STOP PRESS: ZEN to contend 2009 Time Attack Series

24 hours of build and prep time left!

At 5am this morning Paul and David let themselves in the front door of the house, and proceeded to laugh and chat. Seeing this as a good sign I went off downstairs to be told that, after some initial teething troubles the engine had been running. Thank god for that!

After the school run I left them in bed and went in to ZEN, expecting to see Tim and Rich asleep on the sofas. Instead, I discovered they had decided not to bother sleeping, choosing instead to refit the wing, bumper and splitter to finish making that up. When that didn’t go according plan they decided it was not right to run without the Cosworth inlet manifold, so set about making the necessary changes to get it on.

It looks bloody awesome but as I pointed out as soon as I walked in, was totally not going to let the bonnet shut! Not wishing to be defeated, by the time Paul and David were in at 11am pipes, hoses and brackets had been adjusted but there is still a long way to go before it is properly sorted, with various plumbing routes needing attention to ensure nothing gets too hot and brackets to be made up to secure the turbo.

David has got the rear brakes mounted up and is now working on the ECU and loom.

I have been fighting all day to get Rich and Tim to rest and at 4:30pm, I have just managed to boot Richard off home for the night. Tim is back to work on the brackets for the turbo after a power nap! Paul is resting on the sofa and with luck, preparing himself psychologically for tomorrow! We need him to be fresh, ready for running the car in and mapping on the dyno early evening (at which point I hope to send Tim home for a full night’s kip!)

Too close for comfort!

It’s Thursday afternoon, Time Attack starts early Saturday morning and I have just found out that there is absolutely no chance of our Rays wheels arriving in time This leaves us wheel-less, as Duncan Graham is running the Hyper Zeros from last year on his car! I have some limited options. The first, is to run a set of Hyper Zeros we have here with not quite the right offset… but we seriously need some spot on wheels for the Superbattle. Fear not, we have 1x Rota Torque Drift in exactly the right size. I just need to find the money to buy 3 more and someone that has them in stock for next day delivery! Erring on the side of caution, I have already chased down a possible source and I am waiting for them to call me back. But I am getting twitchy and having left umpteen message more than a little impatient! (How frustrating it can be to be a customer, I promise I will remember this!!)

In other news, today we have a complete engine to go in the car. On the downside, sometime between me leaving at 9pm last night and 3am this morning when work stopped, it became apparent that there wasn’t time to fit the Cosworth inlet manifold (as it requires some modification of the exisiting set-up due to the constraints of the front mounted turbo.) Ah well, at least we have something to do for Round 2

Paul was mapping a customer car at midnight last night, which he finished off this morning for the customer to collect at lunchtime. Now Paul and Richard are working through the other 3 cars requiring mapping and setting up this afternoon! Together with finishing off an exhaust install on a car that suffered accident damage in the snow in February. Tim and David meanwhile, are working on fitting the engine and modifying the brackets for the rear brake calipers. The latter ground to a halt however when the machine shop drilling the brackets locked up and went home for the day with our brackets inside their shop!

Still, there is an engine in the hole now Tim has sprayed the front wing and bumper with the rattle cans. Good enough colour match and OK finish!

All cars mapped and customers off on their way home come 7:45pm, so work stopped for a quick BBQ again, to recharge the batteries before commissioning the engine…

I think today is the only day where, despite progress, there has been an air of despondency. I hope that the mood will lift tomorrow once we have that engine running!

3 days to go…

It was Tim’s turn to work through the night and kip at ZEN last night, finishing up a couple of bits. Anything that requires modification or fabrication always takes many more hours than anticipated.  The big news for Wednesday, was David Wallis arriving from Leeds complete with wet sump from Steven Darley. As expected, the existing exhaust manifold would not clear the sump and so David set about chopping it up and making new pieces, before refitting it along with the Cosworth inlet manifold.

We left David working on that and Fred working on the front bumper and brakes, whilst we all dealt with normal ZEN work.

Refreshed ourselves with a BBQ and then sent Tim off home to see his kids and sleep in a proper bed. Rich, Paul, David and Andy stayed late…. with luck there will be an engine to go in tomorrow.

4 days to go…

Everything is cracking on at a fair pace but there are a few sticking points… No wheels as yet from Japan and no injectors from the states. Richard slept at ZEN last night after working into the small hours - with full days of customer work ZEN employees can only get going on the car after hours…

But hey ho, let’s focus on the positive

So we had to spend £500 on cam followers as none of the buckets we had in stock were of the correct thickness…

But at least the cylinder heads and hence the long engine are all built up now And the front splitter is absolutely rigidly mounted and can support the weight of our heaviest technician (that’s heavy )

And work is being done by Fred to mate front splitter with bumper….

