I'll try and post the video tomorrow... :)

Well, that didn't work out as planned. :o

Drove the Spec Boxster from LA to Las Vegas to race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway Outside Road course. Everything went fine in the first practice yesterday and I saw my lap times consistently dropping as I learned the course.

Then, in the second practice, I looped the car 180 degrees at the exit of Turn 10 and spun into the tire barrier protecting the wall. I hit the tire barrier going about 25 mph. Not a big hit but it was a nice smack.

The damage wasn't too bad - front fender pushed into the tire and cut into the tread, passenger side door pushed in, and some ripple on the rear fender.

I am also still losing coolant somewhere. I had the coolant system pressure tested after losing coolant at Buttonwillow and the shop found the reservoir leaking and it was replaced, but I still lost a lot of coolant in two sessions so that will have to be looked at again.

With body damage, a cut tire, losing coolant, and bruised ego from the self-inflicted damage, I decided to call it a weekend and came home (and stopped to refill coolant once).

Race. Repair. Repeat.

Next race in four weeks at PCA Festival of Speed at Fontana.

And yes, I have the video and will post tomorrow.

Oh, glad you are ok! Don’t like seeing dents, even in race cars. Par for the course though for sure! Hope next time is a win!

Here is the video.

I came into the corner behind on everything: behind on braking so I'm carrying too much speed; behind on downshifting so I'm kind of trying to do that and brake at the same time; and behind on steering so I'm chasing the slide instead of catching it. Once I got that far out of phase or sequence, its impossible to catch up, and the best I can do is to try to recover - and in this instance I wasn't able to do that.

I had 4 hours on the drive back to LA to beat myself up about making this mistake but all I can do is learn from it and continue to work on becoming a better driver/racer. And yes, racing does imitate life.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/_kzsPfZroH0" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Nothing worse than have nothing but time to critique & brow beat yourself.

Brush it off, get back on the horse and continue to be
Inspiration for all the 986forum folks.

M

P.S try not to tuck your thumbs in the steering wheel.

I think you should be happy you didn't damage the rear quarter panel that bad. Finding a black door and fender in California shouldn't be too hard.

Glad it was just a minor impact (hopefully).
There are some fresh SKIDMARKS (@0.09min) at exact the same spot, when you realized the curve layout.
You tried to correct the situation, the other Driver let it run straight. Was really difficult to realize the turns...layout too flat, no real environmental indicators, all the same color, at least for my taste as a spectator.
Heads up, always interesting to see you racing vids, Tom :cheers:

Think i would try to press the door sheet metal from the inside out. Classical dent repair. Same with the fender.

If the repair is not perfect visually, but solid – who cares. It's a race car. ;) Has to be rough, dirty, loud and fast. ;)

Your perception is absolutely correct - there is a distinct lack of visual cues due to the featureless landscape. That is part of the challenge (which I failed!).

The reality is that most of us just dream of what you’re doing Tom.. **************** happens, few have the cojones to just keep on going after hitting a wall or two.. Don’t beat yourself up too bad!

Keep it coming! Nothing but respect for you sir!

This ^^^^^^

Thanks and I appreciate comments - whether positive or negative.! :) I had someone else say that my car handling was crap - I didn't argue, there is always room for improvement.

To that end, I've talked to a couple of people about working with me as a driving/racing coach. We'll see what works out...

Wow. I’m impressed! No sentence enhancers were used in this video! Once again, glad you are ok!

As long as you are getting this kind of criticism from someone who is doing it better nothing wrong with that. As you said, always room to improve.
Otherwise it’s like people sitting on their asses on the couch yelling at ESPN channel as if they would have made that shot! Mhm..

Here is the start of the 3rd race at Buttonwillow Raceway in Central California from two weeks ago. I start in 12th and pass 8 cars to move up to 4th by the end of Turn 1. Sometimes, you're just in the right place at the right time. :)

At the Green flag, I get a good start and follow Jeff Shulem in the #445 through the pack as we drag race down the front straight. Then I'm able to slide by on the inside of Jeff in Turn 1 as the cars stack up at the apex which forces Branimir Kovac in the #318 to check up and then Jeff has to go wide.

