2006-03-20 - Round 1, Sidbury Hill : Blog
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Round 1 of the Southern Counties Off Road Championship at
Sidbury Hill was my first event. After years of thinking about it, I was
finally here.
The course we had laid out the day before was 8 miles over the Cross County
Driving Area. Sidbury only ever seems to go two ways, either an enormous
area of chalk slurry or set as hard as rock. We had the 'hard as rock'
version, but the day was sunny, the sky clear and there was a breeze the
keep the dust moving. The target was set at 10 runs for the day.
Having come along on the Saturday to help lay out the course I had a fair
idea of where it went and the major obstacles. On balance I suppose this is
a benefit as it saves walking the course on the day, but it also meant I
knew about 'the hill'.
The hill had been bothering me since the Saturday morning. After a gentle
downhill start and a complex of a handful of corners the course made its way
up the steepest climb on the western face of Clarendon Hill. Nobody else
seemed to bothered by it. But to me and my Vitara, with 1600cc and only
90bhp it looked very steep, very long and very bumpy! I was also worried
about the ground clearance I would need to clear the big solid looking lump
of something in the middle of the track just over the top of the climb.
Run 1
We'd already discussed the strategy for the day - the aim was to finish! So
after the longest minute of my life waiting for the lights to change I set
off from the start at a gentle pace on my first lap of a Safari event.
Within a minute or so we were at 'the hill'.
The entrance to the climb was so rough and bumpy I was almost at a crawl at
a started the climb in second gear. As I suspected it wasn't going to be
straight forward and I ended up taking 1st gear about 2/3rds of the way up
to keep the momentum going. I cleared the 'lump' and we continued around the
course.
With the hill out of the way I suddenly realised how much I was enjoying
myself. The Vitara was superb fun to drive, OK so I had to go easy over the
really rough parts and watch out for big holes but it was great fun, Matt
had to remind me to take it easy a couple of times, we didn't want to be out
on the first lap!
Run 2
With a complete lap under my belt it was now time to begin to learn what the
Vitara could really do. After finishing the first run we pitted briefly to
check everything was still bolted together and went back out for a second
run.
I decided to push a bit harder and begin to learn what the suspension could
comfortably do. On several sections we were airborne as the vitara skipped
from bump to bump. At a couple of points on the course we felt the bottom of
the car draging a bit where the Land Rover based vehicles with 16" wheels
were beginning to deepen the wheel ruts. With every corner I was learning
more about the car and how to drive it.
We crossed the finish and I went to look at our time - 19.28. I was very
pleased. We weren't too far off the pace for our class!
Run 3
Now with a big grin on my face after a second successful lap we decided to
go straight back out for a 3rd run. We drove to the start line and waited
for the lights to change. As we were waiting the engine cut out. I looked at
Matt, Matt looked at me. I tried to restart the car, turned the key -
nothing. The electrics appeared to be dead. I rolled through the start and
managed to bump the engine into life but it was running very lumpy and
didn't want to idle. I reversed back up the hill, across the pits and back
to camp.
As we were moving I noticed the electrics were behaving very erratically,
the rev counter and dash lights appeared to be turning on and off. My
immediate reaction was either a short somewhere, probably in the feed from
the battery caused by the mud and water in the water-splashes on the course
or perhaps a loose terminal or connection.
We set to work trying to diagnose the problem. After borrowing a large can
of WD40 from Julian and lots of spraying and head scratching everything
seemed to be ok. We jumped the Vitara from a spare battery and it started
and ran no problems. After a while left running to charge it was turned off
and started again ok so it was time for another lap.
Run 4
And so we lined up for a fourth run at the course. The start was empty so we
were straight to the line. After what seemed like an age the lights changed
and after a bit of hesitation (by me - did the lights change?) we were off.
As we approached 'the hill' I shouted to Matt I thought something was wrong,
the car felt really under powered and as I tackled the hill the power fell
and I found myself changing down to 1st and then slipping the clutch just to
get to the top. This was not good. We descended the hill and made it through
several more corners before the car began to draw to a halt. Matt said 'this
has an electric fuel pump doesn't it?'. I appeared we had not got to the
bottom of the electrical problems. We waved to the marshals and were towed
back into the pits.
At that point I thought we were out for the day with only 2 laps completed.
We sat and ate some food and gathered our thoughts. Out came the multi-meter
and we set about tracking down the problem.
After a while we realised the alternator was not pushing out enough voltage.
Speaking to a couple of other guys it seemed there had already been a few
alternator related retirements. No amount of staring at it and poking it
with a screw driver was going to fix it so we decided to take it out and
clean it up. After a comedy half and hour of removing the alternator,
partially stripping it and giving up we decided to put it all back together
and call it a day.
One we had put everything back together we thought we should just check the
alternator output - just in case... and it was charging! We were back in the
race.
Run 5
We had wasted a lot of time 'fixing' the alternator but still had time for
at least 2 more runs - all valuable testing time for the Vitaras first
outing. So off we went. After the caution of the first 2 laps I decided it
was time to go for it. After the problems of the last couple of hours it was
great to be back out on the course - and the Vitara was flying!
About 5 miles in I was slowing for a corner and noticed a little steam
licking over the leading edge of the bonnet. I looked down at the dashboard
(for the first time in 5 miles) and saw the engine was red hot!
We stopped on the back straight and opened the bonnet and the rad blew its
top. Looking into the engine bay the fan was running but the rad was so
clogged with mud there was no airflow through it. After few minutes cooling
we realised there were no marshals in sight so decided to fill the rad from
the washer bottle and limp back to the pits.
Once back at camp we removed the front grill and tried to clean the rad. At
that point we saw Jenny who offered the services of Simons jet wash to give
us a chance of getting back out for another run.
Run 6
With a partially cleaned rad we started our 6th run. The day was now drawing
to a close and most cars had finished or retired. We figured we had just
enough time to do one more run, if all went well we might just squeeze a 7th
in.
As we navigated the course, getting faster and faster I began to notice
problems with the front shocks. The faster we went and the harder we pushed
the hotter the shocks got and the more useless they became. The rear of the
car which has the Bilistiens supplemented with fox remote reservoirs was
great but the front Bilstien only set up was not enough for the punishing
surface at Sidbury.
Matt had been given the job of keeping an eye on the temperature, and the
Vitara was struggling to stay cool at pace with a partially blocked rad. By
about mile 6 the temperature was high and we decided we had to back off to
make the finish. As we pottered towards the finish the temperature continued
to climb towards the red. About 5 or 6 hundred metres from the finish there
was a dull pop and the temperature fell rapidly. We kept going and made the
finish.
Back at the pits we opened the bonnet and found the 'thud' had been the top
radiator hose giving up, it had about a 3" split in it. With no spare our
days racing was over.
Retrospective
Of 6 laps attempted we finished 3. The times for the completed laps were (1)
21.53, (2) 19.28, (6) 20.19. I think the Vitara would be capable of a high
18's over the course we ran at Sidbury. The three main problems the first
outing highlighted were the front shocks, alternator and cooling.
I plan to fit a pair of Foxes to the front, hopefully by the next event and
will try to improve the airflow through the rad and the front of the car. If
the rad stays clean cooling will not be a problem but I need to look at
increasing the cooling for those events were the rad will pick up mud during
a lap. I think a splash guard for the underside of the alternator is also
needed.
All in all we had a great day. The car had shown a lot of potential and
seems reasonably competitive and it was fun to drive!
See you all at Slab in April.
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