As part of Mikes ongoing quest to build the ultimate MGC race car we have just finished a major revision of the rear suspension. In place of the leaf springs and anti tramp bars with adjustable dampers the car is now running a five link setup with coil overs giving us easy adjustment of not only the damping but also the ride height and spring rates. This should  improve the handling at the rear as well as saving some weight. We have a baseline setup in the car at the moment and the height is looking a little tall on the springs currently installed. Mike will try it out at Brands next Monday and then we can make any changes to suit him.

Result: 10th overall, 2nd in class

Having qualified lower down the grid than we’d perhaps have hoped we had it all to do in the race. Previously Bluebell has always got off the line really well but the new gearbox has a much higher first gear (imagine trying to pull away as fast as you can in second gear!) which meant that without any opportunity to practice a race start we didn’t know how it was going to go off the line, all we knew was that the clutch needed to be slipped a lot and you could smell it in the car!

As it turned out Matt still made a great start and passed four cars in the first lap. Matt settled into a good stint and had a cracking battle with the number 30 BMW of Thomas Pead and by the pitstop had got the car up to around 17th overall with some cars ahead still to pit. The stop wasn’t fantastically fast (something to work on) but we didn’t lose any race places. Marky was out and up to pace straight away. The car was running really well the only problem being a flat spotted tyre that caused a vibration over about 100mph but more importantly meant that the front wheel was more inclined to lock up under heavy braking where the flat point on the tyre was. Mark was aware and manages to drive round the problem without losing lap time. Mark continued to make up places and was hunting down the number 34 Alfa GTV who understandably really didn’t want him to pass as they were trying to hold on for 3rd place in the class however Mark kept up the pressure and on lap 11 got by, once past he opened the gap up by a second a lap until the flag on lap 16.

Best lap 2.28.15

The season opener for the Swinging Sixties is traditionally held at Snetterton, this year we were on the longer (better) 300 circuit giving a lap distance of just under 3 miles. Unfortunately due to family commitments Mike wasn’t able to make this weekend so it was down to Matt and Mark in Bluebell to represent the Scruffy name!

Matt went out first and almost made a whole lap before the engine totally cut out! Fortunately he was close enough to coast into the pits where it was quickly discovered that a coil wire had come adrift. Matt went back out and completed his session before handing over to Mark who managed to finish qualifying without any further problems.

Having just completed some major work on the car and not having done a test we were treating qually as a mini test session with both drivers needing to get used to the new gearbox. Both Matt and Mark reported that the new box was a massive improvement over the MG gearbox but it was clearly going to take some time to adjust to the difference as the lap times were, if anything, slower than before and we were out qualified by several cars we would have expected to be on par with.

We were to be honest a little disappointed at finding ourselves 25th out of 33 cars on the grid with a best lap time of 2.32.26. But both the guys were now much more at home with the gear change and expected to be faster in the race.

We have known for some time now that the standard MG gearbox in Bluebell was really not up to the job of coping with life in a race car. We have two gearboxes for the car, the idea being that one is in use while the other is being rebuilt, due to the fact that a ‘fresh’ box will only last 4-5 races before the baulk rings deteriorate and you lose the synchromesh to the point that gear changes become slow and ‘crunchy’. The long term solution was to replace the MG box with something more durable and with closer ratios to help keep the car on cam when racing. We have now installed a Tran-X SL72 5 speed, this gearbox is designed as a direct replacement for a Ford Type 9 as fitted to the Sierra. This has many benefits;

for a start the box is a ‘dog’ rather than synchromesh allowing faster changes, it has a close ratio gearset and is specifically designed for competition cars up to around 300bhp. The other advantage is that the type 9 is a popular swap for road going B’s so there is an excellent adaptor kit available from Hi-Gear Engineering (hi-gearengineering.co.uk) to make the install a simple bolt on conversion, we didn’t have to muck about fabricating an adaptor for the bell housing or make up a cross member or get a prop made, it all comes beautifully made in the kit. It uses the original clutch, release bearing and arm and even the slave cylinder is retained.

The only issues we had were due to the fact that we have a non standard crank and the supplied adaptor for the spigot bush needed to be modified and the Tran-X box is about 15mm taller than a standard Ford unit which meant that the transmission tunnel required some ‘adjustment’! Neither of these were anything to do with the adaptor kit itself.

The only downside is that, in order to bunch the other gears closer together first gear becomes much higher so getting off the line is going to need a different technique as the car is more inclined to bog down and lose revs, it’s a bit like trying to do a full bore pull away and finding the car is in second rather than first. There are some more pictures on the facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/Scruffy-Motorsport/170257223025246.