Well initial testing of the in car multi-cam system began today.
It has proved three things
1.As you can see one of the camera's picture quality is pretty bad and I should look at replacing it.
2. The idea of flicking a switch in the dash and changing between cameras should work in principle.
3.I need a haircut.
I'm still waiting for the B&O VHS to arrive so cant test it with that yet, but tried it through the TV and into a capture card onto a laptop and seems to work well.
Right...now to find 1 or 2 more old high end video cameras...anyone?
As you may be aware I am planning on filming quite a bit of footage on the upcoming Scumrun rally in May.
One of my hair brained schemes is to build an old school video system into the car. I will have a fair bit of modern digital shenanigans with me as well but I want to put cameras where they just shouldn't be and will likely get unavoidably mullered in the process.
I'm ideally looking to create a feeling of ubiquitous viewpoint from within the car. A live edit suite at 100mph if you will...
To do this I've been on the hunt for old video equipment for a while now...so far I've accumulated various Hi8 and vhs-c handicams from the 90s (all notably with hi end lenses, mostly sony carl zeiss) These will have their video and audio outputs component cabled into a switch box in the dashboard before the final signal being sent to a Bang & Olufsen Beocord VHS recording unit.
So old school, analogue but quality kit is the plan!
I am waiting for bits and pieces to arrive before I set it all up in my lounge (photos will ensue) and run some testing.
Then I need to work out how to build it all into the car...that will be a whole other story!
Current Bug total camera count for the rally is up to 6 so far...
This time thanks to ByteRipper (think that's right?), one of my neighbour's security cameras caught me working on the car the other day... so in all its glory here is 1 hour of tinkering about in 45 seconds.
Just a quick note to say that I now have my replacement Contour HD 1080p camera.
I'll be sure not to run this one over...
Look out for some more test footage soon.
In other news I've been playing Idle speed over the last few days. It has a bit of a tendency sometimes to 'seek' for the right tickover revs and to avoid this I make the level a bit higher. Been playing with this to get it to a nice balance between more responsive throttle and fixing the tickover issues and pouring fuel down the exhaust.
A few other little jobs I've done include:
A good tidy up! (trust me it needed it after using it to dispose of the christmas tree)
Fitted an invertor and wired in a 6 way mains adapter
Bolted in central camera tripod
Started fixing the dent caused by roof tile.
So just a quickie to say that those who don't believe in Karma may want to look away now.
You may recall in my previous post that I accidentally may have broken the ContourHD camera during testing and I had sent it back to the supplier who shall remain nameless with it's tail between it's legs. Now that they have refunded said item, thanks goes to them for customer service above and beyond... I can own up to the honest truth. The reason for the little recording blighter not working was partly concrete related but may also have been a slight result of its dillydally with the rear wheels on its way through.
Whatever the reason, it has now been sorted and another camera from a different supplier is on route and fingers crossed will arrive shortly. So all worked out nice again...
So back to the Karma...
Those who live in the UK will recall the other days strong winds. It was like Michael Fish has stood up and confidently declared all is calm with the world. ie...it wasn't.
If you want a weather report then your definitely at the wrong place but the result of this wind was a neighbours tile...flung off their roof at high velocity landed square on the join of one of my headlights and the wing. resulting in a rather nasty injury to the bug.
To be fair to nature at least she didn't pick one of the other more sensible cars parked all around me, she had to pick the only car with the custom paint job that it almost impossible to 'gloss over'
so I have 2 choices... leave as is and claim as a drifting battle scar or fix up myself and hope its not too horrendous a finish at the end.
either way a clear demonstration of karma in action I feel...
So as 2012 kicks off like leaving the cones from the nordschleife pit lane in a cloud of rubber burning maelstrom the bug has had quite an eventful first week...
Firstly as you may or may not be aware I am endeavouring to create some oscar winning scumrun video content on the next rally in May... Failing that just capturing a lot of it in somewhere near decent quality will do.
The Christmas fairies came along and brought me a Contour HD 1080p helmet camera with the pro in car mount along with it. So I took the opportunity to give it a bit of a test...
This was going really well until I decided to try some helmet and exterior shots...it appears that the 3M pad on the helmet didn't hold...the camera went flying...smashing into the tarmac at 20mph busting the power button and battery doh! I've sent it back and finger's crossed!
The second issue this week has been that old chum of any true scumrun enthusiast...the MOT.
I use a garage called Fox's in Guildford, they've been serving me well for several years and done the last 2 MOTs on the bug as well as various repairs...
