I felt confident in the car and ready to play about with the setup a little so that I could push for some lap times in the afternoon. But before any “pushing” was going to be done it was time for a much deserved lunch break for all, complete with plenty of caffeine in an attempt to make up for the sleep depravation brought about by all the late nights spent preparing the car.
Before I had my afternoon runs in the car Matt Rivett, who just happens to be defending Castle Combe FF1600 champion took the car out for a few laps to see how it felt. His verdict (thankfully) was pretty similar to mine, nice to drive with progressive handling but perhaps a little nervous on the front end through the high speed stuff. A few adjustments to the front roll bar and I was sent out to see how it felt. That little adjustment certainly seemed to work as the car was definately behaving itself better through Castle Combe’s notorious fast, bumpy sweepers. The lap times were beginning to come down now. I was now setting times below my target time on tyres that had been stood in a garage somewhere for some unknown length of time.
Now that I was happy with the car the plan for the last session of the day was to go out on the new set of wheels and tyres that I had purchased, scrub them in and then see what sort of lap times I could achieve. That plan however fell apart just as soon as I spun the car on the exit of Tower corner in the session before that planned “last hoorah” and lost the engine. Now under normal circumstances I would have just fired up the engine, checked that the track was clear and rejoined. I soon found there was one rather large problem however, that was that the small race battery fitted to the car was totally and utterly flat! After sitting on the racing line on the exit of the corner watching a number of rather rapid cars missing the nose of my beloved race car by what seemed like millimetres! I decided upon returning to the pits (a slightly lighter shade than when leaving) that we should return home and fit a new battery prior to the first race!
So that was the end of what turned out to be a rather successful first test day. It’s a shame the first race day wouldn’t go quite as well…
Pat Buss
Whizz, bang, pop, whizz, bang, pop etc… Not noises you expect to hear from a healthy FF1600 engine!
In a fraught and exciting qualifying session Pat selected the wrong gear whilst attempting to avoid the kamakazi like attempts of another car to scythe his way through the large amount of traffic on the circuit. This rather innapropriate gear selection lead to noises not too dissimilar to those found above, those strange noises were the sound of three bent pushrods and three bent exhaust valves in the engine!
Despite the valiant efforts of all in the team and the selfless help of other teams in the paddock the engine was unable to be repaired in time for the race. This was a great shame as the car had gone very well in testing and once fitted with new tyres in qualifying Pat was confident that he and the car were quick enough to be a lot further up the grid given a couple of clear laps.
A full report of the first test day and the adrenalin fuelled pandamonium that was the first race meeting will be posted very shortly!