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Tel's Tales 043– 2015 Season- Rockingham 22nd March 2015 Well this was it, the start of the new 2015 season for 12 Westfield guys to clear the cobwebs and prove that their winter mods worked and their driving had not gone rusty over the winter period. It was clear that any New Year's Resolutions in terms of dieting and losing weight (rather than paying for more bhp!) had been long forgotten and last years overalls were still a skin tight fit for some. So there was 1 class A, 4 class B, 1 class C, 3 class D, 2 class F and 1 class G car. Like many drivers I had a very early start at 0415hrs which was the bad news but the good news was that a dry warm day was forecast and that turned out to be a big plus for chasing target times. The most frustrating part of the day was as we approached the circuit nobody could find the entrance as Sat Navs wanted to use non existent roads or take us through a factory gate! At one time there were 7 cars and trailers driving up and down a double carriageway and the roundabouts trying to find the correct route, which we eventually managed after a few swear words about missing road signs etc. After parking up in the paddock and in my case a spare garage, a few of us did the long track walk and looked warily at the concrete outer wall and talked about the possible speed on the outer oval and whether we would dare to keep our foot down all the way round the banked corner. The infield section looked wide but tricky particularly near the end. Scrutineering seemed to take forever and drivers briefings had to be done twice in order to accommodate all 146 competitors. Eventually we all stared a convoy run at about 1000hrs and tried to find where the good/best lines were on track which is not easy at a reduced speed. Martin Harvey was showing off his new bling bits in the form of a coloured Bell helmet and Hans device whist I had to get used to my new Sparco helmet in plain white. Pete Goulding was hoping his diff would not try to shake its bolts free and his halfshafts would be strong enough. Dry track and getting warmer by the minute greeted everyone with a chance to put on a couple of good practices. I was going to have a good personal battle with Pete who had done well last year and I was indeed fastest in P1 with 74.74secs with Pete chasing and second fastest on 79.55secs. Most people were in the low 80 secs bracket and enjoying the track although later in the day a driver did hit the wall hard and wrote off their car with big front end damage. In P2 I had put my new tyres and changed the geometry and expected great things. Pete G showed me how to do it with 76.03secs run with Matin Harvey in class B pushing hard with 81.33 secs. Approaching the start line I noticed somke coming from my dash and jumped out to check what was wrong. One burnt finger later showed that the ignition/starter toggle switch was shorting so that was soon sorted. I then set off like a bat out of hell but got caught out at the end of the start straight and could not take the corner and went straight over the rumble strip and the yellow concrete ramp behind it..........I was lucky that I only bent the offside steering arm and this gave me massive toe out. Back in the paddock and all was fixed in 15 mins and the toe geometry reset and the rear bar stiffened up a bit to counter the understeer I had. Lots of Westfield spectators turned up including John and Jane Loudon, Barry Slingsby and his missus, Keith Adams, Mark Bishop and a few others. Poor Stephen Herbert suffered damaged nosecone when a Ferrari driver reversed into his car while in the paddock!!!!!! Timed runs started after lunch and the weather was great with the track getting warmer by the minute. There were no major incidents that I am aware of apart from John Walters noticing some strange marks on a couple of his ZZR tyres but they were safe to run. T1 and T2 times were very similar for most people and John Williams was happy with his time in class A whilst the close battle in B ended up with Martin Harvey winning on 81.33secs followed by very closely by newcomer Barny Francis with 81.66sec, John Walters 81.84 secs and Lee Smith 82.29secs so all very tight. During a break between T1 and T2 a few of us were chatting and trying to convince Lee not to be a “wuss” and keep it flat through banked oval as he had he bottled it in T1 and in T2 he took the hint and kept his foot down reaching 125mph ! John Williams said his aerodynamics were affected by wind getting trapped in a gap under his scuttle.....I assured him that we all suffered from trapped wind from time to time and I added that to my list of excuses for going slow! Graham Frankland in class C was on his own and record a good 88.00secs on his last run. In class D the battle had raged all day and ended with Steve Everall winning (well done our kid) with an impressive 78.77secs, Stephen Herbert close with 79.95secs and Howard Gaskin on 80.48secs. Pete Goulding in Class F scored a max 102 points with a time of 75.73secs whilst I bagged the quickest Westfield run with a time of 74.31secs. A fantastic start to the season and good points scored in the championship. Terry Everall Speed Series Correspondent Class G competitor

