Having had the luxury of having a nose around and a sit in the car yesterday, All I can say is...
Awesome
I really didn't think I'd get quite as excited as I did about a few bits of metal welded together , But it really is a work of art as is the switch panel.

Very very nice

 

very nice work there , steering wheel is cack though !!!!!!

 

Yeah you are right Mr Diggler. Will solve that when I see you tomorrow

 

mr diggler thinks uncle duncle enjoyed his ride out to the family retreat today to collect his circle

 

SPA dual digital. A good choice there Duncan, not least because of the recall and variable alert function.

 

I guess it's fair to say ALL motorsport is expensive, from just about do-able to OMG expensive, I'm currently building a car for the Subaru Cup / Nippon Challenge series, after looking at various options to get me involved in some form of Motorsport I decided I wanted 'wheel to wheel' racing and to do laps of popular tracks along side similar cars so the above series seem perfect, I'm surprised more forum members aren't doing either one or both of these series because from what I see alot of the cars on here are pretty much on there way to been race ready.

 

The impression of race ready and actually being race ready are two very different things. Once you start getting on track and racing it shows up floors in the build and obviously drivers.

People who say they are super fast on the road, just aren't that fast, you can't push a car on the road to it's limit. Then track day heroes think they are fast too, but until you are out there with other really fast drivers you have no idea.

When I first started racing bikes I thought I was fast. Then I had 16 year old coming past me like I was standing still. It took ages and ££££ to get to their level, let alone start winning races.

Subaru cup is a good way forward, but a lot on here won't enter wheel to wheel with their car as it owes them so much and they don't want to damage it (me included). I would be gutted after throwing so much of my own hard earned money into the car (well not that hard). And then there is all the development thats gone into it by Chevron, it runs to £1000s. But as a TA, track, sprint car its just awsome.

 

Your quite right, I've bought a cheap '99 UK turbo (£1000) with the specific intention of turning into a race car, it's pretty rough to start with so I'm not precious about it, in the best case it's going to get battle scars in the worst it'll be rolled / tyre walled etc while that's not my intention it won't be the end of the world. But as you say it's easy to spend alot of money and a big ask to risk thet investment in both time and money.

Really what mean't to say is I'm surprised more poeple don't buld a car with that end in mind in the first place rather than spending a fortune on something they'll never get full use out of and certainly won't recoupe that investment when they choose to sell the car.
To me this is poor value for money.
After all there are lots of rough cheap Imprezas about and the limited mods allowed in the 'production' class would mean lots of people could go racing for a reasonable cost plus it should be possible to recoupe aleast some of the funds by selling a 'race ready' car.
As you say racing on the roads is not really feasible and is really only proof of who's prepared to take the biggest risk not any sort of skill.

And I know what you mean about bike racing (although it applies across the board) when I first went from club racing to the then Supercup (now SS600) the difference was scary, big motorhomes, bigger budgets and the top ten bikes seperated by less than .25 sec really put my tranny van and 4 year old CBR in to perspective.

 

I think Jon and I get full use out of our Subarus

As Jon says there is a huge difference between quick on the road and quick on a track day and then a huge difference between that and TA - took me a full season (and a bit) to understand how to do TA and get the best out of the car and me (and still learning lots)

 

ARDS test passed today at Snetterton

 

lets face it guys, if we were realy that good at driving then we would be earning money from it, there is probebly a hand full of people on here in that position, i think the rest of us are still hovering on that cloud of dreams

 

Remember, if you have sponsors, you are getting paid. I reckon my sponsors gave me more than I earnt last year if I had to pay for what they gave. Age is against most of us though. You have to make your mark early in motorsport these days to pick up a waged drive or ride. I'm way past it. As you get older, it's harder to give up a job to earn less on the off chance that you might win and keep your drive.

I'd rather stay with my 9-5 job and pretty good wage and have a hobby, than mortgage my house and risk it for a few seasons low to mid level racing.

 

absolutely right, I'm well over the hill at 48yrs compared to the young guns, but having dabbled with bikes 20 plus years ago I've never really lost the desire and while bikes are totally out of the question (just looking at one makes me ache) I think I can just about manage a production class Impreza without making to much a fool of myself and the end of the day we're only here once so way not.

It will only ever be a hobby to me, a expensive hobby at that, but most hobbies can get expensive if you get properly into them, Hi-Fi, model trains even keeping Koi carp can all get silly expensive, I know I've been there (well not the trains ).

I suppose I'm lucky to be in a position to be able to give it a go, even if it is probably the lowest level of track based motorsport, but I suppose that's the way of things by the time you get the opportunity to do it your to old !!!
Here's to 'giving it a go' in whatever discipline you choose.

 

 

how did you blag that one dude

 

Was speaking to Baz today about your hardest race of the year at air day See you there mate

 

Yeah - that will be special if it all happens

 

Hopefully going on wednesday.

 

I was only slightly jealous when he mentioned it lol

 

Should be awesome - any idea on acceleration stats for the other form of transport ?

 

bonnet looks good duncan...you having a go in one of those crazy red bull air race planes?

 

Im a technician on it so i have an idea plus been in them a fair few times.

 

Please tell

 

You will have to let me ride shotgun in yours to get an idea

 

3 days to go and loads to do ... eeek

 

Stop posting on here and get on with it then

 

Yep

Done:
- fitted new bonnet
- fitted windscreen
- fitted rear polycarbonate screen (cheers for the help Mr Fulbrook )
- made dash panel to cover ecu
- both seats in
- extinguisher in and connected
- scuttle tray done
- steering wheel on

Picked up the new doors yesterday afternoon from ABW - they are superbly light and with the glass that arrived yesterday from Plastics4Performance will save me around 100 kilos I reckon.

Set about getting them on the car last night and they are all mounted and just one lock / handle to go before they are complete.

Tim is heading over here today to help me the last few bits..

1. fit side windows
2. fit aerocatches
3. fit mirrors
4. oil change
5. wire elec cut out switch

and if time..
1. fit perrin front anti roll bar
2. sort some proper mounts for splitter
3. wire hazards switch

Then I can put some stickers back on it to make it look a bit like it did before and give it a clean.

 

Couldn't see Andy on the timesheets

 

I'm sure I saw the car there on the Friday trackday.

 

I spoke to Andy and saw the car, but not on timesheets all day, it's easy to miss the transponder on the first session though.