Guran's NA6 "Little Reddy"

[Guran]

3rd November 2013
MX-5 Club of NSW track day - Wakefield Park
NSW/VIC Interstate Challenge

The much anticipated NSW/VIC Interstate Challenge for 2013 was held at Wakefield Park on 3rd November. The events actually started the day before with many NSW members staying overnight in Goulburn and then meeting up for dinner with the Victorians at the Soldiers Club. It was an excellent night with lots of friendly banter!


IMG_8830 by Guran5, on Flickr

Although the skies were clear, the conditions were pretty ordinary. It topped out at 26C but there was a hot & gusty westerly blowing all day, and the pressure was very low at around 1010hPa. Hopeless conditions for my car - I expected slow times and sure enough, I was about a second off my PB pace.

Mike had decided to make the competition a bit fairer by moving the faster NSW drivers back into the classes they were actually eligible to run in. This meant that I competed in Class 1 (instead of Class 4) against Rob Downes and Noel Heritage (sharing an NA8), while Ralph Thompson and Phil Ashton were in Class 7 (instead of Class 9) but didn't have any Victorian opposition! Ironically it turns out they would have been better off in Class 9. Oh well.

I'm very grateful for having run in Class 1 because the competition with Rob and Noel was extremely close. This is how the day went:

Run 1: me 1:17.48, Rob 1:18.30, Noel 1:20.41
Run 2: Noel improved to 1:18.55 but stayed 3rd
Run 3: Rob improved to 1:17.67 and Noel to 1:18.28
Run 4: I improved to 1:17.15, but Noel pipped me with 1:17.13. Rob was close too with 1:17.31. Only 0.16s covered the top three in Class 1.
Run 5: I improved to 1:16.99 and thought I had it covered. Noel was close with 1:17.04. Rob missed this run which was the last that counted towards the Interstate Cup.
Run 6: Neither Noel or I could go faster, and Rob didn't hold any hope. BUT he did a 1:16.94 on this run! Then Rob jumped onto the end of the last run of the day and went better again with 1:16.83.

Here is my fastest lap of 1:16.99. I lost a tenth or two at the end in the fishhook.


Rob was very shocked when his name was announced as the Class 1 winner. Congratulations for his deserved win, and thanks to Noel for the strong challenge. Only 0.21s covered the three of us in the end.

As Club President, I had the job of handing out the awards and trophies. The highlight was receiving the Interstate Challenge Cup from Tim Emery, as NSW won it with 158 points to 118 for the Victorians.


IMG_8886 by Guran5, on Flickr

My laptime will apparently still count towards the Class 4 club championship. Not that it matters much because I'm outgunned this year. I was fourth behind Gus Elias (1:15.61), John Karayannis (1:15.80 PB) and Glenn Thomas (1:16.16). Well done guys!

Thanks to Reggie for the pics!

Braking for Turn 2

DSC_9341 by reggiewalker84, on Flickr

Turn 2

DSC_9374 by reggiewalker84, on Flickr

Waiting

DSC_9939 by reggiewalker84, on Flickr

One last thing. Those who were present might have noticed that I was out on the track at the start and end of the day, with Stuart McFadyen shooting some video in a chase car. Stuart is a commercial video director and MX-5 Club member, and he's making a documentary about our club trackdays ... he's chosen me as his subject. He kept me very busy all day with interviews, commentating during my runs, and generally playing the "movie star". I've never done something like this before. Really keen to see the results when Stuart's finished. It's certainly not intended as an egotistical exercise, so I truly hope it doesn't turn out that way!

[mazmad]

Very graceful pirhouette the ute did, I was in prime viewing position to catch that! Look forward to seeing Stuart's vid, he certainly worked hard on it over the day.

[sailaholic]

So the na is (was) keeping up on with the 86? I'm surprised, even with the Prius tires I thought the power difference would make up for it.

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk

[Guran]

Nick, it was more a case of Tony being cautious with his brand new car. I don't have that impediment. I was 3 seconds quicker on the North Circuit when he was using the Prius tyres. That's because I was probably 3-4 seconds quicker through turn 1 which accounted for the second or so he'd gain on the main straight. Plus I really attack the turn 4 flip flop, and he would have been very careful. Speed in a straight line is one thing, but I get much better speed onto the straights that follow the corners and he has to gain that back.

http://www.supersprints.com.au/forms/ti ... 0Times.pdf

[Guran]

2nd February 2014
MX-5 Club of NSW Track Day – Wakefield Park

At last! The first MX-5 Club track day for 2014 and round 4 in the club championship. It was 91 days since my last track outing (Interstate Challenge in November), and I was itching to get back out there. If only the weather had been kinder! The temperature maxed at 35C, which is the hottest track day yet that I've endured. And I conveniently left an esky bottle of drink in the fridge at home. We had a full field of 70 drivers entered, of which 69 started.

Scrutineering was a bit different at this round, with lots of regulars commandeered to help out. We had four lines of cars with two scrutineers on each line (me included). It seemed to work very efficiently and will only get better at the next round. Many drivers (including me) where caught out by the new Wakefield Park requirement for a blue battery triangle - yes, it was in the supp regs but few noticed the change. A handy roll of blue tape did the job for those in need.

I was garaged next to my first-timer student, Baden West who had a turbo NA8. Having chatted about his modifications, I was keenly looking forward to having a drive of this beast on the track. But then I had to swap to Julian Ascone's car because his trainer (David Lawler) couldn't fit in his race seat! So a mildly modified NA8 it was. Julian did very well and finished with a 1:20.22. Baden turned in what I believe is the fastest ever MX-5 lap by a first-timer - 1:12.02! That's almost a second quicker than Chris White's effort in December 2011. Amazing effort by Baden!