More pictures from yesterday, beware you might need to wear an anorak at this point as 'Julie Tourist Information' is unleashed. For those that might have wondered why we did a circuit of Alstonefield, it was so you could see the 7ft high T-Rex, look carefully it's in the centre of the picture. The big lump of rocks to our left was The Roaches. The pimple on top of the hill in the centre of the photograph is Soloman's Temple, Buxton. And lastly, you will be glad, is the first meeting point in Ashbourne.

I thought I would add a picture. I have to say I'd love to do it again.

The next Horsepower at the Hall event called 'April Powers' is on Saturday 4th April, 9am - 12. It is at Doddington Hall, Lincoln, LN6 4RU. Weather permitting I will be going. I will be meeting at MacDonolds, Barlborough on Junction 30 of the M1, aiming to leave there at 8am. As last time bring me 40p for the toll bridge and I will pay the money in one go so we can all get through easily. The Morgan Club are coming this time too. If the weather is nice I was told there is a Marina close by and we could maybe go for lunch there, or I am open to suggestion. Who is coming?

I'm busy rebuilding the battery pack with half the battery cells to reduce weight. While this is ongoing I thought I might share my dyno results from last year and talk a bit about electric power verses petrol power. The following graph shows power and torque against road speed. Remember the car has no gearbox. The motor is directly coupled to the diff. You can see that the graph ends at about 80mph. This was due to a software speed limit bug which was fixed before the sprint events. I have added dotted lines to show how the graph should look. Actual top speed is about 110mph. In any event you can see the flat torque curve starting from zero speed and then progressively reducing once the power limit is reached. The power limit of 120KW (from the battery) is reached at 53mph and is constant until just before 110mph. The manufacturers quoted figure for electric cars is usually the battery discharge power. This is easy to measure since it is just battery amps multiplied by battery volts. The Westfield peak battery discharge figure is 120KW or 160bhp. But - the dyno graph shows actual power delivered at the wheels to be 118bhp or 88KW!! Although electric drive trains are more efficient than petrol engines they are still inefficient. Petrol engines achieve about 33% efficiency, by comparison the electric motor and power controller combination are together about 80% efficient. Thus 160bhp x 0.80= 128bhp. Add the differential and tyre inefficiencies and 118bhp at the wheels seems about right. It turns out this is typical for electric vehicles at full power. In general you can take the published electric car 'power' in KW and convert it to bhp at the wheels directly. So a 100KW car is probably putting out about 100bhp at the wheels. Overall, motor efficiency is strongly affected by the motor speed and load and can get up to 95%( ish) under mid range loads and speeds and down to 65% at low speed and high torque. As the graph shows, above 53mph, full power is always available. Conversely, below 53mph power is progressively lower but torque is constant. Thus on short circuits like Curborough max power is seldom reached. The 0-60 time is unimpressive at 7.5 seconds but once up to full power the car really seems to accelerate relentlessly. It's a bit like driving in top gear all the time. Also, unlike most electric road cars, the Westfield accelerates through 80 mph at full power. This makes the car feel much more responsive at high speed than most EVs since these are usually speed limited to about 85mph. The Tesla is an exception to this. It's also worth noting that the Westfield is continuously rated at these power and torque levels. The battery was designed for the 200KW Westfield iRacer and the motor is good for another 47KW with a peak of 167KW. Most 'fast' electric car manufacturers will over drive the motor and battery for short durations to get the rapid acceleration they are known for. Push these cars too hard and the torque output will automatically limit to prevent overheating. It would be interesting to try a Nissan Leaf or a Tesla around a racetrack to test this. I suspect most EVs would start to limit well before the end of a lap - including the Tesla. Since the Westfield Sport E electrical power system is not stressed when raced there appears to be considerable scope to tune this car for higher performance.

