Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Very first outing, took 4th out of 12 in class and 7th overall at the 9 hour World Racing League race at Raceway Park of the Midlands (Formerly Mid-America Motorplex) in Pacific Junction, IA. I was joined by our very own Shane@DB.

This car has incredible capability. Very rough stab at a suspension setup cobbled together from old hand-me-down parts and was able to personally put down the 2nd fastest time in the GP2 class.

Learning how to drive AWD. Handling was very good as long as you kept the throttle matted. We had some lift off oversteer but if you kept the weight transfer over the rear wheels the damn thing would stay very planted.

Unfortunately on sunday it started having some weird misfire issues so we decided to trailer it before we caused serious damage.

Loving it and looking forward to more racing!

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Congrats! You need to get some of the build pics on here

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Now that I can spend more than 5 minutes a day outside the shop, I think I will!

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Car looked good out there, Paul. Did you guys experience any cooling issues in that heat while in traffic?

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

No, the only time it really seemed to heat up was on friday practice. Other than that, temps stayed really reasonable.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Very cool, saw some of your pics of FB. Congrats !!

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Good to see some DSM love in the racing scene again.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

I already surprised a lot of people I think. There was another 1g that was packed full of aftermarket parts and sloppy work (FMIC, 16g, AFC, etc) and blew up after 7 laps. That's the sort of reputation I hope to change!

Unfortunately we had some minor issues on sunday - misfire and an oil leak (shame on me for using a spectra oil pan, it started leaking at the baffle spot weld) , it was really hot (another upper 80/lower 90 degree day, friday had a heat index of 120), we didn't feel like working on it, and we just decided to trailer it to be ready for gingerman in late august.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Any pics of this whip? Freaking awesome!

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

a few blips of our car in this video:
https://www.facebook.com/SopwithMoto...3498185524493/

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

For various reasons we couldn't get it much lower for this race, and sans windshield:

https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/hphoto...00&oe=56578DA7

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

That is awesome. And I agree its nice to see a DSM out there being very competitive!

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

I'll be posting a build thread for this soon. This community has a staggering amount of DSM knowledge and I'd love to harness some for the benefit of racing this thing. Stay tuned!

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

What sort of times were you seeing at MAM? And what were the top competitors getting?
Congrats on being 4th in class! Good to see a DSM doing work on track.

Edit: are you guys using slicks or street tires? I.E what type of event was this?

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

World Racing League, 9 hour race saturday, 7 sunday. GP2 class. My best time was a 1:49.7. Street tires. GP1 class cars were around 1:45 for the top time I think (boxsters, corvette)

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

We are limited to 180 or higher treadwear street tires. The DSM handled fairly decent for stockish replacement shocks and budget suspension work. It doesn't have much power, so it's not making up much time in the straights.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

My fuel setup, which I was pretty proud of, and worked great in 100+ *F.

http://i.imgur.com/EQKj2hQ.jpg

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

That's awesome guys. Let me know next time you run at MAM, if I don't have plans I'd definitely like to come see some racing (only 2 hrs from me).

And BTW that fuel setup looks so terrible...... lol
Of course I'm kidding, but I'm curious about a couple things. Just at the output of the lower/final pump, there is a secondary line to the FPR. Is that a "T" there? It looks like it but I see no fitting. But if so, I like how it's diverted back to a vertical surge tank so the slosh doesn't affect it on corners, a very good setup.

Last question which I've always wondered, does significant back pressure on a pump hurt its life? In your setup you have 2 pumps feeding the surge tank, but most of the time that's not really needed, so they are forced to provide much more than required volume. Consider below scenario:

Pump 3 at bottom is acting as feed for the fuel system. 99% of fuel from the regulator is passed back into the tank at idle.
At the same time, pumps 1 and 2 (top) are trying as hard as they can to push new fuel to the surge tank.

So you get all 3 pumps trying to put fuel pressure into the surge tank. I've never understood how this doesn't cause pumps to fail. Maybe in real work scenarios it works, and maybe I'm missing a key physics element.

