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

[irish44j]

So, back from LeMons and I'm too tired to write much about it (maybe will later, if anyone is interested). In short, the car did great and we finished all 16 hours of the race with only one small problem (took 5 minutes to fix), and finished in 18th place overall out of 100+ cars. IIRC only a few e30s beat us and they were mostly "i" cars. Overall it was perfect weather, great racing, and just an excellent weekend. If you haven't done LeMons, I highly recommend!

Ours was a 350k+ mile ETA with a non-functional LSD, so that's pretty good.

Not much prep to do for rallycross, we have a 2-day event coming up next weekend so I'll have to get used to driving the M42 car again after a weekend in an M20 car set up totally different :)

Kevin Turner and Matt Rhodes did deliver me a pretty good set of DMacks at hypefest while we were racing, so these will be good for the 2nd half of the season. I'd like to get them mounted before next weekend, but that's not going to happen since I don't have any spare bottlecaps sitting around and don't have time this week to find some....



a few shots from the LeMons race of our car (when I say "our" I mean Jim/Stephen/Chris/Ruffy who own the car....I was just on for driving :) ) Full album is here if anyone wants to see several hundred shots of other cars...

http://s78.photobucket.com/user/irish44j/library/LeMons%20Capitol%20Offense%202013

[irish44j]

A few minor things before the 2-day weekend event......

First, I finished wiring up my electric radiator fan override switch. Not terribly exciting, and not worth a picture (I'm using the stock A/C button to turn it on), but I just ran a pair of wires directly to the temp switch on the rad....easier than trying to tap into the stock wiring which is all wrapped up well. Anyhow, works fine.....this will be good since my temp sender has the annoying tendency to turn on the fan right as I'm sitting at start about to do a run.......

Also, got two of the DMacks mounted up. I only have two spare wheels, so will have to score up a couple more in the near future. Since we're running on all three courses this weekend, I'll plan to use my well-worn Yokos on the hardpack Barn Course, and then on the other two courses (more loose stuff, and way more water truck action) I'll put the much fresher DMacks on the rear to try to overcome my penchance for getting the rear end too far out. We'll see how it works out.

Of course, the two bottlecaps I had spare were very very scratched up...and one was silver and one was white. That simply won't do. So....

the actual color is a bit darker. Actually it's a perfect match to the blue in the BMW roundel...

[irish44j]

Day 1 of the 2-day "Conquer the Summit" rallycross is in the books. Weather was great, and course conditions were great as well. For this event, which wraps up the first half of the WDCR SCCA rallycross season before a 2-month summer break, we run all three of our courses, and it's comp time from all three total.

"Barn Course" - fast, technical, hardpack: this is my best course where I won earlier this year.

"Gravel Course" - hard sweepers, loose surface usually, lots of elevation changes, and we haven't run it this year. Last year I sucked on this course.

"Big Course" - all kinds of conditions and setups, the longest and fastest course.

Today we started off with Barn Course, so for a good weekend I had to start strong here and build a lead. We did 5 runs in the morning and I built up a 4 second lead on class-leader Roberto, but was only 2 seconds ahead of class #4 Chris Nonack, who was driving Nick's e28 since his MR2 is once again "not available." I made a small mistake on my last run and lost a couple seconds so was kind of disappointed with such a small lead.

Here's the Barn Course:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w29rhEi9Z2s&list=UUZDzORFSilgFFHMqcT8uyIA

In the afternoon we ran Gravel Course. I actually drove it pretty well overall I think, and Roberto made a mistake on one run so I ended up building up my lead over him to about 8 seconds by the end of the day, which is good since he's ahead of me in the standings for the season and it gives me a bit of a buffer for the big course tomorrow.

That said, Chris killed both of us on Gravel, making up at least 10 seconds on me somehow. Like I said, he's driving Nick's e28. Nick is a very good driver, and Chris is beating him by something like 30 seconds, and this is the first time Chris has ever driven his car. So that's saying something!

Here's Gravel Course:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOcfLfh3Uzc

So he has a nice lead going into tomorrow, which is going to be hard to recoup. That said, not as concerned with that since I have a nice lead in the standings over Chris.....I just need to make sure to beat out Roberto, really. Guess we'll see.

Not sure exactly what the rest of the class looks like. I don't think any other cars have a shot at top-3 for the weekend other than me, Roberto, and Chris unless someone goes off-course or something. Nick is probably in 4th, and the other e30 boys below him, and then we had a couple other cars/pickups in our class that may be above or below them.

