Dwight and I got a chance to shake down our Steeda '95 Cobra R for the first time after accident repairs at Road Atlanta last weekend with a 90 minute SCCA Enduro.  We found somethings that we didn't like and had a chance the very next weekend to try and work thru some of those issues.

This would be a NASA Southeast American Iron race weekend at Savannah's historic Roebling Road Raceway.  Without question this is my best race track.  I have more laps here than any other course in the year and a half that I have been racing.  I am comfortable with the surroundings and the race track.  It has resulted in my best finish in a NASA race, a 3rd in AI class in September, '07 and some of my most competitive lap times.

We are also able to call on our friends at Carter Racing Enterprises - Home while in Savannah, GA to provide support and diagnostics.  That would be necessary, because this weekend I would be solo.   Ponder Racing Services was committed elsewhere and Dwight's experience is only available to me when we share enduro races in the "R".  This weekend would be completely about testing and sprint racing.

I arrived at Carter Racing after lunch on Thursday.  Justin and Jay were ready to help.  The first thing was to get the codes off the ECU.  The Cobra R generally can run an hour and a half at Road Atlanta with a 22 gallon fuel cell.  But last weekend Dwight apparantly ran out of fuel only 57 minutes into the race.  The car was also idling strangely all weekend.  It made sense to check the computer report and see if maybe the answer was there.

Sure enough the computer told us that an exhaust sensor and the coolant temperature sensor were not working.  That would result in the fuel mixture being very rich.  That would cause very bad gas mileage and could also have caused the rough idle.  Jay also found an exhaust leak from a loose header bolt.  Possibly a result of the crash in March at Road Atlanta.

After making those repairs we put new performance friction brake pads on the rear calipers and discovered that an elbow fitting connecting the right rear caliper to the brake line was cracked and leaking.  I was lucky that Carter Racing had a similar piece in stock.  This elbow fitting was special to the air tight, quick release brakes that were custom made for the race car back when new.

On a test drive after Jay discovered that the right rear Moton shock was loose and moving in the mount almost and inch.  That could have been causing some of our handling issues and was definately caused the clatter I heard.

Friday we enjoyed a good practice day provided by seat-time  performance driving days.  In our third practice session and immediately after running our best time at Roebling Road we lost all pedal pressure in the brakes.  Turns out that the same elbow fitting that we found fractured on the right rear caliper had failed on the left rear and we lost all brake fluid.  Losing the brakes resulted in the off track excusion see above, but one braking zone before this was braking from 140mph at the end of the front straight.  No brakes there could easily have crashed the car again.  We were lucky.

Saturday Jim Pantas and NASA SE took control of the track.  We qualified forth in American Iron for the Saturday race and finished forth as well.  The car was good for about four laps and then it picked up a progressively bad push.  That resulted in giving up track position to the two fast CMC class cars driven by Greg Houseman and Pete Urbanski. 

By the end of the race my tires had cooled and I was able to run some faster laps at the end.  That allowed me to work my way back past the CMC cars.  After the race we found out that both the first and second place finishers had been disqualified for passing under yellow and out forth place became second place points.

Sunday was a repeat of Saturday in qualifying.  We ran our best lap of the weekend but still qualified 4th.  On the start we pass out way to 3rd place and held that for many laps, but again the car got increasingly tight in the corners.  Eventually I had to surrender 3rd place then 4th.

As on Saturday, the car came back to me for the closing laps and I was able to make up a ground on the 4th place Mustang driven by John Godfrey.  On two occasions I had a run on him going down the long main straight and would have attempted a pass, but on both occasions Godfrey moved to the inside of turn one and I was unable to make the outside pass stick.

I settled for 5th.  Again, one driver ahead of me was disqualified and we moved up to 4th. 

It was my first sprint race weekend of the year and the overall result was positive.  Next on the schedule is Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, AL.  June 6-8.  Dwight and I will run the 3 hour race on Friday on BF Goodrich Tires and I will do the American Iron Sprint races over the weekend.  We invite you to come to the track and see us.