James A

SCCA will be there next weekend, we have entered in E Production in our Caterham. But, we fully expect to be at a huge disadvantage on the back straight, but will give everyone heck in the technical parts of the track. Our run group will have 85 cars, never had a field even close to that many so a good qualifying position is critical.

I'm looking for a well used Sierra 7" differential, I plan to install new bearings and seals and a Quaife LSD, so as long as the case and gear set are good it can be in very rough shape. This differential is going in a Caterham S3 standard width so I need the 7" NOT the 7.5". Jim

The 6 speed is not allowed in SCCA E Production, we must run the Ford T9 with standard gear ratios. The SCCa is so afraid of Caterhams that we are the most restricted cars in EP. Just look at the General Competition Rules, it's crazy how much we are constrained.

We had a front seal on the race car differential start leaking, it is a Ford Sierra differential with an AP Suretrac lsd. It was not easy finding anyone to work on the differential, a lot of people knew nothing about the Sierra diff and no one knew what an AP Suretrac was. People who did understand the Sierra diff said they were a pain in the behind to work on and did not want the work. Just wanted to let everyone know of a good source for Sierra rebuilds, Taylor Race Preparation in the Dallas area. Dan knows these diffs and rebuilt mine with new bearings and seals. The AP lsd is no longer supported by AP or Fuji Heavy Industries (who bought the rights to the Suretrac) so if you have one enjoy it until it fails and have a Quaife installed. I am having Dan build up a spare diff with a Quaife lsd as a spare in case the AP lsd starts to die. Oh, Dan has rebuilt the T9 gearbox for several of the Caterham racers including me. Just a reference for you, I'm not in any way associated with Taylor, but he sure has supported our race efforts.

Go to someone who specializes in selling and fitting race tires, the are use to working with 13" and even smaller rims.

We attended the F1 race at COTA and are really looking forward to the SCCA race there in March. There will be 4 -5 Caterhams in EP. It would be great to see some of the other 7s from this forum at the event! Should be a lot of fun! Get your cars tuned up, service your tow vehicle and come on out!

Great picture!

Oh if you look down the Roadracing section a few links you will see a thread called "Lesson in Car Control" that is Andrew doing what he loves best, racing in the rain, and on slicks.

Well, the E30 is one of his favorite cars and I am the original owner and in fact is the car he learned to drive in at... age 10! To this day the kid does not like automatic transmissions! So his picture in front of the E30 M3 is his high school senior year book picture, how cool is that. When SportsCar ask us for some pictures of him we sent plenty of him and the Caterham, but they liked the E30 picture best, and so do I. I do have to say that Andrew loves the Caterham, and compares everything he drives to it, and most cars don't measure up! Oh, he also autocrossed our other Caterham at age 14.

This month's First Gear feature from SprotsCar Magazine, lot's of talk about Caterham! First Gear.pdf

Before you upgrade your brakes be sure to see page 505 of the GCR, we are very limited on what we can do with brakes. Limited to 9" solid disc front and rear. And page 491 limits us to "stock calipers" well the stock calipers on 9" solid disc are the two piston Girling calipers. Not a bad caliper but heavy and the pads are very small. No AP calipers and no ventilated rotors.

There should be anti-rattle clips on the pads to prevent rattling, this could be the issue. The clips are a piece that is separate of the pads, and often left out as they don't effect brake performance.

We have run our EP Caterham in ITE, forget why we did that but it was a race that was for touring cars so we put ITE on it and ran!

Oh and Joe, back to your original question; yes we ask SCCA about the Duratec the answer was no. As to the CSR chassis, I suspect it and the Duratec could be homologated but it would need to be the same way the 7 America was. Caterham USA would need to develop a standard spec chassis and engine, list all of the specs and approach SCCA with the details. I have a copy of what they used originally to get the 7 America chassis and Zetec approved and that information was used to class the car and to incorporate the car in to the GCRs. Seems to me Caterham USA would want to do that, but maybe it just doesn't represent enough sales to bother. One of the dealers maybe... In any event it will be hard to get the SCCA to allow the Caterham to be competitive regardless of what engine and chassis we present. As I said in my previous post Mazda's sponsorship of SCCA right now gives them the big advantage.