On Barn Course with the hardpack, I used my well-worn Yoko rally tires. For Gravel and it's loose/wet areas I put on the pair of much fresher DMacks on the rear (I really wish I had all four mounted!!!!). They made a big difference I think in the conditions, with better tread pattern and a much sharper outside edge. So pretty pleased with that pick-up.

And I like the blue wheels. I think I may have to do all of them this color :)

I only took a few pics since I was running start today rather than being on course. Hopefully someone got some action shots of me..



me lined up with the GC croo


the grass in grid was about 2 feet tall...


The dIrTy e-tHiRtIeS

[irish44j]

So Day Two of "Conquer the Summit" 2-day rallycross was quite the epic rally-battle.

After Day 1 I sat in 2nd a few seconds back of Chris, and Roberto a few back of me. Today we got 10 runs on the full "Big" course. MR ran afternoon and the water truck did a double-pass before us.

The first few runs for me went fine, I just tried to stay out of trouble. Chris made a few mistakes and I caught up to him after 2 runs in the mud. Meanwhile, Roberto is the strongest in the mud and also caught up. So after 3 or 4 runs, all of us were within 2 seconds. As the course dried out and then progressed to getting very hard (all within a 2 hour span), it went back and forth between the three of us, nobody ever getting more than a 1.5-second lead or so, and every run seemed to change the leader, 2nd, and 3rd.

Second to last run Roberto laid down a stellar 77-second clean run, with me running a 79 and Chris a 78+cone. So coming into the last run, here's how it sat (IIRC):

1. Roberto
2. Chris
3. Me (about 1.6 sec off Roberto and just barely behind Chris)

Keep in mind, this is after 20 total runs on the weekend, with a comp time somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,600 seconds....and here we all are within 2 seconds for the top three. And all three of us were driving well....no major mistakes by anyone, a cone here or there but not many compared to most other drivers in the class, and everyone was driving their "A" game IMO.

So.....final run. Roberto was first since he's leading the season points. He just ran a 77, so I assumed only a cone run could get first for me. I think he did too. He ran an 80.xx on his last run (clean)....clearly he was making sure (consiously or not) to not cone. But that should have been enough

I had nothing much to lose, so I went all-out and hit all my trouble spots correctly. For once, my last run was my best run and I hit a 78.xx clean. This put me 0.3 seconds ahead of Roberto with Chris to go. Chris knocked out (IIRC) a 77.xx but coned, so he ended up being about half a second behind Roberto for 3rd.

I may be off a bit on the times, but it was ultra-close for most of the day and we were all tired as hell from the great competition I think (plus, it was very hot....lol).

Nick in his e28 finished in fourth maybe about 20 seconds back (though he was gaining....another 5 or 6 runs and he would have been right up with us).

Jason and Pat (and Roberto's co-driver in the RX7) stacked up behind Nick, but I'm not sure of the order. There were a few other cars (Supra Celica, a baja-style pickup that was very fast in the mud but not in the dry, etc) that finished at the back of the pack.

I'll be interested in seeing the final times just to see how MR did against stock AWD and mod AWD, who were running at the same time as us.

Anyhow, good times. I used my drop event for the first event (where I finished 6th thanks to a few spins), and assuming Roberto drops one of his, right now we are both sitting with 1st, 1st, 2nd at the season midpoint. Chris and Nick are right behind us too, so it should be a competitive rest of the season, especially if Jason and Pat get their car sorted the way they want it and/or continue to gain experience.

Will post up some vids in a while - both in the mud and dry - of what turned out to be a really fun, fast, and long course today. In the meantime, a couple photos just because I can't not post photos, right?

Roberto and me...


the enemy


our crew




Stephen showing off. I might mention here that Stephen won PR class in the ETA, and his co-driver Chris Helgesen took second in PR by 0.6 seconds, so another tight battle, both of them beating usual top-dog Shawn Roberts. This may be the first time in a couple seasons that no RX-7 has won either PR or MR at an event.

Needs to add 2012 SR champ as well.....

[phenryiv1]

Need moar pics.

[irish44j]

I didn't take many pics this weekend for one reason or another, sorry :P

[phenryiv1]

I didn't take many pics this weekend for one reason or another, sorry :P

I have a couple of pics of you but not on my computer. Still on the camera that I DID remember to bring home. If you box and weigh the GoPro (with bag) & hat I'll email you a pre-paid FedEx label. I'll get the cooler later.

[phenryiv1]

Roberto and me...

Given the ground conditions at the time that picture was taken, I'd bet that you shot that right before another one of the RX7's mysterious "issues" that caused them to fall back in grid a couple of spots. I remember that I was parked in the dual-driver lane and they were not because they had some issue.