Ahead of the first Essex blat of the year, I managed to get the Westfield washed and polished to match the shinny new wheels.

Sounds like it's due a comeback

You have impeccable taste Pete - same as mine :-p

It retired from sprinting at the end of 2011 having done 17 seasons of being double driven with my father.

Yes please Do you have something to put it in to protect it whilst on show...? We did, thanks Mark

Cadwell is awesome, I'll be back for sure!

Black looks nice on a red car, matches the cycle wings

Results for Rockingham have now been posted. Looked like a lovely day, or it was when I was in the garage today in Essex That's probably why there are so many 102's today. !! Results for Rockingham - Overall Results -

Just had to renew my membership to post the only pic I got yesterday...... great run out Julie, shame Donna missed it.

That's very similar to what I use Adam; should be in every Westfield owners tool kit!

2 feet???I thought tiggers had 4 paws and a spring in their tail!

No, some of the target times are mixed up so take no notice of them for now. Castle Combe & Rockingham are now correct, i'll post Rocky's now.

Car looks lovely Mark GLWS

Sorry Julie I couldn't resist as it did make us laugh. Remember we come for the entertainment as much as the driving and we get that in spades with you, Glen and Tricky Stu is right we must do it again soon. Thanks to all who turned up today it was good to meet you, hope to see you next time Martyn and Sue

A good turn out for our run to Llandudno

A week before I bought the ASBO last year (with me being a cynical chap) I thought to myself " better get some breakdown cover " so I made a guys day at the supermarket and purchased a years worth of the RAC's finest peace of mind....... then got my Quote from Adrian Flux, paid and sat back to wait for the documentation, 2 maybe 3 days and it arrived, "what's this Flux Rescue?" i said on the phone to them, they said "it's included in the policy sir"...... I specifically asked "have I paid extra for this?"..... "No sir, it's included in the policy"..... so kicked my own rear for jumping the gun and buying the RAC package.... A whole year later and not a beat missed from the ASBO I told the RAC not to renew me as I get some great cover with my Insurance policy......, then get the renewal. Itemised listing...... 'Flux Rescue £36'..... "Eh say's I"...... Ring up and ask why I've got to pay for it this year, "you paid for it last year sir"........ In short they Bundled me and I caught them at it, I raised a complaint today and told them if they wanted me to renew they would give me a years Rescue for free..... There was a superb customer service lady who listened to me very carefully and hey presto they agreed with me and I'm a happy bunny once more..... Victory is mine..... all mine..... Nem..............

Last year after seeing a photo of a Caterham stuffed under some Armco on the internet and being horrified by just 4 x 8mm bolts through fiberglass holding my windscreen away from my face I started making some phone call about buying a cage For one reason or another I could not buy one off the shelf, have a delivery date or I would have to trail the car halfway across the country then do the same trip a few weeks later to pick up the car again With this in mind I started looking at retaining my RAC bar for its integrity and adding a forward loop of my own construction DISCLAIMER Don't do this if you don't know how to weld or doubt your ability. Treat it as information I no nothing about the subject and do your own research or just buy the off the shelf item and have it fitted So I leant a pipe bender from a mate bought some seamless pipe and made a start reading the blue book for info and ideas I first started by bending the pipes to shape I made saddle type claps to fit over the box section with spacers to stop the saddle hitting the bodywork or the box section collapsing 1 2 I trimmed the end of the tubing using rolled up toilet paper centres to sit on the saddle stubs 3 I cut trimmed and tacked the roof bars to the rear loop, the put a bit of wood across the tub to support the side impact bars at the right height to tack them on 4 I tacked in a diagonal to give strength and shield the mirror mounting plate from passengers 5 Cleaned old powder coating off with abrasive disc 6 Fresh back from powder coating 7 Fitted to car Costs were £160 for steel tubing £40 for powder coating £20 for cutting and grinding discs, mig wire and bolts