Duke's'72 Carbed KA project

[510rob]

+1 on the nice welds

[Three B's Racing]

+1 on the nice welds

Hey Rob

Summit Point this year saw John Mortin in our area talking it up. One thing he said was You! have a very special Z stamped filling He also mentioned how impressed he was with your work.

[duke]

Thanks for the compliments guys! I've really been focusing on becoming a better welder recently. I'm no where close to the level of many of the guys out there, but I think I have vastly improved compared to where I was a few years ago.

Very nice job. Those welds look top notch!

I'm sure your KA will enjoy the cooler intake charge from the isolated upper rad line. Are you still using the stock paper gasket for the intake manifold or did you go with a phenolic plastic based one ?

I'm just using the stock paper gasket. The upper line is still part of the intake manifold, so I'm sure the #1 runner still gets a little extra heat from it. To be honest, I don't think that a thermal isolator would be that much of a benefit for me because I am running carbs. There isn't a huge plenum like there is with the stock manifold and the carbs themselves are isolated from the rest of the manifold.

Fantastic fab work. Now put that thing on a dyno!

I would like to! Maybe once I get the 44's on it I will try and find a place to do a dyno run. The motor is totally stock internally though so I don't expect any crazy numbers.

[duke]

Just sent off my entry for the Cascade Lakes Hillclimb on June 28th and 29th and the Hoopa Hillclimb on July 19th and 20th! Can't wait!

[bertvorgon]

Good Luck!

I loved my hillclimb years, what an adrenaline rush!!!!!

Not sure what braking requirements are like, but, I found the softest pad available worked great, as gravity was your friend. Our hillclimb was 2.2 miles long, with 18 turns, and only 4 real hard braking areas, more a case of getting brakes up to temp than anything.

Remember...no $2.00 plastic trophy is worth throwing the car away for.

[qship510]

Good Luck!


Remember...no $2.00 plastic trophy is worth throwing the car away for.

Best advice ever....EVER!

[duke]

Good Luck!

I loved my hillclimb years, what an adrenaline rush!!!!!

Not sure what braking requirements are like, but, I found the softest pad available worked great, as gravity was your friend. Our hillclimb was 2.2 miles long, with 18 turns, and only 4 real hard braking areas, more a case of getting brakes up to temp than anything.

Remember...no $2.00 plastic trophy is worth throwing the car away for.

Thanks for the advice Keith, I always appreciate it. I am currently running the Porterfield street compound and have found it to be a good pad for auto-x as it works well right out of the gate when cold. I suppose that this will translate well to the hillclimbs.

No plastic trophies may be worth it, but what about a wood one? (I this for winning my class at Hoopa last year)

[bertvorgon]

Now that's a cool trophy!

I just took a look at the "course", very similar to the Knox mountain climb, more turns and more elevation gain over almost the same distance. I see the King of the Mountain time is pretty quick compared to all the rest. We have a similar time spread here, which will be very hard to beat. Our "NUMBER" , the holy grail so to speak, was to at least achieve 2 minutes or less.

In looking at that hill, gearing would be a critical factor, besides Hp. I ran as short a slick (20") as possible, on top of my 4:62, as the longest straight only had me between 112-115 MPH.

Getting out of the corners quickly was the key, and what I found worked great was NOT do the BIG late brake, but, get the car hauled down earlier, so the when you got to the corner, you were already accelerating through ( at your cornering limit ) and well into the throttle at the 3/4's of the corner. This exit speed lets the car have a jump on gravity. This actually made quite a bit of difference in my car.

I also wore ear plugs...just calms things down a tad..lets you "feel" the car more..try it, you might be surprised.

[duke]

Thanks for the tips Keith. I tried the ear plugs at my last auto-x and it really did help calm things down. I think I will be wearing them from now on. Also the advise on how to attack corners. With a relatively underpowered car like mine, I have found that conservation of momentum is key in many instances.

I did another auto-x this last weekend. Coned myself out of FTD (just barely also, the cone was still upright but just outside of the box), but was still able to take second overall and win my class so I was happy with that. The car performed flawlessly. The new engine ran like a top and the car handled great. Very predictable and very easy to make adjustments mid corner with the throttle. After a nut and bolt check it should be ready to go for the Cascade Lakes Hillclimb this coming weekend.

[Derek]

Have fun at the hillclimb! I imagine you'll best my time at Cascade lakes in 2008 of 2:11.3.

http://vimeo.com/1267860

Keep the greasy side down! Looking forward to seeing you and your car out at Thunderhill sometime.

[duke]

Thanks Derek. I think I have watched your run 1,000 times to try and get the course memorized before this weekend.

I'm hoping to do a track day or two before the end of the year. Who do you run with usually?

[Derek]

Usually the Golden Gate Lotus Club (http://www.gglotus.org/), since they offer a huge amount of track time and a very laid back vibe. Plus lots of little low-ish powered cars to play with, and I seem to know a few Elise owners. I'm actually going to T-Hill on Friday to run the new 5 mile supertrack (not with the GGLC, but just a private day that a friend of a friend of a friend is running). The next GGLC event there is Sept 11th, and I'm running at the 24h of Lemons the next day (new car!) so that's a strong maybe if I feel like doing 4 track days in a row. I will keep you posted. I would love to do another day at Sonoma, but it tends to be quite a but more $$$ (and way more walls!) and GGLC doesn't do events there that you can bring a non-Lotus to.

