Red Mist Photo makes its first sale!

Proformance Racing School held a track day last Saturday so I got my first chance at taking some pictures of the driver's and their cars.

The lighting was terrible (very dark) but good enough to take some good pictures. Good enough to sell. The first photo sold is this one of a very cool Acura NSX (highly modified):



My photography website is http://redmistphoto.com.

Where did the name Red Mist Photo come from you ask!? "Red Mist" is a condition where any competitor is so hell bent on catching the next car ahead of them that they loose composure and concentration. Naturally, it usually results in a driver error.

Thunderhill Raceway and Cobra Brakes Reprise

Thunderhill was fantastic as usual; I simply love that track. It is very fast, some nice elevation changes, blind corners, off camber corners, fun corners, fun track!

Some photos (taken by "Head-on Photos"):



Brakes

However, the high speed between the many corners and braking into the corners really showed how even the upgraded 13" front brakes are not powerful enough to repeatedly slow down a 3800lbs car. In the first day I went through a new set of brake pads! Pads that normally last 4 to 6 track days!! Went through another set of pads on the second day! Lots of brake fade and boiled brake fluid...

After returning from Thunderhill I installed new Brembo brakes on the Cobra. This time 14" diameter rotors which are also 4mm wider; this makes them much more efficient heat sinks. These are paired with Brembo 6 piston calipers. This should do the trick!

And now, something different...

I've decided to retire from general software development and from working for a company! I'm in the process of leaving my current employer, UIEvolution and have begun some new activities, all of them oriented toward high performance cars and driving them on race tracks! Go figure...

I'm currently redoing the Cantrell Motorsports website; check it out.

I'm also planning to get back into photography. First, I'm taking quite a few pictures of the cars and activities at Cantrell Motorsports. I also plan to do some track side photography at Pacific Raceways and hopefully sell pictures of people's cars to them as part of their day at the track.

Driving on the right side for the brain these days :)

Lastly, I'm leaving tomorrow for Thunderhill Raceway with the Cobra. Several friends from Seattle and Portland are also going, so it will be a lot of fun! I'll be taking the Cobra in my new enclosed Interstate Cargo trailer (pics to come later).

Here is the map of the 700 mile journey ahead:


View Larger Map

And a map of the track:


View Larger Map

NIRWANA Engine Blows!

After many thousands of track driving miles, I finally performed a "money shift"; in the Porsche Turbo no less!

I tried to shift from 3rd to 4th but accidentally got 2nd. The problem with that is if you shift at red line from 3rd, which is about 7000RPM, and you shift into 2nd and let the clutch out, the tires force the engine to spin at about 9500RPM!!!

Bad things happen when an engine is over-revved in such a way. The most common thing is that the valve springs don't exert enough force to close the valves fast enough so a piston or two end up colliding with the partially open valve which typically breaks the valve.

Cantrell Motorsports dropped the motor out of the car last week and performed a leakdown test which shows that 2 cylinders have likely been damaged. So, on we go with tearing down the engine to fix broken bits; and take the opportunity to upgrade a few :)

As you can imagine, this is all going to cost a wee bit of money; hence the term "money shift"... ugh.

Here is the sad photo of the motor below its proper home (the under-exposure is intentional to convey to mood):

The Cobra does Infineon Raceway

The 16 hour trip to Infineon was very much worth it!

As usual, Nor-Cal Shelby Club put together a nice event. This was their annual Mini-National Convention which includes a car show on Friday, several dinner events with guest speakers, and of course, my favorite activity, driving around a fine race track for two days :)

Each year they have a theme for the Mini-Nats, as they call the event. This year the theme was "40 Years of the GT500". 40 years ago Ford sold a limited number of GT500 Shelby Mustangs; which are of course now collector's items. And, last year Ford once again began offering a Shelby GT500 Mustang. So, the theme was a no-brainer for the club.

This guy owns both a '67 and an '07 GT500 (original owner of the '67):



The '67 has this license plate frame, and the '07 has the opposite frame:



More pictures from the car show are on Flickr: http://flickr.com/photos/nirwana42/sets/72157602016042329/

Saturday was spent getting used to the track, which is a bit intimidating due the close proximity of concrete walls all over the place!

