Since the BMW is still on jack-stands in the garage, I decided to take out the MINI for the Capital Driving Club autocross at Bowie Stadium this weekend. It was sunny and hot, but fortunately, not yet so humid. I was competitive with the other MINIs that were running, but I wasn’t up there with …
I recently lost my cell phone which turned into an opportunity to get an iPhone. There are a couple of interesting automotive apps available for iPhone so I thought I’d test a couple of them. The image above shows the Dyno results for the MINI using an app called Dynolicious. It shows a 12.82 second …
On Saturday I finally made it to a CDC autocross event. This one was held at the Triple Skid Pad at Summit Point — same place as the BMW Club event, only this one wasn’t a sogfest. BSR has finally paved the aprons around the inside of each skid pad and cut-out, but the infield …
This past weekend featured the first SCCA Autocross event of the new season at FEDEX field. It was a chance to test out my new suspension and tires. During the winter, I picked up some Hankook Ventus Z214 competition tires from Frisby Race Tires. For a while, they had a special on the C50 (medium) …
I’ve been having some problems with the MINI’s suspension lately. First was a thumping sound in the right rear, and the left front seemed to bottom out on even the slightest bump in the road. That and the fact that my family won’t ride in the car anymore because of the harshness of the ride, …
Well the February car washing weather control experiment was successful. Today school was canceled and E got her snow day. I decided to take the day off and go sledding as well.
It’s hard to get motivated to do anything related to my cars when it’s 15 degrees outside. If I’m lucky, I can keep the garage about 30 degrees above the ambient temperature, but when the best you can get is in the low 40’s, you don’t want to stay there long. Fortunately, we had a …
I got the MINI back from Frederick Motorsports last night. I had Scott install the new adjustable Konis along with the replacement camber plates. I also had to have the front muffler replaced. It’s too soon to really offer an opinion on the new struts. My impression is that the ride home was smoother and …
The replacement camber plates arrived from IE today. The adjustable Konis arrived earlier in the week. Hopefully I’ll have a chance to get them installed next week. When you compare the two photos, you can see how the urethane failed. I’ve been told they have improved the manufacturing process so these are not as likely …
I am always amazed by the chain of events that leads to discovery. This past weekend, I was getting my MINI ready for winter. We don’t get a lot of snow here in Maryland, but when you car is only a few inches off of the ground, it doesn’t take much to slow you down. …