27 Aug 10 ...... Getting ready for first race

.... that was the plan anyway, 16 September at Oulton Park.

After a well earned week's break with Em and daughter Rhiannon in sunny Tunisia in mid August, the time to reflect on progress and what was left to be done before that first race whilst lay on the beach started to become a concern. In just 2 weeks I had a shed load of things left to do. It might have now started looking like a race car but it was far from ready underneath.

Jobs that had to be done that would take time were :-

• Remove, paint & refit front and rear clams, bonnet and boot lids, roof and wing mirrors.
• Full geo set up.
• Fit Tillet race seat, fit drivers 6 point Schroth race harness, pax seat and Schroth 4 point harness.
• Fit Lifeline electronic fire extinguisher, pipework and nozzles in cockpit and engine bay
• Fit TSL timing unit   
• Fix faulty engine temp readout on stack dash
• Test and fix lighting system and sort out rear fog light not working
• Fit wheel arch liners
• Find and fit door seals and fit doors properly!
• Make and fit boot bulkhead
• Fit graphics and series stickers

............. plus a whole bunch of other small jobs.

............. then I had to get some circuit time to learn to drive the car !!

To make matters worse, work was really busy and becoming a real time and thought distraction. The pressure of getting all the jobs done in time for Oulton was making the task just impossible... so I made the decision to pull out of Oulton. That would give me plenty of time, almost a month, before the next round that I could do which was Silverstone National on 16 October.  
.... that seemed much more do-able! So the email went off to Mr Golding to say that I was scratching from Oulton. To say I was disappointed is an understatement but I was at the same time relieved as the pressure was off for a bit.

13 Aug 10...... Power test at TDI

Full Power test at TDI

Just a few days after the trip into Norfolk to get the K6 mapped, the car was back on the trailer this time heading south down the M11 into Essex. Thurrock to be precise and the premises of TDI who are the ET series official power testers. An official full power test has to be undertaken by TDI to confirm that you are below the 151bhp @ the hubs limit befoere you can enter a race.  The series organisers also arrange random tests during the year to catch out theless scrupulous. I wasn't too worried about being over the limit as my VVC is stock part from the hurricane induction, Janspeed manifold, silenecd de-cat and Emerald K6. I was more worried that it was way short of the upper limit.

The power testing kit at TDI looks pretty sophisticated and well able to cope with the sort of power the K series puts out. The TDI guys took over once the car was off the trailer and in the large soundproofed booth they have at the end of the workshop.

After jacking up the rear and removing the wheels, a large hydraulic unit is attached to each hub. I don't pretent to know how it works but once all bolted up and the computer logging unit connected, the car is run up through the gears to max revs as the resistance is increased. After a bit of magic, the LCD display shows the results. It didn't take that long and I think they did 3 full power tests in total. 

By the time that the hydraulic units had been unbolted, wheels re-fitted and the car back down on the floor ready to go back on then trailer, the results were printed.

The guy who carried out the test (sorry I forgot your name but he is the one who carries out all the tests at circuits during the season), gave me the nod to say it was under the 151 limit. I was really surprised to see that the results showed that it was pretty close at 149.5bhp. Definately where you would wanty to be, no closer!............. 149 tomatoes and 128 torques

I was pleased with the overall power it is making, no complaints there! and I was also pleased with the smooth power curve with no flatspots. I have read many times that the K series has an inherent flat spot between 3 and 4k which good old Mr Walker has properly sorted. The torques are a bit lower than I had hoped but I wasn't too surprised as the VVC does like a bit of back pressure and the fitting of a janspeed big bore exhaust and particularly the de-cat pipe don't help! But it's enough and it does mean I can't use lack of power as an excuse for being Captain Slow!! 

The full results of the test are shown in the power curve and data sheet below:-

One final note of interest is that the power and torques from the Emerald dyno session were different to those from the offiocial TDi test. Was it a case of one is wrong in which case is it Dave Walker's kit or more worryingly is it the TDI setup? ........  or is there a reason for the difference that becomes evident later.......... mmmm, watch this space!

11 Aug 10 ..... Getting ready for mapping

The last week has been pretty busy getting the car prepared to go over to Dave Walker at Emerald near Norwich for mapping the K6. 

Jobs on the list were fitting motorsport quick release catches to the bonnet and boot. This involved removing the old catches and making up some aluminium brackets to mount the Q/R post to. 

The boot cover needed a repaint from its original silver to satin black. Plenty of rubbing down and spraying later it was ready to go on. Similarly the doors that I had stripped down months ago had to be rubbed down, painted satin black and re-assembled and re-hung. All of this took up a whole weekend. I am a couple of window seals missing but those can be sourced over the next few weeks.

The new rear Sport 160 spoiler and raiser blocks had to be painted after first lining up and drillng the rear clam (scary!) and then a bright vivid red paint job. After 24 hours for the paint to harden it was fitted on the car.

