This weekend was supposed to be a double header from the MCO – the final snowcross event on saturday followed by the first MCO ice race since 1993 on the sunday. Unfortunately due to the mild weather we’ve had lately, the track could not withstand two events, so MCO officials desided to cancel the snowcross in order to continue on with the ice race. Are we ever glad they did!
Eurotrash was out in full force! In team Nissan – Jeff, Naresh, and returning to join them was Jamie. In team Festiva – Phil and two of his co-workers. Rounding out the group was team Legacy with my brother Chris, my dad Pierre, and myself (Shawn).
The race was held in three 20 minute heats, with each heat having all 18 registered cars on the track. There were three classes within those cars – front wheel drive, rear wheel driver, and all wheel drive. Obviously, the festiva and the nissan were in front wheel drive, and the legacy represented Eurotrash in AWD. As there were three drivers per car, each driver drove one heat, and we staged in their finish order from the previous heat. At the end of the day, it was the car with the most laps overall that won in each category.
The first heat started off with us being staged based on our registration order. I made sure to get in quick, and team Legacy started off with me staging in 6th at the start. Both the Nissan and the Festiva were staged towards the back of the pack. After a few practice rounds we were ready to go! We were all a bit nervous since none of us had any wheel-to-wheel race experience.
We’re off! The first corner was dicey as there were 18 cars headed for the same place. I was able to accelerate off the line faster than some of the FWD and RWD cars staged in front of me, so I was third into the corner. About halfway through my first lap, I made a huge mistake and spun the car (thankfully not getting stuck), and turned my third place position into a last place. I was extremely disapointed but I tried not to let it affect me as I worked my way back up the pack. I changed my strategy a bit and decided to be a bit more conservative in my approach. As I caught up to the cars in front of me, I waited for the opportune moment and then I launched! I caught up to the Festiva as it was in a snowbank (unfortunately, Phil had alternator issues and the car died during that heat), and then the Nissan with Jamie driving. I just barely sneaked by him, but I couldn’t get away. He stayed behind me for the rest of the race, and we diced it out, but he couldn’t get back by me. By the end of the 20 minutes, there were bumps and bruises all over the car (as well as many others), but I managed to fight my way back up to 7th (2nd in AWD), with Jamie right behind me in 8th, and because of the issues with the festiva, they were in last. After the heat, we checked our cars. The festiva lived on! Phil was able to get it running again with a boost. Jeff & Naresh also had issues – they had a leak in their brand new winter tires! Thankfully, someone had a patching kit and they were able to stop it for the next heat. Other than dents, the legacy had survived.
The second heat was a more eventful one – my dad took advantage of a huge crash (no injuries though) and was able to move up to 3rd! the festiva also did great as it was staged in 5th, and the nissan was close behind (thankfully, their patch had held up). Our third place was actually second in FWD, with another green legacy in front of us. It was during this heat that the legacy started showing signs – we think the air filter had started icing over as the fuel would cut during hard accelerations and we couldn’t get full power. But we survived! By the third heat, the track was suffering and our snowy/slushy surface was turning into muddy/slushy surface with gravel and asphalt showing through in many spots. This made it extra hard on the cars since you would go sideways into a corner only to hit a dry spot and wrench the tires sideways.
Unfortunately, after fighting hard into the third heat, the festiva finally gave up as the battery was no longer being charged by the alternator After fighting off the plugged tire, it finally gave up and the nissan also wasn’t able to survive the gruelling track. Even the legacy was having trouble – after a lucky break, the front-runner in AWD hit a snowbank and gave Chris the passing chance we needed! We were first! He continued to run a great race and we saw the white flag! Then, disaster struck – we heard a bang and the car started vibrating like crazy: we had blown a tire with one lap left! I told Chris to forget it and keep going – there was only one lap left. He pulled through and did a great job – we managed to complete the lap in first place suffering through a lack of power and a flat tire! We couldn’t believe it! We had come first in AWD, and second overall. It was an amazing experience for all. It was probably one of the most fun experiences I’ve ever had. After such a great event, it seems as though the MCO will be able to renew their ice-racing heritage and we may have a whole season of it next year! It was a great way to end the winter racing season. Check out the gallery for tons of pictures of today’s festivities. Now all the snow can melt and we can start the summer series!
