So awhile back i did the first drift day in the volvo with never-lift.com at brum wheels. These days are set up to be fun for anyone, in any kind of car, to come along and drift. No bullshit, no pressure, just plenty of seat time, a cheap price, good people and a good time. The track is in Birmingham, at the stock car stadium in the Birmingham Wheels complex. This track is a place a lot of people won't drift because of the high wall and no run off but its wide enough for anyone one to come and have fun without to much fear of crashing. The perfect day for my first drift day of the year!
So early the next morning i swung by to pick up a new face in Dtown but an old hand in the drift scene, Oscar. Oscar has just started the same motorsport course I'm just finishing in Derby and also has few super swedes of his own.
This track is all about line in order to link to two corners, taking a nice wide line as far down the straight as possible to manji into the next corner with no need to straighten up.
In the Volvo, you cant ever lift because it'll bog down and lose angle. So with the throttle pinned and no hand break, momentum is key. Momentum and big balls.
After this shot was taken i went into the next corner a bit fast and clipped the curbs on the inside and bent a wheel. Not much damage and I kinda like the way you can see the blue and white curb paint around the rim.
In the afternoon, the track was run in reverse and mike raised the bar by saying we should have a wall scraping comp. I was game so decided to try and clip it on the was in and out.
I managed to get within a few inches but never managed to touched the wall. Having to manji in, facing the wall the wrong way until the last minute was some of the most exciting drifting I've ever done!
Overall this was one of my most fun drift days, and at only £20 it was a bargain! Hopefully these days will be regular and more and more people will come along. I'll keep the blog up to date with Never Lift website progress.
After dropping Oscar off and parking the car up, I noticed something stinky on the back of the car.
Damn. Transmission oil.
After getting back from the never lift drift day to find oil all over the back of the car i knew something was abit, erm, broken.
So up she goes and I'm greeted with this nice big hole in my diff casing!
The crown wheel was badly scoured to, but as it was just around the edge its fine for now.
The worst part was cleaning the diff out to find this nice little hand full!
So with the diff cleaned out and the damaged double checked I had to fix it fast. I'd been invited to the Redline magazine performance test day in two days time. I managed to find another gearbox and diff combo, as they are one unit on the Volvo 340/360 range, but I didn't have time to collect and fit it.
That left only one option. Chemical metal. It wasn't an ideal fix but it held the oil and when the diff was rebuilt it span fine with no bearing damage and would last the Redline magazine day and give me enough time to collect the new gearbox and diff.
So with the car back in one piece I was ready for for an early start and a day at Santa Pod driving the handing course and running the strip.
So at the redline day i did this....
then this.....
against stuff like this....
Was a top day out, i didnt come last on the handling course and beat some bigger cars. I got a 17.6 second run on the strip to hahahah!
On the way home the diff died again and cooked the bearings and made the output shafts loose!
So new gearbox/diff unit time.
I love seeing 300s go up against bigger more expensive toys
