The good news:
The bad news (the metal bits belong inside the tire):
My next set of Toyo RA-1 tires for these wheels are on the way.
Archive for the 'preperation' Category
The spin-happy attitude of my car seems to be due to worn (out) front lower control arm bushings. I’ve had two different shops diagnose them as a problem, so now they’re getting fixed.
New polyurethane bushings are on the way, and will hopefully be installed before SLMP.
ugh
Yesterday was a bad day for me.
My stereo in the MINI had been cutting out intermittently for months. I knew it was some sort of loose connection in an in-line fuse (not the one in the fuse panel, an additional one right up by the head unit) for the unswitched power. The fuse wasn’t blown, but something was messed up with it. So, I finally figured out that the fuse itself was broken, not blown. One of the metal end caps was loose. So, I bought a new fuse and swapped it in. After that, no power to the stereo at all. 
Next stop, lunch. Driving through the parking lot at Burger King, I grazed a yellow pole coming around a corner. No damage, just some yellow marks on the black pastic wheel arch trim for the rear wheel and a little yellow scuff on the tire. No wheel or body damage. the Mr Clean magic eraser cleaned that up well, so no big deal. But a sign that I was just having a bad day.
Then, a friend and I did a little brake bleeding. He’s going to the track tomorrow in a newly finished car, so it needed a fluid flush. And I needed to bleed my brakes after NHIS. We started with mine. I forgot to keep an eye on the fluid level, and when going for “one more” on the last wheel, the pedal went to the floor and didn’t come back. And, I had left my extra bottle of brake fluid at home - we were at his place. So, we made a trip back across town to pick up some more fluid and topped off the resevoir. The brake pedal came back, but the bleed job wasn’t great. The pedal feels about as soft as it did before we started. And, I’m starting to run low on brake pad already, and these pads have only been used for three track days (and daily driving all winter).Â
In the evening, I decided to figure out what was up with the stereo. So I checked the fuses in the fuse panel. There are two for the stereo. I pulled out the first one, it slipped out of my hand and disappeared. It must have fallen somewhere into the depths behind the plastic panels. Luckily MINI gave us some extra fuses in the fuse panel.
Checked the second fuse, and it was blown. Replaced that one, and the radio was back to functioning. But now I had to head to Wal-Mart to pick up some more fuses so I’d have spares again.
Bad day.
I hate the day before a track event. Thoughts of my car ending up crunched against a wall keep running through my head.
Once I get out on the track, those thoughts are long gone. But, the day before…
Yup, my Friday the 13th event has also been cancelled.
At least my next event won’t be - it’s a car show inside the local shopping mall. Of course, getting the car presentable when it’s snowing out and I don’t have a garage will be interesting.
I did get the rear seats out and the rollbar’s cross and diagonal bars put back in.
The next driving event on my schedule will be an open lapping day at Calabogie on April 30 that is being organized by Bimmershop Racing out of Montreal.
One of the more important things when heading for the track is the “track box”. It serves two main purposes…
As part of the preperations to go out on the track, all the loose stuff inside the car needs to be removed. At some tracks, you’re lucky and there are covered garages with work tables, so you can just stash stuff in a relatively safe, dry place. Other tracks aren’t so well equipped and you’re basically hanging out in a gravel parking lot. And, it usually rains at some point. So, a container of some sort that is big enough to hold all the stuff you take out of the car, and keep that stuff dry, becomes pretty important.
Since you’re going to need a box to put stuff in anyway, why not get one that’s a little bigger, and use it to carry other supplies as well? That’s use number two. Here’s what I have in my track box:
- Tire pressure gauge - get a pretty nice one that has a relief valve for lowering pressure easily
- Notebook and pen - useful for writing down stuff like tire pressures, contact information for people you meet, etc
- Scotch tape - some clubs will give you nice vinyl numbers to put on the car, others will give you a piece of paper with a number printed on it and say “tape this to your window”. Without tape, that’s pretty hard.
- Painter’s tape - some clubs will make you tape up and glass on the front of your car such as headlights. Painter’s tape can also be used if you have to supply your own numbers on your car, but it’s a pain to do it that way
- Glass cleaner - windows get dirty, so bring something to clean them with
- Paper towels - goes with the glass cleaner, but get used for lots of other things too
- hand cleaning wipes - hands get dirty
- brake fluid - at some point, you’ll need to bleed your brakes, so have more fluid handy
- a quart of oil - my car doesn’t burn oil, so I’m not really sure why I carry this around, but it feels like the right thing to do
- tire tread depth gauge - so you can keep track of just how worn those tires are getting. Comes in handy when you want to rotate the tires to even out the wear on them
- brake pads - at some point, you’ll use up the brake pads that are on the car, so carry along the next set so you don’t have to go home early
- sunscreen - if it’s not raining, you’ll be getting sunburned
- Tarps - for covering the box and other stuff when it rains
- clean t-shirt for the drive home - it’s either going to rain, and your shirt will get wet, or it will be hot and your shirt will get all sweaty. And either way, it will end up dirty. A clean, dry shirt can make the drive home a bit more pleasant.
Also put in the car an umbrella and a folding chair.
Water is another important thing to have on hand. Get an insulated container that can hold a fairly large amount of it. You don’t want to have to pay the track for overpriced bottled water.
I carry along my full (but small) toolbox. Minimally, you want to bring the tools you’d need to rotate / change tires and bleed brakes. So, the right size sockets for those two tasks, a breaker bar, a torque wrench, socket wrench, and a plastic hose and bottle for bleeding brakes.
I wish I had the following:
- aluminum racing jack
- mechanic’s gloves
- easy-up tent like shelter
- air tank or compressor
My first driving event of the season is coming up on Saturday. Last weekend, fellow MINI owner Thompson helped me get the car ready by flushing the brake fluid and changing to the summer wheels and tires. Of course, the forecast for this week now includes accumulating snow. So, I guess the snow tires are going back on after all (this evening).
I’ll write up another post soon about “what’s in the box” describing what I have in my track box. That’s after I sort through it and throw away the garbage, take out the stuff I’ve never used, and replace the stuff that’s used up. A correctly stocked track box is pretty important when you’re heading out for an HPDE / track event. And in a MINI, space is at a premium.
I just sent out my registrations for the April 7 ADSS at NHIS and the April 13 “Cabin Fever” HPDE, also at NHIS. Assuming there’s space left in the events, I’m going driving!
I’ll post some more as I go through the preperations for these. But there’s a foot of snow forecast for tomorrow night, so it’s not quite driving season yet.
There will also be pictures, video, etc from the events. So stay tuned.
My first driving event is only four weeks away. I’m going to attend the White Mountain chapter of the BMWCCA’s Advanced Driver Skills School (ADSS) on April 7. The ADSS is a parking lot base school, the highlight of which is the wet skidpad, and even better the wet figure-8 skidpad.
At some point soon, I need to sort through my “track box” and get rid of the junk, and replace the things that I’m running out of. Also, I need to flush the brake fluid at some point, and give the car a once-over to make sure everything is still good to go.
And, get this blog up and running…