The Ducati 749 wore a new suit to the track this time around. Although it looked great, it’s mechanical state was not quite up to to the image. It was more show than go for Sunday’s track day.
The weekend started rough and it went a little downhill from there. While finishing the dress-up on the bike (the red gas tank arrived late on Friday), Saturday, the fuel tank o-ring was damaged and required a fast trip to San Jose to get a $25 replacement o-ring. At least the dealer had it in stock and I was able to get the bike back together in time to pull into Monterey for our pre-track-day dinner.
The first break in my routing was not unloading my truck on arrival. Once back from dinner it was 10:15 PM, I found that someone had pulled up next to me in the space I’d planned to setup my gear. There didn’t seem to be much point in unloading in the paddock at that point, so.. off to sleep I went:
Dawn comes early in Monterey, and despite my original setup plans foiled, equipment was unloaded and the bike was plugged into the generator to start warming up the tires:
With the rest of the crew arriving, we got the bikes into tech.
Dr. Johnny debut his newly refurbished track bike. He’s a happy camper, as you can tell!
Unfortunately, when unloading my 749, I noticed that the bike seemed difficult to move around. After some fiddling around we discovered that one of the front brakes was dragging pretty badly. My first session was going to be spent taking apart the left front caliper.
My pal Isaac was able to score a ride on the damn fine SuperLeggera owned by the track organizer. He was very impressed at the handling.. I guess light
I was eventually able to get the brakes handled and the bike on the track for the last couple of sessions of the day. Things went OK, but it seemed the brake was starting to drag again, so I packed it in; we all loaded up and headed for home.
Absolutely a day of ups and downs… so.. let’s start off where the day did.
Having just finished putting the truck back together again, it was time for a really good test drive. This time I picked Hwy 17. A 16 miles windy trek over the 1,814ft. Patchen Pass in the Santa Cruz Mountains (the epicenter of the 1989 World Series Earth Quake, mistakenly associated with San Francisco, 40+ miles to the North). Hwy 17 displayed on Google Earth
The old dog handled the mountain with ease. Passing slower vehicles on the steep climb was a non-event. Considering the type of vehicle, it handled the curves quite confidently.
Once in San Jose, first top was Club Auto Sport, where my trainer Isaac has his facility (Fit for Speed). Had a great workout, then headed out into the sun to start running some errands while in The Valley.
First stop was Harbor Freight to check out the finest in Chinese manufactured crap for American consumption.
The truck will need a set of wheel chocks, and these were on sale for $40 each, so I grabbed a pair. Don’t know much about them, but hopefully they are not complete crap.
Also needed was some rubber flooring for the back. The original plan (as you might have seen in the previous post) was to carpet all 14′ of the van. After some discussion with some other track junkies I know, a change of specification to rubber flooring was made. This stuff was not very expensive, so I picked up 4 rolls (enough to cover 6′ x 8′) of the stuff on the left ($38 total).
Next up are some ramps. These on the left are 8′ long and rated at 500 lb each. Nothing I own weighs more than that, and made in steel, they seemed stout enough for my purposes. A pair is $72, and that fits the budget nicely.
Ramps, rubber and sundries loaded up and ready for the next stop. However I spent so much time in Harbor Frieght, I needed to get rolling back home to complete some software projects. So.. heading to the dealer for a spare key and the RV shop to look for lighting, will have to wait.
And waiting I would be doing. A lot of it as a matter of fact. Not far out of Los Gatos I began to lose power, followed quickly by a batter light and a vivid reminder of my breakdown on Hwy 1. Recalling how suddenly, and with little warning it died last time, I found the first decent turnoff on the little mountain highway I could find, shut it down and… just felt pretty damn deflated.
Having just a few days before upgraded my insurance policy on the van to something called “Full Roadside Coverage” I ran up my insurance company and for the first time in my 50 years of life, tried out Road Side Assistance.
Very long day/story short.. they dispatched a flat bed heavy-duty tow rig from Santa Cruz, and said that the distance to back to town (about 22 miles) was ALL COVERED. I asked the operator if I could get it towed to my personal shop, and she said I’m covered for up to 26 miles, the distance to the nearest Mercedes Dealership that can service the rig. Excellent (considering I’m getting towed).
The tow truck driver was a nice enough guy. We talked cars and trucks all the way back through the hellish commute traffic (It was 3:00PM by the time we started rolling up the hill). As stated, they transported me all the way to my West Side garage, we unloaded and I put the van way for the next round of repairs.. :/
Unloaded all my stuff from the back….
Then unpacked the ramps to give check out the length and angle.
