Fun Cup Brands Hatch last Saturday

[Nash]

It was a great day regardless of the outcome and there was some great views.

[b33fy]

Potential for a great finish Paul, just need to sort yer nuts out, look forward to seeing some action next time around.

[Crunchie Gears]

It was a great day regardless of the outcome and there was some great views.

Living the dream

[Nash]

It was a great day regardless of the outcome and there was some great views.

Living the dream

You certainly are Sir

[Weathers]

In all seriousness that does make me think “I hope the chap that put the Westfield together put the right bolts in the right places!!!”

Glad you enjoyed your day Paul. All part of the experience. And a nice photo souvenir.

I don’t know your mechanic(s) or their level of experience and I’m not looking to apportion blame but had someone over tightened it do you think? Or was it the wrong type of bolt for the application? In which case is the rest of the car ok? Again I don’t know who built it so I’m asking purely out of interest.

Mechanicals are just one of those things in all mechanised sports. I’ve had the strangest things brake on my bikes over the years despite my best efforts to check everything. And then check it again. Hopefully that’s the ‘car shake down under race conditions’ done and she’ll look after you for the rest of the year.

Good luck at the next round and beyond.

[Crunchie Gears]

In all seriousness that does make me think “I hope the chap that put the Westfield together put the right bolts in the right places!!!”

I don’t know your mechanic(s) or their level of experience and I’m not looking to apportion blame but had someone over tightened it do you think? Or was it the wrong type of bolt for the application? In which case is the rest of the car ok? Again I don’t know who built it so I’m asking purely out of interest.

Mechanicals are just one of those things in all mechanised sports. I’ve had the strangest things brake on my bikes over the years despite my best efforts to check everything. And then check it again. Hopefully that’s the ‘car shake down under race conditions’ done and she’ll look after you for the rest of the year.

Hi mate, I cannot speak highly enough about the mechanics. The team Manager is Tom Pickering and is very experienced. He has run Fun Cup teams for the last 5 years as a hobbie including the championship runner up twice. His day job is as senior engineer in a team running LMPT 2 cars doing the Le Mans series. His Dad, Graham, supports him and has supported race teams for many years including the five years in Fun Cup. Our last guy is Dave the senior engineer at PT Motorsport and is at the track most weeks supporting all sorts of race cars. I have faith in the pits they are very good and many of our competitors ask their advice if they have a problem.

That said, we did buy a dog of a car. It was an old war dog. We have spent time and money getting the car to go. As alway as you cure one problem it moves to the next as the car then puts strain on the next thing. We are running more competitively this year and the strain of running the kurbs harder stripped the bolt. The list of preparation gets longer but we will change the bolts every race and use high tensile steel in future.

In hindsight it would have been cheaper to buy a reconditioned car.

As for driving the car when not 100% I am OK with that provided I feel I can cope. Not sure it worked last year at Brands

[Weathers]

Thanks for that Paul, it's interesting to 'hear' your set up and by the sounds of things you've got a great crew behind you. I've always built and maintained my own race bikes (road, cross country and downhill) and have always said "if you look after your kit, your kit will look after you". I'm happy to hand over my car but not sure how I'd get on handing over my bikes. The car is a tool, the bikes possibly a love affair

As for buying a less than perfect motor, I guess you can put your stamp on it albeit within the regulations you have to run to. I imagine it's quite tightly controlled? Interesting to try different set ups and also as I found out when having a lesson at Brands, wet lines blew my mind when I tried them under instruction. Couldn't believe the difference it made, even in a light weight front engined rear wheel drive car, although totally went against the dry 'racing' line that I'd had drummed into me for years. Like learning to drive again!

Sounds like a load of fun for you anyway.

[Crunchie Gears]

We spend Friday going out in the car and trying different setups. We have to give the pit crew a debrief on each outing; where it oversteers/ understeers / locks up and how good it is at putting down the power. They then look the lap times/ corner speeds and so forth. Every thing is ajustable so they string it three or four times and adjust the preload / rack. They normally find between a second and 4 seconds on most circuits.

To be fair I do the debrief and listen in to what is being done to the car but think Ian needs to speak for the drivers so it is one voice. We have had discussions that I should be the voice as if we get the car sorted for me I maybe quicker and Ian could drive round the handling so we might be quicker as a team. We did not reach a decision. I like the car to oversteer more than Ian but I am happy with the car more often than not.

Practice day is a good deal of fun for the tech side of things and the driver coaching.

[Fury1630]

We will use new high tensile bolts on the suspension from here on.

Sounds like a good shakedown run & you've got faster since last year. I'm sure the pit crew will have a supplier & know exactly what they're doing, but Margnor in Jacobs Well are very good for bolts & perfectly happy to sell you just one washer if that's what you want.

They stock all bolt the grades & are very knowledgeable. Be careful of going too high up the strength ladder though, 12.9s can be a bit brittle (ask me how I know this ), not what you want with a vibrating thing like suspension.

[Crunchie Gears]

Thanks Tony. Appreciated and I have passed your sage words to the team.