Quote:
Originally Posted by henk4
He was the fastest car, certainly after the surprisingly fast Leaf had to stop. He stopped twice apparently for water intake. (and not as the commentators suspected, to make the race more interesting)
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OK. Here's the deal on me and my Frazer Nash at the Revival.
I had built a new engine for the race using a new block which I knew had a flaw (an inclusion around No3 bore making water routing poor) but at the time decided to risk it. During practice, at high sustained revs in top gear the temp gauge was rising rapidly whereas the car normally runs at a steady 70 degrees, therefore I knew that at least one cylinder was getting hot. I took the view that it was better to finish the race (and make it more interesting for the spectators) by doing short stints with pit stops to allow everything to cool down rather than plod around for 12 laps at 7/10 watching the temp gauge. During the 2 stops it made sense to throw in cold water while we could. Frankly speaking this also made the race more of a challenge for me. On the last lap after catching up with Nick at Fordwater, the car genuinely went flat and with the temp no higher than it been during the race, I suspected fuel pressure which I increased with the hand pump. I took the descision at that point to accept P2 rather than to end the race on the last lap with a melted piston.
As a footnote, on the first lap of qualifying (on the same engine) for the race at Spa the following weekend we melted a piston.....
The spare, less powerful, engine was sent over from the UK for the race which was running P2 on the penultimate lap when the ign switch failed. Grrr.
Well done to the Ruston team on a superb win in the Alta.