The deck height on the sprinter is 2′ 3″… which.. is pretty darn low for a vehicle capable of carrying 5000 lb. of cargo. I might have liked to have 10′ ramps, I’m not 100% sure I’m strong enough to reliably get the bike into the truck solo… (perhaps a winch is in my future?). But I’m going to go with these for now. The ramps also have holes in the sides and top that I could use to bring them together and make a nice solid platform for getting two bikes up into the truck, walking along side them.
There is a lot more experimentation to do, but for now.. I have to do some research and figure out WHY this things seems to be eating alternators like a kid loose in a candy shop after hours. Something just aint Right.
Another day, another pile of pictures. Today was more of a ‘get things done’ day than the rest. Here is how things are looking:
Removing the flooring
Having already removed the rear 8′ section, to find that the van’s floor already has sound damping material laid out upon it. Awesome! 😀 This means a lot less expense in re-doing the floor, since that won’t have to be done.
It was quite a mess under the flooring, so some multi-purpose cleaner and brush were put to work cleaning things up.
Starting the application of the sound deadening material to the wheel wells. First sections were easy enough, the sides, not so easy though.
In the following image, you can see the channels where passenger seat brackets would bolt to the floor. A cargo van this is, obviously those parts are not in place. They are on my list of things to do when converting this to my version of a Toy Hauler.
Next up was a mounting system for a navigation solution. I was shown this cool system at a local car audio shop, so I bought 3 (one for each car)!
I’m not ready to pony up for dedicated GPS, and I had this Android table with celluare LTE that cost me 99cents… and it was just looking for a good home. Now it will have one.
Below is what the mount looks like. Just a magnetic pad with a rubber fact to keep the device from moving around too much.
For now, the Android phablet thingy will be powered from a 12v lighter adapter. When I get a new head unit installed with USB power, this cable will be hard-wired into the dash, or some other more suitable solution. As is, it’s within reach, has power, and is ready to nav!
Adding one of the little steel plates by my iPhone, it too can serve as navigation, audio source, entertainment, whatever need be. This is the coolest product for using mobile devices in a car that I’ve seen yet!
Barely, but it does fit. Now to paraphrase Quinn “You’re going to need a bigger garage.”. It would seem so… or external storage lot (there are a few around).
Bought this fancy Magic Eraser thing to try and remove the plethora of hideous graphics on the van. It was $14 at the local auto parts store, I bought both of the ones they had. Sorry, didn’t take a photo of it, yet.
After a few hours of grinding off decals from the driver’s door.. it’s looking just a tiny bit better!
Taking a break from vinyl / decal / sticker removal, I started to measure out the interior of the van for how things are might fit. First was measuring off the back doors to see how far the track bikes will intrude into the cargo area (7′ 6″ minimum). The black line is where it will likely end.
Van has a cargo floor with several anchor points. Good for hauling gear, bad for adding a 2nd seat row as I’m currently planning.
With a lot of 10 year old halogen lighted vehicles, the plastic lenses age, yellow and during into little more than a diffuser. Not good for night time driving. A kit was “On Sale” at a chain auto parts store (I later saw it for the exact same product at another locally owned parts store for the same daily price).
About an hour of sanding on both lights and polishing netted a decent result. I think I need to spend more time working on these lights, it’s still not a like-new effect.
Much more work to be done to bring this thing back to a more presentable condition.
It’s January 1, 2015. Not only is it a new day, and a new year, but a new project.
It’s Project Track Truck. Prepping for the next season of track days begins now, with the end of a 3 month search for the desired track vehicle. After much deliberation, waffling, searching (including writing software to find these elusive beasts at less than insane prices), missing out deals…. I finally (think) I have it.
A 2004 Dodge Sprinter 3500 Long WB, High Roof, Extended Box. Yeap, it’s as big as big and heavy duty as they came in 2004.
With a GVW Rating of 9990 lb., this is just a couple of happy meals shy of a commercial vehicle. Powered by a 154 HP, 5-cylinder diesel engine (yes, it’s forced induction by way of turbocharger). It’s no sports car, and it’s also not very pretty. In fact, I believe the first words out of the Mrs. mouth were: “Holy crap, that thing is ugly. Have you lost your mind?”
Perhaps… but it’s my mind to lose (I think), and this is how I plan to do it.
2004 Dodge Sprinter 3500
Cleaning it up
Later in the day, I assembled a crack cleaning crew, consisting of myself and my 12 y.o. son. We embarked upon a clean-up effort to remove the gruesome letting from the van.
After nearly 4 hours of labor, a trip to the hardware store, and some failed ideas.. we were able to mostly clean up the passenger door and the two rear doors.
It might not seem like much, but it was some progress, and even though I might still shudder when visible in daylight, for now, at the moment, at night… with poor lighting.. it almost looks OK.
