Miata Mailing List: June 1995, Message #194
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   From: Miq Millman 
Subject: MGB's versus Miata's
   Date: Sat, 3 Jun 1995 16:27:01 -0400

Last of three parter.  As always, praise and comments to SEFisher@aol.com.

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Subject: Two-Bit Racing Makes Its Debut
Date: Mon, 06 Apr 92 12:09:21 PDT
From: Scott Fisher  (now SEFisher@aol.com)

I hate Daylight Savings Time.  Specifically, I hate having to get up 
an hour earlier when I have to be in the first run group at a course
two hours away.  It's even worse when we decide to take a short cut
that leads to a stop to consult the map, but we got there with ample
time to get the tires changed and lined up in inverse order on the 
grid.  Thank goodness I don't have to get to work as early as I have
to get to the course.

This was to be the first outing for what we're calling Two-Bit Racing,
due to the numbering scheme: yesterday we were 0, 01, and 10.  Uh-huh.
The "we" there includes Miq Millman, owner of the white CS Mazda Miata
that Chris Kantarjiev and I took turns abusing for altogether something
like twelve runs yesterday.  I really really like autocrossing stock
class cars.

CS had an interesting assortment of cars, including a new Mercury
Capri, a couple of Jensen-Healeys, and one or two Porsches.  Quite a
change for me from the ES sports-sedan brigade I was used to seeing
the last time I did this.  We struck up a conversation with a nice
couple in a very pretty metallic purple (and somehow it managed not
to be a contradiction in terms) Jensen-Healey; they were a natural
for three British-car enthusiasts driving an imitation Lotus Elan
for the day.  (In fact, when I poured the woefully inadequate coffee
for Miq and Chris, who arrived at my house to caravan to the track,
I was able to hand Miq an Austin-Healey mug to represent the two and
a fraction Sprites he owns; I of course drank mine from an MG mug;
Chris had to make do with a generic Union Jack mug, since I don't
have any Triumph paraphernalia in the house.  "This is a strict BMC
household," I said, "which stands for `Bring More Coffee.'")

We had enough time to make a hurried and insufficient walk around the
somewhat disappointing course.  For starters, the timing lights for
the start were at the apex of the second turn of a right-left pair 
separated by maybe ten feet.  The rest of the course was mostly
straights and boxes, one four-cone slalom, an interesting decreasing-
radius right-hand turn disguised as the end of a fast sweeper, and 
a couple of wiggles in some straights.  Once again the Cal Expo lot
had a wealth of unused real estate in the center and a perimeter course;
at least this would contribute to the safety of the course workers.

I blew the slalom the first time out, which proved that the Miata does
in fact have more power than I'm used to in an autocrosser.  I've been
accustomed to standing on the gas and letting the GTI's nimbleness 
keep me between the cones; you can't do that on the Miata, which really
does pick up noticeably over 4000 RPM.  One cone somewhere else on course
added a disappointing couple of seconds to my scratch time.  Oh well,
first time in this car, and I haven't done this in a long time.  I'd
have lots of excuses.

Other interesting features: from years of Fahrvergnuegen, I'm accustomed
to sneering at inside rear wheel lift.  (The E Prod car's welded diff 
does about as good a job as the E Stock car's FWD, if you think of it.)
On the Miata, even with its limited-slip differential, lifting an 
inside rear wheel causes a lot of noise with little motion, at least
till the car settles back down and you start to take off again.  The
decreasing-radius turn at the end of the sweeper made that really clear.

After the sweeper there was a sort of back stretch with a few more
dislocations that ended up being more challenging than they had appeared
on the walkthrough.  They definitely helped me get a feel for the brakes
on the Miata, which have a tremendous amount of power assist but which
do slow the car nicely once you figure out how softly you must touch
them to avoid lockup.  (No, there's no ABS on this one.)

It was at least a fun day for all of us, and educational as well.  Miq
learned two lessons that day: one was not to forget your SCCA card in a
far-away-from-home event, because you'll have to pay the extra fee and
you won't be allowed to run for points.  The other was not to quit driving
at full-blast for anything but a red flag.  He blew the slalom in an
exciting way, mowing down the last cone in such dramatic fashion (he's
only put 1000 miles on the car himself, so we were all suffering from
novice's disease to some degree or other) that he was sure he'd DNF.  So
since it was his car, and he had to drive it home, he motored casually
back to the start-finish line -- only to find that the DNF hadn't been
reported.  Who knows, he might have been faster for having missed the
slalom...

My education consisted of an increased understanding of how much wider
the Miata is than the MGB that I normally drive.  Yes, the book says it's
ten inches wider, but I really know it's five cones wider, because that's
how many I spread over my three runs.  One in each of the first two slaloms;
at least I figured that out and cured it for my final run, slowing just a
little in the middle of the slalom to keep the whole run at a constant
speed within the limits of adhesion.  But at the start of my last run, I
picked up a cone by trying to squeeze the car into the timing lights at 
a more aggressive angle.  Too bad, because my scratch time was one of 
only three cars to break 40 seconds on that run, with a 39.793.  Oh well,
it looked like I would still be third even with the penalty, as the other
car to do a 40.793 (my adjusted time, down to the thousandth of a second)
in the third run had previously done better, and was in second anyway.

Chris learned several lessons, the most important one being the old saw
about how luck is when preparation meets opportunity.  (Chris also learned
one of my lessons from the same day, which is that the Miata needs a big
red light to tell you when it's running; he couldn't hear, in one of his
first runs, that he'd stalled it on course, while I couldn't hear that it
was running when I set out for my second run.)  Someone in the timing
booth made a mistake on Chris's last run, so he got another... and then
there was a problem on THAT run as well, so he got a fifth run.  

And he knocked me off the podium, turning a 39.5something with no cones.

I can't complain too bitterly about it; I once got to be in first place
because I had two re-runs at the beginning of a session.  Unfortunately,
I was running first in the group, so my time didn't stay at the top of
the heap.  So congratulations to Chris for a podium finish in his first
drive in a new car!  

Meanwhile, I think we're all pretty psyched about the event.  The car
still isn't completely sorted out; I mean, we have A008RSs on Panasports
and a sump full of Mobil 1, with some Redline MTL in the gearbox.  But
the shocks are non-adjutable Tokicos, the suspension alignment is as
delivered, and we haven't touched the timing.  (Unfortunately, the
book says that timing has to be 10 degrees plus-or-minus 1 degree, and
other Miata drivers say that 13.5 degrees is about the best place for
power output.  So we don't have much room to play there.)  But now Miq
has the factory service manual, so we can try playing with the suspension
settings to see if there's anything we want to do to them.  And even with
some relatively inexperienced drivers who had virtually no seat time before
the event, one of us managed third. 

Again, congratulations to Chris, and my sincerest thanks to Miq for letting
me drive the car. 

--Scott




-- 
Miq Millman   mmillman@ptdcs2.intel.com	  503 642 6139   (Aloha site)
AL4-55  Intel, 5200 NE Elam Young Parkway, Hillsboro, OR 97124-6497
See also miq@teleport.com