Krueger Tuned Racing
As many of you know (from my constant posting), that my family and I built a ChumpCar race car out of a 1993 Volvo 940 Turbo. We started on August 30th and completed our journey at the completion of the ChumpCar race at Watkins Glen International this past weekend at the 7+7 (hours) endurance race.
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When we arrived on Friday, we unloaded all our gear and the car, then took the car to tech. This is where they inspect everything you've done and if they don't like it, you have to fix it or you don't race. Lucky for us, we only had to tape a couple wires on the starter. Everything went well and we got our penalty, 27 laps. You see, in ChumpCar, the base point total is 500. If your car is 500 points, you start with a 0 lap penalty. Our base value for our car was 450. We did 230 points of improvements, which equaled 180 points over the limit. This race had a 1.5 times multiplier, so that meant we were 270 points over, which is 27 laps in the hole. We'll be filing a request to re-evalutate the 450 point starting value over the winter.
The race morning was hectic to say the least. We had a drivers meeting at 8 am, then we could get the car started and driver set up at 8:45 with 2 parade laps starting at 8:55. My Uncle, Walt is the car owner, so he went first. The plan was for him to race about 10 laps, then I would head out for an hour stint. On lap 1, he passed the first car in Krueger Tuned Racing ChumpCar history. Then it went downhill quick. Heading into turn 11, he heard a pop and then the oil pressure went to 0. He brought the car into the pits, shut it off and we started to diagnose the problem. One of our other drivers, Don is a Volvo mechanic, so he knows pretty much everything there is to know. He checked several things and we decided the best thing to do was raise the motor up so we could get the oil pan out. My brother, Chuck and cousin JC took one of our trucks back to our shop (90 minutes away) to get the other motor in case we needed it. Turns out, our engine builder didn't clean the oil pan thoroughly and it clogged the metal vent. 3 hours and 13 minutes later, I was out on the track.
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It had been raining all morning and even snowed a little. I had a limited amount of time now, since my oldest son was running in the Sectional Championships for Cross Country at Victor. I ran 8 laps total with a best lap of 3:09.29. That's pretty slow, but I wasn't about to push the limits only to end up in the Armco, like some others did. The car still wasn't right, however. When you put your foot to the floor, the fuel would cut out. At first I thought it was a transmission issue. Turns out, the turbo was creating too much boost.
So I took off and rushed to his race. I actually got pulled over on the way, going 75 (in a 55) as the State Trooper told me. Luckily, he left me off with a warning, because "I was honest". My son ran his best race and was the teams 6th man, so that was great for him.
Meanwhile, Don, JC and Chuck all got a turn on the track. They all experienced the same turbo/fuel issue I had. Chuck had the fastest times in the wet, with a couple 2:54's.
We had dinner at Seneca Lodge. This is an amazing place. There is so much racing history in the bar area. F1, CanAm, NASCAR, etc all spent nights here. If you ever visit Watkins Glen, be sure to stop here.
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The garage area on Sunday morning, prior to anyone being up. It was so peaceful. But, this time change messed me up.
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Sunday came and at our drivers meeting we were told they would be delaying the start of the race due to ice on the track in 3 spots. They told us to get our regular cars out and get on the track for some caution speed laps to warm it up. It was cool to be out there in my minivan and slow speed with 100 others vehicles.
A friend of my Uncle, Pete was the first driver out. He ran a couple laps, then we brought the car into the garage to install a boost gauge, so we would know exactly how much we were making. We had to do it this way, since we weren't allowed to do any work on the car until after the green flag dropped. If we did, it would mean a 60 minute penalty. On his first lap by, he gave us a hand signal which meant 15 psi of boost. Stock is 8 and the injectors are only rated to 12. Fuel was cutting out at 15. Now we had to feather the gas to keep the boost less than 15, preferable in the 10-12 range. He ran mid to high 2:40's for his laps in the dry conditions.
Boost gauge going in.
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I went next and found it was a major pain to glance at the gauge, while checking mirrors for cars passing me, as well as managing to race with 1/2 - 3/4 throttle. I got into a decent rhythm and ran some good, consistent laps. I did 17 laps, with a best of 2:37.24. But we encountered another issue. After about 40 minutes of racing, the car acted like it was out of fuel (bogging down) on the longer / hard right hand turns - 3 of them. We're not sure what this issue was being caused by, so we just came into the pits to top off the fuel every 40 minutes. This was only using 8 gallons and it's a 20 gallon tank.
JC went next and had a best lap of 2:38.75. Don ran after that with a best lap of 2:41.16 and then Chuck finished off the race. His best time was 2:37.93. We finished 36th overall, and 18th out of the non-chumpionship cars. We certainly would have been higher up, if we weren't in the garage for 5 hours of the 13 hours. We completed 136 laps, while the winner finished 271.
Here are a few more pictures and a video of my best 2 laps, which were back to back.
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Out of turn 11, on to the main straight.
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Here is the video of my fastest 2 laps, which were back to back. Laps 82 and 83 overall.
Thank you to everyone for your support.
i love driving those insane little cars!
