1st Gen Most liked posts in thread: R53 Race car Build - Chequebook racing

To summarise the current spec

Link G4+ECU
15% SC pulley
Airtec FMIC
JCW intake
Cat Cam
Robert Cox Rallye head (stick valves)
200whp

GRP Bonnet, boot and doors
BC Racing RM series with 9kg springs
Powerflex black series full bush and joint set
R56 rear control arms
Eibach rear anti roll bar
CAE shifter
FL gearbox
3J Driveline LSD
1080kg including me and half tank of fuel


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I then had a great weekend in Donington Park.

We only managed 3 laps in quali due to a car fire from one of our quickest Civic's so the 40+ car grid was jumbled up making for a great race throughout.

I started 9th alongside another Mini in both races. He is massively quick off the start both times leading me into Redgate. His car is pretty twitchy on the rear end whereas mine feels solid allowing me to carry more speed into the corners particularly Craner Curves. Had some great battles with a Mk2 1.8T Golf which was quick on the straights but slower mid corner than me. He got the jump one lap from the end when I was wrong footed behind a back marker meaning I just missed out on 3rd in class but managed a 7th overall finish in race 1.

Had a spin in the second race at Redgate on spilt coolant losing 4 positions but luckily I was able to claw those positions back again finishing 4th in class and 7th overall.

Only managed to remember to turn the go pro on in race 1





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Then I stripped out the sound deadening aith a heat gun. For those considering it I tried it at first with a freeze spray which worked but takes alot longer. Heat gun works a treat once you get the technique right. But most importanrpyndo.kt heforenits caged!!





I then went full retard and removed 8kg or wiring and all the heater and AC system






Ready for some livery. Easy extra 40hp gained in stickers here!



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Then had the boot lid made for the #56 Mini by CCF Fibreglass.

2.5kg versus 7kg stock without rear window and latches.

The rear window is 7kg, so with lexan being 50% lighter than glass it should equate to a saving at the back of the car of around 8kg.

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The combined weight for both OEM doors was 54kg (doors + internals 23kg each and glass 4kg each).

Now the combined weight of both GRP doors (4.6kg each) and lexan windows (4kg) is 13kg.

41kg saved!!!!!! Well happy with that[emoji16]






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So i returned to the UK almost a year in from starting the build for the Birkett Relay 2018 and it has was manic!

Preping the car was a nightmare as I'm tool limited as now live in Cyprus. We ran out of time on the wrapping so just kept it to the GRP panels.



It was a great weekends racing with the Army Sports Car Racing team, which consisted if an E46 M3 Cup car, an MG Midget, two 206 GTIs, an E46 330i challenge and me in the Mini. Sadly we lost the M3, by far our fastest car during testing so with the handicap having already been set we were now unlikely to have been able to unlap ourselves as quickly as we would have with the M3 running.

The event for me was fraught with poopy pants moments throughout, not my best track work, and had it not been for the teams pit crew descending on my car post 'practice incident' and the generosity of another team supplying me with spare parts I wouldn't have even made the race!!

After a manic week trying to get the car ready, I got it to Silverstone whilst still needing to solder in the resistors for the rain light, bleed the brakes, secure the headlight blanks and apply the livery to the new panels.

I had changed the rear pads which from the outside still had a good few mm meat, however the inner right rear was down to the back plate. For some reason, despite the fluid only being maybe 90 minutes of racing in age i had a realy soft and long pedal which looked to be caused by the heat from the rear right inner pad which had unbeknown to me worn to the back plate at Donington park in September. The fluid on that corner was black and once flushed through gave me the correct pedal resistance. That non-existent inner rear right brake pad also explains why the Mini was really unstable in the latter half of the last race at Donington Park.



The windows were also a pain as they were designed to use standard Mini window runners. With these doors I didnt have that option so had to breakout the saw! Also I now know they flex over 110mph which when it's raining is bad.