The heat was easily the most defining aspect of this track day. It was just ridiculous and kept getting hotter and hotter as the day wore on. The officials did a superb job to give drivers six runs of five laps each. Great job by all the volunteers! Everyone had enough by around 3pm and packed up early.

I'm definitely out of the running for Class 4 this year - John, Gus and Glenn have stepped it up a notch. And in these sorts of conditions, my poor old NA6 struggles to make any power. My best laps in each run were 1:17.97, 1:17.39, 1:17.39, 1:17.95, 1:17.41, 1:17.73. Nearly all of those were on the 1st or 2nd lap - the times increased after that as the tyres cooked and sliding got even more dramatic than usual. Even my optimal laptime of 1:17.08 was disappointing compared with my PB of 1:15.80. If nothing else I was pleased with the consistency.

My fastest lap of 1:17.39 (1:17.34 by PBox)


I finished 5th in Class 4, beaten soundly by Gus Elias (1:15.74), John Karayannis (1:15.81), Glenn Thomas (1:16.29), and just pipped by Brad Carpenter (1:17.35) - well done guys! Gus now leads John by only two points. There are three rounds to go at Winton, SMP and Wakefield Park. It's going to be a very close fight to the finish.

[maroubra]

Ive been reading your updates and they are great!

[Guran]

... but wait there's more:

But most of all, I won't have a hope if the new 1.6L Lotus Elise shows up at the Supersprints (1598cc, 100kW, 876kg, 114kW/t). Fresh out of the box and fitted with R-specs to replace the Neovas, I suspect that thing would be capable of 1:13s!

Now there is a limited edition Lotus Elise Club Racer. $69k plus on-roads for a stripped out, ultra-light track day special. Same Toyota-sourced 1.6-litre naturally aspirated engine as the base Elise, 100kW and 160Nm, but driving only 852kg of car - 24kg lighter than the base model. It also gets a Sport setting for its Dynamic Performance Management traction control system, different sport suspension (including Eibach springs and Bilstein dampers) and an adjustable anti-roll bar. This thing ought to be capable of 1:12s at Wakefield Park. Yep, that'll be a fair match for my 20-year-old NA6! At least there will only be ten of them in the country.

It finally happened. A young bloke registered a 1.6L Lotus Elise for the Supersprint Championship this year. He's already knocked off my Wakefield Park and SMP GP records that stood since 2011. No surprise with 115kW/t competing against 91kW/t - I'd need a 2L ND to match his power/weight advantage. But at least I managed to beat him in my NC at Wakefield Park (107kW/t) running on KU36 tyres. After two rounds, we're tied on points for Class 1B.

[StillIC]

Bryan,
Type 1 has a number of freedoms which could be exploited to build a faster NA 1.6. I have realised while building my Type 2 1.6 that some of the things I have done to improve it could legally and/or easily be done to a Type 1 car. Examples include:

-Lightweight seats, driver and passenger;
-Engine reconditioning within manufacturers specs, which then allows a slight overbore (within the CAMS 2% capacity tolerance), slight compression increase and a resultant advantageous cam timing change, getting the tolerances right, running modern rings, as well as other advantages that come from building engines by hand;
-Freedom of ignition system, therefore a Toyota COPS;
-Freedom of exhaust so long as diameter is the same (although no tolerance is given on what is considered the same!), which means free flowing mufflers, cat and mandrel bends;
-Wheels can be 14x6 on the NA 1.6 as this was the size that was common and optional in the nation of manufacture;

Additionally I believe consumables such as dampers and bump rubbers on the suspension could be replaced with aftermarket parts, without breaking the spirit of the rules, and in any case would be virtually impossible to check or argue about, which might help keep the car a little flatter while cornering. And you could run a viscous LSD, which Little Reddy didn't have. Some time on a dyno could also be used to tune the flappy air flow meter for maximum power.

I'd love to do it, but I think you'd have to drive. And someone would have to fund it, although I could contribute time and components.

[manga_blue]

Also, casting and machining quality on B6 and early BP heads was pretty variable. On my original head about 35% of the available inlet port area was lost to mismatches in inlet manifold flange and gasket positioning. I see nothing wrong with matching ports to manifolds and removing casting dags and machining faults inside the ports (so long as you don't reshape or polish). Depending on the original quality you can pick up quite a few hp there.

The argument about 14 x 6 wheels on an NA6 is a bit tenuous. The only time I had wheels checked at scrutineering was by NSWRRC when we were neck and neck on points. They checked mine against the placard on the car. An argument about some mythical car sold in Japan or in limited numbers here was never going to work with them.

[StillIC]

The argument about 14 x 6 wheels on an NA6 is a bit tenuous. The only time I had wheels checked at scrutineering was by NSWRRC when we were neck and neck on points. They checked mine against the placard on the car. An argument about some mythical car sold in Japan or in limited numbers here was never going to work with them.

Basically what you are saying here is that the scrutineers may disagree with the rules as written. Which I am sure they can and do, but that doesn't mean it is illegal or disallowed. Plus the cars aren't mythical, the MX5 was released with 14x6 alloys and 14x5.5 steelies in Japan as they couldn't make enough Daisies for the rest of the world and the JDM. Standard car, standard wheel width, and my JDM grey import NA6 only has a tyre placard with tyre size listed, not wheel width. And I have published printed information on these facts (although not peer reviewed in the strictest scientific sense). Every bit counts in competition, especially against grey import VTECs and bloody expensive Lotuses!