They had done that on Barn as well, but I think it was Margarita.

I have to admit that we had to pull off to the side just before start when Jason killed the shifter (again) and I had to repair it using the keys to his Tacoma, but that was late in the day when conditions were getting worse and the delay actually hurt you, unlike the first 1-2 runs where even being 5 cars back was a huge advantage.

Chris got stuck being in the first round of the dual drivers on main on Sunday, running right before me. He and I were very early in the overall run order and the conditions were apparent as an obstacle (that was when the RX7 dropped back by a handful of cars). I think that I was 13 seconds slower than on any other run that session.

I would also like to see the final times. The car felt good but I just have no front-end grip on the slop. I understeer like mad until the surface gets tacky. Once it is dry I seem to be fine on my Winterforces, even though I can practically feel them chunking.

I don't know what else I can do to get the car more sorted. It makes a lot of loud noises and is as rough on your body as falling down a hill but it no longer has the wallowing suspension and darty steering. I can upgrade a few things here and there but my main issue at this point is the operator behind the wheel and not the equipment under the hood. More grip would be nice but other than that, the car is doing what it needs to do.

Congrats again on the win. Hard to believe that last year my times were as close to yours as they were when you look at where the gap is now. I know that you went to the new motor, but so did I- plus I now have real suspension. I should be closing the gap, not falling further behind.

[irish44j]

Well, no worries on Roberto there. I was immediately behind him on every run for Gravel and Big courses, with Chris/Nick immediately behind me....so we were all in the right run order except for a few runs on Barn before they fixed the dual-driver grid. Chris and Nick being 3rd and 4th in the season points made the dual-driver thing kind of odd for them, since one of them was getting a significant advantage after water truck runs.

Not sure what to tell you on your car. I would say that in these fairly tight courses with a lot of slaloms I have an edge because of lighter weight and lighter front end, and with the rally tires vs. snows.....but Chris was with/ahead of me all weekend with a much heavier and larger car, and snow tires....so that would tend to debunk that theory. In the end, most of it comes down to driver (again, shown by Chris being as fast as me in a car that shouldn't be as fast, showing he is probably a better driver than me...). IDK. I think you need to be more aggressive - I remember when we autocrossed I would think the same thing. For rallycross, the more aggressive you are with the throttle, the more rear grip you have and the less "sidewayz" you'll be usually. There are sections where I practically yell to myself to keep the pedal on the floor, even though my "normal" self tells me to lift......and when i do keep it pegged, it ends up being a fast run. When I'm more tentative, car gets sloppy and run gets slow. Be more aggressive on the throttle and use it to set the car.

Nobody has front-end grip on the slop. The key is really just to brake hard BEFORE the turn, set the car, and use the throttle to steer you around. If you're pushing through the turns, you're braking too late (and/or braking through the turn) and not throttle-steering enough. I set my tires this weekend for rear-end grip with the newer Dmacks adn put the old Yokos on the front, because I just wanted to be able to set the angle and then have grip with the rear to steer with. Front is just along for the ride in most of those muddy sections, IMO. There's a good GRM article from last year with a top rally/rallycross guy talking about how to get corners "right" in sloppy conditions and it's pretty handy. I'll see if I can find it.

Did you guys do the e36 rack yet? I don't remember.

Were you running interior video? If so, I could always sync up one of mine and one of yours to see where you're losing time (or what kind of sections).

Chris was laughing last night because when Jason rode with him, Chris's video captured Jason saying "yeah, apparently I drive like a grandmother" about himself, haha.....

[irish44j]

Interesting that your car is "rough" on your body. My car certainly makes a lot of noise and such, but I don't feel that it's a ridiculously rough ride by any means - and I'm on essentially the same suspension as you are.

I almost wonder if it's more about your seat not fitting well or being too firm (my seat has a good amount of padding). May want to pad the seat some more, perhaps?

[phenryiv1]

Not sure what to tell you on your car. I would say that in these fairly tight courses with a lot of slaloms I have an edge because of lighter weight and lighter front end, and with the rally tires vs. snows.....but Chris was with/ahead of me all weekend with a much heavier and larger car, and snow tires.

Nobody has front-end grip on the slop. The key is really just to brake hard BEFORE the turn, set the car, and use the throttle to steer you around. If you're pushing through the turns, you're braking too late (and/or braking IN the turn) and not throttle-steering enough. I set my tires this weekend for rear-end grip with the newer Dmacks adn put the old Yokos on the front, because I just wanted to be able to set the angle and then have grip with the rear to steer with. Front is just along for the ride in most of those muddy sections, IMO.