Shawn
The x-brace is designed to connect the front subframe to the frame of the car in order to improve steering response and handling. It’s a BMW part that comes stock on all convertible 3-series BMWs as well as the M3. I had tried to install the x-brace during the transmission swap, however two of the “nutserts” (female inserts that must be pressed into the subframe to bolt the x-brace to) were not installed properly and let go during that attempt. So I picked up a few more, and pressed them back in. One of the reasons they let go is when I was bolting the x-brace on, I had started cross-threading them. This was because on of the holes did not line up perfectly. A bit of drilling correct that issue, and the installation was complete.
Next was the valve cover gasket. One of the tell-tale signs of a leaking valve cover gasket is if there is oil in the spark plug holes. Since pulling the plugs brings you about half-way to replacing the gasket, I decided to purchase one just in case. Also, I had noticed that there was some oil residue around the cover in certain areas, so I figured it would be a good idea to replace it. Two or three yeras ago, I would have been scared to try opening up the engine, but with the experience I got during the FSAE project in university, I feel much more confident tackling these types of jobs. Sure enough, the cover came off with ease. All that is really involved (once the coils and the wiring harness is removed) is to take off all the bolts, and lightly tap the cover to break the seal. Once the cover was off, I cleaned the mating surface and installed the new gaskets. BMW recommends putting some gasket maker in certain leak-prone areas (around the front joints and the rear of the cover), so that was done as well before reinstalling the cover. All done!
After the engine work was complete, I worked on installing my new midpipe. In the last work session, I had cut up my old midpipe in order to remove the catalytic converters and resonators to run a straight pipe into the rear muffler. Before I had a chance to complete that, one of my fellow MCO members, Arek, from 8-Legs Racing, informed me that he already had one built. I quickly went over and picked it up. Unfortunately, the flanges to bolt it onto the headers had been cut off, so I had to do some clamping and welding work to install it. I haven’t reinstalled the rear muffler yet since the hardware was completely rusted and I’m waiting for new hangers to come in.
I had an electrical fire (in key switch) on a long stage and it took me 25min to rewire the car to get us going again. We started rolling just as car 99 reached our spot. Lucky.
and already picked up a used transmission from a local scrap yard as the synchros were starting to go on it anways. This was just another excuse to get it done! Since it was going to opened up anyways and my clutch had overheated a few times, I decided to invest in a new clutch and flywheel. 
The original flywheel was a twin-mass and weighed 25lbs. I opted for a single mass stage 2 aluminium flywheel from UUC Motorwerks that weighed in at 8.5 lbs! With that, I purchased a E34 M5 clutch with a performance organic disk (slightly more grabbing power than the stock M5 disk). Since the transmission would be out, I also figured it would be a good time to replace the shifter with a short shifter. After doing some research, I opted to go with UUC again, and I purchased their EVO3 system with the double shear selector rod (DSSR). To rould it all off, I figured it would be a good time to replace the 
engine and transmission mounts, and UUC was my source again: I purchased their red polyurethane race mounts. Finally, I planned on changing the differential and transmission fluid with royal purple synthetic fluids.
Next were the clutch and flywheel! We started unbolting the clutch from the flywheel and we were able to get them all except for one that stripped. After some prying, we separated the pressure plate from the flywheel and we were able to spin it around to get access to the flywheel bolts. Those were removed, and the assembly came off. At this point, we noticed that the rear crankshaft seal was leaking. It wasn’t too bad, but this was the time to replace it if we were going to. This means we wouldn’t finish that day, but at least we’d be doing it right. Instead of calling it a day right away, we decided to tackle the engine mounts. It was a bit precarious to install these as we had to tilt the engine to the side so that it was only being supported by one mount, but we were able to do it with no issues.
assembly went very well and we had less issues than we though with accessing the bolts (especially the starter bolts). After the new tranmsision & mounts were installed, the shorter shifter came next, and then the driveshaft.