Sunday, we started to play a bit more but I never really felt comfortable pushing the car much due to those walls!

Sure enough on Sunday a car at the front of the pack clipped the inside of T12 and bounced to the other side and hit that wall too. I was about the 6th car when we came up to T12 and all I saw was lots of bright red brake lights; which is totally unexpected since this is a major passing zone. So, we all went from full throttle to full brakes very quickly; I almost rear ended the white car in front of us and I just waited to get hit from behind. I heard some tire squealing and just waited for the hit... I heard the car hit something; fortunately it wasn't my car! Two cars toasted by the walls... I caught this all on video, it is the second crash in the movie below; if you turn up the volume you will hear the tire squeal and the hit! Then, on the right you see the original victim, a red Mustang, smoking!

I had a great time, but I still like Thunderhill in Willows, CA the best. The Cobra and I will be there Oct 27/28... Can't hardly wait.

Here is a shot of the me and the Cobra in T2:



The Cobra ran great; suspension felt nice and no cooling issues.

Here is the in-car video. First of my fastest lap, then some fun with some classic 60's Mustangs, then some fun with a stock car racer and finally some of the mishaps. Enjoy!

Cobra Suspension Test

The suspension upgrades from Maximum Motorsports got a nice workout on Aug 20th at Pacific Raceways. The forecast called for rain so I didn't expect to excercise the suspension much, but it turned out to be a mostly dry day.

I'm very happy with the results; there is much less body motion and the -3.6 degrees of camber in the front really helps with the understeer and tire wear is much more even (instead of wearing out the outside edges).

Here is a 10 minute video from that day; I had a little fun by adding some of the common thoughts that go through my mind as I'm driving.



Next week I'm taking the Cobra to Sears Point (Infineon) Raceway. I'm very excited because I've never driven at this track! It's about a 1000 mile drive from Seattle; I'll be towing it on my trailer.

Here is the track:


View Larger Map

Here is my travel route from Seattle to Sonoma:


View Larger Map

Cobra Cooling and a Track Day at PIR

Happily, the cooling modifications have been mostly successful. After testing at Seattle's Pacific Raceways showed consistent mid 230F water temperatures, I pushed the car a bit by moving from the 3.1" supercharger pulley to a 2.94" pulley (gaing over 30HP) and took the car to Portland International Raceway where it was around 90F. And, the Cobra didn't like it so much! Water temperature easily rose to above 240F which is dangerously close to the 245F "limp mode" cutoff which really is a big damper on fun! Fortunately, by driving with the heat on full blast, the water temps dropped below 240F. It was a fun and HOT day! Below is some in car footage from the event. I'm chasing an Ultima supercar; which is always very satisfying to hang with such cars in a lowly Mustang :)



We've since then dropped back to the 3.1" pulley and added some heat shroudinng around the radiator to help air move more efficiently through it.

Now that the heat issues are resolved we are also replacing the stock shocks, Steeda street/sport springs and Steeda camber plates with a Maximum Motorsports coilover suspension.





On Aug 20th I'll have a chance to try out the new suspension at Pacific Raceways and shake out the car before our early September trip to Sears Point in Sonoma (my first time there!).

Cooling the Cobra

When I first purchased the Cobra I researched as much as I could about it's strengths and weaknesses when run hard at the race track; most of my information came from the forums at SVTPerformance.com.

As is common among relatively inexpensive high horsepower cars, the Cobra runs very hot at the race track. In fact, after hard lapping for about 15 minutes it starts to overheat and when it reaches 245F (coolant temperature), its engine management computer puts the car into "limp mode" which effectively cuts back maximum power; thus reducing the heat generated by the engine. In anything above 70F ambient temperatures, my Cobra, as predicted, overheated in this manner.

