Cadwell Capers - 20th April trackday report
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newtothis
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- Bike owned: YZF R125, RVF400, Morini 3 1/2
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Cadwell Capers - 20th April trackday report
Having owned the RVF for around 9 months now it seemed about time to take it on track and find out what it can actually do despite having me on board. There's just not the opportunity on the roads to discover the bike's capability so I booked myself onto one of MSVs novice trackdays at Cadwell Park. Whilst its a somewhat daunting circuit for complete novices I've been racing MG's at club level for 20 years on and off so have been there many times...in fact I've probably driven around 50 sessions on the track!
During the week before I did a bit of mild fettling, checking the throttle closed cleanly, giving the chain a thorough scrub and lube, all the usual stuff. Fortunately my brother has a van (for lugging race stuff and cars about) and we had the offer of a trailer from someone at his work to make life really easy.
Other of course than the stupidly early start to get to deepest Lincolnshire for signing on. In, as it turned out, fog all the way from Hertfordshire to about 2 miles from the track. Fortunately we know the way pretty well by now so were able to make good time. Once there the day was bright and cool with a gentle breeze wafting off the north sea.
Sign on, noise test etc all done the day started with a ducks and drakes session behind an instructor. The idea is of course to show everyone the line but when the first person in the queue drops back 50 yards and everyone in between is randomly riding all over the circuit I'm not sure anyone learned much! The turn-in and apex cones must have been feeling particularly unloved.
The day itself was shared between the novice bike session, an MSV run cars session and one by MG on Track - with whom I've done a few days in the past. 20 minutes per hour each so enough of a break in between to grab a cuppa, have a look over the bike and a mild tinker.
First time out I just left the suspension alone, using a tie wrap on the front fork shows I have plenty of fork travel in hand - even when braking hard enough to be just locking the front wheel. However the static sag is maybe a touch higher than most people seem to suggest. I weigh 73kg so don't load the suspension that much, but I'll have to look into whether some alternate front springs may have been fitted at some point.
The first full-on session showed that being on the line allows you to catch up with pretty much anything that's not on it! Almost all of the other bikes were bigger capacity and newer so had considerably more straight line speed, however the general lack of track positioning meant they were slow everywhere else.
I glanced at the speedo along the top straight and though 'surely I'm going faster than 50!' it appears the speedo had got scared about being so far up the scale and promptly crapped out. Not a problem on track but I then had a slight weep of oil from the drive housing, to add to the excess from luring the chain that was now getting flung off and making its way out of the sprocket cover. Nowhere near enough to get onto the back tyre and nothing a quick wipe with a a rag couldn't sort out though.
A quick clean up and cuppa later we were off again. People seemed to be getting the idea of where the circuit went now and getting through traffic was trickier. At one point I caught quite a train of people and rather than fight my way through decided to back off and allow a gap to build, about the length of the bottom straight, all well and good but I caught them up again in two clear laps.
Speedo leak still minor, chain oil diminishing, but now a few specks behind the right hand side vent on the seat cowl. Hmmm. Nothing showing on the engine casings so after a good peer around I surmised it wasn't too serious.
Meantime one of the cars had dropped oil from the entry to the mountain round to the pits so everyone was being fairly cautious, you could just about choose one side of the line or other but few were confidant enough to cross it mid corner.
A tweak of the suspension and another blast, then whipped the seat and tank off to look for oil. It appears one of the cam cover bolt grommets allows a tiny dribble through which then gets blown around and out of the side vent. Everything was still done up so a minor niggle but can be lived with. The other thing I noted was that one of the bar ends has now gone AWOL, I didn't hear of anyone catching one in their teeth so assume it's in the grass somewhere so will get found by the mower.
A number of people wandered over and said 'I used to' or 'I have one of those' including another member here (sorry I forgot to catch up and get his name) who has just recently acquired an NC30 in various colour schemes as a project. Another guy had an NS400 that had just arrived from Japan and a tweaked RD350, he commented it's nice to see a few older bikes at the event as everyone else was just getting on theirs and riding them, rather than partaking of inter-session fettling. He recommended the practical sports bike days as having a good atmosphere - and lots of NC's.
Overall a fun day, but I just couldn't get that fiddly little chicane right, I managed to remember that the bike needs longer to shed speed than the car! The often made comment about bigger bike riders being fast in a straight line and forgetting to carry speed in corners seemed to work out as a truism. I certainly found that people would fly past at about the pitlane exit then grab the brakes and shoot past backwards whilst I was still hard on the throttle. They'd then next hurtle past about on the crest of the park straight so god knows how far they dropped back through coppice and Charlie's!
Mind you the fact that the bike has Bridgestone 003 tyres on might have something to do with that!
