Got wind that Speedventures is hosting a weekend out at Chuckwalla Valley Raceway this coming weekend. after the success – and also all the stress and long hours – of SLB, I figure it would be nice to finish the season off with a fun no-pressure event. Could even get some early 2018 testing in, plus CVR is just a great Miata track.
The plan is mostly to just roll the car out there in the same trim as it ran at Buttonwillow, but first I did a post-race inspection. Superlap wasn’t easy on the car, there’s several things that took some damage and need repairs, and a couple of those things need addressing before going to CVR.
First, the front upper ball joints decided to try to remove themselves from the upper arms. Going back through notes I realized V8R recommends tack welding these in to the arms to avoid this. Clearly, that would have been a good idea.
Took this as a sign it was time to improve the front upper arms. Switching to the V8R X-Lite front uppers. Spherical bearings throughout and track-side quick camber adjustment via shims. Also, 0.95 lbs lighter than the arms they are replacing (each).
Second, the mounting tab on each of the shorty mufflers broke. The safety wire was the track-side fix at SLB. These were made with really thin material to cut weight, clearly just a little too thin. Remaking them with thicker material today:
