Road Atlanta

#1

Well,

I didn’t get to qualify or race Saturday due to a motor problem. Originally looked like a head gasket blew in qualifying, but now it is starting to look like some type of valve train problem. It sounds like a bent valve, but all the symptoms don’t make sense to me (lost power, overheated, engine stopped running, no oil on dipstick). Took off the valve cover, and it isn’t a brocken rocker arm. Anyway, kinda bummed it happened this way.

David Cullen did suffer a blown head gasket on his "new" engine during qualifying, and that ended his weekend too.

I left half way through the race on Saturday and Robert Patton had a healthy lead. He had qualified with a 1:47. Stubbs qualified I think around 1:50. There was supposed to be a fifth driver according to the roster, but I didn’t see him in any of the sessions.

Patton’s car looks good and strong, I hate it that we didn’t get to race. Will just have to wait until next time…

#2

Sorry to hear of the trouble. Keep us posted as to the failure.

#3

Mel:

Thanks for the good report.

'Sorry to hear of your misfortune, and that of the others. I’m hoping everyone is back running and can make it to CMP in May.

I always knew that Robert Patton would be strong, especially after driving his police car with a motor that was definitely a little down on power. With a good engine, I’m not surprised to hear that Robert was at 1:47.

I looked-up the results from last year and I was running 147’s, with a fast lap of 1:46:9.

Are any of you guys going to make it to CMP?

Carter

#4

Carter,

I could have sworn that you ran a 1:45 at some point.

Last August I ran a mid 46 in practice (not sure I even got a clean lap), a bad 48 in qualifying due to traffic and a 47s in the race due to corded front tires. (.75" total toe out will do that, whoops!).

I am thinking my best practice mid 46 was still a second off your best race time. Unfortunately I can’t find any archives of results on the nasa-se site anymore to check out the history.

I was hoping to lay down some good times this weekend since we had some new tires and I thought we might have found a few more ponies.

#5

Mel:

1:45??? I don’t think I ever got there.

I remember you and me racing together in our eta cars so we’ll probably be there together in our i cars.

But now that I think about it, you were significantly faster in your eta car at Roebling in Nov of '04 than I was that weekend in my i car so maybe you’re just that much faster…

Carter

:wink:

#6

only one way to find out :wink:

#7

CMP?

#8

Road Atlanta proved to be an eventful weekend for the spec e30 racers. Cullen blowed-up his newly installed junkyard engie due to a coolant problem and headgasket woes. Mel was out with what looks to be oil or bottom end problems. Steve Stubbs was greatly handicapped with his dual-purpose K Stock mobile and the power-robbing catalytic converter that has to be used in K Stock. Steve and I talked about the fast competition that exist in spec e30 and how he will have to ditch the cats to be competitive…Ask me how I know…Steve’s lap times were in line with some that I had run in previous years with the cats installed. The new Checker Cab car is so much faster in a straight line than the Mayberry police car that I previously raced that it made my lap times look respectable. For me, Saturday’s race was uneventful as I just drove around within a pack of 944 guys. No need to really race them. On Sunday the moved the GTS guys to our group and I had fun trying to catch Eric Nissen in his GTS car.In Sunday’s race I caught a good tow and pulled off a fast time of 147.1. The car was respectable in both qualifing sessions at 147.3and 147.8. I’m looking forward to the race results for Sunday to see if I can match Carter’s performance where he did a fast lap at 146.7 with an average for the race at 147.5. Carter has certainly given us a good lap times to shoot for.Util the next event… Regards, Robert Patton