SK400

I wish i could join.. but traveling around the world right now. Best time for me at thunderbolt is 1:29:20.. and that's taking #1, #4 and approach to #7 too slow. Without a windscreen, you should easily be in the 1:28's .. Let us know how it goes! and yes.. lose the wiper blades please.

Oh my.. it has been a while since I've logged on... and I will take the 5th. Great "pimp my ride" in red pic, ... but the best part was the act of fitting those "accessories" on the handbrake and shifter levers. Every Cat owner should try this at least once.

BRING-IT-ON Crocs! Put on those tires, drop the passengers, wax the car. We are ready for you.

Hey guys! Sorry, i'm late to the party adding to this thread. Have been busy returning home in CT, then Canada, and now on my way to Montana. All for good reasons but have been on the road none stop. Let me first thank Mike and Tom very very much for all of their work and efforts in pulling this event together. You guys rock!!! Massive thanks for all that you do for the group, keeping the spirit of the sevens alive and going. Hands down awesome. I had a blast. I think that of all the Seven events, this was probably my favorite one. Unsure why, perhaps because of the two tracks, perhaps because of the fast driving we all did, the camaraderie, my new red "pimped ride" , my new haircut after trying a few gears in Tom's orange beast (this thing is SICK..) .. or simply because of the humor and friendship that prevailed the entire weekend. LET'S KEEP THIS GOING! 10th anniversary.. HERE WE COME! . we will need T- Shirts and caps made. A few random thoughts: To Jay - you are a hero. Driving a Cat from Hartford and back deserves super hero physical endurance award. I'm really sorry about the brake and the weekend, but you took it like a real Seven owner. To Vlad & Paige - terrific meeting you both. Love the color scheme of your car! you and i could share the same red toolbox and air pump. it would match. (sorry, not sharing underwear) To Blake & Paula - agree on the award, fast and consistent on the track. Paula, we share the same heritage. You are the best Caterham neighbors in CT. To John & Connor - great meeting you both. D***, you are both fast!! and caught me by surprised on the track. Awesome lapping with you guys. To Simon & Carry - you guys are awesome. Simon, you are lightning fast and look up to you. But i have to say that Carry stole the glory as the "best and craziest passenger" ever... To Mike (kitkat) - you continue to impress me. To Dan & Michelle - awesome seeing you guys. Particularly enjoyed my Nigel Mansel moment.. Thanks for the glory To Tom - now i know why you circle around the pits with your orange beast waiting for the green flag. Getting this SICK thing started and rolling is already a accomplishment.. To Jeff - love your new blue ride! beautiful car Looking ahead, i am indeed concerned that our new friends JohnB and Connor will find a way to gained another 10 to 15 mph at the end of the straight .. which will be our certain doom. We can't let this happen or we need to step up . .. more to come on this over the next few months.. We will call this project "THE REVENGE OF THE REDs" And i would be remiss not admitting that i'm still shaking from my Orange gear shift experience. Yes "Vroom Vroom" dreams, Tom. Perhaps Orange is the new red?

I fired her. She was not meeting expectations. .. Now looking at a Spanish or Italian Nanny’s. Heard they are better (tougher, know what they want, what works and does not work etc. Eg they have more experience) . I guess i’ll Let you know!

Nice! This could be the biggest turnout of all times!! Now the question is: to change tires or not for the weekend? I ask myself because Blake and i had a spring shake down at LRP on Monday and had a blast .. but tires took a serious beating. I have ZZR tires with A24 compound which I absolutely love, but as Croc had warned me, .. they wear faster than the eye can blink, even with our light cars. I also felt that I had to muscle through my brakes .. more than usual it felt, so perhaps due for a new set of pads.. after 4 yrs, it a probably time. In in any case, these are what I would call champagne problems. I’m sure I’ll survive . Look forward to seeing the bunch very soon

Croc aka Alan Touring. Kidding aside .. impressive!

Pickles looks like a terrific ride! congrats! I also live in CT..close to the Stamford area. Where are you approx? Also have you considered Montana for plates? simplifies the whole process.

