Lanark Highlands Prep begins

Well THAT was a long time.

Yeah, we’re back, we’re back, as a matter of fact, we’re back. Just like that one mistake you made in high school, just like a bad penny, like…well, let’s just say we’re back to some rally work. After a very long break following Tall Pines 2015 – in which dogs were acquired, children played hockey, daily drivers broke and were replaced, and much much more – we finally got up to the shop to complete the work we started in January so that we’ll be ready for the Lanark Highlands rally May 7. We got some bearings so we finished rebuilding the front strut top hats and we checked and lubed the brakes while we were there. We also checked the base tune on the ecmlink, which looks pretty good, so it seems like all the basics are working. There is the small matter of the power steering pump needing a rebuild, of course, but apart from that and a list of ‘nice to have’ things that we can do when it’s warm we seem to be pretty good.

The ECM link is important because the next thing that’s on the list is to get The Manchurian on a dyno and see what we can improve. We had some issues at Pines with power in the higher rpm’s but changing the fuel filter seems to have helped that. So, if we have a good base it would be nice to get the rest of the power-making working better. Obviously a 32mm restrictor isn’t great for making big horsepower numbers but that’s what we have to run in our Production AWD class, so we’ll do what we can do with what we have. We’re not trying to be this guy, for example.

So with that said we’d like to make reliable, decent power so we can forget about the motor some more and focus on setup for the suspension and brakes. Because hey, we’ve done four or five rallies on this setup already, so we may as well try to get it sorted out. And yes, we will plan to attend a test day, just not the one in April.

For the season we’re planning to hit Lanark, Galway, Black Bear, a Rally Sprint if one happens this summer, and then Pines. Hell, we’ve already got the cottage booked for Pines. It would be really cool to get to one of the Quebec rallies – Defi or Charlevoix – if time and money permit, because there’s also the Eastern Canada Rally Championship that we’ll be competing in as well as the OPRC.

So with all those plans we’d better make sure the car finishes. That means both mechanically and us not doing anything more stupid than normal. Hopefully by the time May gets here it will be summer-ish or at least spring-ish so we can work on the car without gloves and with the shop door open. Both improve the experience a lot.

We’ll have some more picture-worthy activity soon, but in the meantime enjoy our pictures of our tires. We need to get some off damaged rims onto undamaged rims, some onto new rims, and eventually some new ones. Gotta work on that tire sponsorship…

Ok, back to work. More soon!

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bryce

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