Pitchblack Motorsports Rally e30 318i (now with M50) - and some Porsche 924S stuff.

[irish44j]

Nice weather, took the afternoon off today to do a couple things.

First, headed up and hit Crazy Ray's in Jessup, a big local pick-and-pull yards. Only a couple e30s there but managed to fill up the backpack with random stuff....a few dozen nuts and bolts for the "spares" bin, a couple poly exhaust hangers in new shape (in the trunk of a Honda), some good-shape pedal covers, a map light setup from an e36 (this will go in the rallykar, since I have no interior lights and it's annoying), a handful of other random stuff for the car, and the real score was three more of the yellow glass fog light inserts from the W-series Benzes, which are great for converting stock fog lights on many cars to lexus-style yellow while using stock bulbs. I happen to need one of these since my WRX fogs with them got smashed by a rock and one was destroyed....And I got a second set, since I can sell them pretty easily for $30 or so on the forums.

All in all, I paid $6 for all the stuff I picked up. This is some of it, the rest is just random fittings, accessory pieces, nuts and bolts, wire harness straps, etc.





my broken WRX fog light. The lenses, I found, can be replaced by using some off the ultra-cheap "ricer" fog lights at Advance Auto, which are a perfect fit for the groove in the OEM lights.....so will fix those this week.

with the base for the yellow inserts installed:


After the junkyard, headed over to Chris's place again to help out more on the LeMons e30, since the guys now have 2 days to finish it and tow up to Watkins Glen. I worked with Jim on making up a center gauge and switch panel out of aluminum. I had to leave before it was done, but it should turn out looking pretty good...



workin workin...



the Dons of the dirty e-thirties....Chris and Scott...

[phenryiv1]

Love the ducts for the front brakes.

[irish44j]

well, the weather shaped up and finally got around to doing something I've been wanting to do since last summer: paint the damn roof white. With no A/C this car gets extremely hot sitting in grid in the summer (and driving in general in the summer). I've seen how much a white roof can do for cooling an idle car so that's what I did.....

Not quite done, still need to touch up/finish a few details, but here it is. Reminds me of an old Chrysler LeBaron now, lol...

[Mark 42]

http://www.amazon.com/Police-Vehicle-Grille-Strobe-Warning/dp/B004SX5HMG/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1365975898&sr=8-5&keywords=police+lights

[irish44j]

haha, nice...very illegal in this state though :)

today I was bored with not much car stuff to do. Change the 4Runner and WRX's oil, and then decided to play.

From a project long-ago I had a PIAA rear LED fog light sitting around. Figured I'd put it to some use and add a bit of safety to my drives with a high-mount brake light on the trailer (since the standard ones are so damn now)....

as an added bonus, it provides some "upright" support for the tires, so they will have a harder time moving when strapped down. Anyhow, just some "free project" stuff, nothing all that exciting but whatever.
Busted out the welder and some steel stock, and the result:







brakes on

[irish44j]

now full event for this weekend...another 60-car turnout....wow.

All the e30s (and e28) should be there, plus a 330xi e46. Should be fun :)

[Mark 42]

haha, nice...very illegal in this state though :)

You might get away with it on the track if it's not public property.
Most cops probably wouldn't bother you if it's during the race, even if it's of questionable legality.

[irish44j]

oh, not worried about it on the track......could do that no problem. But it's illegal to even HAVE them mounted in/on the car on public roads. And since I"m on permanent vintage plates that I definitely don't want to lose for something stupid, I tend to toe the line a bit.

The police theme (modified of course) has struck me for LeMons car ideas, however :)

[Mark 42]

You could probably make them removable and keep them in the trunk when you're on the road.
When I lived in Alabama, one of the guys I worked with told me about when he was in high school...
he and his friends would go to the remote area where all the kids parked & "made out". The took to jam
jars, put red koolaid in one and blue koolaid in the other (or food coloring?) and shined a spotlight through
the jars - all the kids in the cars would pop up in panic. Sounds like the kind of fun kids who live in the
country would come up with.

I did a police car at the slot car track we race at - painted one of the class legal NASCAR bodies
and raced as number 911.

[irish44j]

Event #1 - First Win!

After the debacle at the first event this season, had to hope that my improvements to the car (and hopefully my driving) would pay off at the second event. As luck would have it, today we were on the Barn Course, which is known to be pretty hard-packed surface, fairly tight and technical with most setups, and the course I usually do best on for some reason.

Adam set up a very technical (and very long) course with about a million cones on it, and I'd be surprised if anyone didn't pick up a handful of cones during the day, or more. In the morning it was fairly compact surface but a bit damp/loose. That quickly dried out as the morning went on. We only got four runs in the morning, but I was fastest (as far as I know) in the class of 11 MR cars in all four runs and had a 10 or 12 second lead on the pack at lunchtime.

In the afternoon, the water truck came through over lunchbreak but I had a good grid position (thanks to my lousy first event) and it wasn't terribly wet. The course was a bit shorter and with some very tight hairpins, but still fun. I really do love courses on Barn, they tend to flow really well and the tight setups are favorable to a light car like mine.

For the first run or two (out of 6), knowing I had a good lead I took it easy and made sure not to spin out or do anythign terribly dumb, hoping it would dry up. And it did...by the end of the afternoon it was like tarmac in most areas.

In short, for my run group (about 30 cars, including modifed FWD and stock AWD and MR), I think I had the fastest afternoon time (or maybe second fastest), even with some very fast cars driving. Roberto and Spoth upped their games too and put down some fast times, and in the end I managed to knock out a great final run and win MR by about 15 seconds all-told.....

Had a few cones on the day (maybe 5 or 6 total) but they didn't hurt since everyone had cones.

Anyhow, really pleased with how the car handled, and running Barn Course is always good to get me on-track with my driving. I think I'm going to add 1/2" spacers to the rear springs since I did hit the exhaust a couple times on some real rough sections, but otherwise the H&R sports and front spacer really turned out to soak up the terrain while significantly improving handling and reducing body lean.

A few pics I took (not many since I was doing grid/starter)....



subie field


Jesse and Spencer on drive-through


Croo


Alex


Field


MF Del Sol, with Ridgeline Tow :)

[shiboujin]

I find it amusing our friends all know each other. I see alex all the time at the local thursday bmw meets (I haven't been in a while though).

I did find 2 spring pads if you're still interested.

[irish44j]

Yeah, it was funny. I used to see him commuting in traffic with the plates "RALLY BMW" and was like "what a poser" and then he showed up at the event the next weekend, and proved me wrong.

Unfortunately for him, he's stuck in with the Subies in AWD class so he doesn't have much of a chance at the moment to win...He's a good sport about it though and has a good time just driving.

I may get those pads from you at some point - are they the thick ones?

[phenryiv1]

Congrats on the win. Consistency was the key- you were incredibly consistent all day and really drove mistake-free.

I did not fare so well, but that will change.

[shiboujin]

are they the thick ones?

That's what she said. Uh they are the standard lower pads. not the butt plug lookin ones.

[silence]

Congrats on the great results! Looks like your getting the car dialed in.