Solo Race - Umm al Quwain

With the fan re-wired and some other issues attended to, this weekend's adventure was a Friday afternoon jaunt to UAQ.  The Motorplex had organised another Solo Race around their 10km offroad track, but due to a delayed start, we only managed two runs before darkness descended.

My first run gave me a time of 9min 28sec, knocking 19secs off my previous best - which was good enough to win last time out.  But on the second run disaster struck.  Halfway round I could feel something wasn't right on the passenger side front wheel.  And shortly before the finish it let go completely, leaving me to finish the run in an unimpressive 11minutes-plus, on three tyres and a rim.

However that proved to be enough for 3rd place and a trophy - the winner didn't come close to my time on the first run, so at least I can claim 'fastest lap' in the 4x4 class.

Big thanks to Richard Bailey, who provided a first-class pit-stop service for the event!

Mark Powell entered his newly-re-acquired Fast and Speed Buggy, and sadly blew the 4L Nissan V6 engine on the first run.

There are still a couple of issues to be resolved with the Beast, the main one appearing to be fuel related.  It feels like we are running out of steam around 4500-5000rpm, but without any misfire, so I suspect a fuel pump/fuel filter problem.

Good news is that they will shortly announce a championship schedule for the 2013 season, to include 4 Solo Races and one rally!  So finally, we can get some local racing.  And that's a Good Thing.

Dubai International Rally

I'd already volunteered (again) to run as '00' car for this event, planning to run it in the road car as in previous years.  But with the Beast newly tuned, I decided this would be an ideal shakedown opportunity for it.  Ian Simpson had already been press-ganged into co-driving, as Sheila was Stage Commander.

The DIR is the final round of the Middle East Rally Championship, which is a saloon car event, so the tracks are firm and fast.  But first we have to get to the start of the first stage, a 70-odd km trek from Rally HQ at Dubai Mens College.  Halfway there I felt the steering tighten up, and immediately checked the engine temperature and the ignition lamp - both OK.  So that means it's not a serpentine belt failure.  A quick look under the hood confirmed that we'd lost our power steering fluid - someone hadn't tightened the union on the pump.  With a strict schedule to keep, I couldn't spare the time to hunt for ATF, so I just refitted the union and we ran the first three stages without power steering.

At the end of the 6th stage we were headed back to DMC when the heavens opened.  The rain was the worst I've ever experienced, and I was happy to get back safely to Dubai.

Day two dawned bright and clear, but Stage 7 was littered with deep puddles and deeper lakes.  We had no problems with that, but Mark and John got drenched in their open Buggy as '0' car!  But our day came to an end as we staretd Stage 10 - suddenly we had no cooling.  An electrical problem meant that neither fan was running, and although I managed to jury-rig a supply to one to get us home, we had to bail out of the stage.

But overall, the Beast performed well, the engine ran faultlessly and we have a couple of issues to fix before it goes out again - which will be this Friday (14th December).  A 'Solo Race' is being held up at Umm Al Quwain Motorplex, so I'll be up there to try and get another win in the 4x4 class!

The Day of the Dyno

There is some debate about the desirability of a thermostat in a race car engine. Some say that it restricts flow and that it is a bad thing, others say that without it, the engine will be slow to reach its ideal running temperature. Often they are removed in the hope of reducing engine temperatures that are close to the limit, rather than addressing the underlying problem.

I can now state quite categorically that thermostats are a Good Thing. When Mark Adams found that, contrary to my recent experience, the Beast was running hot at a fast tickover, he started investigating. And he discovered that we had no thermostat. However, in the LS2 engine, the thermostat and ‘stat housing design is such that without one, around 50% of the water flow from the pump will be immediately short-circuited back to the pump infeed, without going anywhere near the radiator! This is clearly a Bad Thing, and one more legacy of the original (rather questionable) build quality. He also found a blanked off bleed tube, which is there to release any air trapped in the highest point of the water jacket back to the radiator. Without this, hot-spots can develop where the air has displaced the coolant.

A quick trip to the helpful guys at Al Ghandi resulted in a shiny new ‘stat and housing, and after some re-jigging of the coolant pipework by Robbie the Fabricator, normal cooling was restored!

None of the garages where the Beast was serviced had noticed these problems. We’ve gone down the road of solving overheating through bigger and better radiators and fans, without understanding the fundamental problems. With these addressed, we can now put the Beast under the stress of a dyno run, which has been delayed accordingly. So before we even get to the tuning, Mark has earned my gratitude.

So finally, we get the Beast on the 4x4 dynamometer at 1000 Dunes Garage, where Sam has built his reputation on tuning Evos. As suspected, Mark finds issues with the mixture as well as the timing, which are addressed as the mapping is progressively refined over the course of some ten dyno runs. The final result (with restrictor) is a maximum 213 bhp at the wheels, coming at around 4700rpm, and a peak torque of 277 ft/lbs with a very flat torque-curve. The mandatory FIA restrictor (37.2mm) is costing us around 15 bhp, but the torque is actually slightly increased – go figure. All figures show an improvement over the original mapping, but more importantly the re-map should provide increased engine reliability and durability.