MOT failure as expected (well honestly after the 2011 it had did you really expect a clean sweep?) on all the areas that if I had actually stopped to think I would have known it would fail on, emissions, headlight aim, few other bits and pieces...but the main one I didnt realise, the rear breaks were £$%£$&
and by $£%&$% I mean not working at all...totally seized, kaput, deceased, like said parrot...
Turns out it needed new pads, discs and calipers. sorry night pictures are never good but here are the shiny new brakes
These now fitted (and still to be bedded in) and new shiny MOT in hand the bug is ready for 2012's fun and frollicks!!!
Thanks to santa for helping me in my filming needs with a contour hd camera... Should give some great internal and external car shots as well as some helmet cam action
Also started fitting permanent camera mounts into the bug...photos to follow
First things first ... Mot due next month gulp...fingers crossed!
With the ring out the way I figure it's time to start thinking about getting the bug ready for Next May's Scumrun.
Plenty planned but for now a simple job...a little more stripping.
The guys at autolink last time I was down there explained some more weight saving options. So with a bit of unbolting and peeling managed to remove some metal panelling and sound proving in the rear of the car
So it's down to the fuel tank at the rear now, the holes on each side go through to the boot so means I need to pack the boot accordingly!
So as I sit in this hotel room in the darker depths of the rainy Ruhr thinking of all the other things I should be doing I thought I should give an update on that last few days.
But first things first... Here are two quick videos... The first is the official Scumrun version, They also visited the ring only 2 weeks before I did so here is a little promo video...
The second video is my video blog of the visit, less flashy and shot on my phone so pardon the quality!
The Nurburgring is more than a place, more than a few days past time, more than a chance to make a fool of yourself on a race track, it is nothing less than a way of life.
You see it all around you when your there, the Nurburgring's victims. Not in the sense of the unfortunates who tangle with the armco but in the sense of the people that feel compelled to devote all their spare time and money into being part of the ever-ongoing scene.
Whether its the local Golf owner who has rebuilt it from the ground up over many years and remortgaged his house to pay for the annual Nordschleife season ticket...
...or the well off, nothing better to do with his time, ex businessman with the Porsche GT3 RS who tells everyone how they only just bettered there 8 minute and 3 seconds lap time yesterday... or the miriad of inbetweeners they all share one same total conviction and passion for the home of German motorsport.
It's easy to see why, and even easier to feel part of it.
The ferry journey over was fairly uneventful, but I was the first to arrive in the queue for the ferry which made for an opportune photo moment...
After getting the 2am ferry, then driving down to the ring having had no sleep whatsoever I thought it would be a fools game to head straight onto the track. I setup camp (quite literally) at the Nurburgring camp site where we stayed with Rag the Ring last year and tried to get some sleep.
After convincing myself that 1 hours sleep was fine I headed up to the Nordschleife entrance. Here are a few pictures of what I found waiting...
But it was fairly obvious what was standing out in the car park... This swedish guy's Gumpert Apollo, 750hp and the fattest tyres I have ever seen.
On my first lap I got overtaken by this thing...as it changed gear it was like a 3 way split between a thunder clap, a ship's fog horn and Thor's dyson.
Donning my helmet I bit the bullet and headed out onto the track. The great news was that being a random monday in October it wasn't horrendously busy. In fact on most of the laps I did I had a good few kilometres between seeing other cars whether overtaking or being overtook.
On rooting through the interweb I found these pics of my work...I have ordered a couple of them but they haven't arrived yet so please forgive the watermarks.
The last one is my personal favourite.
I did do one lap with the roof down as I felt it would not being doing justice to the poetic nature of the place and the car unless I did. However the photographers either chose to ignore me on that round or were otherwise occupied. I like to think the latter.
On the Tuesday I had a little time before heading up to Bochum where the reason for this 'ahem' work trip was waiting so I headed back up to the track. I had already found out that the Nordschleife was closed to the public that day. This was actually a blessing in disguise as it forced me to do two things. Firstly I explored the surrounding roads, up and down the mountains, through the picturesque villages and around the only slightly less infamous 'Sudschleife', and secondly it enabled me to head to the various viewing spots and spy on what was going on that was so important to stop the almighty Team Bugsplat head out on track.
As it turns out it was a manufacturer testing day...Marques I spotted were, Mercedes, BMW, Audi, Renault and Land Rover amongst others. There were supporting roles played by Aston Martin, a Nissan and Lexus that seemed to be benchmarking themselves against each other, 2 Porsches and even a Maserati made an appearance. I toyed with the idea of turning up and telling them the bug was a prototype for the new 'retro' mx-5 but I think they would have seen through that one...
Here are a couple of spy shots...get me I feel all secret agent
I quite like the 'disquises' that they endow these test models with. Personally I think they should offer that as a colour option in the showroom.