I also got picked up in scrutineering for having a liquid lead battery that wasn't covered (which hadn't been picked up in any previous races!!). His insistence that it be covered by plastic left us in an awkward position until I randomly noticed a dinner tray lent against the garage wall. It was the perfect size to cover the battery compartment, secured with some self tapping screws, and sealed with some harry black tape, it's quite possibly my favourite every bodge on the car.

Saturday Morning Practice -

The day started off very cold, but luckily dry.
Despite setting the second fastest time in the team practice for me did not go well. Whilst trying to get temperature into the tyres (it was sub 5° outside) I span it after only a couple corners luckily keeping it out of the gravel. With some temperature in the tyres I started to pull some good laps together whilst learning the track (having never done the GP circuit) until on my 5th lap I caught a much slower car mid corner at high speed and completely lost the back end when i lifted off the throttle. This sent me barrelling into the gravel eventually stopping just shy of the crash barrier.

Feeling lucky when I got back to the pits not to have any damage, we realised not only had the car inherited a large amount of the gravel, but it had got jammed between the wheel and tyre, the brakes, the steering rack and worst off all had torn the serpentine belt. Luckily a fellow competitor lent us a belt and tensioner tool, we removed the gravel and 2 hours after the race had started we were in the garage waiting for our turn!

Race -
Whilst in the garage hoping to get out there and improve on the 2:38 practice lap id done, (which considering i was still learning braking points and the corners etc i hoped to vastly improve on with some track time) the heavens decided to open up and not let up for the final half of the race. Driving these conditions on the Nankang AR1 tyres would have been a bad decision, however a brand new green and unscrubbed set of Nankang NS2Rs were nothing short of terrifying for my first few laps in the rain as they scrubbed in and got rid of the release agents etc so much so I nearly pulled back in rather than risk crashing.
Should have scrubbed them in before hand, however after a couple laps the tyres began to provide some decent grip.

However, with the car still running it's dry setup it was oversteering like crazy and giving me no confidence in it when near the limit of grip. Given my off in practice and following the team talk I chose to lower the pace and risk by knocking out some consistent(ly slow) laps given its better to lose a couple seconds a lap but finish than to lose 5 minutes by getting stuck in the gravel.

An absolute terrifying yet great experience at times, driving a car that wasn't being friendly, whilst sharing the track with some very exotic machinery who are dive bombing the inside and outside lines of each corner as they come past!!

Being the hindsight world champion that i am, maybe some Rainsport tyres would have been a better choice given the actual versus forecast conditions and I definitely should have disconnected my rear anti roll bar so it wasn't trying to kill me in every corner.

Also finding out how a car drives in the wet for the first time is not ideal in race conditions.



[video=youtube_share;zAXLoQcjhbA] [/video]

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17kg removed from the back of the car. Cannot believe the battery was 20kg on its own!





Shiny new Coolerworx gear shifter and facelift linkages. The standard gear shift on the R53 is so notchy, long and a nightmare when downshifting from 3rd to 2nd when decelerating and from 4th to 5th so this was a very a nice change (No pun intended)



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Decided to move from Electric Blue to gloss black. Really chuffed with the results!



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Firstly, between fitting the front mount IC and the ported head, I ended up within 3whp of the previous setup which is kind of what I expected.



Had some issues with the front mount IC popping the hoses due to upwards movement
http://cloud.tapatalk.com/s/5d7c8ed00886c/20190907_102707.mp4

Made it with a day to spare but the weekend was not without fault

The IC hose popping off ruined my qualifying which messed up my starting position for both races.

Strapping it down with locksire was a good temporary fix.

Starting further back made for good racing with a 5th place finish in race 1 and then in race 2 after going from 18th to 4th I had a crash going for 3rd with a snapped driveshaft

Race 1


Race 2

 

Alumite. Basically the same aluminium composite that you see on road signs. Bent it when I crashed I to the barrier in the last video and I just bent it right back

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Realising I'm in the UK and removing the heater was stupid I stuck in a new 2kg one which gets heat from engine coolant. Works a treat!




