Another Wreck, another Race Car.....

[golfmeup]

Thanks for sharing Peter!
Shame about the wind, looks like it was affecting a few cars.

[Peter Jones]

Round 4 of the Vic Super Sprints tomorrow.

Going to be freezing out on the Island.

In other news I'm converting the car to run on e85.

I'm currently accumulating all the fuel system bits I need to make the conversion.

Lots of work to do.

[Notso Swift]

Guessing today wasn't the day for a PB...

[Peter Jones]

Survival was the name of the game today.



I gave up after 3 rounds and packed up.

I couldn't get any power down without spinning the wheels.

I had lateral and braking grip but I just couldn't accelerate the car.

Proper wets would have worked much better than the semis I was running.

Spun out 3 times, locked up and slid down the turn 4 exit lane.

After seeing the above incident and a few others I decided to call it quits for the day.

I suppose I did get the change to bed in a new set of brake pads and square off my semis which were pretty lumpy after Sandown.

Heated windscreen worked a treat.

[Peter Jones]

[Notso Swift]

Trailing throttle at apex

OK now Ihave seen the sequence for the Evo it was his fault, from the first still it looked more 50/50 but he didn't lock them up and let the car finish its business - when you have lost it it is lost, just bail out - the car will travel in a straight line once you lock it all up, that Newton bloke was on to something

[Peter Jones]

Starting to collect stuff for the eventual e85 conversion. Probably wont finish it off until the end of the season.

Here's what I'm up to.

This is an e85 tester. It tells you the % of ethanol in the fuel. It appears my local United is closer to being e90.



I'm wiring a flex fuel sensor into the data logger. This measures the ethanol % and fuel temperature. This will let me log the fuel quality so I can review it should I suspect a fuel issue. I'll plumb it into the return line to the tank. That blue hose will be cut and terminated to run through it.



This is an e85 proof fuel level sensor. It works on capacitance and has no moving parts. This will allow me to run foam in the tank. I had this custom made in China for about $150. A local sensor company quoted me $1600 for the same thing.

I mounted it in the top of an old sensor which I'd gutted. The thread is M20x1.5 so I was able to modify a CV nut and braze it to the old top for the new sensor to screw into.

This will be wired into the logger too, it's main function is simply a fuel gauge so I know if I need top up between rounds.

You use up to 30% more fuel volume with e85 so I'll be keeping a close eye on consumption.



The reason I never did e85 from the beginning was the fuel tank. e85 absorbs moisture from the air and can become corrosive to steel and aluminum parts. As my original tank already has a few rust spots it was all bit bit hard at the time.

This is a brand new tank from the UK. It has some differences to the OEM tanks that will make this thing possible.

In order to make the tank proof against e85 I will line it with a POR-15 product designed to seal fuel tanks.

POR-15 Fuel Tank Sealer

There is no trap door on the filler and there's not the plastic surge tank/filter holder that the OEM tank has. Both of those would have made using the sealer very difficult.

Because this is a brand new tank there's no safety issues with brazing AN fittings onto the pipes for more secure hose work.





I'm doing some very amateur science here and chucked a bunch of different metals and hoses in some e85 to see what happens. I've got one bucket where they're all submerged and another where they're partially submerged. Just curious to see if the horror stories are true.



I also have to swap out my Integrated Engineering surge tank for the version with the anodised insides and run new anodised hard line front to back.

If I can figure out all of that then it'll be off to the dyno for a retune.

[sports racer]

What's the benefit in running e85? So far all I'm hearing is negatives - use up to 30% more, corrosive, lot of work needed to convert.

[Peter Jones]

More power.
Cheaper fuel.
Cooler running engine.

20 litres of 105 race fuel costs me $85 and a 3 hour round trip to purchase it.
20 litres of 107 e85 costs $26.40 and a 10 minute round trip to a servo just down the road.

[guile]

this is an engineering masterpiece, well done. i love the quality of your work...

[Notso Swift]

I have one of those simple eBay testers, and ave also found around 90% is normal I know people who use the flex fuel sensor, but I don't have the capacity with the Autronic
Apparently United is pretty consistent , Caltex is a lot more variable (E70 to E90)

My experience is 22% at WOT, less as an average

Your "bucket of Fuel" is exactly what I did!

[Peter Jones]

Good to know that United tends to be consistent.

From memory I think Caltex makes their ethanol from waste and United is from wheat/sugarcane?

22% is OK for the racing I do. I tend to use fuel as ballast if I've got traction issues and I'm still running a full sized 40L tank.

[Notso Swift]

United brought the CSR/Dalby refinery, so control their own supply chain
Caltex go to a variety of sources (including United) and blend form there. If they have poor supply (or it is dear relative to spirit) the percentage changes

[Peter Jones]

Dramas yesterday out at Sandown.

Was going pretty well cutting 1:29 laps in the second round when I snapped the timing chain.

Bottom end should be OK. Head is off to see if it can be salvaged and what parts it's going to take.

Probably need to have all valves and buckets replaced as well as several of the guides as a bare minimum.

Should be enough time to get it fixed before the next round.

[Peter Jones]

The bolts on the adjustable cam gear sheared off and did a lot of damage around the bearing saddle nearest the dizzy.





Broken chain. Might have been the cam pulley bolts that let go first. Hard to tell which was the cause.





This was only the second outing on this pulley. It's stuffed now.



I don't think this is what's meant by valve overlap.





Inlet buckets got smashed up.