scannon

http://www.ksl.com/?nid=1070&sid=16323148&_mid=1115&_rid=1115.800.232423

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2032756/Slappy-Landings-The-slingshot-waterslide-flings-120ft-air.html

I consider the Caterham to be as much of a reproduction as the Cobra kits. The Shelby GT350-H was a real car as were the Vipers and the Ford tractor.

My neighbor down the street is into replica Cobras, Daytona Coupes and GT-40s. He builds many of them from scratch with extremely high quality. Today he held a gathering of the Mile High Cobra Club. 32 Cobras, 2 Cobra Daytona coupes, 2 GT-40, a Shelby GT350-H Mustang, a '55 T-bird replica, 3 Vipers, and other cars showed up at his shop. He invited me and asked if I would bring the Caterham. My friend with his Miata Italia tagged along as well. Below are some pictures of the cars and a beautifully restored Ford Tractor. The lime green Cobra with the race markings and serious roll cage set a new record at the Pikes Peak Hill Climb this year at 11 minutes, 55 seconds winning the next class below the unlimited class. It runs on propane. The people were all very friendly and easy to talk to. My Caterham probably had more people standing around it at any given time than any of the Cobras. I overheard one of the owners telling a group of his buddies not to challenge me to a drag race as I would beat them. They were talking about power to weight ratios and he had looked at the blurb on my windscreen and figured out my power to weight ratio was a couple of lb/hp lower than their Cobras.

I wasn't going to let a few injuries ruin my trip. It was bad enough I had to leave the Caterham at home and bring the Miata. A few people noticed me using my right arm to lift the left arm up to the steering wheel or table and such. It was pretty much useless at the time. Still and all, it was the best road trip in recent memory.

My Caterham went down just before time to leave for Gert's Black Hills Tour. Two of the studs that secure the turbo to the exhaust manifold had sheared and I didn't have time then to fix it. That meant that Tom and I had to take the Miata on the tour and while on the tour I took a bad fall down a hillside tearing the rotator cuff on my left shoulder, injuring the right shoulder, bruised some ribs and removed a serious amount of skin from my right arm along with countless smaller scrapes, cuts and bruises. It took six weeks to get in to see my ortho doc but I finally saw him on Tuesday. He told me what I already knew was wrong, a badly torn rotator cuff and probably some detached muscles in the shoulder. There is also possible damage to the right shoulder he fixed two and a half years ago. I go in for an MRI on Tuesday and then we will set a date for surgery. Someone on another thread (that I couldn't find this evening) mentioned a doctor/yoga specialist that had a cure using a modified yoga head stand exercise. I tried it a few times and it improved the range of motion and decreased the pain in the shoulder. It hasn't fixed the problem but has made the arm more usable. Thank you for the suggestion. I decided since the arm was somewhat usable to tackle the removal of the turbo and manifold to replace the studs. I wanted to get it done now so that when I complete rehabilitation of the shoulder the Caterham will be ready to drive. The job was completed this afternoon and a test drive went well. The stainless steel studs were replaced with inconel studs with Stage 8 locking hardware. The manifold required machining on both surfaces. I also painted the cast iron turbine housing and downpipe with 2000* paint which required three bake and cool cycles. To help take the strain off the 8mm turbo studs I fabricated a bracket between the engine block and the downpipe. I plan to have a flex coupling welded into the exhaust just in front of the muffler where the catalytic converter used to be. It sure felt good to drive the Se7en again. Getting out of the car was difficult and even less elegant than the normal Se7en exit but well worth the effort.

How about GOTAV8.

http://www.detailingworld.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=230396

There are viton O-rings available for the Miata CAS. Google "viton o rings miata" and you will find some sources. Fix it ASAP as that oil is also seeping into the bellhousing and soaking your clutch. Usually the factory O-rings are good for 70k - 80k miles.

It seems like there are a lot of people on this forum who have or have owned a Miata so its time to fess up - who owns(ed) a Miata? Time to come out of the Miata closet. I own a '92 Sunburst Yellow Miata with many modifications. It recently dyno'd at 279 RWHP and 264 torque. I have owned 28 Miatas so far. I expect to own more in the future. My Caterham has a Miata engine and transmission.

http://www.autoweek.com/article/20110826/F1/110829887 More news/rumor from Joe Saward's Blog:

http://www.wimp.com/whenaccelerating/

Mike, I'm really happy to hear that. Would you like to borrow my Caterham driver's seat and install it temporarily in your Birkin to see if it will help with your back pain?

Does a good interview and then the star in a reasonably priced car bit. http://www.topgear.com/au/videos/sebastien-vettel

They aren't actually broken, as in broken bones. The left one has a torn rotator cuff and the right one (which had rotator cuff surgery 2 years ago) has either a torn muscle or another tear in the cuff. This happened during the Black Hills tour. One of the Sevens broke down and we all stopped to help out. I had to take a leak and one side of the road was flat with no cover and the other side was steep with trees on a shelf about 50 to 60 feet up the side. I got to within two steps of the shelf when a large rock I stepped on gave way and I fell about 20 feet down the slope. Both shoulders took a hit and my right arm lost a lot of skin. I also had some bruised ribs and small cuts and scratches all over both legs and arms. The arm was bleeding badly so I cleaned the dirt and pine needles off with bottled water, wrapped it in some terry cloth and Tom drove me to Deadwood to the ER where I finally got to relieve myself. The trauma nurse cleaned the arm again with tap water, applied some antiseptic and bandaged it up. The cost for this little service was $365. I have limited range of motion in the left shoulder and pain in the right one. I saw my doc right after I got back home and he referred me to the ortho doc who fixed my shoulder the last time. The problem is there have been so many injuries this summer that the ortho dept. is backed up and I can't see the doc until August 30th. I'm in an HMO so unless I want to pay for it myself I will have to wait it out. I decided to see if I could manage the removal of the turbo and did get it out of the car on Friday. I plan to tackle the manifold today and then get them to a friend who will extract the broken studs and true up the mating surfaces. I have inconel studs to replace the SS ones. They were only $19 each!!! I have a couple of modifications planned to decrease the stress on the exhaust system and hopefully this won't happen again.