First race weekend was an utter failure. The cartek isolator was a nightmare and kept cutting all electric mid race which on a car with electric power steering is terrifying, the tyres were terrible and the alignment was pump.

First race weekend completed (in part)....

I raced in the Armed Forces Race Challenge at Silverstone National Circuit along. Absolutely roasting day. Really varied grid which made for loads of good battles throughout.

Qualifying
This was the first time driving the car (other than moving it around) since the build started 6 months earlier. Never the best thing to do, anyway not ideal. 1st thing I experienced on my first fast lap was complete electrical cutoff for the car mid corner on Brooklands. Poo'd my pantz. Restarted the car managed another lap and the next flyer it happened again. Did this 3 times on total.

As said it was read hot. Started the tyres on 24psi. By the end they had gone off a cliff so tried cooling them down for 2 laps and then have one last go but chequred flag came out before i got to do it. Finished the qualifying with 34psi in the tyres after effectively 3 cool down laps and queuing to get back into the paddock so i dropped another 4 psi out the tyres which worked well for race 1.

I felt like the car was setup too safe. Struggled to get the front end turned in and also could not induce any oversteer to help. Had to really drive around the car setup which wasnt ideal.

Between qualifying and race 1 we thought maybe there was a poor earth on the cartek which was using riv-nuts as the earthing point so we fixed of loads of parallel cables to an earth point whixh seemed to fix the issue. No issues in Race 1 at all apart from the car not wanting to turn in.

Race 1
Had a good start but was boxed in then got over taken by a few up the inside of Maggotts and Becketts but I was able to get the power on early and out drag them into brooklands. Spent the first half.of the race in a really good tussle for 16th with 3 others. Managed to break free and gap them only to loose rime when i was being lapped by the leaders and they were on me again but managed to hold them off until the end for 16th.

Anyway, pulled in the paddock and the elec cutoffs hit with a vengence. Took about 10 attempts to park the car.

Race 2
Lasted 4 laps before retiring as the car was unsafe to drive as when the cutoff happens you lose steering. 4 times. Each time I was knocked down to last, managed to overtake 4 over the next lap only to do it again. Decided to pull in the pits as its not worth risking a crash. Sad way to end a good weekend.

We identified the issue of the electrical cutout. Basically the Cartek isolator cut off circuit has a maximum rating of 30A and the circuit we were using was about 34A over that at points and was nuisance tripping. Some subtle changes to the wiring have stopped the issue completely. The bad thing was as we had changed so much in one go it took a fair amount of labour and time to get to that fault as everything had to be checked.

I then got a bulk load of work done to make it work better as it was just too safe and too soft

3J Driveline LSD. 40/90 ramp with 75/85lb preload

R56 Rear Trailing Arms

Vibratechnics Race lower engine mount (the original was cracked)

Full set of Powerflex Black series engine and chassis bushes (originals we're 100k old)

Powerflex inner ball joints (original had ALOT of play)

9kg/mm springs with a 5mm preload on the front and 10mm preload on rear (original springs was 7/6kg/mm front and rear)

Corner weighting it gave a crossweight of 50.87% with total weight including me and 3/4 a tank of fuel of 1184kg.

Geometry set to -3.7° front camber, -2.5° rear. Running with parallel toe at the rear as i can't get any more toe out with this camber and the stock upper control arms still in place. Front toe out is just over 1.5mm if i remember rightly. (Last setup was 2° front camber, 1.5° rear with same toe setup)

i then fitted some Nankang AR1.







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I had originally planned to go for a 17% pulley, but I've gone back on that idea now as in racing once you have heat soak it's not going anywhere, so thought safer than sorry.

So, whilst they were doing the cam and injectors, 1320 had a a poke about the engine bay and found my pulleys were all fucked.

If you remember, my earlier posts, last year at the Birkett relay I had an off into the kitty litter where the gravel went so high in the engine bay that it tore the serpentine belt. We replaced it track side however in our rush to get it changed before the race, we never noticed the pulleys were damaged.