So that's pretty much it, I have many more photos but don't believe you want to see them all, so I will leave you with my 2 favourites, both Mercedes, both on the same corner...
So until the next time, which given I now count myself amongst the contaminated I'm sure there will be a next time...Team Bugsplat from the Nurburgring signing off...
So its now a few days until I hop on a ferry and head down through Belgium, into Germany and make the obligatory trip to the green hell...
On Wednesday Phil from www.archenemy.co.uk came down and rolled all 4 wheel arches and fitted the rear spacers so she's now got her stance sorted. Made this video of it...
Phil did a fantastic job and as you can see it now fills the arches and as a bonus it doesnt rub in the slightest! Thanks Phil!
Right, so also, last time I was at the ring I noticed a lot of people (especially the ones in the open top cars) were wearing helmets. I'd been talking about getting one for a while but they cost quite a lot and not being either a biker or a full on track day enthusiast I knew bugger all about them.
My neighbour came good on this one... He's into his bikes and on mentioning I was after a 'lid' he emerged with his spare one and said I could have it for a tenner...and even better it fits!
Ok so it's blatently a bike helmet and I'm sure its not going to get me into next years F1 season but will keep me head safer than the current protection of 2mm of canvas roof.
Lastly, at the weekend I swapped over to the quieter exhaust system (Booh I hear) but alas the mental one breaks the NBR volume limits quite substantially. According to my 'Tricorder' app on my phone (yes I'm that nerdy) its well up around 107-108db so not going to risk it.
While swapping it over I made a mildly disturbing discovery...
The bracket holding the two pipes together had been grinding and bottoming out on the road to such an extent that half the bolt and thread had been worn away and welded to each other.
This was alleviated with some subtle lump hammer smashing to get it off.
So the exhaust was fitted with nothing holding the join together other than the pressure of the fitting itself...as you can imagine it rattled like a wasp in a coke can...and not in a good way.
Not having the time or inclination to get another large bracket that would then just bottom out again a different tac was needed...
So I went retro and picked up a fairly meaty Jubilee clip and tightened it round the join and best as possible. This so far has worked, although it is mildly blowing it doesnt rattle any more. and there is no bolt and thread hanging down to decapitate unsuspecting rabbits who duck...
So the only thing I need to worry about now is that the front spacers are causing a mild unbalancing of the front wheels leading to a little vibration above 70mph. But to be honest I can't see myself doing anything about that just yet. Ill live with it...
...and anyway if the wheels come flying off on the Carousel at least I've got my helmet.
24 Sept 2011
To fix this I got a set of lightened aluminium spacers and some extended wheel bolts. What initially seemed like it would be a simple job of knocking out the old bolts and fitting the new ones into the hubs soon became a bit of a mare. The bolts I got had splines that were slightly wider than the stock bolts. They just wouldnt go into the hubs.
Along came my mate rob who luckily for me builds kit cars for a hobby and has all the kit need ed. He took 4 of the bolts and lathed them down a bit as a tester. This did sacrifice the splines but worth a try we thought.
So today I took the 4 new bolts and tried again. They went in without too much issue pulling through with the bolts with no cross threading or wear which is good. With the 25mm spacer it gave just enough thread for the nuts to go on. So on initial appearance it seems to have worked! At least until the wheel comes flying off anyway.
So Rob has kindly agreed to sort the other 12 bolts so I can do the other 3 corners
Here is a pic of the one ive done as you can see looks.so much better. I think I might either have to remove the arch liners now or raise the suspension up a tad. But ill figure that out once the 4 wheels are done.
There has been a blight on the bug ever since I fitted the new suspension. To some it may seem like a small think but it has been bugging me every time I look at the car. The wheels on it have a daft offset that makes the wheel sit really far inside the arches and as such the arches dont look filled...
So its about 6 weeks until the bug gets taken to the Nordschleife for a rerun of last years Rag the Ring, albeit solo this time, although hopefully with less rain!
Before then there are a few little jobs I need to sort. Well 3 come to mind.
1.Wheel spacers and extended bolts to fill the arches fully.
2.More 'lightening' and stripping
3.Swap the exhaust back for the less mental one that won't fail the ring's noise limits
I'm hoping to get a roll bar in there also but only if I can find one for the right price, steel tube seems to be a bit of a commodity at the moment.
So for the first job I ordered a set of 25mm lightened aluminium spacers and extended wheel bolts from RallyDesign. On attempting to fit, I realised eventually that the end of the bolts are about 1mm wider than the stock bolts. So now I'm setting about filing all 16 bolts so they will fit in the hubs. No pictures yet but Im confident it will really fill the arches with an extra inch each side. So much so that I'm starting to think I'm probably going to need to raise the suspension back up a bit to make them fit. eventually Ill probably roll the arches and drop it all the way down lower than it is now.