Not everyone stayed on, someone found that Coppice isn't actually flat out and this chap shows excellent body position, unfortunately not whilst on the bike...
Hopefully the image links now work
During the week before I did a bit of mild fettling, checking the throttle closed cleanly, giving the chain a thorough scrub and lube, all the usual stuff. Fortunately my brother has a van (for lugging race stuff and cars about) and we had the offer of a trailer from someone at his work to make life really easy.
Other of course than the stupidly early start to get to deepest Lincolnshire for signing on. In, as it turned out, fog all the way from Hertfordshire to about 2 miles from the track. Fortunately we know the way pretty well by now so were able to make good time. Once there the day was bright and cool with a gentle breeze wafting off the north sea.
Sign on, noise test etc all done the day started with a ducks and drakes session behind an instructor. The idea is of course to show everyone the line but when the first person in the queue drops back 50 yards and everyone in between is randomly riding all over the circuit I'm not sure anyone learned much! The turn-in and apex cones must have been feeling particularly unloved.
The day itself was shared between the novice bike session, an MSV run cars session and one by MG on Track - with whom I've done a few days in the past. 20 minutes per hour each so enough of a break in between to grab a cuppa, have a look over the bike and a mild tinker.
First time out I just left the suspension alone, using a tie wrap on the front fork shows I have plenty of fork travel in hand - even when braking hard enough to be just locking the front wheel. However the static sag is maybe a touch higher than most people seem to suggest. I weigh 73kg so don't load the suspension that much, but I'll have to look into whether some alternate front springs may have been fitted at some point.
The first full-on session showed that being on the line allows you to catch up with pretty much anything that's not on it! Almost all of the other bikes were bigger capacity and newer so had considerably more straight line speed, however the general lack of track positioning meant they were slow everywhere else.
I glanced at the speedo along the top straight and though 'surely I'm going faster than 50!' it appears the speedo had got scared about being so far up the scale and promptly crapped out. Not a problem on track but I then had a slight weep of oil from the drive housing, to add to the excess from luring the chain that was now getting flung off and making its way out of the sprocket cover. Nowhere near enough to get onto the back tyre and nothing a quick wipe with a a rag couldn't sort out though.
A quick clean up and cuppa later we were off again. People seemed to be getting the idea of where the circuit went now and getting through traffic was trickier. At one point I caught quite a train of people and rather than fight my way through decided to back off and allow a gap to build, about the length of the bottom straight, all well and good but I caught them up again in two clear laps.
Speedo leak still minor, chain oil diminishing, but now a few specks behind the right hand side vent on the seat cowl. Hmmm. Nothing showing on the engine casings so after a good peer around I surmised it wasn't too serious.
Meantime one of the cars had dropped oil from the entry to the mountain round to the pits so everyone was being fairly cautious, you could just about choose one side of the line or other but few were confidant enough to cross it mid corner.
A tweak of the suspension and another blast, then whipped the seat and tank off to look for oil. It appears one of the cam cover bolt grommets allows a tiny dribble through which then gets blown around and out of the side vent. Everything was still done up so a minor niggle but can be lived with. The other thing I noted was that one of the bar ends has now gone AWOL, I didn't hear of anyone catching one in their teeth so assume it's in the grass somewhere so will get found by the mower.
A number of people wandered over and said 'I used to' or 'I have one of those' including another member here (sorry I forgot to catch up and get his name) who has just recently acquired an NC30 in various colour schemes as a project. Another guy had an NS400 that had just arrived from Japan and a tweaked RD350, he commented it's nice to see a few older bikes at the event as everyone else was just getting on theirs and riding them, rather than partaking of inter-session fettling. He recommended the practical sports bike days as having a good atmosphere - and lots of NC's.
Overall a fun day, but I just couldn't get that fiddly little chicane right, I managed to remember that the bike needs longer to shed speed than the car! The often made comment about bigger bike riders being fast in a straight line and forgetting to carry speed in corners seemed to work out as a truism. I certainly found that people would fly past at about the pitlane exit then grab the brakes and shoot past backwards whilst I was still hard on the throttle. They'd then next hurtle past about on the crest of the park straight so god knows how far they dropped back through coppice and Charlie's!
Mind you the fact that the bike has Bridgestone 003 tyres on might have something to do with that!
Not everyone stayed on, someone found that Coppice isn't actually flat out and this chap shows excellent body position, unfortunately not whilst on the bike...
Hopefully the image links now work
Last edited by newtothis on Thu Apr 23, 2015 5:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Zippy
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Re: Cadwell Capers - 20th April trackday report
Sounds like you had fun.
You definitely need to book yourself onto the Cadwell day that PS and Classic Bikes put on. There's a thread on it in the events section.
You definitely need to book yourself onto the Cadwell day that PS and Classic Bikes put on. There's a thread on it in the events section.