Chump Car - John Allen Special USFail1 Race Team Build

[KI4UJO]

Don't sacrifice the rear euro! Anyway, nice build and can't wait to see some race shots.

[acolella76]

No pics of my sick ass brakestand????

[dinanm3atl]

Build Day 1 - Cleaning, Parts List and some Fixes


So the time has come to get started. We are probably way early but we as a team decided it would be better to have the car done and ready to go early then try to wait it out. With that in mind we took the JAS out to the build location. One of our members is letting us use his basement garage which is the perfect location since the build will mostly happen during the winter!

The day started off nicely. Since part of the team was en route we decided to get out to the car and get it started. Dead... jump it with an E30... well that didn't really all that great. Battery is REALLY dead. Put it on my battery charger. No go... Finally 24V E30 arrives with a larger and more robust alternator and after a little coaxing it fires up! We are off! Good way to start...


John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 1 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr



John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 2 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr



John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 3 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr


Car was pulled in and we quickly got it up into the air. Some members got into the interior and others under the car. We figured out and confirmed the list of parts while the interior/trunk were removed. We also spent some time removing the remnants of a sound system.


John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 4 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr


Cleaning brought out some laughs. We found all kinds of fun stuff like the pre-delivery inspection paperwork from 1986. Various maintenance records some of which we could not read. Some google translator found out it appears to be a CSB, Diff Bushing, Labor and an oil change.


John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 5 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr



John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 6 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr



John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 7 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr



Interior work was done...


John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 8 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr



John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 9 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr



John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 10 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr



John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 11 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr


Rich got to work on the first issue of a surging idle. The MAF was extremely gunked up. This cleaning plus some vacuum line replacement on the FPS fixed the issue.



John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 14 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr


Issues Resolved:

-Surging Idle
-Steering Wheel Looseness Resolved
-Power Steering Fixed - No more arm work!



Test Drive!



John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 12 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr



John Allen Special BMW USFail1 1st Work Day 13 by MotorSportMedia - www.racemsm.com, on Flickr



More to come... Going to do some heavy maintenance on the front end. Replace rear end bushings. Engine will be removed to be cleaned and resealed. Trans will be serviced. New Clutch installed. Driveshaft Serviced. Diff Serviced. And more!

[dinanm3atl]

Initial Planning meeting on Tuesday. First workday Saturday!

[dinanm3atl]

Do a NASCAR style ladder bar set up on the drivers side for an extra safety cushion. Chump Car allows a lot of contact between cars.

Understood :)

Exactly, DinanM3Atl has some of the best pictures around.

Appreciate it.

[325ix]

wow what an asshole

Exactly, DinanM3Atl has some of the best pictures around.

[KenC]

Do a NASCAR style ladder bar set up on the drivers side for an extra safety cushion. Chump Car allows a lot of contact between cars.

[Massimo]

Welcome to the addiction!!

Err who are you welcoming?

[priapism]

Welcome to the addiction!!

[acolella76]

wow what an asshole

[dinanm3atl]

I promise you no one is going to steal your pictures, you aren't that good.

Thanks. Not worried about picture theft from these snapshots. I don't watermark to prevent theft.

[Jafxod]

I promise you no one is going to steal your pictures, you aren't that good.

[dinanm3atl]

I'll jump into that thread and read! Thanks!

[NigelStu]

What did you do for your cage? That is one place I cannot grasp firmly what is legal/correct.

I worked with my buddy/local cage builder extensively on our cage. It is fully SCCA legal, which is more than enough for Chump compliance. He had another E30 in the shop when I dropped my car off, and we went through a few changes to improve on the design. We were able to get a bit more leg room and a bit more head clearance. Big thing was improving the dash bar - dash/heater box fit perfectly, still have fully stock functional defrost and the dash can be removed easily if necessary (or if you don't run a dash, you'll have an excellent place to mount gauges/battery cut-off, etc.). Only thing I would have done (without increasing the budget with additional bars/bracing) would have been to lower the upper driver door bar a bit for improved ingress/egress.

Some pics of the cage are here:

http://www.r3vlimited.com/board/showthread.php?t=189404&page=2

If you want more detail, let me know and I can email you full size pics.

[dinanm3atl]

Rich's...

Cage as I understand is pretty simple design wise but would love to get the car stripped and that important part done.