Prep & Mods
01/98 - 03/98
Man, it's been a busy two months! Although Steve tried his damnedest to get us out there for the first round at Willow Springs for the season opener, a lack of some key parts kept us off the track until the AFM season opener at Buttonwillow on March 7th. Lack of parts was the key problem, even though some were ordered as far back as November 1997. All of our sponsors and key players came through for us, and for that we're grateful.
The weapons of choice for Aramel Racing's 1998 racing season are a pair of 1994 Honda CBR600F2s. They're a little long in the tooth, but with the help of master tuner Curt Jordan and suspension gurus Michael & Morris at GMD Computrack LA we will be competitive against the latest and greatest hardware. Steve will start the season on last year's bike with a fresh Super Sport-spec motor. I bit the bullet and converted my street F2 into a racer, complete with a Jordan-built Super Bike motor. My bike received all the usual street-to-race conversion parts that we used on our bike last year, with the following changes / enhancements:
Curt did a masterful job on the Super Bike motor. If it runs 1/10th of what it sounds like on the dyno, it'll be a screaming rocket. The whole package, including the switch to a total-loss system, will take some getting used to. The flat slide carbs aren't forgiving of ham-fisted throttle control like the stock CV carbs are. Bump-starting the bike and monitoring the available battery charge will be a pain. The motor builds revs instantly, thanks to loosing the flywheel and the addition of the feather-light Cryolabs clutch plates.The Cryolabs cryo treatment of most of the engine makes for a stronger, lower friction motor.
Steve's bike received the original motor out of my street F2. Curt installed the cams, black box and carbs from last year's motor (which is now our spare motor). We also installed Cryolabs aluminum clutch plates and had the clutch basket parts cryo treated.
New for both bikes this year:
The G.P. Composites bodywork is terrific. It's made of Poly Vinylester-based fiberglass and is more flexible than the stock ABS stuff. As is usual with aftermarket bodywork, it took some time to get the fit just right and we had to engineer a few brackets to hang it from, but we're very happy with the final result. The Zero Gravity windscreens are about the same thickness and shape as stock, but the optical clarity is great. Goodridge supplied front and back brake lines, along with a steel bleeder banjo fitting for the master cylinder. Installation and bleeding was a snap. Silkolene Pro Race 2 brake fluid has as high a boiling point as any other out there and should work very well with the EBC HH Sintered pads that we'll be using this year.
Sprocket Specialists came through with a last-minute order for our front and rear sprockets. Our un-named and subsequently dumped sprocket sponsor for this year fed us a line of bull for three months. They guaranteed that we'd have their sprockets in our hands in time for the January race with the WSMC, but they never materialized. Curt Jordan suggested Sprocket Specialists and we had our first order in two days.
Fred Renz of Yoyodyne Titanium started working on a prototype titanium muffler bracket which we ran towards the end of last year. He finished up the design in January and delivered a beautiful rainbow-anodized bracket, complete with Ti mounting hardware.
Other goodies for this year include two Viewpoint Photography-provided Shoei X-SP helmets with custom Troy Lee Designs paint jobs (thanks Valerie!), Art of Racing paint jobs, new Held #273 gloves for Steve, and a Kinsler air density gauge to help out with the tuning chores as we travel to different race tracks this year.
Our new trailer was treated to rear levelers, a propane heater & cabinet, hook-up for a propane refrigerator & BBQ, and a converted Gorilla Rack to hold our spares kit and a Steve-built tire rack. Rob Fisher, a drummer-buddy of Steve's came through with some beautiful die-cut Aramel Racing decals for the sides and rear ramp. He is working on some race bike graphics and will be handling all of our lettering and die-cut decal needs.
We put crashing in the back of our minds, but it's a reality in road racing. We began a serious effort to build a spares kit this year. So far it includes:
We're still hunting for more parts. You'll find a complete list of our needs, along with some stuff we have to sell in the For Sale / Wanted section of our site.
Let's go racing!
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Copyright 1996 - 2003, Aramel Racing, All Rights Reserved