The culprit is a wholy inadequate cooling system from the Ford factory. I read about the ultimate solution, called the Evans Cooling System, early on, but it costs serveral thousand dollars (including installation), so I've been playing with less costly changes. None of which helped, so, in the end, I recently had Cantrell Motorsports install the Evans Cooling System.

The two main things the Evans Cooling System addresses are the thermostat and oil cooling.

In the stock system, the thermostat is flawed in a way that allows too much coolant to go through the bypass rather than through the radiator. The kit relocates the thermostat and the bypass routing. Here is a picture of the new thermostat location, the black round thingy in the center.



The stock system utilizes a water-to-oil heat exchanger to cool the oil. The problem with this setup is that it effectively uses the radiator to cool the oil. Add this to the flawed thermostat design, the coolant simply can't be cooled enough.

To address the oil cooling, the Evans system does away with the water-to-oil heat exchanger that is an integral part of the oil filter housing. The oil filter is relocated under the bumper and Cantrell added a Mocal oil cooler just ahead of the left front tire.

This picture shows the relocated oil filter and the new oil cooler (note, this is someone else's car, but my setup is basically the same).



This picture is of my oil cooler.



And here is Brandon at Cantrell Motorsports, doing his usual magic on my car :)



The first test of the new system came last Wednesday (July 4th). Ambient temperatures were in the 70's and low 80's and the Cobra was able to run at full blast for 30 minutes with no overheating!! Yeah!!

Coolant temps hit a high 236F, but stayed there. Post-intercooler intake air temp (IAT2) was in the 160's F. Both temperatures are still too high; coolant should be closer to 220F and IAT2 should be closer to 130F, especially to maintain full power.

Stay tuned for updates on future Cobra cooling...

1987 Carrera Joins the Stable

I seem to be drawn to the older Porsches lately. Several of the main Porsche magazines seem to have at least on 70's RS or RSR clone story in every issue. This got me thinking about and looking for an RS clone. But I soon concluded that I would rather have a nice unmodified 911 from the late 80's. Mainly because they were the last of the original 911's and they are galvanized so they are not potential rust buckets like the 70's 911's can be.

So, I set out to find a pristine 86-89 Carrera... And on Sunday I found it!

1987 Diamond Blue Carrera with 26,000 miles and in like new condition.

Nirwana gets some track time...

A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to take NIRWANA out for a bit of fun at the local track, Pacific Raceways. This was an Alfa Club event so it was possible to give rides; something that is getting harder to do, especially in the Northwest. So, I was able to invite one of my co-workers, Russ, who is a bit of car guy himself, and was interested in a ride.

NIRWANA, a 1997 Porsche Turbo, continues to be my all time favorite car for both daily driving and track time! It is the most responsive car that I have driven; it feels so amazingly alive! And, with over 470HP, that liveliness is very enjoyable :)



Below is an in-car movie of Russ's ride; notice how we just keep on passing and passing all the other cars during the session; except of the seriously turbo-charged white Miata at the end :)

Enjoy the MOVIE! (20+ minutes and 75MB)

Since I discussed the Cobra's brakes recently, I should mention that the rotors were on the Turbo were finished by the end of this track day. The cracks didn't quite connect the drilled holes in the rotors, the normal indicator that the rotors need to be replaced, the cracks were still pretty long.

Now the Turbo has some nice new rotors, which I'll be "seasoning" for the next couple of months until the next track day with one of my favorite groups; Chris' German Auto.

Cobra's new brakes

The new brakes performed very nicely last Wed (June 6) at Pacific raceways. They felt better than the stock calipers which gave me enough confidence in the brakes to increase the speeds, especially on the front straight. However, I am going to try the Hawk DTC 70 pads because with the HT10's, I still could not get into ABS coming into T2, which tells me the tires can handle more braking force.

Here is a in-car movie of two of my faster laps:



Unfortunately, but somewhat expectedly, the Cobra still ran quite hot on the track, reaching 238 degrees after about 15 minutes of hard driving. So, we're going to install an oil cooler shortly.

Hint: Cobra needs better brakes...

