Anglesey - September 2000

Saturday 30th September 2000
Nice calm settled weather greeted us on Saturday morning we took the bike straight out onto the track and found out that we could easily ride it in top gear everywhere except the hairpin. We hadn't altered the gearing since Rowrah so it just shows how much faster Ty-Croes is! We put a 14-tooth sprocket on the bike and tried again. This time it was better but we felt the bike was running a little rich, so we put a smaller jet in and tried again. The bike now revved harder, we were lapping in the 1m 13s bracket which was similar to last year. It does seem funny that at Rowrah we have been getting faster and faster, however here at Ty-Croes the bike doesn't seem to improve in the same way.

We were happy with how the bike was going so we spent the afternoon scratch racing and enjoying the nice weather. After practising had finished we replaced the Piston ring as normal ready for the last race of 2000.

Sunday 1st October 2000

The weather was quite different. There was a stiff breeze and it was cloudy. I thought that it was going to start raining all day as the clouds were quite low and grey. We were lucky to make the start, everything happened very quickly. We hadn't got the transponder so I had to run and sign for it while most bikes were already lined up on the grid, we'd just got the bike to the line when the flag dropped and we were off! Unfortunately the bike didn't last long! I did 5 laps and the bike went pop. Going up the hill the engine started to tighten and at the top it made 'the rattle of death'. I pushed it back to the paddock, we looked at the plug, it had melted. We took the head off and found a nice neat hole in the middle of the piston.

Plan B - The bottom end of the engine was full of alloy, the barrel had survived the abuse. We decided to swap the bottom end of the engine, use a spare piston and ring. We also decided to go back to the original jetting (Make the wholething richer) The only draw back was the spare bottom end had only 5 gears. After doing only 5 laps I had realised that the wind meant that the gearing was too tall, so we also decided to put the 13-tooth sprocket back on the bike. This took about 50 minutes, I went back out for a shake down. The bike would only run with the choke on. I brought the bike off the track again and we put an even bigger jet in the bike. After doing this we'd lost about 1 hour. However the bike was now running okay. Both me and Lea were really surprised, the bike would now go flat out in top gear all the way around the track, but to do this meant that you were on the limit at both the right hander half way up the hill and through the chicane.


Occasionally rain started to fall but we just kept going. I had one or two 'moments' but the weather soon changed again and the rain held off.

Our fastest lap was 1m 11.8s which was pretty reasonable considering all the changes we'd had to make. (It is about a second quicker than last year). By the end of the race we'd done 209 laps. We've blown it for the championship but that's racing! We ended up 15th in class and scored 6 points! Here is the class 2 championship at the end of 2000.

1st Brew X1	78 Points
2nd Noisy B's	75 Points
3rd F U Cups	66 Points
4th Armageddon	62 Points
5th Team ARSE	58 Points

So this year we've kept the bike out on the track all year. Altogether we did 956 laps, that works out at 44p per competition lap. The only disaster was today, but we couldn't ask for more. No one got hurt, the bike has been faster than last year and we're still finding more power, little by little, roll on 2001.

Rowrah - June 2000

We have had a real struggle to get the bike ready for the June race at Rowrah. After a bit more filing in the barrel no matter what jets we put in the carburettor we were still getting a weak mixture. There was several things that could have been going on, did we have an air leak somewhere? Were the crank seals leaking? Was the carburettor now causing problems that we hadn't seen before? In the end Lea got to the bottom of this whole thing by putting another carburettor on the bike which solved the problem, we now believe that (maybe) the air jet in the original carburettor wasn't able to work correctly now the engine has been tuned that bit further. So with the new carburettor in place we headed for Rowrah.

Saturday 24th June 2000
The bike initially was fine, we ran rich to feel safe, after all the problems mentioned above we didn't want to knacker up the engine straight away. We decided to weaken the mixture mid morning so put a smaller jet in the carburettor, Lea also moved the needle higher in the carburettor to see if this made any difference, as it was the first time we had used this carburettor anything was worth a try!

We were now happy with the engine, but by lunchtime I had started noticing a strange vibration through the bike when going through the chicane at the far end of the circuit, the whole bike vibrated mid corner when it was changing direction. I came into the pits but we couldn't see anything, nothing was loose or hanging off the bike, Lea took it out and had the same problem. Over lunch we had a brainstorm but couldn't fathom what was going on, by early afternoon it was getting worse and in most braking areas the bike was now vibrating badly! There was definitely nothing wrong with the running gear on the bike, wheel bearing were fine, the headstock and shock linkages had no play in them, the brakes weren't binding and the pads looked fine! We decided to swap the bottom end of the engine, this at least would prove that the vibration wasn't coming from the engine. As we started to undo the engine bolts Lea noticed that the front engine bolt was already loose, we decided to tighten everything up and try the bike again, it did look a bit like clutching at straws, only the front engine bolt was loose the other two were tight. However on the track the bike was transformed back to it's former glory! One loose engine bolt and the whole bike felt like a complete bag of nails!

At the end of the day we put a new ring in the engine and had a few laps to make sure the bike was now running okay. The weather had been dry all day, there was a breeze but it wasn't windy. The day got better and better, by evening it was sunny and settled. 