EDIT: or maybe the surge tank is at like 150+psi, but I would assume the FPR would be affected at that point, delivering higher than desired pressure alwyas.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

You're very close, but bottom pump is lift pump feeding surge tank

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

The 2 main pressure pumps don't run at the same time, one is backup pump that can be switched to on the fly when one of the pumps starts failing in the middle of a race, which has happened many times.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

OH! Nice.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Follow up (now that i'm out of meetings for the day) - the surge tank (diesel fuel filter) is pressurized (to a couple psi) by use of the aeromotive regulator. Return from rail goes back into there. In theory system pressure is bumped overall by doing this, but we've noticed negligible difference. And as Shane said, the parallel pumps are one or the other.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Ready for battle this weekend, Racing GP2 again with World Racing League at Gingerman Raceway in South Haven, MI! Wish me luck, the suspension is much better this time, with good pit stops I think we're an easy contender for the class win.

https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/hphoto...7f&oe=56781553

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Looking good Paul!

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Agreed, looks good! Good luck with the race.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Thanks guys. I'm well aware she's pretty fugly, but to me the function comes before the form. Hopefully we can work on the 'form' in the offseason - radiator duct, cleaner front bumper, splitter, bodywork and paint job.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Www.Dipyourcar.com

:) perfect for racecar!

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Looks good!

Good luck.

seriously looks way better than all that hideous neon colored bullshit that's out their these days and all your shit is functional.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

I'm not about flashy or bright. I'd much rather win and have nobody realize it :)

Action shot:
https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/hphoto...47533842_o.jpg

Unfortunately we lost an alternator on saturday which took us out of the running (still put down fastest lap in GP2 by a good couple seconds with Shane doing a 1:46.41 and I did a 1:47.XX)

On sunday I drove first, getting out of the car in 4th overall/2nd in class, Rob got in and within 20 minutes the turbo seized. I have never seen a turbo fail like that, i'm interested in doing a teardown to find out why.

Car has some more bugs to work out but it is obvious to me this thing will have no problem with the speed required to go for a win.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Curious with a turbo, does your gas tank empty out quicker than some of the other cars?

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

For sure, BSFC is higher on a turbo car, they are less efficient and must run a higher AFR. But the fun factor is much higher!

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Figured, so I guess I kinda figured it means you'd have to pit more which seems like a handicap.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

It's all in the strategy. You can make up for fuel consumption with extra speed. Actually our car could do 1:40 on a stock size fuel cell, we are allowed up to 18 and I think that'd put us 1:50-1:55 which is pretty comparable with most teams. Dependent on the length of the race, it might be a wash.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Do you have any baffling in the oil pan for lateral stuff? Where are you feeding the turbo from?

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

we just have the stock baffle, we overfill the car by 1/4 quart or so. We feed the turbo from the stock location. As far as we know, no drops in oil pressure during high-G turns (keep in mind, we're on street tires)

Suggestions? Should I be feeding the turbo from the OFH? I'm also scared of too much pressure, turbos do not need much pressure and we've had seals blow in our old turbo civic because we fed it way too much pressure (added a restrictor later on)

I know the head feed is the factory designed location so I had more faith in that.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Looks like a blast.

Fwiw - From memory, when I used to run my 1g at the track I overfilled by .5 - 1 full quart. No issues with fairly long sessions.

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Wow, extra fuel will add 10 seconds to your lap time when full?
And FWIW, 2g are fed from the OFH stock. Either location is probably fine, especially if you're just running it hard when the oil is up to temp so pressure is lower. Interested to see if you can determine the root cause of the turbo failure.

How do you refill the gas during pitstops? Just the stock filler or do you have one of those aftermarket ones that fits certain jugs?

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

sorry, that was 1 hour 55 minute, stint time.

filler (not the final setup but you get the idea)
http://i.imgur.com/pgUvKm9.jpg

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

Ah, extra 10-15 mins between fillups, makes more sense now.

And that's a huge filler neck, nice. How long does that take to fill then? I've never done endurance racing before, is fuel refill the the longest part of the pit stop? Do you need to change anything else during the race? Pads and tires last a full race? I'd like to get into this at some point, but not many teams around here though.

You mentioned street tires, do you run a 140+ treadwear compound that will last an entire race? Or a higher treadwear R-comp like the RA-1 or NT01?

Re: Just finished my first endurance race in a 1g DSM!
 

-It takes maybe a minute and a half to fill the car.
-Either that or belting in the driver, we're unfortunately not as fast as we could be at that.
-Depends on the length of the race, usually tires if its a 24hr
-Cool suit ice, sometimes top off with oil (not our car though). whatever breaks
-Generally yes, if you get the right ones
-180+

You have a lot of questions! I'd highly recommend renting a seat or going to a race to crew to get a feel for what it is like. The team doesnt' need to be near you to do that.