GOING STRAIGHT
We don’t make things easy for ourselves, do we? After the disaster at Anglesey, it was back home with a broken Kawasaki again.
The problem was down to a dumb mistake: We’d left a bit of paper tissue inside the engine – to stop the oil drips – after checking the clutch before we went to Round 7 of Golden Era SBK. It had blocked the oil-intake filter in the sump. We all felt terrible because it was all over for the Kawasaki before Ritchie even got going. He was relying on its power to pull him down the long back straight over the weekend’s races.
He performed well though, riding the feisty Suzuki SRAD – the spare bike supplied by Drew Plaskitt – but on a 750cc, although it’s quick, against the bigger bikes it was always going to be a struggle.
Well, were not going to let that happen again, a small oversight that cost us bigtime in the end.
A gutless Kawasaki, but not for long.
Back home we stripped the engine down and found that the actual damage, on the surface of it all, wasn’t too bad.
The Carrillo con rods looked Ok, and the crank, although it looked marked, was polishing out nicely.
Overheated, the shells were shot.
The shells had just nipped up and had got very hot. Luckily, they hadn’t moved – Ritchie had switched off the engine just in time.
To make a proper job of polishing the journals we took it to Roland and Alsop – specialists in racing engines – and asked them to do it.
Then we got a phone call from them to say the crank was bent. Blimey, we would never have thought it possible. It was 18 thou’ out-of-line and rendered useless because of this.
Luckily, we had a spare crank waiting ready for an emergency like this, so this went in with new shells all round. Nice and straight.
There was still more to come.
The con rods, although they looked OK, had distorted slightly when they got hot. When we measured them with the new shells they were far too tight. We couldn’t risk it.
Thanks to Matt Pearson, who had three good ones from an engine Richard Blunt used to race. He said we could use them. Thank goodness!
They turned up in the post last week and it was all go over the weekend to get everything measured up and assembled ready for Oulton Park.
Engine split to reveal wear and damage...
Almost back together again two weeks later...
Thank you Wiseco. :-)
...head on, nearly there...
It was a couple of full day’s work, but the ZX-7R sounded a treat when we fired it up.
So now – thanks to Drew Plaskitt – we’ve got two bikes again to take us on to the final two rounds.
We took the Suzuki to Oulton Park for a session, just in case we didn’t have time to finish the Kawasaki (Our day jobs have been extremely busy of late) and Ritchie managed some very respectable times on it.
The SRAD went well, we’ll see how the ZX-7R goes this week.
We’re not messing around now with two rounds left, this engine will see us through.
it’s taken Ritchie to where he is now, and it’ll take him through to the final.
If he’s to win the championship, then this the motor we built, will do it with him.
Thanks again to all our friends and supporters who’ve helped and to everyone at Wiseco Piston Inc, Kais Suspension, R&G Racing, Cradley Kawasaki, CP Carrillo, TA-Creative, Holbeach Tyres, Nova Racing Transmissions and Roland and Alsop, our new engineering friends in Chobham, for their help and advice.
See you all at Oulton Park for Round 8.
Team 71
Pictures: Team 71.
