Curborough Sprint – 27th August 2011
There were lots of things on the “To Do” list after my first event in the Matador but due to time contraints all I had chance to do was target the suspension settings. A check of the camber confirmed what my eyes were telling me which was that both front wheels had nearly 2 degrees of positive camber. The camber was so far out that it wasn’t possible to get enough movement on the upper balljoint to get the 2 degrees I was looking for and had to settle for 1 degree. A check of the front geometry also showed that the track width was different from one side to the other so this was sorted along with the bottom balljoint retaining bolt that was allowing 1” of travel without actuating the suspension. Hopefully these changes will help sort out the wayward handling and provide more bite from the front end to improve on my previous best time of 61.61secs.
The forecast for the day was initially looking like rain at about 10am and then on the morning I checked it and it had changed to 10pm which was great for me since I have no wet tyres! The weather looked great as I arrived at the circuit to a paddock full of Caterfields everywhere; I was definitely the odd one out! Just before the event I had managed to get some new brake pads, EBC greenstuffs, to put in to help bring the brake pedal up and to give some much needed bite to the brakes so I set about changing the pads – I’ve always got to have something to do on race day!
Due to the pad change the first run would purely be exploratory to see if I had any brakes and to check the handling. The car was much more positive and the brakes were completely transformed but required a lot more finesse than before to stop them locking. For the second run I gave it some death but it was a scrappy run simply due to not being used to the handling and brakes but the power wasn’t quite there either resulting in a 63 second run at 97mph. On arrival back at the pits the radiator promptly spewed water everywhere and the header tank was boiling away for about 5 minutes! I noticed that the vacuum hose to the MAP sensor had become detached and also the fan fuse had blown. Fortunately the engine seemed fine and after replenishing the water I was ready for another run.
Then it rained. Bloody weather forecasts! The track was completely wet for the first timed run and on slicks it was a joke so I was sideways everywhere and had to back off down the straight resulting in a 70 second 80mph run.
So it was all down to the last run. A quick tweak on the tracking for more toe-in to steady the car under braking was all that was required and lots of concentration for a good run. Fortunately the weather dried out and although the track was damp in places it wasn’t sufficient to cause any major problems. The run was quite good but I could have been more aggressive on the brakes and some of the gearchanges weren’t too good either. The time over the line was 60.16 and 99mph, a good 1.5 second improvement over last time shows how well the changes have worked. It was good enough to be the fastest Curborough Championship contender at this meeting and I received a very nice trophy too!
Next time, more improvements to the gearchange and hopefully break the 100mph barrier and get below 60 seconds.
Tags: Curborough mallock
