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EAST FORTUNE 19/20 APRIL 2008

After the fiasco of Knockhill in its winter splendour we hoped for better conditions at East Fortune for our second meeting. We got there in the early evening and parked up in a spot reserved for us by Team IC Racing who also rapidly assisted in unloading the lorry and erecting the awning – thankyou! We plugged in to the new silent generator in the paddock and settled in for the night.

We were scrutineered on Saturday morning and after a short delay while they rallied enough marshals, we were ready to get in our first practice. This was the first run of the new engine, the first run with the altered fairing and the first run with new brake pads so we set off with a little trepidation. There was a good turnout of sidecars with 23 entered, roughly half F1 and half F2. The first practice went quite smoothly and we gently bedded in the new brake pads. Then we got a qualifying session coming in with a fastest lap of 1m 12s which put us in 12th position. The track was cold and most sidecars were about 2s slower with lack of traction. Alan Shand had been watching our qualifying session and thought that the outfit was too highly geared as we were barely getting into top gear before braking for the first corner. We decided to lower the gearing over the lunch break.

It was nice to catch up with Brenda Mitchell from Digby Brown Solicitors, who are sponsoring Douglas Racing as well as several solo bike racers, in a year which sees them launch their new Motorcycle Law Department.
The first race came after lunch. We set off with great enthusiasm only to find we were struggling to keep ground. We kept going to finish 12th. When we pulled back in to the paddock Kerr explained that he couldn’t get up through the gears and we had completed the race stuck in 3rd and 4th gear.

There had to be something wrong with the quickshifter again and we spent the rest of the evening replacing and checking each component. Thanks are due to everyone who made helpful suggestions and especially Ralph who was press ganged into changing the switch having confessed to having an interest in auto electrics.

Unfortunately this was not the case and we spent each race on Sunday going out for the warm up lap and coming straight back in, making alterations and trying again. The quickshifter would change gear without hesitation when driving round the paddock but simply would not operate under load. The final conclusion after many sleepless nights has to be that the Techtronic box which interrupts the signal to the coils, momentarily cutting the ignition allowing the gear to change up, must be the faulty component. Klicktronic have kindly sent us a replacement and we hope to be cured before Knockhill. It has been a rapid introduction to electrical engineering and we are learning fast. Thanks to MacGregors Industrial Supplies for providing a circuit tester which should make the job easier.

Best wishes to you all
Kerr and Jen

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