Full screen with sound is worth it for this video!

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/C7mNkA06oWQ" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe>

That was VERY cool! What an exciting track that is even just watching. The sound track is like the end of the world but in a good way. That calm before the storm and sound explosion when you get the green gets me every time!

Good video Tom!

your car really took off tom once the turbo spooled up

Thanks! More to come...

I was caught in Shulem's draft!

So fun to watch. I've never run BW in that direction - we've always ran it CCW. Looks like it's a bit more interesting in this direction.

Absolutely more interesting fighting to get to the esses first, we have gone thru there 2 wide with half the car in the dirt

I replaced the brake pads/rotors in Feb with EBC Yellow pads and Cquence cross-drilled rotors and flushed the fluid with ATE Type 200. I've run this exact combination several times before and it has worked pretty well.

Then I raced at Buttonwillow and did the Friday practice at Las Vegas and by then the brakes were not inspiring the usual level of confidence. They didn't have nearly as much initial bite as I expected and overall felt a bit mushy.

When I pulled the front pads, they looked and smelled cooked. Maybe even over-baked. I wonder if the EBC Yellows are not quite up to the task of my braking level and style, so I bought a set of Pagid Orange and re-flushed the brake fluid just to make sure.

I have run this combo (Pagid Orange front and EBC Yellow rear) previously and it worked quite well so I am hoping to have confidence inspiring braking at AutoClub Speedway in two weeks. This track really puts brakes to the test.

I'll do a quick run up Hwy 2 tomorrow morning to bed the new pads and then the car should be ready to race!

http://986forum.com/forums/uploads02...1523591827.jpg

I'm assuming you did the proper bed-in procedure yes? Maybe a higher boiling point fluid like Motul 600? I run the EBC yellows on all 4 and they give me quite the initial bite after being warmed up, but then again I don't compete in an SPB or BSR:D

Yes, I did the recommended bed in procedure and since I've run the EBC Yellows before several times, I was surprised. Definitely going to use Motul 600 - I might even do another flush next week before racing at Festival of Speed.

Took a run up Hwy 2 (known as Angeles Crest Hwy) north of LA to bed in the new brake pads and stopped at Newcomb's Ranch for breakfast. There are usually some Porsche folks up there on Friday mornings and I ran into Magnus Walker and Hannah Elliott!

http://986forum.com/forums/uploads02...1523651330.jpg

Its time for the PCA Festival of Speed at AutoClub Speedway in Fontana, CA. This is the largest Porsche event in the West.

If you are planning to attend, please stop by Garage #3, Spaces 25-26 and say hi!

http://986forum.com/forums/uploads02/FoS1524109148.jpg

Well, that didn't go as planned (Part II)...

Anyone remember this post from last October? Replace Entire Engine as Preventative Maintenance.html

To quote myself:


Looks like I had about 11 hours of engine life left after I made that post. :eek:

In this morning's first practice at AutoClub Speedway, the engine suddenly lost power coming out of the Turn 9 hairpin. Erin Vogel and I had been working our way through the field when she passed me without any effort while I had the pedal to the floor. The engine coughed a bit and then regained power. I got through the next two turns ok and then the engine cut out. I tried re-starting while coasting but no joy.

Luckily, I was right at track exit so I pulled in and coasted to a stop in the paddock. I was able to get the car re-started and it sounded fine, but the low oil pressure light was now on. Uh oh. That's not good.

At this point, I concluded that the engine was probably starting to fail so racing anymore this weekend was out of the question.

I figured that I had nothing to lose (and yes, I know what the owners manual says about not running the engine with the low oil pressure light on) but I decided to take a chance and see if it would still get me home.