Friday was a lapping day at High Plains Raceway (HPR) an hour East of Denver. I went along with some friends doing some testing of hood configurations for curing the overheating at the track of their turbocharged Miatas. My Caterham is broken and so are both shoulders so I wasn't there to drive. As I parked my truck in the paddock the first thing I noticed was a very nice maroon Caterham SV a few rows over. No one was near the car so I kept an eye on it to see if I could spot the owner. While having lunch in the pavilion I saw someone by the car and then a pickup towing a Super Stalker on a trailer pulled up. I dropped my lunch and headed over and introduced myself. The owner of the Caterham is George Hoge of this forum, you may remember the mention of the car being a father/daughter build. The Super Stalker is owned by Michael Pederson also of this forum who recently flew to Florida, bought the car and used the Super Stalker to tow the trailer back to Colorado. Unfortunately, I didn't have a camera with me so no pictures of the people and their cars.

http://www.connect.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150356645406233&set=a.136404746232.135752.113224741232&type=1&ref=nf

http://www.dailycamera.com/erie-news/ci_18712044?IADID=Search-www.dailycamera.com-www.dailycamera.com

A Homeless Man's Funeral As a bagpiper, I play many gigs. Recently I was asked by a funeral Director to play at a graveside service for a homeless man. He had no family or friends, so the service was to be at a pauper's cemetery in the Kentucky back country. As I was not familiar with the backwoods, I got lost and, being a typical man, I didn't stop for directions. I finally arrived an hour late and saw the funeral guy had evidently gone and the hearse was nowhere in sight. There were only the diggers and crew left and they were eating lunch. I felt badly and apologized to the men for being late. I went to the side of the grave and looked down and the vault lid was already in place. Didn't know what else to do, so I started to play. The workers put down their lunches and began to gather around. I played out my heart and soul for this man with no family and friends. I played like I've never played before for this homeless man. And as I played 'Amazing Grace,' the workers began to weep. They wept, I wept, we all wept together. When I finished I packed up my bagpipes and started for my car. Though my head hung low, my heart was full. As I opened the door to my car, I heard one of the workers say, "I never seen nothin' like that before and I've been putting in septic tanks for twenty years." Apparently I'm still lost.... it's a man thing.

Top Gear Tribute to The Jaguar E-Type - YouTube

The STV Focus was the engine of choice for Caterhams until they switched from Zetecs to Duratecs. The first Seven I drove was Caterham USA's (at that time it was called Rocky Mountain Sports Car, Inc) SV demonstrator with an SVT engine with cams, not sure what ECU it had. I have access to a wrecked SVT Focus with 73k miles. If anyone is interested I can sell you the engine with ECU and harness for $850.

Here's the text of the email announcing the show for 2011: Hello! Boulder Creek Events is gearing up for the 13th Annual Boulder Creek Hometown Fair over Labor Day Weekend. We are excited to announce that we will have another Classic Car Show on Sunday, September 4th! As a former participant we would love for you to come back and be a part of one of our favorite special events! There will be 8 categories (Best of Show Car, Best of Show Truck, People's Choice, Best of Show Participant's Choice, 1949 & Earlier, 1950-1959, 1960-1969, and 1970-Present) and trophies will be awarded to the winners of each category. Food will be provided from one of our wonderful food vendors at the Fair. There is no entry fee required - all we want to see is you and your beautiful classic car! Attached is the application and flyer with dates and times. If you have any questions feel free to email me. Thanks! Sara I've attached the application form, the flyer is too large to attach. There is also a large Cruise In with a DJ and prizes at Karz in Lafayette on Labor Day. Karz used to be the Sonic on South Public Road, a block north of South Boulder Road. Car Show 2011 app.pdf

Changing from a Link ECU to the Hydra Nemesis gained 61 HP. No other changes, same dyno, same tech, same temps, one year laters. My Miata with a built 1.9 engine is still running a Link and only made 279 HP on the dyno last week. Some day I will have the spare cash to put a Hydra on it. It will be interesting to see if the Hydra makes as much improvement as it did on the Seven. I've never timed the car or taken it to the dragstrip. I would estimate that 0-60 is about 3.5 seconds. The chinspoiler and wings from the CSR moved the scary speed from about 120 up to 135 MPH. I'd want more aero before going any faster.

Thanks for the kind words MMTX. It did the 301 HP at 10.5 psi boost. The water/methanol injection was not working at that time, it is now functional and I have since removed the catalytic converter so HP has jumped up a bit. The turbo manifold is the standard FM piece. For a narrow body Seven you could use the manifold off the '04 - '05 Mazdaspeed Miatas. It tucks in much closer to the block. That is what FM used when they converted their Westfield to a turbocharged 1.8 engine. At the FM Summer Camp last week I got a ride in a '95 Miata with their 2 liter stroker motor running E85. Its a fully built motor running about 25 psi. It dyno'd at 460 RWHP and 420 torque. There is also a drag Miata out there making 660 RWHP and a little over 600 torque from an FM 2 liter stroker motor. Last I heard he had broken into the 9 second range in the 1/4 mile.