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24 Hours of Lemons cars

Car Preparation – Day 1

Now that we had the car at Dietsch Werks, we had to figure out what was wrong with. Day 1 would be all about stripping the car under Robs guidance. We started out by jacking it up and draining the coolant.

The next step was to remove the cylinder head. This was needed because the 325 is an interference engine and the broken timing belt guarantees that we have belt some valves. We disconnected all the hoses + wiring and used a forklift to lift the head out of the engine bay.

Lifting the head

Once we pulled the head off we made a surprising discovery – all the pistons had valve marks on them.… Read the rest

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24 Hours of Lemons cars

Car Pickup

After a couple of weeks of frantic paper writing things have finally cooled down enough that I can go back to writing my blog. First on the list is a series of blog posts about our preparation for the 24 hours of Lemons. Sit back and enjoy the fun. 🙂

The first and most important thing we needed to run in the Lemons was a car, not just any car, but a car that we’d be able to buy AND prep for for under $500. Looking through the results of the first race we decided that an older japanese econobox would probably be the best car to run with.… Read the rest

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24 Hours of Lemons cars

It’s alive

On Monday we finally got our Lemons car started for the first time – still need to put the cooling system on buts its a relief to finally get it running. I promise I’ll have a series of posts about the actual prep work.

It’s Alive from rnair and Vimeo.

P.S.: The smoke is just oil smoke and the unbolted exhaust – the video got cut off because my phone died on me 🙁… Read the rest

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24 Hours of Lemons cars motorsport

We’re in!

I am a huge fan of the 24 Hours of Lemons and am glad to announce that Team SFF1 has officially been accepted into the Arse-Freeze-Apalooza race to be held in Alatamont on 20-21 October. My co-drivers will be Guy Argo, Rob Dietsch, Gabriel Matus and Jyri Virkki. Since we are going to be racing an 1986 MW 325E we decided to go for a BMW F1 based team concept. Check out our accepted team concept and application:

Team Name
SFF1 BMW Sauber

Vechicle Make & model:
2008 BMW Sauber F1.08 aka renovated 1986 BMW 325 E with a broken timing belt and bent valves

Team Concept
After a fast, though unreliable, start to the 2007 Formula 1 championship, the BMW Sauber F1 team has decided that they need additional preseason testing to properly prepare the 2008 F1 car.… Read the rest

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24 Hours of Lemons cars motorsport photos videos

24 Hours of Lemons


I’ve been very interested in the 24 Hours of Lemons since I first heard about it last year and when I found out that the first race of the year was this past weekend I just had to go check it out. The Altamont Motorsports Park in Tracy, CA is the home of the race and features two ovals which are interconnected to create a road-course for the Lemons race. The cars all had to be bought and race prepped for under $500 (excluding safety gear) with a team of 4-6 drivers. Despite the name the actual racing would only go on for about 14 hours with a 10 hour break at night to let people recuperate as well as repair their cars.… Read the rest