Castle Combe Camping and Race

Last Saturday the team met at 2.30pm and boarded the minibus, bound for Castle Combe circuit in Wiltshire.

After a brief stop over at a motorway services (allowing Kirt to get a cup of tea), we arrived at the circuit at 6.00, to witness the last few vehicles departing from Rally day, the event that had taken place that day....

The team made short order of putting up their tents and we managed to have a very decent BBQ before the daylight went. Following the BBQ, I assembled the audio-visual gear I'd decided to bring and following a brief squirt of Lynx deodorant to encourage the portable generator into life, we all watched "The Empire Strikes Back" projected onto the side of our race trailer!!!

Up bright and early the day of the race, the team managed to get 2nd in line for scrutineering and spent a good hour practising out on the track.

After a frankly blistering formula 24+ race it was finally time for us to race and Natasha Layley took her place on the huge grid of 50 cars. The flag dropped to start the race and.......nothing.....the car rolled to a stop 50 yards form where it had been pushed off, the pit crew had not turned the isolator key far enough!!!



Tash, right in the middle of the field!

After some swift and welcome intervention from a nearby marshal, we were finally underway, and during her 40 minute stint, "Tash the Crash" managed to climb her way from the back of the field to 28th place...a pleasing start!

Following Tash, Charlotte Finding took the wheel (stick?) as our second driver and continued to climb through the busy field of cars despite feeling quite poorly the night before....now that's what I call dedication!

After a good pit stop to change driver again and put in our second set of batteries, Billy Nightingale put in a sterling effort and clocked our fastest lap time yet finishing his drive in 15th place!

Another driver change and Carlos de Costa had an engaging drive, which saw some epic tussles as he fought hard for position amongst some truly excellent cars. at the end of his drive Carlos had managed to gain a couple more place, putting us in 13th.

Our final driver change and our third set of batteries put Liam "Hazzard" Lynch in the car for the gruelling 1hr 20minute final chase to the flag. Despite slipping back a few places during the last pit stop, Liam quickly put in our fastest lap of the day and started gaining places as cars ahead of him began to slow or suffered from mechanical issues. At the end of an exciting 4 hours of racing, Liam was over taken in the last ONE SECOND of the race and was just squeezed into 11th place.

Given the superb pedigree off the cars ahead of us this was a real achievement! That combined with our highest ever mileage of 99.9 miles, we have now edged our way up the qualification table for the National Finals to equal 14th place!!!

One more heat to go (tomorrow) at the BBC's "Top Gear" track before the National finals in October!

IT ROLLS!!!

After school Greenpower club continues on Wednesdays, however the dedication of Reece Bawden is frankly outstanding!!!

He is now working hard on the new car several evenings a week, with the aim of entering formula 24+ (16-24yrs) races next season!!!!

Since my last post we have experimented with mounting the derailleur mechanism....

Made the steering column and tested it for "feel"....

Bolted the front axle to the front bulkhead with little CNC made "top hats" and had the first tentative roll down the corridor.....

 

 

Finally, we made the steering track rods and connected them up, stuck the shell on and had a bit of a sit in......

 

Even I can just about fit in!!!!!!

A Nail Biting Race at Bedford Autodrome.

On Sunday the Plume team gathered before dawn in the school car park, climbing wearily aboard the minibus, we departed for Bedford Autodrome for the first race back after the summer holidays.

Having passed scrutineering, Billy Nightingale took Darkside out for a few practise laps, before handing the car over to our least experienced driver Ellie Pennick (she'd only driven once before). As Ellie racked up some decent times in practise and said that she felt confident, the decision was made that she should be the first girl ever in Greenpower history to undertake the longest, final stint in the race (more on that later!).

Come race-time Charlotte Finding drove well from the grid, tackling the sharp first corner consistently and clocking up laps despite being overtaken by some other teams, who as time showed, were pushing too hard too soon!

Charlotte ready for the grid...

After 40 minutes the first driver change allowed Billy Nightingale to get back in the car and he quickly started to gain places, climbing over the course of his drive to 11th place.

A second driver change and a fresh set of batteries and Kirt Cowell rapidly set the fastest lap so far, but sadly whilst tussling with Philip Morant's Fireblade, Kirt suffered a black flag for "cornering too enthusiastically"........harsh I felt!

Despite this setback, Kirt continued to gain positions reaching 7th place by the end of his 40 minutes. The next driver change to Carlos de Costa was frankly disgracefully slow and cost us quite a few places....much more practise needed I think!!! Carlos lapped well and despite managing to spin the car twice on the now slightly damp first corner, he maintained position, battling hard with several other teams throughout his session.

The final battery and driver change went much more smoothly and Ellie quickly settled in to her marathon session, clocking up faster and faster lap times and eventually setting our fastest lap time (much to the frustration of Kirt).

Despite also spinning on the first corner a couple of times, Ellie battled on and managed to climb to 4th place before a serious crash between two other teams temporarily stopped the race!!! Thankfully, both drivers were shaken, but uninjured. The race got underway again with only 10 minutes remaining! Despite Ellie lapping faster than both 3rd and 2nd place cars, we simply ran out of time, finishing less than half a lap behind 3rd place.......WHAT an exciting race!!!!

Special mention should go to Natasha Layley, who despite serious injury during the summer holiday, came along to support the team. We wish her a speedy and full recovery.

A nice suprise and a little progress...

So.... the pupils' first day back of the new academic year and within hours, my trusty team were pecking at me to do some work on the new car after school!! We began with a well overdue tidy-up and then got to work on locating the steering column and mounting the rear derailleur sprocket onto the back axle...well done chaps!!

Liam, Kirt and Billy measuring and  marking-out the location of the steering column.

Looks promising!



Drive sprocket mounted to rear axle, mock up of motor location.
The rear derailleur mechanism will be mounted upside down.....somehow!