pethier

I have a 4:00 appointment tomorrow with thealignmentguy.com to swap tires and set the front alignment on my Birkin. Lucky me that there was a cancelation. He was all booked up in the week before our first double-autocross weekend. I assume that a live-axle Birkin has no rear-alignment adjustability. The front camber is adjustable via a system I have not come across before. I intend to shoot for the same area as my non-adjustable Caterham has. The tires I am going to put on are takeoff Yoko A052 205-15 from a friend who is a national champion. I was a bit disappointed that the bolt circles on the Caterham and Birklin are different. The wheels on this Birkin are 7x15. Well, I'm off to measure the camber on the Caterham.

Last night I finally got around to affixing the right mirror to the Birkin. Went as smoothly as the first. Having a 17mm open-end wrench handy for adjusting the mirrors seems like a good idea for a while. You can see in the catalog pictures that each mirror has three joints, and two of them have big jam nuts. I have a 4:00 appointment tomorrow with thealignmentguy.com to swap tires and set the front alignment. Lucky me that there was a cancelation. He was all booked up in the week before our first double-autocross weekend. I assume that a live-axle Birkin has no rear-alignment adjustability. The front camber is adjustable via a system I have not come across before. I intend to shoot for the same area as my non-adjustable Caterham has. I'll be taking this discussion of tires and alignment to the autocross area.

That price looks better than reasonable to me. Somebody who likes track days should JUMP on this.

In my own experience, most Seven people love showing off and talking about our oddball cars. MN to NJ is too much of a stretch, though. I'm 76. Nobody in their right mind would describe me as "athletic". I'm 5'8" and am now back to my teenage weight of around 150. I can get into and out of my Caterham S3 with its top on and steering wheel in-place. I have also acquired a Birkin. I have not gotten the top on it yet. I find it is more work for me to get in and out of it, mainly because it lacks the square frame tube that I use in the Caterham to stop my heel from sliding forward during the process. The Birkin is also more-annoying since the seat is fixed in place and I need tools to move the pedal assembly.

Search on Amazon.com for Motorcycle Mirrors, 10mm Bolt Motorcycle Handlebar Rectangle Rear view Side Mirrors, Compatible with Kawasaki Honda Suzuki Street Bike Cruiser Chopper Brand: Miijzorr This is not the first photo on the page, but it shows the dimensions. The threads measure M10x1.25 Mirrors are convex.

Yes, the heat gun worked. Thanks ever much.

OK. I'll take a shot at it with the heat gun.

I figured that changing the side mirrors on the Birkin would be a walk in the park. The mirrors that came to me with this car are flat. The left one is wonky, and a DPO tried to fix that with an airplane clamp. That does not work. Got new mirrors. Convex. Look good. Mounting method looks identical. I rolled back the big locknut. Now all I have to do is grab onto the mirror strut and rotate it out. No go. I took a closer look: I see red. I fear that some DPO has used Red LocTite on this mirror stem. WHY? There is a massive locknut on this (much-more substantial stuff than on my Caterham). I can't believe it would rattle loose untreated, much less rattle loose with Blue LocTite. Just for laughs, I check the right mirror. No, that one is not coming off either. OK, so if it is re LocTite, there is no way it is coming out without heat. So how much heat do I need? Will a serious heat gun do the job? I have already wrestled off the wind deflectors, since they certainly will not survive any heat in the area. Should I not try heat here? Plan B would be to declare the removal imposible, crack the nut and Dremel the part that didn't fracture saw the mirror stem off leaving the threaded stub sticking out of the windshield frame find or make coupling nuts and screw the new mirror into that.

Got the Birkin out for a drive. First time this year. This is the car park for the Mendota Overlook of the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi rivers. The weather went right back in the dumper after this. Mirror adventure in another thread...

Had disturbing news that there may be no autocross at the LOG. No autocross, I'm out. Stay tuned.

I can see a reason. On one side of the car the exhaust system could be in the way. You might have room for one ratchet and not two. Then again, there is no reason that the ratchet end has to be exactly in-line with the main piece of E-track. On the exhaust side of the car, you could run the front-tire ratchet behind the front tire. The ratchet for the rear tire could sit offset from the main E-track and anchor to a short track placed for that purpose. A single could do it. If it is a single, I'd be sure that one is through-bolted. I put my E-track in this trailer and through-bolted all of it, except where the hole hit a steel frame member I tapped the frame for 1/4-20. When I bought the Caterham, the tracks were too far apart for the single-strap method. I put in a second set of tracks butted up against the originals. Since I didn't have a helper, I screwed this second track to the deck except where I hit a steel frame member I tapped the frame for 1/4-20. Usually, the Seven lands so I put one clip in each track and the strap runs at a slight diagonal over the center of the tire. With the wider wheels I now have for the Caterham, I will probably be on the original outside tracks. Time for lunch. The pounding rain and light hail seems over...

