August 2024
Steve Jones & I recently attended the July “GEAR” meeting which was run at “Sydney Motorsport Park” on the North circuit which has the long main straight & they say that turn one is the fastest corner in Australian Motorsport.
Steve had a great day with the Midget sounding sweet & running well all day, great to see Steve has cured the clutch & oil leak problems that plagued him for the past couple of years , I’m sure that Steve enjoyed the day & had a big smile on his face at the end of the day .
From my point of view it was great to get back on a race track,(it’s been a while) and the first couple of runs down the main straight it was obvious what 30 more horsepower can do for you.
The car felt great however that was to be short lived because after the first few runs and about halfway down the main straight again the car started to pop & backfire, so it was back to the pits to investigate what had happened. A compression test revealed a blown head gasket between cylinders 1 & 2 so that was it for the day onto the trailer and back home. Disappointing I must admit but when you play with old cars and stretch them to the limit you can get problems.
I’ve since removed the cylinder head & after some intensive checking come to the conclusion that it is just a gasket failure, which is disappointing considering we used a good quality gasket, so we’ll have another go with a different gasket. Thanks to Matt Blanch for his help checking it out & confirming my diagnosis.
Over 80 cars competed in the “GEAR” day & I assisted “GEAR” President John Dall to do some random scrutineering checks. He commented on the high quality & presentation of the cars competing which is great considering there seems to be cars we haven’t seen before turning up at each meeting and “GEAR” continues to flourish.
It is great to see these historic cars being driven as they were meant to be and not left locked up in a garage rotting away.
Sunday 11 August will see round 7 of the State Hillclimb Championships run at “MGCCN Ringwood Park” and that is definitely worth having a look at with the best hill climbers in the state competing.
Coming Events
- Wed 25 Sept “GEAR” at Pheasant Wood
- Sat-Sun 28-29 Sept “HSRCA” Spring Festival at “One Raceway” Goulburn
Remember drive them don’t hide them enjoy your MG.
Cheers,
Gary Piper