With the second job I've got the guys at autolink to thank. While down there having the roof fitted they showed me one of their cars they were working on and had been fully stripped. What they showed me was a whole load of metal panels that are unnecessary from the rear deck and can be unbolted and stripped. So ill be taking a ratchet to it.
The third job is a fairly simple one, jack it up, 2 bolts and a bit of elbow grease to swap the boxes over. I'll probably keep the quieter one on for a while, to be honest I can't drive it how I want with the noisy one without constant fear of 'interference' from our friends in blue.
So a few simple bits to sort for now.
working on a few ideas for the Scumrun rally next May so always more to be done!
It is about this time of year that 2 things happen, the rain begins. If england had a 'rainy season' it begins about now and goes through to next May. Secondly I start thinking about the things I need / followed by the things I want to get done for next years Scumrun. It's to this end that I went down to autolink the mx5 specialists who fitted my new clutch and gearbox last year and asked them to sort out the inappropriate offense to nature that was my roof.
So here is my eulogy to my old roof.
"A dear friend, served me well across the voids of the european highways, through the high's of the mountain passes to the depths of the racetrack abuse. you were squished, folded, flattened, stretched, taped, beaten, drenched, insulted and to my eternal debt hidden from 90% of events wherever possible. I salute you old roof, you were the wort on the arse of the bug but you gave it character and several more leakage problems"
However it was the wrong colour and pretty crappy, so had to go...
Met the guys who were really helpful and special thanks to Nick who did a great job of fitting it while most of the southern members of the MX5 owners club turned up to watch!
here are some pictures. I hope you agree that the new roof now makes the car look much meaner! grrrr
So video is my thing right, it's what I do, I may not be spielberg but I love to create video shorts. So it was all too easy to say yes when Mr Scumrun asked me to run the Scumrun Youtube channel.
Ill also post relevant videos here as and when they are done...hot off the press is Tunnel Run The Movie, a video of Myself, Mr Scumrun and Mr Floppy Throttle and a few other chums testing out the hindhead tunnel. Also contains important info about next years event.
More to come soon before, during and after the next rally, so keep watching!
Good News! after last Septembers Rag the Ring where the bug proved her real worth as a track car I've been hankering to head back to the home of german motorsport hopefully in the dry this time!
Also after a little blast around Brands Hatch in April on the Scumrun I really want to get her back on some de-restricted tarmac
So I plan to head over there in October to one of the tourist open days. Hopefully it won't rain!
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In other news we are now confirmed for the next Scumrun in April 2012, Zach is making a bold and brave return to the copilot seat after 5 years after his last jaunt in 2007 in the Calibra.
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In car news, The bug badly needs a new roof,
1.because after the graffiti respray the roof is totally the wrong colour and undermines the whole look of the car when it's raining...and I live in England (so it's always raining) and 2. because its got more holes, patches and gaffer tape holding it together than the Mary Rose...So before the autumn kicks in (and therefore more rain)
I'm looking to find a supplier / fitter and ideally sponsor to help with my roofing needs! Hoping to get a roll cage in there also at some point, as it's not the safest thing on the road given how stripped out it is.
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With nay cries from many I have...after much consideration...decided not to turbo convert the car. Yes I have a turbo from an old 323 AWD turbo in my loft (same engine) that I could fit with a lot of work and a few more bits but the power gains are not worth the unreliability that many have highlighted to me. I have genuinely spoken to 50+ people who either know MX5's or have turbo'd ones and while most have said that it makes the car mentally fun, they also are quick to point out that they are mentally frustrating.
This leads me to consider the use of the car, it will often sit unused for a couple of weeks, before being taken out and thrashed, combine that with the annual 3000 mile round trip of Europe, and unreliability is just not a price I'm willing to pay. Given that half of this years rally was limped round on 3 cylinders as it is, I need to remember the engine is getting on a bit!
This does beg the question of an engine swap, whilst funding issues makes this currently unrealistic unless some very kind sponsor comes forth, I still do like the idea of dropping a 2002 vvti 1.8 in there at some point...but we will see.
..
so all in all, 2 more events planned in, return of the Zach and plans for a new roof. Keep an eye out for more Team Bugsplat updates soon!
Ive decided for the next rally that the bug is going to need to be more lightweight so ive started stripping the interior with the plan to replace with lighterweight more rally version here are a few pics
Ive refitted the now repaired fixed camera mount also.