A week ago I had the Cobra at Pacific Raceways and after the second session, this is what my right front brake rotor looked like this:



This of course, ended my day at the track, sigh. The crack was especially disappointing given these were crygenically treated, which translates to twice the price of normal rotors, and this was only the second track day using them.

In a way, I was not too surprised since it is almost unanimously accepted that the stock 2003 Cobra brakes are too weak for such a porker; mine weighs over 3800 lbs, wet.

Thanks to the Internet, and Maximum Motorsports, I ordered a set of 2000 Cobra R front brakes; these are a common front Brembo brake setup, originally used on the early 1990's Lotus Esprit. They arrived two days later and I installed them on Friday; here is what they look like:



Pretty! Well, they won't look that good for very long, that nice gold coating is there to prevent rust on the non-wear surfaces.

I'll be breaking them in for a couple of weeks before taking the car out to the track on June 6th. This breaking in period is called "seasoning the rotors", which heats them slowly over time to help prevent cracking... Cross your fingers!

New to the stable: 2003 Ford Mustang Cobra

I've always been a Mustang fan, well of the 60's and 1995+ Mustangs. It was inevitable that I'd eventually have to try one out.

During the winter I looked around for a deal on a curent GT500 (also a Cobra), but the dealers were asking outrageous markups; a local dealer was asking $25K OVER the $45K MSRP. That is just plain wacky pricing for a Mustang.

So, I looked at the previous generation Cobras which were made in 2003-4. These also had supercharged V8's which make 390HP, compared to the current model's 500HP. After some research on the Internet, it became clear that a boost to 500HP was quite simple for the earlier Cobras. And, they run around $25K; so, for the same amount as the markup on a current Cobra, I can get a clean used previous generation Cobra, and have 500HP!

It didn't take long before I found a 2003 "garage queen" with only 9800 miles in completely mint condition; as far as I can tell, it was never driven in the rain (in Seattle!).

Here is how it looked when I bought Dec 23rd.

A great year with the Cayman S

I may have been too busy to blog this past year, but I was not too busy to have some great fun with the Cayman S.

Soon after purchasing the car I took it to the local race tracks and as expected, loved it. So, in went the rollbar, racing seats and harnesses.



During the year, the Cayman and I visited Pacific Raceways, Portland International Raceway, Thunderhill Raceway and Laguna Seca and enjoyed every mile, including the 2000 mile roundtrip of freeway driving to Laguna Seca and back to Seattle.


Here is a shot of us at Laguna Seca's famous Corksrew.

Here is Windows Movie in-car footage from Laguna Seca

This is the second time I've made the journey to Laguna Seca; last time was in late 2003 in a Speed Yellow Boxster S. Coinsidence? I think not :)

I sold the Cayman S a couple of months ago, almost a year to the day that I bought it. What a great car! But, a bit too perfect. Not boring, but not exciting either. The Elise is a much more fun track car. More on that later.

Porsche needs to build a 997 GT1

The Ruf CTR3 just brings home to me that Porsche needs to bring back the GT1. Why? Because, it was a mid-engined car, which is a much better performance car architecture than the rear-engined 911.

It is really sad that the such a great car manufacturer is hamstrung by the 911 legacy so much that they can't actually build a proper sports car that does not cost a small fortune! The Carrera GT was certainly a superb supercar, but it really was not something you can drive everyday or to the grocery store; unlike say a Turbo, GT3 or GT2.

Porsche clearly has the engineering capabilities to create a 997-based (or Cayman-based) GT1; a mid-engined 911! Price it above the GT2, say a tick over $200K and they'd give Lamborgini and Ferrari some excellent competition.

Official Porsche GT1 page

ruf-ctr-3

2-2008-ruf-ctr-3
Originally uploaded by pstoppani.

Ruf recently announced a fantastic car, the CTR-3, which is supposedly based on a Porsche Cayman. The CTR-3 has a twin-turbo motor which should finally put some power into that chassis.

Pooped out on blogging...

Seems I pooped out on blogging over a year ago. Well, it was a very busy year for me. Should be a bit calmer now. I'd try to post again about my favorite topics: mobile, cars, and gadgets.