So I packed up and headed out for the 40 mile freeway drive. At about the halfway point, the engine started sounding like marbles in a tin can. I pushed in the clutch and it died. I coasted to the next exit and parked it. Tried starting it again and it would turn over but not catch. Called a tow truck and got a nice, air conditioned ride to House Automotive in Pasadena.

House did a quick compression and leak down test. Looks like cyls 4-5 aren't too happy.

This afternoon I made arrangements to have the spare engine trucked over to House on Tuesday. Then they'll swap in Engine #5.

Racing is life. :)

http://986forum.com/forums/uploads02...1524264819.jpg


http://986forum.com/forums/uploads02...1524265529.jpg


http://986forum.com/forums/uploads02...1524264917.jpg


http://986forum.com/forums/uploads02...1524264884.jpg

Aaaah.. living with a 986..
had the same experience when my original engine went out but it got me home somehow. Strange enough, even with a toast engine the Boxster never left me stranded so I could say I’ve owned worse cars. I promised myself next time it happens a bigger engine will go in.

You’ll be back in action in no time Tom!

Replace engine, rinse, repeat!

Dang. Your weekends haven't been going the distance lately. Hopefully you've gotten this out of your system and have lots of trouble free events ahead.

At least the engine got you up to see Magnus & Hannah. :cheers:

All race engines are defined by time. A local shop here had a Daytona prepped 993 race car, crazy fast... they expected 30-35 absolute tops as it was spec’ed for 24hrs. They were shaking down a tired engine at a local track event. Still scary.

Replace, rebuild... rinse and repeat! At least 2.7’s, even in race trim, are relatively inexpensive!

Sorry to hear that:(
What do you do with your "blown" engines?

In the past, the engines ground themselves into aluminum-burger so they went to the metals recycler. This might be the first engine that is in a condition where it might have some parts that can be salvaged. Not sure what I might do with it...

I suspect its still not worth it to dig in -- but looking forward to the diagnosis.

Mike

Bummer Tom. The same luck has been plaguing Dan Carusillo with his 3.3L air pumper. Hope things get sorted so you can get back out there.

Consider the issues sorted.

Engine #5 being uncrated yesterday...

This is an engine from a Tip-equipped 986 so there is a list of items to swap to make it compatible with a manual car along with moving some nearly new parts from the failed engine to the replacement engine. Add in a few new items and it should be ready for installation.

Task
1. Swap engine wiring harness
2. Swap clutch, pressure plate, and light weight flywheel
3. Swap Fuel injectors (recently cleaned/calibrated)
4. Swap deep oil sump, baffle, oil return pots, and extended oil pickup
5. Remove air conditioning compressor and lines
6. Swap under-drive pulley and shorter serpentine belt
7. Update cooling hoses (remove 4th line)
8. Update vacuum lines (remove 4th line)
9. Swap AOS (brand new)
10. New spark plugs
11. New air filter
12. New S model oil cooler/o-rings
13. New oil and filter
14. Refill with distilled water and water wetter

http://986forum.com/forums/uploads02...1524663056.jpg

So while we are on the subject of engines... driving along the other day I had a though. Which is rather scary usually for me, because there is usually a $$$ figure associated with it! Anyway, would it be possible to "de-turbo" a turbo 996 engine, and retro it into our cars? The reason to eliminate the turbo "stuff" is I don't think the inter cooler etc would fit. Eliminates the IMS BS, and make some fun HP? Just a crazy thought? Stone, motor looking good! Fun thread!

I'd probably want to up the CR on the pistons --

The Turbo's do have issues with chains failing.

Probably not worth the cost -- that's a $20K+ engine into a $5-$10K car.

Mike

metzger engine - same as gt3. doesn’t fit apparently (even without turbos).

I have heard that as well. As it is - the 2005 3.6 911 motor is a REAL tight fit. My airbox is in the trunk.

http://986forum.com/forums/uploads02...1524684738.jpg

As much as I'd love to get in to racing - it's stuff like this that would simply stretch my ability to pay for it just a bit too far.

Good luck with the swap!