Like I said, most of mine is technique. Braking too late (unlike tarmac where I seem to be able to judge/time it properly), too much steering input...the operator error thing is going on. I can't blame the car.

Did you guys do the e36 rack yet? I don't remember.

No, maybe this summer. But with the work that the truck now needs it may be delayed. Jason agreed that we need rally tires but I don't have the energy or time to "chase" a rally event or team until they sell a set. If you see a set FS, send me the link ASAP. I registered on Special Stage so we'll see what happens.

Back to the e36 rack, it may help but right now we are loking at major headaches to shore up the driveline. I think that the CSB is going and the shifter has to come out. First things first, and the steering is functional but the driveline is not playing nice.

Were you running interior video? If so, I could always sync up one of mine and one of yours to see where you're losing time (or what kind of sections).

No interior video, but you have my GoPro with Sunday's runs. Feel free to download them before you send the camera back. Nick gave me a few pointers Saturday and I promptly forgot them by Sunday. I could not master that "S" on the back straight. Too hot on entry, too late with the steering. It will be obvious on film.

Chris was laughing last night because when Jason rode with him, Chris's video captured Jason saying "yeah, apparently I drive like a grandmother" about himself, haha.....

Worst part...I think he beat me on comp. I beat him dead to rights Saturday but I lost so much time on my first run Sunday that I never made up. I can't whine too much- Chris ran (literally) right in front of me and he still managed to make the podium, even with a horrible first run in fractionally worse conditions.

[phenryiv1]

Interesting that your car is "rough" on your body. My car certainly makes a lot of noise and such, but I don't feel that it's a ridiculously rough ride by any means - and I'm on essentially the same suspension as you are.

I almost wonder if it's more about your seat not fitting well or being too firm (my seat has a good amount of padding). May want to pad the seat some more, perhaps?

It is not uncomfortably rough, but there is no "give" when the car takes a hard shot. I was more saying that as evidence that the car is not loose like it was in the second event when all of the suspension was failing.

And I really like the fit of the seat, so unless I develop some weird dislike, the seat has been one of my favorite upgrades. I do have quite the bony ass, however.

I need to get the CG Lock fixed (and/or get the harnesses in) but the seat is awesome.

[irish44j]

So here are final results posted.

First one is a little analytic comparo I did of the top three in class, all within 1.5 seconds total time. As you can see, I dominated Barn Course (which is my favorite, and which I also won earlier this year in a single-day event), but was 3rd fastest in raw time on both other courses, though not by as big of a margin. Since Big Course we did 10 runs on (versus 5 on the other courses) that is a bit of a disadvantage for me, and I wish I had built a better lead on Barn to start the weekend, but what can you do....

In the end, it was the cones that carried the day. I had the least cones, so I won. Chris was actually the fastest car on course, but his cones put him in 3rd. Take the cones away and the standings flip.




and the total MR results (12 total cars). Hope you have a magnifying glass, if you actually care...

[irish44j]

Note the RX-7 (Shawn's PR car) in last place. That guy took out 31 cones and he only ran one of the two days. wow.....

[95maxrider]

I would like to note that Chris used to own an E28 and currently daily drives an E24. He is very familiar with the chassis and has much more seat time in it than I do. He is also a fantastic driver, as evidenced by his results in a not-ideal car. I learned a lot about how hard you can drive in the dirt by riding along with him. The car really didn't mind being driven at the limit and responded well to being thrown around. Going off of what Josh said, it did almost feel like it had more grip the faster you went.

Patrick, I hate to say this, but I think if you did some auto-x events in the E30 (potentially on the snow tires), it would help you drive in the dirt. I'm pretty sure the reason I'm so much faster than you and Jason is because I just have so much more experience driving around cones. You should also be getting as many ride alongs with fast drivers as you can at events to see how they are doing things. Riding with Chris helped me tremendously, but a large part of that was because it was in my own car. Let him drive it next time for one run :) Sh!t, he beat me by 5 seconds on the first run on Saturday!

All-in-all, I know that I have a lot of room to improve as a driver, and my car certainly has room to improve (rally tires, a functioning O2 sensor, valve adjustment, sway bars worth a damn, spring rates, functioning ABS system) whereas you and Roberto are kind of tapped out (you've got much more experience and your cars are pretty much as prepared as they can get). If I can get those issues sorted by the next event, I think I stand a much better chance of being closer to the top.