Been an interesting month or so with the car. Good, bad and the ugly you might say.
The good....the car performed well on a few track days the last few months, Castle Combe on Friday just gone was excellent fun and really enjoying the track at the moment as well as being less than 30 minutes drive makes it ideal.
Going to take me a while to get the confidence to really push on as it's tight and no run off anywhere so instruction is key at the moment. Had Erling Jensen (got some interesting stories!) in the car a few times instructing and he's been excellent so hoping to continue that. Didn't realise he was connected to the Button's at first, should have guessed, but he's got a very smooth driving style which I'm a fan of.
The not so good stuff....before the track day, typically, had a few issues crop up at far too short notice to sort before going. First was a suspension type knocking noise that appeared to start a few days before Combe, seemed to be coming from the engine bay / suspension area so checked everything was tight and nothing loose, all seemed ok so was a bit of a mystery. Only seemed to happen with lock on the steering wheel and hitting bumps at the same time. Still, a bit unnerving when giving it some round a track as wasn't really sure what it was though there were no handling issues and the knocking didn't happen while on track, smooth(ish) surface I guess.
Anyway, had a brain wave the next day and remembered the cross braces in the engine are known for coming loose even though they don't appear to be by hand even after yanking the crap out of it to check. Got a wrench on the bolt nearest the firewall and sure enough, it was a bit loose. Tightened it up to spec and problem solved. Annoying, but glad it wasn't anything more serious. Which is just as well as.....
The ugly.....don't think I've ever come across this before but...a day before the track day whilst doing some data logging for the AlphaN tune, I noticed a fairly substantial leak of oil in the engine bay, not terrible but more than a misting for sure. Seemed to be coming from the VANOS / chain tensioner area. Considered the crush washer on the tensioner as a usual suspect and nipped it up a tiny bit but pretty sure it wasn't that as been done recently and wouldn't start leaking that much oil all of a sudden.
Took it for a quick drive, still a leak so not that. Bit confused at this point as it had some work done on the VANOS a few months ago and it's been fine. It did seem a bit wet under the VANOS though so checked the mounting bolts and problem found immediately, one of the bolts was loose and couldn't get any torque on it. Took it out and yup, thread in the engine stripped
The trusty VANOS strikes again.
At this point I'm considering cancelling the track day, as never getting that fixed at short notice but wouldn't get a refund on the day and far too short notice to sell the day on, this is literally the afternoon before it. So as a bodge to try and salvage something, put a little Loctite on the bolt and put as much torque on the bolt as possible before it started slipping. It did at least hold a reasonable amount, not to spec (10nm) but at least enough that it wasn't just loose. Loctite being a slightly nuclear option is less than ideal but with it needing a proper repair with I guess a helicoil or time-sert it was worth a try.
Seemed to improve the leak slightly so it was more of a drip but still not great and no idea how bad it would get on a hot day at Combe. Although cheesed off at my luck, decided to go anyway as nothing to lose and if it started leaking badly could just call it, grab some beers and head home to drown my sorrows. Waste of a booking fee but these things happen. So packed a litre of oil in the tool bag and hoped for the best.
Got up nice and early on Friday to get there in plenty of time, just as well as the main road to Combe through Yatton Keynell was closed due to a serious accident that morning. I know the area fairly well, I didn't really know an alternative route though from that point and no getting away from the fact it's mostly surrounded by tight country roads so reluctantly followed Google.
Big mistake, as the tightest single track road possible was the alternative and it was horrific, I think Combe specifically say not to use this road for track access as I found out later, especially for trailers and as everyone else seemed to be using this route it was chaos. What should have been a 25 minute trip was about an hour. Lots of stand off's with cars coming the other way, no where really to pull in apart from in a hedge to give way. Barely a road designed for car's to be honest let alone anything else.
Genuinely considered turning round and going home, seemed like a cursed day at this point, but as couldn't turn round anyway
stuck with it and the flatbed in front of me sort of acted as a parting of the waves and everyone coming the other way reversed miles to get out of his way. A bit of luck I guess but still, not a good start.
After eventually getting there, to add to my already pretty strained mood, it was a proper scorchio day on Friday. Not unexpectedly of course but must've peaked at around 30+ degrees and it was pretty uncomfortable at times with relentless sun and no cloud cover. Not great for the car, not great for me
. Topless was order of the day for most the paddock by lunch time and the GoPro had also had enough, couldn't get it to turn on as it'd overheated before even taking a video, useful. Roof up was the only slight respite, GoPro recovered enough in the marginal shade of the roof to turn on. And no, the aircon doesn't work, never had it re-gassed as never felt the need to, might reconsider that decision!
Despite the moaning so far, driven by the various events of the previous 24 hours taking the pee, there was a much more positive side. After a few gentle and slightly nervy sessions in the morning with unknown knocking and oil leak included, the car seemed fine and although running pretty hot pretty quickly, the leak seemed to be more a slow drip and wasn't loosing barely any oil. I was checking the level religiously before lunch and had hardly lost anything, didn't even need a top up with it reading just below maximum on the dipstick.
So finally, a bit of luck and could relax a bit and start to enjoy the day despite getting burnt to a crisp and everything stinking of sun cream, putting a helmet on was pretty grim!
It might seem a bit foolhardy to crack on with these issues but I was uber careful feeling things out and checking the oil and you know when something feels off and it frankly didn't hence I carried on. A small risk sure, but I didn't feel I was putting myself, the car or more importantly anyone else at risk. No more than what usually exists on a track day anyway.
I kept sessions to a maximum of 15 minutes but in honesty the car was fine and could've taken more, even the tyres didn't get too wrecked despite them feeling squirmy pretty quickly in the peak of the heat, something most were suffering from talking to the guys parked around me apart from a few of the slick shod guys.
Was a proper friendly day though, had some laughs with an E92 M3 parked near me and an MG (B) I think it was, lovely vintage car and good chats in between sessions.
Overall was a good day once there, and the S54 keeps going despite 115k miles on it and still impresses. The carbon box sounds amazing of course. James Redish brought a Z3M with a carbon airbox at the end of the day which when we blasted past together sounded pretty epic I was told, no videos of that sadly.
The bolt issue is just bad luck I think, the VANOS has been on and off this car so many times I'm almost not surprised it's happened given it's an aluminium thread. I'll still always say, if your VANOS isn't broke don't mess with it, it's by far caused me the most issues out of anything on the car in the last 10 years since it's first 'removal' and wasted a ton of money to boot. I could well be on my 3rd unit come the end of the year and I don't think there was really anything wrong with my original. Live and learn.
Now I've just got to find someone who can fix it preferably before the end of summer. I've made some enquiries with Darragh at EM3's which is looking hopeful, also big shout out to Wassup on here who's been really helpful
top chap!
Just realised this is more of a diary entry
but I guess that's kind of what this thread is for as my car is nowhere near interesting enough to start it's own thread!
Few pics and a video filmed on a potato just to get an idea of the sound, will use my phone next time I think. Added a quick video of in car as well though it's a bit of a cheat as the mic is in the engine bay
the noise at full chat is just incredible 
North West Surrey
