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On Track Development - 2022/ 2023

Any car fresh out of a restoration will need a certain amount of development to iron out all the niggles, and the Wesbank BMW was no different.

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At the first track test in January 2022, the car was very skittish and tended to waddle in a straight line. This was remedied by getting the wheel alignment done and the car proved to be a lot more stable.

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During the demonstration run at the Passion for Speed in January 2022, the drive shafts failed. Upon inspection, it was found that the driveshafts were pushing against and deforming the end plates, just enough to allow the balls in the CV joins to fall out, resulting in no drive. These were overhauled and refitted.

During the Ford and Friends event, the same thing happened again. It was then decided that the driveshafts would be replaced with proper splined driveshafts with CV joints, and this was done by Alan Poulter at SA Swiss.

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At the next track test in April 2023, the gearlever came away in my hand. The threaded adapter between the gearlever and the lever on the gearbox had sheared. This was then drilled out and a new adapter was turned. More disturbing was the oil light coming on at idle. This went off when the revved a bit, but it was sent in to be checked out. The oil pump was tested, which showed no issues. Eventually after much effort, an oil and filter change sorted out the problem.​

While the BMW was on show at BMW Menlyn it developed a sever oil leak. It was found that the lip around the top of the sump was warped, so a new lip was made and welded onto the original sump.

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The car was physically very hard to turn, especially going left. The left front wheel was too far forward and sometimes scraped against the body, so it was decided to do a proper wheel alignment. The job was given to Dave Ray, who had years of experience setting up the old Wesbank racer cars.

Once the handling was sorted, the car needed to be dyno tuned, and the car was sent to Clive Densham to be set up. He found that the car was over-fueling at high revs, which would explain the low oil pressure experienced previously. The engine oil was being thinned out by fuel. Smaller jets were installed and the car ran like never before.

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