Bottom line up front... a bad day at the track is still better than a good day in Afghanistan
Well guys, not a great day at the track. I kissed the wall and here is the end result:
Good news though is that no one was hurt and it didn't damage my RZ wheel. The only thing that was hurt was my pride. I have a video of it that I will post later on once I figure out how to cut it down to under 10 minutes. I was on the last turn tracking out maintaining throttle and it broke loose. I went back and forth a few times before I did a 180 and hit the wall.
I pitted to have the tech guy check out the damage and was given the green light to go back out and finish the session, which I did
I was extremely relieved that the damage was as minimal as it is.
However, after the next session I pull back in to my spot, put my drain pan under the car(as a precautionary measure) and start talking. I notice a coolant smell a few minutes later and pull the pan out.... sure enough it's leaked around 20-30oz of coolant. I take the intake and intercooler off and notice some black material on my radiator fans. I trace the problem to the hose that connects from the bottom of the AST to the bottom of the radiator has come loose(I'm assuming the radiator was jarred when I hit the wall) and hit the fan until the fan eventually wore a hole in the hose. Phil is pretty sure he has a spare and I'm going to go pick it up in a couple of hours. If he doesn't, I'll just splice a metal hose in the line. I'm hoping to avoid that as it would introduce 2 more potential failure points, but would work for the time being.
Chris was running well today and I believe came in 8th overall in TT and 3rd in TTA. Here are a few more pictures from today.
Phil's MB FD:
I'll have the hose replaced here in a couple of hours and be back at the track bright and early first thing in the morning.