| Author | Message | ||
     Trojan |
Unfortunately Snetterton was a complete disaster. The bike only got completely finished on Friday morning, and I loaded up and went straight down to John Warrington motorcycles in Malton in North Yorkshire to get it set up on the dyno. John is extremely thorough, so we ended up being on the dyno until 8pm, but came away very happy with 103bhp and 106 ft lbs of torque at the rear wheel. Not bad for a motor with a standard bottom end and just some head work and 12:1 pistons fitted. By the time I got to Snetterton it was 1am, so just parked up where I was told to by the gate guy. Unfortunately at 6am another jobsworth decided that I couldn't park there and had to move to the furthest point of the furthest field to set up. There were spectators closer to the track than I was! After scrutineering it was straight out for practice, and that is where it all went wrong Just two laps into the session Jonathan coasted to a stop just before the pit entrance and had to push the bike in from there. Once into the pit lane it was obvious that an oil line had come adrift from the pump, and the belly pan was full of the stuff. On closer inspection it turned out that the oil pipe hadn't come undone, but the union joining the pipe to the pump had actually snapped in half! As this is one of the only parts that hadn't been touched on the bike I can only assume it had been over tightened from new and failed due to vibration in the end. The bike had done 500 miles on the road and 7 hours on the dyno with no problems at all before this. A quick call to Steve at Black Bear H-D revealed that, although they didn't have anew part in stock we were welcome to come and remove one from a bike in the workshop. Dave Machinek (Mick Machinek's (#65 XB9R) brother was very kind and drove me down to the dealership, where we were pointed to a brand new City X and told to remove what we needed! Thanks to Steve for that and to Nigel for the use of his tools. Sorry we left the bike in a state of undress. Anyway, back to the circuit and got the bike back together. Refill with oil and away we go....not. We had compression, spark etc but no way was it going to start. After spending all day trying everything possible, and getting advice from Martin at Warr's and others, we just couldn't get the bike started and gave up at around 6pm and came home. I won't know the extent of the damage until I get the engine out next week, but hope that it isn't too bad. To cap it all I got home and had food poisoning on Sunday (don't buy pies from freeway service stations!) so the bike hasn't even been unloaded yet. On a more positive note, Jonathan got two firsts in the Minitwins (SV650) on Saturday, followed by a 2nd and a 5th on Sunday (tyre went off in the last race). He also did one of the Thunderbike races on Sunday using his Minitwins spec (stock) SV650 and got a 4th starting from the back of the grid, just 200ths of a second off the best lap time. I think that once we have the Buell running well it will definitely be possible to challenge for the lead in this series and are looking forward to the next round at Mallory Park. Thanks to all who helped out on Saturday, and we'll be back. Thanks also to our sponsors: Hal's H-D, Free Spirits, Torco oil, Reactive Suspension, Motogadget, Bell Helmets, Paint my Ride and RRC components.  | ||
| 12r |
Matt that is one helluva bike, you realised my Fantasy Firebolt  Sorry to hear about the troubles at Snetterton and hopefully Mallory will be better. Pity there's no round at my local Oulton, or even more local Darley Moor - now that would be something ! | ||
| Trojan |
Hi Mark, We will be at Cadwell later in the year, which is a little closer to you I think? They are all a long way from us unfortunately  but you take what you can get with a new series I suppose. | ||
| Rocketman |
Matt, is John Warrington on the industrial estate in Malton? Is he familiar with the Buells or just yours? I was going to use Dean Ashton (APC), as he's an old mate of mine, and about a mile down the road, but he's more familiar with the Virgin Yamaha's LOL Malton's like 30 odd miles from me and I've heard there's a fella there who's good witha dyno. Sounds like yer man? Rocket | ||
| Trojan |
Hi Rocket, There are two dyno places in Malton. I think the one on the industrial estate is Dyno Bike, who is very good with carb model Buell/Harleys. John Warrington is just off Castlegate and is a whizz with FI bikes, especially those fitted with the rapid bike ecm. | ||
| Blake |
Tough luck, bummer. Hope to hear more satisfying next time and without the indigestion too.  That bike is surely bound for a championship. Sure sounds like the rider is as well. | ||
| Rocketman |
Thanks Matt, and better luck next time. I'll try make Cadwell, and maybe something in between. Thanks again. Rocket | ||
| Trojan |
A rare picture of the bike during the brief period of damp practice that we had.  | ||
| Firebolteric_ma |
matt, that bike is super sweeeet looking. i hope things go better for you on the next one. looks as if you may have a winner w/ the new bike. good luck w/ the season and keep us posted!  | ||
| Surveyor |
Matt, what is it about Sntterton? We did the MRO there last year, the bike seized four times in the first day and we finished the last rebuild at 11pm on the Saturday. On Sunday we qualified fine and the bike stopped again in the first race...I couldn't face another rebuild and we had run out of spares so I left the track, drove to Birmingham and got a flight back to Dublin only to get a call to say we forgot to turn on the fuel in the race!! Your bike looks great and I wish you better luck in the rest of the season....you know it allways (almost) gets better. I look forward to seeing you at one of the (non-Snetterton) rounds later in the season, will you be at Anglesey or Pembrey? (Message edited by Surveyor on March 29, 2006) |