The damage to the pulleys had in turn tore apart the new belt which was effectively 60 minutes old and wouldn't have lasted my next race weekend. Had this not been noticed, I'd have probably blown my engine and been out for the season.



We now have new pulleys, belt fitted



Anyway, the new ECU and wideband was fitted, 15% SC pulley stayed on, 550c injectors and a cat cam installed.






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Next up race 1 of 2019

Great weekend at Brands Hatch.

I was nervous heading into the race weekend having not driven the car for 6 months and with it now having more power, different gearbox, tyres and much more on a circuit that bites pretty badly.

Qualifying was nothing short of carnage. It was very cold, the AFRC were first out and cars were going off everywhere. The car felt undriveable on the brand new unscrubbed tyres and I was struggling to get any temperature in them. I managed 3 laps before it was red flagged due to crashes losing one of those times for exceed track limits meaning I would start 14th for race 1 and 2.

Race 1 came around and it was wet, cold and dropping some sleet. Not ideal weather for semi slicks but some pressure changes made for a pretty driveable and predictable car. A great first lap had me move upto 8th until a good few laps getting over confident I mixed ambition and ability up heading into Surtees losing the back end and spinning losing 2 positions and a chunk of time. I managed to catch them and retake the positions finishing in 7th overall and 1st in class.

Race 2 could not have been more different: Dry and warm. A poor launch again didn't help, losing a position into paddock hill bend. I then ended up in an awesome battle with a couple of the Class A cars but couldnt make it through. Initially cautious in the corners not knowing the dry braking points, lines, grip levels, I finished very confident in the car and a little gutted we didn't have a 3rd race there. Race 2 result 10th overall, 4th in class.

I need to learn to heal and toe as I really struggled getting it from 3rd into 2nd and lost chunks of time with either a box of neutrals or going into 4th rather than 2nd. I ended up using 3rd gear at fldruids instead!

Race 1



Race 2





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Race weekend 2 Anglesey not so good!

Had a shocking week leading up to the Anglesey race.

My cartek isolator decided it wanted to stop working so had to rewire a manual cutoff in I stead which made me wander why I even bothered with the cartek in the first place. Waste of money!

I then fitted a facelift supercharger and new waterpump and foolishly a 17% pulley thinking what's the worst that could happen...

Then en route to Anglesey I had a proper blow out on the trailer.


Eventually arriving ready to race, the car was immediately on pace in qualifying setting 7th fastest lap in qualifying on my 2nd lap with traffic, less than a second from 2nd, before my IATs went through the roof and cylinder 2 ingested a spark plug smashing the head and exhaust valves.

So after all that travel and work I watched 3 races from the sideline rather than the wheel.

Gutting as the car was really good.





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Panic stations to get it ready for the 3rd race weekend at Donington park



My FL gearbox was fitted, and it was nice not to have to use 2nd in tight bends, but mostly.

I also fitted a new Rallye head from Robert Cox Engineering. Looking at other images of ported heads, these seem to be much bigger. Hoping for good gains once fitted and mapped accordingly.

Changes in summary
I'm now on a 15% pulley not a 17%
I'm now on a FMIC not a TMIC
I'm now on a FL gearbox rather than pre
I'm now on a rallye head rather than stock.

Guessing on power difference on a post card. I think they may cancel out on the dyno where IATs are ar 21⁰ maximum before each run.

On track however, I was well above 60⁰ IAT consistently so if that reduces substantially my actual on track output should actually be more.



For reference this is a standard head. If you look at the 1st image which is the exhaust port. You can see the gasket imprint. The ports are taken out to the 1st line.

The final picture is the inlet and that rectangle with the peak is completely machined out

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Just checked, its a Fletchet hornet kit car. Its closed wheel, and much like Caterhams etc with wheel arches they are able to race with tin tops

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Insta; @chequebookracing

 

Splitter time



Really happy with how it came out.



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