I was supposed to join a few friends at NJMP last weekend for another fun day.. but the weather was uncooperative so we decided to postpone the event. Instead, I found out that EMRA was hosting an event at Limerock on Saturday. It was a very last minute decision but glad I went (a family friend of mine, long time member and instructor at the club had reached out). A good and fun club and we benefited from lots of track time and no track congestion. The weather held for the day so i was able to drive my car from home to the track and back. I had wanted to try Limerock with the new roller barrels .. and see if i would be black flagged because of sound. I prepped the car installing my catalytic converter and added back the R500 air filter carbon fiber cover to suppress sound as much as possible (which saps 6HP per earlier dyno test!). Long story short.., it worked. No black flag and no complaints from the club. In fact there were several other cars that were much louder than i was.. I even removed the carbon cover for sessions 3 and 4, with no issues. The car performed well and posted a 58:25 s but with still a bit more understeer than i'd like especially in turn 1 and still some sloppy driving. Something i'll play with and try to tune out next summer (both the understeer and the sloppy driving). Now that "sound" does not seem to be an issue after all, I think that with a new set of avon ZZR A24, the cat bypass installed, the chassis slightly retuned, and a lot better and consistent driving from me, this car can probably break into the 57 s range.. and why not in the upper 56s at Limerock. I think it is possible. These cars are quick! .. and yes, roller barrels are terrific.

Sweet! A west coast extravaganza would be fantastic. Also, agree on your note about Matt's car .. we thought that the car setup might have been too stiff in the rear. So this explains it all. I hope he had the chance to play and reset the suspension properly this summer. Matt if you read this, let us know. as an aside, I wonder if we might be able to organize a similar event on west coast with the help of this usa7 community. Some form of arrive and drive .., something to think about. And high speed dive bombers beware! :blush:

Terrific write-up Croc. Thanks for sharing with the group. This looks like a vacation made in heaven. yes, curious to hear more about how the 620R handled compared to your CSR. When Simon tried Matt's car at our NJMP event, i remember him mentioning how difficult it was to get rear end grip.. unsure if it was only because of the torque or because of suspension setup. Italy next year you say? Could be quite a bit of fun.. I'd love to learn more about logistics, cost etc Talk soon

Tom, Mike just a few words to thank you both very very much for an outstanding weekend. These events are getting better and better and attendance is remarkable. I'm on a road trip and left my camera at home last night so I won't be able to download any pictures and movies until next week, ....but I have the culprit cone flying caught on camera. I was the lucky one in this story, the cone missed me and my car by a few inches. I could have caught it in my face, would I had been closer to the apex... I'm glad you and your car did not get hurt more than you and it did. I could have been a lot worst. In any case, thanks again for the hospitality and the company. Can't beat this. Thanks!! seb

Mike, Tom Does the 48 hrs deadline apply to guests? My mother in law and friend would like to come and spend the day to watch the cars on the track and would like to get them tickets but waiting a bit just in case the weather does not fully cooperate. Should i simply go back in the system and add the guests to my Saturday registration? thanks much Also - I plan to leave southern Connecticut around 2 pm or so on Friday and make my way to the track. Anyone else in the area leaving about the same time? Would be fun to caravan. thanks! seb

Three weeks to go everyone.. three weeks! I can't wait. Now hoping for good weather. Unfortunately my family will be n Montreal already, an unable to join... but my Mother in Law who lives in Phily, and a bit of a car enthusiast, wants to come as a guest for a day. yes.. she is pretty cool.

Micheal Avon states 22" diameter for my size of rear ZZR tires.. (if that's your question). I'm really revving, probably around 7600 to 7700 RPM to get those speeds. Which is a lot for this engine... Tail wind might have helped a bit that day.

I finally had the chance to try the car for the first time on a track this season last weekend. I joined my good friends at NJMP for a fun HPDE event and was able to compare and contrast this year's performance with that of last year, before installing the throttle bodies and bigger injectors. I did have a fresh set of tires which counts for a lot but with this in mind, I was able to shave about 1.5s per lap without any particularly refined / consistent driving and with some traffic on the track. The big noticeable differences were (a) top speed, where I used to max out at 127 - 128 mph and now reaching 134 - 135 mph at the end of the NJMP lightning straight, (b) gear change timing especially from 5 to 6 coming out of turn 5 and 8 (the bowl) and © the sound! I can finally hear my car over the exhaustless miatas and porsche caymans who can pierce your ear drums a mile away.. So overall - a good upgrade I would say and would encourage anyone not subject to track decibel limitations to consider this throttle body upgrade for their R300 - R400... the car comes alive.

