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07/05/2002 A TALE OF THREE ENGINES At the opening round of the RAC MSA British Top Methanol Championship in April we set a British elapsed time record of 5.597 seconds with our new dragster which arrived from the USA just a few days before the race. Making the most of the weeks after that meeting, we checked over every detail on the car, re-plumbed the fuel and oil systems with new ultra lightweight hoses, freshened the engine and assembled a spare engine ready for the second British championship round. We arrived at a sunny and hot Shakespeare County Raceway on the Friday lunchtime and unloaded the car for its debut in its awesome new paint scheme. The look was created by our sponsors at Total Design and features a 380 BHP Ford Lightning pick up, one of the lines sold in the UK by American Car Imports. The paint was applied thanks to a huge effort by Gigi, Aziz and all the staff at Master Repairs and Servicing who stripped the body panels back to bare magnesium before spraying on a single layer of lightweight helicopter paint. All of the graphics, including the vinyl pick up image, were made and put on by our friends at Custom Graphics to complete the radical new livery which drew many admiring glances over the course of the weekend.  Apologies to the race fans expecting to see the PlayStation road show at the SpringNationals. The rig was seriously damaged in severe weather the previous weekend and was unable to attend whilst repairs were being effected. The road show will be at our next race; the FIA Main Event at Santa Pod on the 1-3 June. On the cool but dry Saturday morning we fired the car up to check everything was running properly before heading on to the track for the first qualifying session with the record tune up still in the car, adjusted for the prevailing air density, temperature and humidity. The tune up proved to be too aggressive for the poor track conditions and the car shook and smoked the tyres and moved around a lot on the way down the dragstrip. Masterful control of both the steering wheel and throttle pedal by driver Dave Wilson guided the car to a 5.84 at 226 mph to take the provisional number one qualifying slot. In the shut off area we collected the car and found a trail of oil and Dave telling us that the engine was "dead." Sure enough, back in the pits we found that a connecting rod had broken, punching a hole in the engine block, damaging the crankshaft and taking out the oil pump on its exit. The damage to the block was extensive and unrepairable - leaving us with one very expensive and unusual wine rack and the need to make an engine change. Once the spare engine was in place half of the crew stayed behind to bolt it all in place and check over the rest of the car for damage caused by the tyre shake. The rest of the crew went on an adventure to Farnborough and Reading to repair the oil pan that was damaged by the kicked rod, fix the exhaust headers that had been damaged by the tyre shake and borrow a spare spare engine from our friends Paul Stubbings and Wendy Baker's Krypton dragster. After an enormous effort by the entire crew the car was ready to run again and the borrowed engine was sitting, ready to race, in the engine stand in the trailer. To conserve our resources for race day we elected to sit out the rest of qualifying and spend time "testing" our new pit scooter, kindly provided by 1st Line Motorcycles. This proved to be a wise move as our 5.84 held for the number one position and meant we could start eliminations with two race ready motors. As the number one qualifier we received a bye run in the first round where the American Car Imports Racing machine recorded a deliberately conservative 5.98 at a still stout 240 mph to secure lane choice over our semi-final opponent; Lex Joon from Holland in the Splitfire Chevrolet Camaro funny car. Arriving back in the pits last because we ran last the crew cracked on admirably and had the car turned round, test fired, and sitting on the ground ready to run within 70 minutes and before all the of our competitors. Backing up form his burnout alongside Lex, Dave noticed a strong vibration in the clutch pedal shortly before the engine shuddered to a halt. The team and safety crew pushed him off the track then watched Lex solo for the win and a place in the final. In the pits we found that a wrist pin had shattered allowing the number 8 piston to come free from its connecting rod and cause chaos by smashing valves, rods and badly scoring the camshaft.  It was a disappointing end to a tough weekend for the team and means we stay in second place in the championship standings. However we will be back stronger than ever at the opening round of the FIA European Championship in June which is a completely separate points chase. New parts (including a new block) are already on order and our damaged crankshaft is on its way back to the USA for repair courtesy of Air Sea Logistics. The entire team are bouncing back and are extremely keen to repeat their British record performances of the Easter race to set an FIA European record. I'd like to thank my super crew of David, Dave, Linda, Fred and Ricki for their dedication and efforts over the last few weeks as well as Anthony and Jon Cohen from American Car Imports for their invaluable support and assistance. Thanks also to Paul Stubbings and Wendy Baker for all their help in getting their engine out of the Krypton car and to the race track. Our class representative Jon Cross did another excellent job and as always we enjoyed reading about ourselves on eurodragster.com. Congratulations to our good friends on the She Devil team whose driver, Steph Milam, recorded her first 6 second and 200 mph runs during qualifying at this event. Also a big well done to George Greaves for a very successful debut in the Sportsman ET class driving his ACI supplied Lightning pick up that matches the one on the side of our dragster.
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