And the brakes have been mounted on the front and checked for fit on the rear and the plan of bracket modification drawn up!

The last weekend!

Friday 17th April 2009

I was at home with the kids today and so Paul had a very hectic time coping with all the office stuff and all his tech jobs!

I popped in at tea time because the brakes arrived today from Compbrake (well the fronts at least :o)) and I had to check them out and take photos - they look fab. We are very pleased with them, just need to sort some pads… Performance Friction please….

Early night for Paul and the lads tonight.

Saturday 18th April 2009

Paul had a full schedule of customers till 1pm, so the morning shift was left to the fabulous Mr T. Extra afternoon helpers were Fred and Santa’s Little Helper. Jobs tackled included: Filling and sanding drivers door. Re-moulding all polycarbonate windows. Making the definitive choice on how to mount the splitter. Mounting front brakes and adjusting lines to suit. Completion of the short motor. Sustenance was provided by Mr R McDonald.

Sunday 19th April 2009

Paul, Rich and Andy took the £0 time and half Sunday shift today

Richard has been giving some attention to the Cosworth heads - for speed we had to go for un-shimmed, and so we need to build up and check clearances and make sure we have the right cam followers to shim them up correctly. Turns out we need a full set, so a bit of a hold up on that now and more spending

Andy has built up the individual throttle bodies, cleaned and inspected any components that are being re-used and so everything is set heads wise now, just as soon as we get the followers!

Rich and Andy have also put all the basic ancillaries together such as water pump, oil pump and so on.

The drivers door has been sprayed and looks great again and the refitted poly windows look and fit better now too.

Paul has turned up some brackets on the lathe for fitting the front splitter and some interim flexi-MDF inserts have been cut.

By 7pm, there wasn’t much left to do bar eat a huge Sunday roast

The build gains momentum

Just 9 days to go…

Another full day of work work - it’s nearly midnight and I am still here (complete with the 6 and 8 year old kids) trying to get the admin back log cleared!! Tim, Rich and Paul were all working on customer cars till 7pm again too!

So updates…. We sorted the brakes today, yeeeeha! Going back to the weight saving principle of our 2009 upgrades, one of our main concerns when choosing a new brake kit (apart from the obvious stopping power) was opting for something lightweight. So, after much research (and elimination of a lot of kits due to lack of funds) we settled on a front and rear system from Compbrake. With luck they will arrive tomorrow. That makes Compbrake the fifth new supporter for ZEN in 2009 and a new supplier for stock products too.

Andy T made a huge difference to the team effort again today by kindly picking up the block from the machine shop, post- bore and hone. Even better than that, he also delivered our Cosworth cylinder heads and pistons. Andy set to cutting out the frame around the drivers window and then together with Paul they layed up some carbon fibre to re-attach the frame as desired and with extra strength.

Leaving that to go-off, Andy scooted home and Paul has begun to build up the bottom end of the engine - he had hoped to use last year’s crank but as soon as he put it in the lathe for a cleanup it was blindingly obvious it was no longer straight! That’s the budget stretched again! Paul got the new crank out the box at about 10pm and now at midnight the bearings and rods are on. More tomorrow.

Whilst Rich and Tim attacked the aero fitment issues… Starting from the back, the bumper was cut to make way for the rear diffuser and new fixing points were found. Next the main piece of the flat floor was affixed as per last year and then on to deciding how to make the front splitter work (yeah we are still umming and ahhing this one)

Bedtime!

10 days to go…

Got to bed at 2am this morning, having driven the 5 hours back from Cornwall through the night. Straight back in to chaos and fitting 5 very full days of work in to 4 again! we had an absolutely manic day with the phone ringing non-stop and plenty of booked and passing by customers to keep our minds clear off Time Attack!

Mr T did the honours of droping off the engine block halves and 2 pistons at the machine shop this afternoon - we hope they understand the urgency with this one! The full set of pistons is on backorder but assured will be available by the weekend.

Mr T came round at about 6:30pm just as Paul finished the final map of the day and everyone’s attention turned to the green car. First off we all admired the work of art that is the Cosworth Inlet Manifold. Mmmmmmmmmm.