Sunday 25th June 2000
There had been showers over night but by the morning everything was dry and settled. The race started and we soon got into the rhythm, the bike was running fine and straight away I was lapping in the 1m 4s. The bike was faster that the May meeting, but the real benefit from the changes were in the versatility, we now have more mid range and can use this in traffic without losing quite as much time.After about an hour someone dumped oil everywhere and the race had to be stopped. To say how dodgy it looked the marshals soon had everything under control, the race was restarted behind a 'pace moped!' It did look very dangerous, concrete dust was everywhere and certain places were either slippery from the oil or dusty from the concrete. I was taking it well easy, to be honest most people adapted very well, there was very few people crashing because of the oil, this did surprise me!

As the race went on the track got better and better, our bike was running fine, both Lea and me could keep doing 1m 4s laps so we were happy. I had a few near misses and did touch one or two bikes (I'm sorry if I got tangled with anyone who's reading this THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT! I apologised to Ape Racing for bashing into them at one point!) 

About four hours into the race Lea had an accident at the right hand hairpin, he'd exited the bend and was looking forward when he caught the kerb which sent him lock to lock and over the top! The tank flew off the bike and Lea did a somersault down the tarmac, however he was soon back on his feet, he came straight into the pits, the bike looked fine so I took it out while Lea collected his thoughts. He'd banged his shoulder but hadn't done anything too serious. In my last stint I got a faster lap that before but it was still in the low 1m 4s we were running 13th or 14th overall and 3rd or 4th in class by the end. Again we didn't look at how many laps we'd done. The bike had been reliable again and we'd had another great race.

The results confirmed a 3rd place we did 255 laps and scored 18 points. We were 7 laps behind the class 2 winner Brew X1 and 5 laps behind Noisy B's. We only need 1 lap per hour challenge for a class win! Our fastest lap of the race was 1m 04.18s the bike was over 1 second per lap quicker than the May meeting. In the championship were 3rd place it looks like this :-

The Class 2 championship looks like this :-
1st Brew X1 (130) 59 points
2nd Noisy B's (123) 57 points
3rd Team Arse (109) 52 points

4rd F U Cups (115) 50 points

5th Armageddon (147) 49 points

One round to go. Will everything be reliable at Anglesey at the beginning of October?

Rowrah - May 2000

Saturday 29th April 2000

We didn't want the same problems that affected out first race last year, so this year we haven't done anything radical with the engine. Straightaway in the bike settled down and we were lapping 1m 8s. We used the same gearing as last year and the bike worked well especially down the hill through the right, left combination.

The new front forks now give us more feel than the old 'bodged' front end so we were happy about the improvement. We decided to weaken the mixture and this improved lap times down to 1m 7s.

It started raining in the afternoon so we didn't bother doing much in the wet. We were happy that the bike would be reliable and hoped for better weather for tomorrow.

Sunday 30th April 2000
A good day! The track was dry and the weather got better as the day went on. The bike ran fine, we were doing 1m 7s and 1m 6s consistently. We did have two accidents. I fell off at the end of the straight trying to outbrake someone and lost the front! Lea did exactly the same thing at the next right hand hairpin. Both accidents didn't damage the bike so we only lost a few seconds on each one. The new paint got scratched on both side, so the bike now looks used (a good thing in my opinion!).

One of our friends had a go on the bike mid race, he was lapping at 1m16s but was being sensible. Ian was chuffed that we'd let him have a go on the bike. After the race we were chuffed that the bike had gone so well and didn't care too much about our position, we couldn't have done much more. We had a talk after the race and decided to put a new ring in the engine and weaken the mixture a bit more for the 4 hour race tomorrow.

By the end of the day we'd done 302 laps, our best lap was 1m 6.26s. This got us to 4th in class, we were 21 laps behind the class winner Brew X1 (130) who managed 323 laps. Again our bike had a slower 'best lap time' than all the bike above and several that were below us in the results, this shows that by being consistent we're able to score more points that being fast but unreliable, either because other teams are breaking down or falling off and needing to repair their bikes! From this result we need to find 3.5 laps per hour. So the class winner was lapping us every 17 minutes. We're happy enough with the result.

Monday 1st May 2000

No accidents today. The weather was sunny the bike was running fine and we had another great day. Lap times were now down to 1m 5s or 1m 6s and we just kept going! Ian had another go on the bike and got down to 1m 12s, he was happy because he'd went faster than yesterday. We were all well chuffed.

No one on the track was giving an inch and overtaking was sometimes difficult, but both Lea and me had some great battles. Some you win some you lose but I was smiling all day! The results showed more good news we were 4th again!

The same three bikes as yesterday were in front of us but this time The Noisy B's won the race, their bike had been purring all weekend, how can a 50cc moped go so fast without revving hard? They did 203 laps we ended up 13 laps behind on 190. Our fastest lap was 1m 5.53s so weakening the mixture gained us about three quarters of a second a lap. This time we were being lapped by the winners every 18.5 minutes. 

Oveall we're 4th in the championship with 34 points, The Class 2 championship looks like this :-

1st Brew X1 (130) 39 points

2nd Noisy B's (123) 38 points

3rd F U Cups (115) 37 points

4th Team Arse (109) 34 points

5th Armageddon (147) 32 points

I don't think we're going to do anything radical for the next meeting but we will try and improve a little by making small changes.