The Hudson Project
July 1, 2010: Randy's Update from the Bonneville 100
Unfortunately, we did not get to race on race day. Everything was going good,
the new carbon fiber seat and three-wheel cart worked out great for MR. On
Friday, I had to run the practice road with a instructor to get my rookie
license. The practice road is nine miles of the road we were to race on
Saturday and they run us down and back for a total of 18 miles.
When I took off with the instructor for my rookie pass, the truck ran better
than it ever did. In the first half mile before the first turn, we were
already up to 148 miles per hour and the truck was handling great! As we got
down to the finish for the first nine miles, I heard a weird sound, like the
waste gate opening on the turbo and I noticed the water temp was climbing
higher than normal. They turned us around and ran us back to where we
started and the truck was not responding like it did on the way down. It was
really sluggish and the temperature went to 240°F really fast. As we
pulled into the pit area, steam began to come out from the hood. When I
opened the hood, I noticed the bottom radiator hose was blown to pieces and
there was some oil residue on the motor. This can be one of two things: we
blew a head gasket or spit out an injector, and the boost pressure went
into the water cavity and blew it out!
Unfortunately, MR did not get to run it the car because he was going to hop
in after my rookie run so we could do some testing, but because of the
motor letting go, that did not get to happen. When a motor is producing
this kind of power, it is always like rolling the dice when something is
going to break. This weekend, I plan to tear it down and see what happened
and figure out how to make it stronger so this will not happen again. I
have already started ordering parts to do a complete rebuild and we will be
good to go before it needs to go up to Seattle in August.
Randy
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