The motorsport lightweight hardtop was next to go on after first fitting a new seal to the perspex rear window and making new retainers for the rollbar cover clips as they are not available new from Lotus. The hardtop is fixed with four bolts at the leading edge which involves drilling the windscreen surround (scary moment no.2!!). After drilling the hardtop first and marking the surround it was a careful job to drill the surround. It's about 50mm thick and needs to be at the right angle to bolt up squarely. Having checked the bolts would go in, tiger seal went on the roll bar cover which would secure the hardtop at the rear. Job was quite straightforward in the end. 

Next job was to fabricate a heatshield between the exhaust manifold from the large piece of nimbus I had bought from Yvo at Elise Shop as part of the SELOC group buy. I started by making a template from card. I wanted it to wrap around the manifold protecting the bulkhead, laminova and oil pipes and go down to to the undertray so that all the heat would be funnelled up and through the boot cover vents. Took a while and while I was at it I fabricated a small piece that would protect the oil filter which becomes pretty close to the manifold when the oil cooler take off adapter is fitted. I took the opportunity to fit the alternator heatshield from Eliseparts. It comes flatpacked and takes a while to work out where it bends and folds, but I got there in the end. It looks really good now it's finished and works very well.

I had originally intended not to fit wheel arch liners but changed my mind. I had 2 rears already and just needed a pair of fronts which I picked up from SELOC classifieds. 

On the big day (today) I had to fit the liners, quickly set front and rear toe by eye and bleed the brakes once more just to be sure. I was due at Emerald at 2pm and started the jobs at 7am. I checked all the fluids once more plus tyre pressures and torque up the wheelnuts. I had only ever started the engine in the garage and reversed it in and out a few times but never run it up through the gears and bedded the brakes. Wasn't too worried about them as they would not be needed today. So at 10.30 i reversed the car out and onto the road and ran it up and down my quiet rural road just to make sure I could get gears and all was ok. Took a few pics for posterity....

 The it was off to fetch the trailer at 11am from it's secret storage location. It would be the first time for the car on the trailer so that would be a learning experience too. I winched it on front first in the end having angled the rear of the trailer down using the jockey wheel. Went on a peach. Took a while to get the new straps right but each one got easier. I really should have tried this first as it took a while and put me behind.

Finally I was ready and after a quick check of the preparation notes for mapping from Emerald, I had a last check of oil and water before setting off. A quick txt to Andy Napier to check what fuel was best and I was off to Watton in Norfolk. Andy had recommended Shall Super V but there were only BP stations on route so I had to go for BP super unleaded. The elise was filled right up and a jerry can also filled for good measure. Dave recommends bringing plenty of fuel as cars can use a fair bit on the dyno.


Watton is about an hour and 15 away for me. I was made welcome by Dave and the team and they quickly set about checking the car over and strapping it down on the rollers. The dyno is in a sound proof room and fitted out with plenty of air blowers that were positioned at the front of the car for cooling and blowing air in and around the engine bay. There is also a meaty exhaust and fume extraction setup as you would expect. Dave prefers it if the undertrays are removed which was handy cos they had not been fitted (one less job for me in getting the car ready!). Dave hooked up his test bay PC to the serial comms port and positioned the twin lcd screens he uses during the mapping so that he can easily read them when he is sat in the car at the controls.


The screen on the right had the standard M3D software running and the screen on the left is dedicated to various instrument and dyno live readings.This screen can also display graphs of results after each mapping run. Dave has a wireless keyboard and settings console for use inside the car whilst he is at the car controls.

The mapping process consists of adjusting and setting ignition and fuelling for each of the 16 load sites in the M3D ecu at increasing revs. A wide band lambda probe is put in the car to get AFR  readings. 


Dave was happy for me to sit in on the session provided I used the ear defenders provided. It was all pretty relaxed at first as he set about mapping at low revs. I was a bit nervous generally as the car had never been properly run apart from a few engine starts in the garage and a couple of hundred yards of running up and down the road at home just to check that I could get all five gears on the new box and linkage. Mapping is laways carried out by Dave using fourth gear runs.

I started to get more nervous when the revs got a bit higher! Once you get to about 5000 rpm it's all very noisy and the car is really straining at the restraint straps. During the full power runs towards the end at 7000 rpm maximum revs I hav to admit to having my fingers crossed.I needn't have worried as the car ran faultlessly with no leaks and the temps stayed rock steady which showed that the PRRT and laminova were doing their job.

After about 2 hours the mapping was finished and I nervously waited for the final figures. The scores on the doors were max power 163 bhp @ 6,800 rpm at the flywheel with a smooth curve and no flat spots and max 142 torques @ 4,900 rpm with a nice healthy flat 135 torques between 4250 and 6000 rpm. Dave reckons that equates to about 143 bhp at the hubs but the official ET power test I have booked for Friday 13th August at TDI will confirm. I have to admit to being a bit disappointed as I thought I might see 170 bhp peak and maybe 146/7 at the hubs but better to be sure of being within the 151 bhp limit for the series. Dave reckons that the power is about right for the engine spec and I have to believe he is right. One potential future bonus may come from using better fuel. Dave was not impressed with the fuel I had used and recommended the Shell Super V which might be worth another 1 or 2 bhp on top.

Power Curve

Next blog update will be after the TDI power test when I will post up the official power curve.