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The only way to spend a Saturday

At last we finally loaded Old Red up to go testing at a Sat RWYB with our brand new Sprintex supercharger kit. The spec for the car today was:

Stock Short block

Stock Cylinder head

JCW Air box

GRS Intercooler

Cat Cam

Janspeed manifold

1320 de cat pipe

Borla Cooper cat back

Competition Clutch Super Single

Quaife diff

1320 stand alone ECU

Tesco 99 fuel

Weight with driver 2550lbs

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We arrived at the Pod at 7.50am and Jake changed the wheels over to our new 15 x8 Rota Slipstreams and our 3 year old 25 x 9 – 15 Toyo

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As you can tell we were rocking some wheel gap, which the driver of the day, Scotty Barnes, wasn’t too happy about, but as he arrived late he had to be embarrassed for the morning. (notice I out reacted him with the camera)

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This was the first time Scotty had ever driven the car at the Pod and he opened his account with a 13.1500 at 106.18…..on his 5th run he had it got it down to ...........

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Scotty had smashed the standard head record with this 12.5772 at 108.72

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We couldn’t see it getting any faster with the slicks so we decided to put our 5 year old BFG street drag radials, 205 50 15.

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Another record broken and the first supercharged  MINI  into the 12s on street tyres.

Obviously we couldn’t have acheived this without the support of our family and friends. We’d also like to thank the following companies who supply us parts to use and abuse and give them feedback to improve those parts so we can all go faster in our MINI’s. So a big thanks to:

 

Track Club Power Engineering for helping us develop our plug & play stand alone ECU

Competition Clutch for producing the Super Single flywheel & clutch

Sprintex for the first production twin screw supercharger kit for the MINI

Cat Cams for their awesome camshaft

Motul for all their Oils and fluids.

Performance Friction for their brake pads

 

I must admit it’s only now that I write the above list that it makes you realise how much abuse that the Quaife diff has had in the last 5 years, and it has never ever failed; it’s managed about 300 passes down the drag strip with 7000 rpm launches on slicks and with nitrous. We’re on our 3rd make of clutch, we’ve snapped 6 driveshafts,  twisted 2 unbreakable driveshaft and yet the original Quaife diff is still going strong and has shown us British quality engineering at its best.

 

 

2006 memories
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Thomas & Scott weekends off.............
...............usually means working on 6 sec @ 230+mph FIA Pro Mod cars


Thomas is crewing on Graham Ellis twin turbo Plymouth Superbird piloted by Nick Davies

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Meanwhile Scott is crewing for Andy Robinson 53 Studebaker.........after this warm up and check 6.15 @ 229

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An 8 month wait for some .........
...............15 x8 Rota Slipstreams, but well worth it....Thanks to Julian at www.rarerims.co.uk

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Proud Father
What a way to spend your Sunday with your boys....stripping their first MINI engines to a block.

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Didn't take that long before the heads were off
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You can tell which one was Joe's favourite tool

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Jake finished his first and thinks he found the problem
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In more detail

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First Round of Euro Sport Compact @ Santa Pod
Sorry for the lack of updates over the last 2 weeks..............
........so here is a snapshot off what has been going on at 1320.


The Sprintex kit looks even better on the engine, it seems such a shame to put a radiator in front of it.

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The Sprintex belt tensioner is a work of art in itself

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Scott managed to get our new Competition Clutch Super Single fitted on the engine, we're hoping this will be a softer hit than the old twin plate clutch. We're hoping for no more snapped / twisted driveshafts  

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We've been trying to do some R&D for quite a while, In the end we had to book it in the diary as a job. As you can see by Scott "Dash" Barnes that he had to work twice as fast to make up for Thomas "One Hand" Barnes.............the end result was, 1 car 3 blokes 4 cams tested.

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Its always nice when parcels turn up, but its even nicer when they're actually for one of cars 

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The contents made our shelving look even more spectaculator

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close up pic

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Sometimes there really is no room at the MINI Inn

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I'm sure you'll agree Scotty did a wonderful job making a mount for the aquamist gauge in one of the vent pods........ BUT

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.......the first attempt at making a mount ended up with Thomas at Addenbrook's Hospital on the operation table. Thomas now has a 15 stich battle scar on his index finger. I'm sure he'll give you more details when you see him, if you really want to know. He can still tune a MINI with one hand though ...........

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That looks a lot neater and tidier

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Scotty completed his Motorsport NVQ
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Old Rattler Sunday Pic
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Sunny Warm Saturdays
What loverly weather it was today, Sat / Sun is about the only time I get to play in the workshop and thankfully the boyz hadn't locked there toolboxes...so it was an ideal time to do some jobs / adjustment to the "Old Rattler" our R56.

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First job on the agenda was to adjust the camber to the max that the Cross camber plates would let us.

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Obviously this makes the tracking out of wack so out come the trusty 70s Dunlop tracking guages

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As you can see the 16 x 8 Rota Slipstreams and 205 40 16 Neutons look the part....but due to the smaller height of the Neuton tyre over the toyo 215 45 17 our bumper clearance is now minimal...........a lot of scrapeage can be heard going along Moor Road.

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As you can see there's not much clearance between ture and arch in the rear either

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So a nice chilled out succesfull day, I didn't rip the bumper or sump off on the way home either........but 4 teenagers in a slammed old skool Golf gave us the thumbs up so it must look right...well in there eyes :)
This weeks snippets
Saf from www.nappyhead.co.uk left his car with Scott for his regular oil service and new door handles , cooper petrol cap and asked for the front to be dropped another 5mm, everytime Saf comes here there's another set of wheels on the car, he's got it down to owning only 4 sets now lol.
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Meanwhile in between jobs, Thomas has been sorting out the wiring on the Power Ranger, basically ripping out the previous wiring add ons, Race Techolog supplied us with a serial lead that plugs into the 1320 stand alone ECU and Race Technology Dash, thus saving time & stress rewiring all the engine sensors for the data logger and freeing up channels for other sensors. 

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