Roshambo Racing

Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Testing!

Ready to shred the slalom at Dirtfish
We had a great testing session at Dirtfish Rally School on Monday.  We arrived at 8am and spent a few minutes in the shop installing the required Supertrapp muffler to keep the neighbors happy.  We worked with Dirtfish's ace mechanic Derik Nelson to setup the new suspension.  Derik had a good plan for us, starting out on the slalom to test low speed compression, and then moving to the "Boneyard" to test high speed compression settings.

The suspension performed really well! We need more seat time to properly test and tune it, but it's ready for Oregon Trail.

Before heading to Ditfish, we stopped at Chase Race to align the car.  Doug Chase did a great job and helped us get it dialed right in.

On the Alignment Rack at Chase Race

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

2012 Car Prep

2012 is here and our first rally is rapidly approaching.  The Oregon Trail Rally is May 4 - 6 near Portland.

The car has received a major upgrade in the offseason:
That's a picture of the new RS&SP (Baratec) suspension.  These replace a very decrepit set of Hotbits suspension, which were intended for another car and not really intended for rally.  With the new RS&SP's, we can attack more on rough stuff, and the car will handle better on all surfaces.

We've also added a new Peltor intercom system, replacing the Terraphone system that we've used for years.  The Terraphone didn't quite have the volume that we needed to hear each other well in the car.  When you're doing 100 mph down a gravel road... you kind of need to be able to hear what the navigator is saying!

Here's the car in the shop with the new gear.

We are heading up to Chase Race this Sunday for an alignment, and then heading to Dirtfish Rally School on Monday for a day of testing.  This will let us set up the new suspension and dust off our driving shoes.

For Oregon Trail, Doug will be driving with Gabe West co driving.  Dan has a family obligation that weekend, but will hopefully make it out to cheer us on.   Gabe hasn't navigated in the new car yet, but he's always done a great job, and I'm sure he'll come up to speed quickly.

Come out to Oregon Trail!  On Thursday, May 3rd, cars will be on display at Pioneer Courthouse Square in downtown Portland from 11 am to 1pm.  Racing starts on Friday at Portland International Raceway at 6pm. On Saturday, racing is near The Dalles, and Sunday the action moves to Dufur.  Check out the Rally America website for more details.   Hope to see you there!