OK, here is my view of Caterhams and EP in SCCA. First of all go to the SCCA General Competition Rules and go to page 475 the Production Car category and in particular pages 504 and 505 which deal with individual car requirements, notice anything about the Caterham versus other cars listed, like several times the number of restrictions any other car has?? The fact is that if you own a Mazda, skys the limit on what you can do. Own a Miata, unlimited engine, brakes, body work, and when that did not get it done they lowered the minimum weight. Hell, they just lowered the Mazda 3 weight by 500 pounds and a well prepped one was already competitive. The fact is that SCCA EP is rapidly becoming Spec Super Miata, it is really disheartening for all non Mazda owners and is resulting in defections to NASA where it is perceived you will get a fair break. The Mazdas keep getting breaks until they win in the classes they enter, and it is certainly true in EP. SCCA soon to be Mazda Car Club of America. My advice, race NASA, it can't be more unfair than SCCA to Caterhams. My son and I will likely be testing the NASA waters soon, it certainly feels like SCCA doesn't want Caterhams in their ranks.

Nice job! Do the "doors seal to it?

Well it was my son who lowered the record not me, I don't have that speed. It's amazing he set such a fast time as it was 100+ degrees F all weekend and the pavement at Eagle's Canyon has gotten so rough the cars was skating to the outside of every turn, I mean just bouncing to the outside. So bad corner workers were calling it in, couldn't compensate with shock settings so we lived with it. Almost everyone was having difficulty with the rough surface. No run-offs this year as the silly SCCA puts the run-offs right at the beginning of the school year/College year! This will be his freshman year at college so it's not a good year for the run-offs. And, having the run-offs at Road America is not good for Caterham's too high speed, and what organization thinks the weather will be decent in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin that time of year? But, having said this rain would be a real advantage for us, the kid loves wet races, loves them!

Well, the Eagle's Canyon record was lowered by almost 2 seconds on Sunday, it is now 1:58.855 for a Caterham.

You know I am not sure about the tonneau. But you can run an SVT engine with restrictions and a 100lb weight penalty so you must run 1560 with driver instead of 1460 with the Focus Zetec.

You can down load the SCCA GCRs for free and review the restrictions levied on Caterhams, and there are a lot. But, we both race in EP, my son more than me and faster than me, and it is a lot of fun. Figure out how to make your car comply and jump in! There are 5 Caterhams in EP in our region and 2 or 3 Lotus 7s in FP, a great knowledgable group of racers! Lot's more nation wide, I'm not sure how many.

Hey 18 year olds think color coordinated shoe laces are a big deal! Yes, professionally prepped by me! Clam shell wings are required by SCCA per GCR 9.1.5 page 505, even the dimensions we can cut them down to is specified! Maybe 140hp at the rear wheels, engine mods are very tightly regulated This car has many races on it, in fact it is the car that won the National EP championship 5 years ago, we bought it last year and have been racing it since, our next race is at Eagle's Canyon in 4 days. Andrew has been racing EP since the beginning of last year. We run Hoosier 43543 radials in R80 compound (the rules limit us to 13 x 6 wheels)

In preparation for a race this weekend we scrubbed in some new tires and verified some suspension changes to our EP Caterham 7. One of my son's friends came out to the track with us and made a video, here you go:

Fantastic Brad, it's good to see you out at RA with the Boss! Those cars are fantastic track toys, I see them at tracks around here and am very impressed. Now let's see, you could run that in what,,, T1 or T2 in SCCA? Andrew is racing this weekend at the SCCA event at Eagle's Canyon, the 7 I was going to drive is out of commission right now so I will just pit crew.

Could he be going to Lotus?

build a full bodied 7? you mean try it again: http://www.caterham21.com/