Group W Racing

I’m looking for a 160 frame,engine,and what have you. My daughter wants to start racing this coming season and the boss says I can work on it in the back of the shop.

Thanks, Frank

Mick Hart (he’s that super friendly really fast guy from Canada eh) has (had) a solid 160 motor for sale.

The motor has sold to Joseph in Kirkland.  Congratulations Joseph – it’ll be a good motor for you.

His description:

It has new 2mm over pistons 175 cam kibbelwhite valves & springs new cam chain etc and comes with 22mm keihin carbs. It has polished cases as well. It has run 8 races.

He’s asking $750, which in my opinion with the inclusion of the carbs is a more than screamin’ deal. Anyone thinking of putting together a 160 racer should probably just buy a solid motor like this rather than put one together from scratch.  It’s definitely cheaper.  If any of you want I can give you retail prices for some of the parts that are listed so you can see what a good deal that is, even aside from the labor required to assemble the parts.

There’s one more race weekend up here this year, October 3/4. I hope as many of you as possible will make it. Sure would be nice to see some Portland racers.

There seems to be a whole lot of energy about these days for 160/175 racing. AHRMA seems interested in attempting to find a west coast venue for a round next year.

We’re certainly planning on trying to outdo ourselves at next year’s SOTP weekend at Seattle. Hopefully we’ll chase down some sponsors and have more stuff to give away that weekend. Please feel free to pitch in on preparations and planning!

There will likely be a kart track day on Friday before the race weekend again, and lots of great racing with good friends. If you didn’t make it this year plan on making it next year for sure.

Michael

Check out the Blue Rocket in front of Doug Polen’s GP garage at Miller. He even had his riding school brochures on the seat! Racing with Doug was a blast! He is “ohmygawd” fast on the 175, grinding all the way through a set of boots in just 6 laps!

Craig Haggart has a 160 evangelizing “tract” he hands out at the track to unsuspecting victims. I’ve posted it in the category “articles” here for anyone to pick up and run with.

It’ll at least give you some ideas for something similar for your own area –

Michael

The first of the pics from the Miller weekend are starting.  These are by Corey Levenson as forwarded by Ivan.

http://www.pbase.com/coreyl/bonnevillegp_2009&page=all

There are a few shots of 160s in there, and some of them I couldn’t identify from the results listed on mylaps.com.   Can anyone identify the bikes/owners?  For instance – who’s number 139?

Michael

Here’s one part on your engine that is critical to it’s life:

The oil filter rotary joint.  Know it, love it…

This joint needs to be carefully inspected every time you change the oil.  You should be cleaning the oil filter every oil change as well.  Pull the oil filter cover on the right side and check out the spring loaded rotary joint.  Make sure it’s in good shape and the spring is not messed up or catching on anything.  The rotary joint piece should be nice and springy, and also nice and smooth where it bears on the oil filter cap.

Then check out the part of the cap that the rotary joint runs on.  You want to make sure it’s flat and smooth.  If the rotary joint is eating it’s way into the cap you’ll soon have trouble.

And the trouble?  Generally the cam, lifters and  cam bearings suffer first from the lack of oil pressure.  Not good - it generally makes a pretty big mess.

This is usually a pretty trouble free part – but needs regular inspection as the consequences of it having any trouble are so dire.

It’s probably also worth noting that we usually replace the 6mm phillips screw that holds the cap in with a 6mm allen bolt the same length.  Als0 – you should be using blue loctite on that bolt as you really don’t want it coming loose.

And finally – after you remove the 6mm bolt holding on the cam you can use an 8mm bolt as a puller to remove the cap – the inside of the little boss that the 6mm bolt passes through is threaded 8mm.  Screw in an 8mm allen bolt and it will eventually start pushing on the end of the crank and push that little cap right out.

Cheers -

Michael

At http://www.mylaps.com/results/showevent.jsp?id=469439

Way to go everyone!

Top 5 from saturday LeMans race:

1 – Polen
2 – Mick Hart
3 – Tim O’Mahony
4 – Joe Pethoud
5 – Andrew Gray

Saturday 200GP

1 – Mick Hart
2 – Tim O’Manony
3 – Jack Parker
4 – Mike Polkaba
5 – Andrew Gray

Saturday 250 GP

1 – Paul Germain
2 – Mick Hart
3 – Jack Parker
4 – Tim O’Mahony
5 – Stephen Gillen

Sunday LeMans Race

1 - Mick Hart
2 – Mike Polkaba
3 – Tim O’Mahony
4 – Joe Pethoud
5 – Andrew Gray

Sunday 200GP

1 – Mick Hart
2 – Mike Polkaba
3 – Jack Parker
4 – Tim O’Mahony
5 – Lanny Henderson

Sunday 250GP

1  – Paul Germain
2 – Ralph Hudson
3 – Mick Hart
4 – Mike Polkaba
5 – Pete Derosa

Michael

Check this out – Aaron got a chance to ride King Kenny’s beast TZ750 flat track bike:

http://blogs.motorcyclistonline.com/6574586/events/falling-flat-on-my-back-at-the-indy-flat-track/index.html

Michael

Here’s more from Ari  – the article on Motorcyclist online about racing the 350 at VIR – http://www.motorcyclistonline.com/features/122_0909_legacy_racing_part_2_vir/index.html

Very cool video in that article – someone out here should get that setup and start recording our races like that.

Michael