Really??!? Were you intentionally trying to wear the tires out? I know the bowl is unforgiving for front tires ... but geesu. I hope at least, for the time it lasted, you enjoyed a bit better traction and handling with the A24. If not, well i'll be in big doodoo with tire budget for the year.

Not so fast Mike (clearly, you know how to press on my buttons). Just got myself a fresh set of ZZR tires with a24 compound this time. (I just leaned that I've been driving on the harder a64 compound for the last 2 years). So bring it on! All good fun

Well here is the moment of truth folks! I took the car to a Dyno at P1 Motocars in Stamford, CT, for a few pulls. This is a top of the line shop and highly recommended if you want to have some work done on the car and in the region. (engine, alignment, general maintenance, mods etc). Here it is: a) Without R500 airbox cover: 198.42 HP @ 7250 RPM and 158.4 ft-lb @ 6100 RPM at the wheels on the graph, although in the shop, we had read a very consistent 199.5 HP on two separate runs (probably with a different correction value). Shall we call it 200 HP at the wheels? Applying a 10% transmission loss factor (a reasonable estimate for this simple drivetrain, but you tell me) to the 198.42 HP, this translates exactly to 220 HP at the flywheel, which is what Caterham had advertised with the throttle body upgrade kit. I unfortunately do not have a Dyno reading for the original R400 setup but literature puts it at 210 hp @ 7600 rpm and roughly 149 ft-lb at 6300 rpm. I think the 210 HP was right but doubt the 7600 RPM as I know the car struggled past 7500 RPM and hit the cutoff around 7600 / 7700 RPM or so in the past. So net net, a good 9 to 10 ft-lb increase probably really above 4500 RPM, a 10 HP top end increase as a result and a lot more sound, (a lot). Note that this test was conducted using regular 93 octane gas and had noticed significant difference in the past when I used 93 octane from race tracks pump. Also important, I have ZZR tires and pressure was set to 18 psi.. as a few psi more could have changed the readings slightly. Temperature was a comfortable 68 deg and 50% or so humidity. b) With the R500 airbox cover: 192.4 HP at the wheels and 154.4 ft-lb so about a 6 HP and 4 ft-lb of torque drop from the filter only version. Applying a 10% transmission loss correction factor to the 192.4 translates to 214 HP at the flywheel. So this cover saps a lot of power unfortunately and only helps a bit on sound. But it looks good J . The graph below represents with and without the R500 airbox cover. The blue line is without and the red line with. In conclusion, I think the upgrade was worth it but will really pay off on tracks where I’ll be able to run without the R500 airbox cover (example NJMP), where decibels are not an issue. I live close to limerock and normally enjoy a clandestine track day or two there during the year .. but I fear that now, even with the cover in place, I might get myself into decibel trouble for very little horsepower increase (4 HP), not enough to make a difference on lap times. But I’ll see. I’m eying a session on May 22nd and will give it a try. Since the car is now already loud, I may just decide to go full out, and complete the engine upgrade , shooting for a 270 HP setup with the help of the UK tuner SBD. See you soon on a track! Seb http://www.usa7s.net/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=12601&stc=1http://www.usa7s.net/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=12602&stc=1http://www.usa7s.net/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=12603&stc=1

Bruce would you mind attaching a few pictures of both? thanks!

Slight correction - P1 Motorcars

P1 Motorsports in Stamford, CT. A good shop. Candidly, I wont be tuning much on the dyno simply because my ECU is locked by Caterham. But they also have great alignment equipment, scales etc and last time I went in for suspension and alignment tuning, the owner did all the work himself on my car.

Simon, good to hear from you. Let's see if this upgrade really helps with lap times.. I suspect that it will still be really difficult to follow you and keep up with your pace!! On a separate note, I have a dyno test and tune appointment on May 6. I unfortunately don't have the pre-readings but still curious to see what the engine puts out with the roller barrels. I'll test with and without the R500 carbon airbox.

Friends What is the tally right now? I'm counting the days ... Can't wait to see you all soon. Blake, will we see you with your car? Will you have completed it in time?

What a great day on the east coast. Could not resist to take the car out for a spin. Overall, i like the new engine setup, but it feels like it lost a bit of low end torque (under 3000 rpm) or not as responsive off the line .. but then it corrects the the car feels solid and stringer especially above 4500 rpm. I still plan to dyno the car soon, but has anyone experienced a change in torque (lower?) under 3000 rpm when changing to roller barrels, especially when opening the rollers suddenly? just curious.. thanks!