The annual Summer Clash at Scotia Speedworld was hectic for all of us, me, the crew and Buttons. It started Thursday for me picking up my son David at the Halifax airport and heading to the track , located across from the airport.
We had to be there before 4 to put or car on display for the annual Show & Shine on Thursday from 5-9..
There were Stock Cars from a few different divisions, many Classic cars, a water bath where kids throw a baseball to hit a target that releases the latch keeping the person sitting on a seat, and if they hit the target, the person ends up in the water tank. It was a fund raiser and a few Pro Stock drivers were the targets.
It was a hot day for sure but we had to good time.
I was signing autograph cards when a lady came up to me and asked for an autograph and told me I was her favorite driver. She said she watched me race at Riverside on July 18th for the IWK250 and with our effort that night we became her favorite car to cheer for. Rachelle Reid made me feel pretty good about that. I was humbled by those kind words.
Rachelle introduced me to her finance’ Robbie Fraser. They stayed with us for a few hours and got talking to David, and before the end of lthe night, not only did we make new friends but also had an offer to help us Friday and Saturday. We gladly said yes.
Friday
David told me before he came, he wanted to practice with my car on Friday to see if he could improve it, I said yes for sure. He flew from Ontario to help his Dad a very nice gesture.
WE went through tech okay and he started practicing on our old tires, to start with. I was spotting for him and Robbie helped wherever he could. Both Chris White and Jacky Lynds were working and wouldn’t make this session, but Jack was planning on coming on Saturday. Chris came but missed most of David’s practice. The Pro Stocks had the track from 12:30 to 3:30 and I didn’t take any laps in that time.
David came in a few times and on one stop he said “these brakes suck, good pedal but they don’t slow the car down”. I told him I had been complaining about that for the past 3 years. Good hard pedal but the car doesn’t slow down.
On suggestion I was running PFC 11’s because they were cheaper, but the didn’t work, The better brake pads were the PFC-13’s, a much more aggressive pad. I ad a set that was wore quite a bit but we put them on. David said they were better but still not good enough. He also complained about the steering, how hard it was. That was the same issue we had at PEI on July 25th.
Once David was getting use to the tires we put on the new tires for final practice and he got down to a 14:667 about the same time as my fastest this year.. My fastest ever is 14:500. After practice was over it was my turn to run the 2 laps for time trials. Our best lap was a 14:85 but miles off the last cars. Four cars broke the track record with at 13:90 setting the record by Cory Hall. The Sportsman had their 100 lap race later in the evening.
We left the car and trailer at the track, and had lots to talk about on the way home.
Saturday
It was my turn to practice all day Saturday with 2 30 minute sessions and one 20 minute. Chris White, Jack Lynds, made it plus we had Shannon Riley, Justin Thompson, Robbie Fraser and Rachelle joining us again. I wanted to push myself as hard as I could to impress my son, but I spun out three times. I don’t think they were all my fault but I was having trouble steering the car again. It was very stiff but seemed better at 6000 rpm.
I got down to a 14:71 but the steering kept getting worse. When leaving the track I could hardly steer away from the retaining wall on my left side because it was almost impossible to turn right.
I went through the pits to see if anyone had a spare pump but no one had one with them. It started to racing and by 8:00 they postponed the race until Sunday.
Sunday the 250.
There was only one set of hot laps on this day and starting time was going to be 2:00. I could not steer the car backwards as I moved out of our pit stall. David had to turn the wheel for me to get the car out and then straight. I went out but the steering was impossible. When I entered the turn I could not pull the wheel to the right, it was jammed hard.. I returned to the pits and we agreed we would only go out for the fan appreciation then do a few laps and pull off. But then Darren Butcher came over with a power steering pump assembly the same as ours. We got excited and put it on. Now things were different and we felt we could race, but the steering was still locked when turning right.
We had lots of people come by our car for an autograph card, more than most teams had and some waited a while to get an autograph. I love our fans.
23 cars made up the field and yes it was discouraging we could not race but it was something we just could not find.
After introductions we got ready to start the feature.
On the green we didn’t get one lap in when cars piled up between turns 3 and 4. After the clean up we gained 4 spots but that would be it because our lap times were crazy slow and I pulled off to get out of the way.
The boys and girls made a gallant effort and we didn’t finish last, taking 18th.
Monday & Tuesday
On Monday I took the car to Auto world to have a servo installed. We knew it wasn’t the pump. I re installed our pump and asked my friends at Auto World if they could install the servo. Carrie said yes to come over in the afternoon. I was just too wore out to do it. Ryan MacDonald got it in and called me Tuesday morning saying it still wouldn’t turn. I went back home unloaded the car and called R&D. I figured I needed a new rack. I talked to Stephen Henderson and he suggested to check out the rack assembly before ordering one. I removed the assembly, removed the tie rods and took it to them. After an hour of checking a fellow came in and asked what the problem was and I told him I could not turn the car to the right. I said a little prayer that he would know. He said “you probably have a seal gone in the slave cylinder. Rob took it apart and found the seal was destroyed. We were told the hydraulic lock up I was feeling was impossible to manhandle for anyone.
We got a seal, Rob put it in and I went home happy but still concerned this would be the fix, but after two hours of me on my back and getting it all in, I am happy to say the car steers very easy now. I prayed often for this to be fixed.
I can only post one picture on this website but I have lots to show what we did. If any of you are on Facebook I put a post on there with lots of pictures. So it wasn’t a bad weekend and we made two new really nice friends, Robbie and Rachelle. They are going to PEI with us o the 29th of August.
God is good,
Thanks for visiting our site, God bless you all.