Rich removed the fuel tank from the car, before removing the foam inserts and lifter pumps. We are upgrading the fuel system to increase fuel supply and pressure, more of that as and when. Then off home for Rich to get some rest, leaving Tim on (unpaid) nightshift duty.

Paul has drawn up a list categorised in to 2 columns: ‘necessary’ and ‘nice to have’. This evening I pointed out where we could save some more money and time by re-allocating some stuff to the second column! This means we might go for the 2007 StopTech brakes to the front and (borrowed) 2008 STi Brembos on the rear. Not as light as the brakes we are (still) trying to do a deal on but time and money is of the essence! I have also shifted the dry sump over to ‘nice to have’ simply because we don’t have the time to get it sorted. Fortunately Steven Darley had already agreed we could borrow his wet sump set up (we sold our 2008 Group N modified wet sump to fund the 2009 build!) Cheers for those that come up trumps when we beg, borrow and… no, we haven’t resorted to ‘steal’ yet! Another small bonus for the budget was a surprise post on 22b by one of nicest customers Steve Fullbrook. He was after a GT style wing for sensible money, so everyone is a winner as he was more than happy to take our Buddyclub wing (of blue car fame) off our hands, for a small cash boost to the Time Attack fund

Tim, Andy and Paul set about modifying the rear quarters to increase the wheel clearance… Unfortunately, there was an issue with the carbon kevlar panels at point of fitment way back over a year ago, which meant that the clearance that should have been offered by the wide arches did not fully materialise. The upshot was that a) the WRC bumper did not fit (hence ending up the Zero Sports one) and b) the wheels rubbed on the inner arches, to the extent that smoke was billowing out of the rear arches at Brands Hatch After much sweating, cursing and some bleeding, the near side rear arch was unbonded, freed and pulled out and the result is fab. Last year’s wheels can now fit inside the arch and the bumper we originally intended now fits on that side.

I was at work till 10pm, by which time my daughter and niece were getting a bit frazzled so I left Tim, Paul and Andy busy on the race car. I expect they have the off-side arch and the bumper sorted now. Perhaps they have also offered up the flat floor and rear diffuser. Will it work with this bumper or not?……

The work / Time Attack balance!

Progress seems to have slowed somewhat There are plenty of emails going back and forth but nothing much physically happening. The CE28Ns are ordered (wooohoo) but need to come from Japan. We are still trying to strike the right deal on brakes and Paul is still corresponding regarding connectors etc for the Solaris loom. We are waiting on the Cosworth inlet manifold and having decided time was running too short, we are now also waiting for a full pair of Cosworth AVCS cylinder heads (instead of having to port, polish and fully assemble our own).

The bank holiday is screwing with everything this week. We are fitting a very full 5 working days into 4, with everyone working late this week every night on customer cars, so we have happy customers enjoying their newly built and / or finished cars over the weekend. Paul has had no time from last night basically, to do anything race car related, so looks like we have reached a temporary halt till after the bank holiday. Paul and I have a long standing engagement in Cornwall for Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday, visiting family and fitting / mapping an ECU.

Mr T brought the block halves back tonight having been busy machining to Paul’s plan. Luckily RS Components can accept orders for next day delivery up until 8 pm and so the materials needed to finish the job have been bought.

Another late one for Paul and I on regular ZEN work. We simply have to finish by tomorrow night so we can get to Cornwall for Friday.

The specification starts to form

Today we have chosen some new wheels, yay! Rays Volk Racing CE28N one-piece forged, in titanium silver. Look the business and more importantly, save getting on for 3kg per wheel over last year! OK so they are not cheap (especially with the YEN killing everything coming out of Japan) but looking at it in £ per kilo saved, it is a no brainer. We have been keen to work with Rays for a while so it is with pleasure that we announce them as our third new supporter for 2009.

Whilst out and about yesterday, Paul went to see the guys at Cosworth. We now have on order a very sparkly new inlet manifold. In 2008 the car ran from Knockhill onwards with Cosworth rods, pistons and head gaskets. ZEN now use Cosworth components in the vast majority of our power engine builds and we also stock Cosworth ancillary products. They are a testament to the engineering excellence of the company and we have total faith in their design, build and function. In 2009 the ZEN car will have Cosworth AVCS camshafts and valvetrain, Cosworth pistons, rods, bearings and headgaskets in the engine, as well the intake manifold and plenum. New supporter number 4 for 2009!

Everyone had far too much work on today to attempt anything on the race car, so not much else to report.