I've bought a VW & left the 911 at home!

[jakriz]

I've posted this text on the Euro Look Forum & Joe (vujade) suggested that I also let u guys know what I've been doing downunder.
Enjoy!Oh & I've conned another loon to come out on the track with me this year, my good friend CT Hansen in his beautiful oval.

Sunday the 20th of October marked the final supersprint run for the Porsche club of NSW. It was fantastic weather, not a cloud in the sky, but unfortunantly very very hot, not the best for little VW's turning 6000rpm all day!
CT & I arrived nice & early at the track & set up our pit bay, shared none other by a 3.0Litre 914-6 with supertrap mufflers & slicks! Fantastic. He didn't pay our little VW's much attention though.
Whilst unpacking our cars, we hear another VW coming............I didn't know of any other VW entrants......sure enough, a clean little L-Bug turns into our pit bay. Out gets regular 911 driver 'Eric' & he says, "I've bought a VW to race & left the 911 at home"!! Yes thats right people, some of the Porsche drivers are coming to their senses & returning to their roots, back to where they all began, the humble Volkswagen. Anyway, Eric starts to tell us that he picked up the L-Bug only a few days earlier, it runs a 1916cc Penrose motor fed by a single Dellortoe, more than enough to have some fun in & it runs on Empi 8 spokes & that is all the modifications, it's not lowered & parked next to mine it looks like a 4WD!!! but Eric is chuffed by his purchase & is looking forward to getting it onto the track.
CT & I were a little nervous by Eastern Creek as both of us had only been there once before & that was 2 years ago. Standing at the bottom of the straight & looking up is more than a little daunting, especially with the huge sweeper at the bottom.
We head out onto the track for our first run of the day & it's just amazing how wide this track is, with heaps of run off & big sweeping corners everywhere. I took a mate from work out on the first run as a passenger & he just didn't know what he was in for. He was amazed at the speed at which the 'little' VW's get up to & the way that they hold on in the corners. He thought that every time that I took him through the sweeper that we were going to go off the track.
After our first run, CT & I realise that the hot weather is going to play havoc with oil temperatures in our little VW's. I run a type 4 cooler with a Mazda RX7 oil cooler above the gearbox & also the rear wing & CT runs a cooler with an electric fan & some ducting under the car above the gearbox, but it was to no avail. Granted mine takes about 2 laps longer to reach 120d than CT's, but it's still too hot too quick. We didn't even use our power pulleys opting to use the full size pulleys for as much air flow as possible but we limited our gear changes to 6000rpm so as to avoid exploding fans, but at Eastern Creek 6000rpm is more than enough as it's a very quick flowing track so it's not neccessary to wring the neck out of the car.
We decide to only do 2 timed laps per run , with 4 laps being timed it gave us a warm up lap, 2 hot laps & 1 cool down lap.
I can't remember how many timed runs that we did but we were some of the last ones to leave as we just couldn't get enough of the track. I just can't explain in words the fun that we had, u definantly have to try it for yourselves. Just imagine, I pull out of the last turn out onto the straight with CT on my tail, hit 6000rpm in 3rd, slam it into 4th, CT slowly pulls my draft & pulls up on the inside of me & we are doing 5500rpm in 4th (185kph) when we hit the sweeper side by side. I just take my foot out of it a little bit , tuck in behind him so close that all I can see are his louvers over my bonnet, & he said that all he can see was my big smile through his little oval window. Come out of the sweeper & we have slowed to about 5000rpm & we both plant it again, racing for the hairpin at turn 2. I duck up the inside & get on the brakes late
get through the corner first & CT said that I had the inside front wheel in the air for most of the corner. We chase each other around the rest of the track & come to the big long straight again & I try as hard as possible to get as much sling shot onto the straight so as stop CT using my draft again, 6000rpm in third, hit 4th, tacho still climbing, hit 5500rpm in 4th & CT has just crept up on the inside of me again before the sweeper but it's not enough & he backs off & lets me through the sweeper first this time which allows me to keep my foot flat to the floor & take full advantage of my heavier Superbug with the rear wing which really comes into it's own & I'm able to put quite a bit of space between me & CT in his 140kg lighter oval ( which I havn't been able to do all year) & line it up for some late braking again into the hairpin. CT & I pull into the pits, get out, take our helmets off, look at each other & just burst out laughing each & every time!!! We just had a ball.
What was also excellent was the amount of VW people at the track, especially in the morning, with at one stage we would have had at least 30 people in our pit shed, checking out the cars, introducing themselves, talking VW's & drooling over Porsches. The support was fantastic.
We also may have up to 6 or 7 VW's racing in the Porsche club next year! CT & myself will be back for sure, then there is Eric the Porsche owner, John Ladomatos in his new 1916cc L-Bug , Rudy in the now rebuilt ex John Watts 1916cc L-Bug race car, Dino Jugovac in his German Look Oval should be finished in time for next year & also Jim Stevenson in his twin turboed wasserbxr Superbug may be up & running in time as well. I think I may have started something! Look out Porsches!!!!
Improvements for my car over the Xmas break will be changing my 1.25 rockers for 1.4's which the K-8 is supposed to be running with so as to raise my valve lift from 500 thou to about 535 thou just for a little more poke out of the corners. My 45mm Dells will be fitted with a CB Performance update kit for a little more power & I'm also going to install Total seal rings while I have the engine apart, the barrels will be HPC coated for better heat resistance & the pistons wil have 2 coatings applied to them, one for the crown & one for the skirts , the exhaust will also be HPC coated to try & contain a little heat on the track. I'll also be relocating the RX7 cooler up underneath the front bumper to control the temperatures for the summer racing , I figure if its good enough for the Porsches then it should do the trick for VW's. I'll also have a new wing for next year. Richard from V-Force currently has in the moulding process my new GT2 wing with larger side air intakes & an adjustable top platform which will replace my 993 wing.
CT will be installing a new front beam & may try a larger cam from the Webcam range with more duration. He'll also be trying out some 044 heads to see any difference for the Street Eliminators.
Then I think that the next step to take on the Porsches is more capacity, so I'll try out a 82mm crank for much greater tourqe, raising my little 1880cc to 2110cc & CT would have 2275cc with the bigger crank.
But that thats all in the future.
stay cool
Jak Rizzo

www.beetleracing.com

[jakriz]

www.beetleracing.com