I always go off the ends of the car, but that's really because I am used to tying down cars like an Elise where you have no choice. I see no reason why a guy could not tie down a Seven by having both ratchets between the front and rear tires. The geometry of the strap holding the tire to the track is the same either way. I don't recall seeing a formula car tied down that way, but there is no reason it would not work. BTW, the guy doing that youtube video is not that good. Among other things, there is no good reason to tie up your strap ends like that on an enclosed trailer. That's only to keep them from flying around in the slipstream. Also, I looked again at the site and I don't understand why you want those rings and the of the straps. This set is like mine, and it is 31.95 a corner: https://www.autohaulersupply.com/products/ultimate-horizontal-e-track-wheel-strap-low-pro-553719?variant=50221642744114 I have never tried that Erickson brand, but I cannot imagine they would be any better.

I have bought from Steve at Autohauler Supply and have been happy. Last year I treated myself to a new set of over-the-tire straps and these are the best ones yet. Ratchets are silky-smooth. Right now they are $36.95 a corner. https://www.autohaulersupply.com/products/2x11-ratchet-hdor-endshdorauto-idler-lps-dw-554676?variant=49012265746738

Bingo. I'm a messy guy, but I always hang up my rear E-track straps on the trailer wall. I also put some big clamps on the walls to hang bags with Seven weather gear.

The car in question is not a solid axle, but deDion. The rear hubs are bolted to flat tabs that extend forward from the deDion tube. There are four bolts, I believe, and by shimming one could adjust both camber and toe. I can't seem to lay hands on the latest report from thealignmentguy.com but I do remember that my Caterham has some negative rear camber in it now. It has a lot more negative front camber, which is not adjustable. My Birkin has a live rear axle. The front is adjustable for camber and looks about zero. I'm planning to adjust it to match the Caterham and go from there. BTW, you can get some negative camber in the rear of solid-axle cars. It tends to cause a lot of wear on the parts. Back in the stone age, a guy I knew raced a Mustang notchback. He was going to enter a TransAm race and took the Mustang to a tech to get some negative camber. He told the guy he wanted to watch. The tech advised he not watch because it would be disturbing and might give him nighmares.

BTW, what is the weight limit for trailer-towing with your Nissan Frontier?

Rule of thumb on hitch weight: Park your truck and loaded trailer. Use your tongue jack to lift the trailer off the ball. Measure from a repeatable location on the truck bumper or hitch to the pavement. Lower the trailer to the hitch. Roll your car back and forth on the trailer until you measure a 1" drop from the no-trailer level. I use a friction gizmo to prevent sway. It does not affect the hitch height. If you are going to use a leveling hitch, use one of the bar types that puts anti-sway friction into the mix. Don't use a chain type that does nothing to prevent sway.

The buyer of my 1700 did not put the engine in a Birkin. That engine/5-speed is bound for a Lotus 7. Whether the mounts I supplied with the engine/5-speed will fit the Lotus without a lot of work has yet to be known to me. I am absolutely certain they will not fit a Birkin. Birkin uses one horizontal bolt at the chassis, which seems a bit unusual to me.

Still have not again located the mounts. They must be around here someplace... Again, these mounts, for when I find them again, are for an early Zetec 2000cc in a Birkin.

It's raining pitchforks and hammerhandles just now. I'll atempt to get out there today.

I'm starting to lose track. I think I have the mounts. All Zetec motors are not the same. The motor that was held by these mounts in the Birkin came out of a 1995 Ford Contour.

My guess is Stamford, Connecticut.

Triumph Spitfire or Lotus Europa circle.

I'm already booked. Circumstances will dictate whether I have the Caterham or the Birkin in the trailer, but I'm planning in being there. I had to miss the last go-round in Utah for non-car reasons. It won't be a homecoming for the Elise I bought in Park City, since it has expired while under new ownership.

I have a crossbrace on my roll bar that was described as an FIA/ The salesman in the video needs someone to teach him how to put a harness on. That buckle is WAY too high.