Glad to help on the video. Cascade Lakes is has pretty good sight lines compared to Larison Rock and Bible Creek (the other HC's I've done). Have a great time!

[bertvorgon]

GOOD LUCK!

We used to walk our hill many times, just to really see the pavement, where the bumps and dips are, changes in pavement surface, and site lines. We would go up a few weeks before, just to refresh ourselves.

Other key was the best place to initiate braking ( tree, bush, girl in bikini ), as I said before the corner, to then be able to be on the power well before mid corner. If you watch the "king of the late brakers", they scrub off so much speed, then have to re-accelerate all that mass, which costs TIME.

Also, may sound silly, but, try a higher gear where you can, if your engine can pull it, on the faster corners. This kinda relates back to the engine screaming away, everything sounds like your racing, but, if you got out of the last corner faster, it is actually smoother if you can carry that higher gear.

I'm envious.....

[duke]

The following is my report from the Cascade Lakes Hillclimb.  Warning:  It is be a bit long winded, there are no pictures (I'm not very good a remembering to take them) and the videos I do have are of such horrible quality that I most likely won't bother posting them.  There were people taking photo's though, so if I come across any, I will post them.

This last weekend was the Cascade Lakes Hillclimb.  Located just outside of Ashland, Oregon (about a 7 hour drive when towing a trailer) this is the farthest I have traveled for a race.  However, it is one of the closest hillclimbs to the bay area (the others being Hoopa, which I will be going to, and Virginia City, which seems to be dominated by the Ferrari/Porsche type crowd).  Having done Hoopa last year, I had a little hillclimbing experience coming into the event.  I opted to trailer my car, and my Dad was kind enough to come along with me to act as pit crew and truck driver, making the weekend a little less stressful for me. 

We arrived at the hill around 5pm on Friday and unloaded the car for tech inspection and to take a few leisurely drives up the hill so I could get a lay of the land.  The event is cool in that race central is at the top of the hill in a large gravel lot where many of the competitors camp for the weekend, giving it a very unified and welcoming feeling, and also allowing you to save a few bucks by not needing to get a hotel room.  Tech went by without any problems, and my dad and I loaded up to check out the hill.  The only other hillclimb I have done is Hoopa, which is very steep and has mostly tight corners, making it a kind of point and squirt type of deal.  Upon my first drive of the Cascade Lakes course, I could tell this would be much different.  It was no where near as steep, and many of the corners were fairly fast (~3rd gear) and I could tell that carrying as much speed as possible would be key.  After a few laps, I felt ready for Saturday's runs, but knew that I would be primarily using them to familiarize my self with how the hill felt at more of a race pace.

My primary goal for the weekend (beyond keeping the car in one piece)  was to go below 2:10, which would give me the record for my class.  After watching video of other 510's on the hill, I knew that this would be possible.  On my first run I generally took it easy, driving about 7/10ths, trying to learn the hill as much as possible.  I was rewarded with a 2:12.84, right around my goal time for the weekend.  For the next run I attacked a few sections a bit faster than the first and my time came down to 2:05.49.  That gave me the hill record for OSPU, and put me about 5 seconds ahead of the other car in my class.  I didn't have a work station for the afternoon runs, so I used the time to check over the car and watch the video from my second run to see if I could pick out sections where I could improve.  I was able to identify a few key areas where I could pick up speed. Then after the second run group was finished, I hiked down to the bottom of the hill and walked the course to get a better feel for the intricacies of each of these areas.  I did another two slow laps of the hill in my car after dinner.  I felt ready for the next day, confident that I could take a few more seconds off of my time.

After working turn 4 during the morning run group (which was nice because it was one of the corners I felt I could improve on, so it gave me a chance to see the lines other people were using) I got ready for my last two runs.  On my first run of the day, I felt spot on for the first half of the course, but made a few mistakes during the top half, including a 2 second penalty for hitting a cone in one of the chicanes.  Despite this, I still went faster than the day before, recording a 2:03.02 (including the 2 second penalty).  After seeing this my goal for the next run was to make it under the 2 minute mark.  I knew to do this that I would need a clean run and to perhaps take some chances in a few turns.  My last run went great.  I felt fast through all the key areas and hit both chicanes cleanly and quickly.  However, there was one thing that slowed me down a bit.  The road surface had been deteriorating though out the weekend, and some of the corners seemed to be developing patches of loose surface, which does not inspire much confidence when you are trying to attack it at speed.  I finished my last run with a time of 2:01.27, not quite my goal, but still good enough to win my class by 10 seconds and drop the record by about the same amount.  I ended up finishing 12th out of the 40 cars in attendance, which included some pretty fast machinery (some high powered home built cars, fast Porsches, and a few new Corvettes).

On the whole, it was a very fun weekend.  I was able to keep the rubber side down (along with everybody else, as there were no big accidents the whole weekend) and my car ran beautifully.  It was an awesome venue and the Siskiyou Sports Car Club did an excellent job of hosting.  Definitely an event that I would like to come back to in the future, hopefully to get down below that 2 minute mark.

Attached are the full results.

[PoorMtnKid]

Congrats on the win. I would like to check something like this out but dont think they do anything like this near Las Vegas.