Success!!!!! I finally after 2 somthing years of failing, had wonderful success. Races were on the 29th and 30th and I was there. I raced 6 times over the weekend, 25 laps or about 8 miles of racing. The sled turns so so well and is very competitive, from egts im quite rich up top, but that was expected. My clutching is nearly dialed in and holds at 7800rpm (on the colder day, when the engine was running less rich, the clutch was at a higher rpm (7900) than the day before so when I get the sled a little leaner, I should be right at 8000-8100 rpm). The sled runs at about 155 water temp and 850-900 egts (want them to be 1000-1100)
Overall, very little broke on the sled this weekend, actually, nothing broke. However, on the first day, I was struggling to launch the sled and noticed that the rear end seemed a bit lower than it was supposed to, due to the timing between races though, I didn't have any time to fix it. Later that night l realized that the rear suspension was actually completely compressed, bound up somewhere. The next morning (-4 degrees) I got up early and did some rear suspension work, I was able to heat up some components and it popped back into its full travel. I also gave myself some more rear travel and put more track on the ground for traction. I thought that maybe because the sled was so low that the ice forming on the joints was locking it up. For the first race, I launched perfectly, i was headed into the second corner tied for second, but another rider crashed and a restart was called, the second launch was terrible, the same as the day before and I had to fight through the pack to get 4th overall, if I had been able to launch like I did for the first launch I would have placed very well. Coming back into the pits I realized that my rear suspension was completely collapsed again, but I didn't have enough time before my next final to fix it. Heading out to my next race I was planning on just making due with the problem because it was my last race of the weekend. However the sled had different plans. There is an entrance to the track before the track and as I was about to turn left onto the track, I lost steering. Thankfully this happened before I was heading into a corner at 70. Later I discovered that my lower bushing bolts had backed out, a simple fix and a reminder to bolt check and locktight. After much video watching I realized that I was actually riding on the lube tank for almost every race, due to the suspension being collapsed. I will be taking it apart this week but I have a feeling I know what's happening, ive read the the rear mono shock can become unusable after years, I have another one to swap on if this is the case.
Race standings:
Day 1
1st race 5th out of 6 (race 1 and 2, no cool down, back to back)
2nd race: 4th out of 7
3rd race: 3rd out of 4 advance to finals
Last chance qualifiers day 1:
4th race: 4th out of 6
5th race: 1st out of 3!!! Advanced to finals
Day 2 finals
1st race: 4th out of 9
2nd race: dnf
The next race is coming up soon and I'm excited to be very competitive