SATURDAY WHISTLER DRIVE

[bertvorgon]

With the weekend actually looking to be good...make that GREAT...who would like to do a nice cruise up to Whistler on Saturday morning?

I'm going to jump at the chance here, to go for a drive. Maybe leave the plant at 8:00, nice drive up, have lunch or just a coffee, and head back, home my mid afternoon.

Let me know...

[jason]

Pulling my motor saturday, so I'm out ...

[Byron510]

I'd love to... if I had a running car!!!

I'll have to catch up with you next time Bert; I'm in the middle of a minor detuning of the Bronze that went sideways in a bad way....

I'll print the full story, when I figure it out! The short version is that I don't have a running 510 at the moment.

Byron

[GREG510]

sideways in a bad way....

Nothing serious I hope

[Byron510]

sideways in a bad way....

Nothing serious I hope

No nothing too serious, but a lot more work that I had initially planned on doing. The end product will be a lot more drivable, though. (I hope, barring any other Murphy curve balls!)

Byron

[RONSLYCHUK]

I too,would love to come-------but,I have been ordered to clean out the garage by my BOSS!!!!!(if you know who I mean}

[gooned]

Gonna be an awsome day to cruuze, I to am in no-ride land - AND - boss say's get to work (more)
Get some pics so we can all live vicaroiusly (sp?)

[McShagger510]

I can be there - Check your PM Keith and please call me in the AM.

James

[ajen68510]

DOH ! Read too late. Lunch bag let down .

[bertvorgon]

Morning World!

What a great day to get out for a cruise. As the day would have it, due to last minute notice, and people’s domestic schedule, it was just James and Rob in his 240, and me.

We left the plant at 10:00 am sharp, in bright sun and blue sky. Temperature was perfect and my motor felt very strong. We went past a Vancouver police motorcycle, who had a guy pulled over on Knight street, a reminder to be good out on the highway today.

This was to be my first run on the new VTO 15” x 7” Classic 8’s, zero offset wheels, which I had purchased a few months ago. I had PDM Racing do the tire change and balance, as he has one of those great tire machines that hardly touch your wheel, and, a LOAD FORCE balancer. Dave’s wheels are really nice, the finish is very good, even on the backside. During balancing, there were no issues, other than we had to turn one of the 048’s on the rim, which we think was just the tire’s issue. These tires have seen some serious G-force, so who knows how much things got moved around. During the drive, at speeds up to….well, lets’ just say they were nice and smooth! I still have that one vibration that is going to be delt with up and coming. I did weigh the wheels, and in my case they weigh 17.9 lbs, as opposed to my old Rikens, which were 15.5 lbs, same as the Panasport racing wheels. That would be my only issue with the wheels, just on the heavy side. Would you notice it on the street, no, no big deal. The hub could be machined out a tad, as a good chunk of that weight is there, so they can machine it down for the different offsets.( I will post up on the VTO thread)

On hitting the Iron Workers Bridge, north end, I look ahead of the traffic and see a garbage container sitting in the middle of our lane! I slow down very quickly, with James thinking I’m brake checking him. Traffic came to a sudden standstill, with hopefully no one behind us getting rear ended. The fellow ahead of me got out and moved the darn thing out of the way. Off we went, with traffic opening up nicely. Cresting the ridge above Horseshoe Bay had the spectacular vista ahead of us of the snow covered mountains, and Howe sound ahead of us. Wow, was the great!

Where in the World can you get in your 510, and within 1 hour be into such fantastic scenery, mountain vistas, and great rolling highways? We were able to zip along really well, letting a few “faster” cars do the radar sweep for us. We had planned to do a quick stop at Brittania Beach, for a photo op, and decide based on traffic, if we would push on to Whistler.

Whistler it was, traffic still flowing very well. That new highway really is good, letting traffic sort itself out. We were able to pick up the pace even more, again letting a few guys press on even faster than us. The usual Audi A4, and a mountain biker in his Subaru. It was all I could do to not go after them, as the drive would have gotten the excitement quota up even more. The leg from Squamish to Whistler goes by in a blink now, with traffic being quite light, bonus round! The Tantalus Mountains were absolutely shimmering in the snow cover, and I decided that we needed to stop there for a photo op on the way back.

Arriving in Whistler had us going into the Day lot to park. We then decided to head back to Creekside, to go to Vancouver Pizza ( Boston Pizza ). To you none locals, anything with “BOSTON” on it has been changed to VANVOUVER, till the hockey playoff series is done! Even BOSTON BAR in the Fraser Canyon, has changed its name for now, very funny.

After a nice lunch, we saddled up for the drive back. My car was running perfectly, all temperatures where they should be, oil good, etc.. I had only given it a bit of boost, so I had not really hit the thing with full power yet. There were a ton of motorcycles out this day, the usual Harley Hog Noise machines, to the great range of Sport bikes. We stopped at the Tantalus lookout, taking these pictures of the cars and mountain range.

Clearing Squamish, the pace was very good again, which was a real bonus for mid afternoon on a Saturday. Outside of Horseshoe Bay, I had a Sport bike rider kinda goad me along, he would slow down, then accelerate HARD. I put up for that a bit, then, as I know that road, and there would be NO potential for a gendarme to be ANYWHERE…….lets’ just say I had a discussion with him on the benefits of four wheels VS two, and that a turbo 510 accelerating THROUGH the corner, and then OUT, will errasticate all but the best riders. He understood that, as when he finally caught up with me, he gave me the big thumbs up. It was a good discussion!

The rest of the drive was the usual traffic mess, until I hit Knight Street. Ton’s of people were heading into the downtown core to either go to the hockey game, or, be part of the street scene, watching outside. Thank goodness for my two electric fans. With all the stop and go, my water temp never went over 170F.

Thanks to James and Rob for coming along, great way to start the driving season in ernest.

GO CANUCKS GO!

[bertvorgon]

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FINAL