1976 Hawke DL17 Formula Ford
Conversion to Kawasaki ZX10 bike engine with chain drive differentialI have now run the Hawke with the Kawasaki ZX10 engine for three seasons.
Times have steadily improved.
GAC Fintray Hillclimb 2004 (Picture: David Baker)
Here is some in car footage taken with my Mustek DV2000 (incredibly cheap digital video recorder)
http://www.westhouse.plus.com/images/kames.mov
Kames Sprint 2003 - (5.9Mb Quicktime Movie)
At Kames, the Hawke did not have the LSD fitted and had taller gearing.
http://www.westhouse.plus.com/images/golspie.mov
Golspie Sprint 2004 - (6.3Mb Quicktime Movie)
In 2004 the Hawke had the Quaife LSD and a 51 tooth rear sprocket fitted.
Note: The Jedi and the Radical were not as close, on the track, as the video suggests - there has been a subtle edit!
Click Here for more in-car video
During 2003 and early 2004 the car was running a standard Mini differential.
This did cause a few problems with reliability - I was starting to destroy a diff every event!
I obtained a Quaife ATB LSD at the end of 2003 but did not get around to fitting it until after I missed out on a 'Fastest Time of the Day' when the diff broke on the first competition run at Kames in 2004 (Every one of the five practice runs beat the eventual winners time!)
When I fitted the LSD, I had to learn to change my diving style and car set-up a bit.
I used to go into a corner and stand on the throttle, the inside wheel would spin and the car drove round the corner.
Try that technique with the LSD and the car would give immediate extreme oversteer.
I soon learned to be a bit more cautious with the throttle.
After I re-attached the anti-roll bars there was a bit of improvement.
I did fit the 275Lb/in 6" front springs, with new AVO coil-overs during 2003, as I was able to bottom out the nose box under heavy braking.
I still managed to bottom out the front so I went to 325Lb/in 5" springs in 2004.
Late in 2004 I decided that the rear still was not giving enough traction (after trying the car on the Crail 1/4mile strip).
When I scraped the paint off the rear coils I found to my horror that they were 525Lb/in
(I omitted to check this when I transferred the coil-overs from the Royale).
After a quick rummage I came up with a pair of 250Lb/in springs for the rear and these seemed to improve things somewhat.
Airborne at Golspie (2006)
I found that the original gearing 17/47 was too tall (not even pulling max revs in 5th gear at Knockhill), so I fitted a 51 tooth rear sprocket. The gearing is still a bit tall so I really need a smaller front sprocket.
Unfortunately, the ZX10 used a unique dished sprocket and I have been unable to track down a supplier of a 16 tooth 530 conversion front sprocket (I know that they were made).
At one Kames event I thought I had forgotten how to drive after the first couple of runs!
Was it my imagination or did the brakes have too much travel? Anyway I bled the brakes with little improvement.
Same thing with Forrestburn Hillclimb the following week - It was not until I was changing my wheels, to put the car on the trailer, that I noticed that the big circlip holding the front, live stub axle to the hub, had come adrift.
This caused the disc to go hard up against the caliper causing the brake problems.
In 2003 I was using a fairly old bike battery (and no alternator) this caused a couple of problems when I was double entered at a two day Fintray Hillclimb.
By the end of the weekend we had to push start the car and on Angus's last run there was a bad misfire due to lack of volts.
A new battery now lasts all weekend.
Lossiemouth Sprint (2006)
I only visited the scenery a couple of times. The usual off(s) at the Kames hairpin (trying too hard?) and a very spectacular off into the long grass when I got too much right foot coming out of the last corner at Forrestburn.
I did find a rock in the undergrowth which punched a couple of holes in the alloy floor (glad my seat is spaced off the floor).
The only other recurring problem was a misfire, I think it was caused by condensation on the plug caps.
The car would run fine up to the start line but on the first lap it would drop onto 3 cylinders, I think trapped water in the plug recesses was vapourising then condensing on the cooler plug tops after a short time of running.
It was very bad at the last Alford Sprint and I could not get the car to fire on all four at all at a Crail test session.
(I think I put the plug leads back on in the wrong order after Alford!)
I have now stripped and cleaned the carbs and put the leads on the correct cylinders and the car seems to be running once again.
As far as results go for 2004 - I had a fairly successful season.
I managed three first in class awards, scored consistently in the top ten and was runner up in the 2004 Guyson Scottish Sprint Championship - Class C Competition Cars.
For 2005 - I really need to get a smaller front sprocket to improve the gearing. I was only just getting into 5th gear at the end of the 1/4 mile (still have 6th gear in reserve!).
Times for 1/4 mile were almost identical to Angus's Suzuki 1052cc GSXR powered Hawke (12.5 seconds @ 107MPH).
My Hoosier R25A slicks are now getting a bit hard (I did buy them in 2002) so I think I might give a new set of Avon slicks a try.
2005 Season
Best season so far.
Just a few minor changes made but now everything seems to have come together.
I managed to source a 16 tooth front sprocket which combined with the 51 tooth rear gives me much better gearing for most tracks.
I reduced the rear springs from 250 Lb/in to 150 Lb/in - this really made an improvement to the traction.
I changed from Hoosier tyres to Avon A40's, these were a lot stickier and eliminated the first lap understeer I used to get at Golspie.
First time out with the new set-up, at Kames, saw my first ever FTD.
This was despite an intermittent miss-fire. The next day I changed the coils & plug leads and this cured the problem.
I was looking forward to trying the new set-up at Knockhill but the weather was foul, so no improvement here.
At every other venue I managed to improve my times, overall my times improved by an average of 3%.
Other results included a second best time of the day at Kames in June, two first in class wins (4th BTD) at the Fintray Hillclimb and a 2nd BTD at the Forrestburn Hillclimb.
I was 4th in the Scottish Sprint Championship "Top Ten" and I won the Motorsport Junction, Scottish Lowlands Speed Championship.
The car survived reasonably unscathed, apart for a minor indiscretion at the September Doune hillclimb, where I rode over the rumble strips at the approach to the esses and bent the left, top
front, wishbone. I managed to negotiate the esses and crossed the finish line with 3 wheels in contact with the track (and was still within 0.3 seconds of by best ever time at Doune).
During 2005, I also ran a Radical Clubsport 1100 at a couple of sprints. The Radical was on 3 year old racing slicks which were a bit hard. Nevertheless, the car ran well and I managed a class
win in the up to 1400cc Sports Libre class at Golspie.
2006 Season
Another good season with many personal best times and two more Fastest Time of the Day at Kames.
2006 Alford Sprint (picture: Ian Thomson)
Some new venues were tried this season including the RAFMSA Lossiemouth sprint which took part on the runways of the RAF base. Very fast with a scary final 180 degree, double apex, corner.
The Hawke ran in much the same configuration as 2005, a new set of Avon A91 slicks replaced the worn out A40 slicks.
I had one major "off" at the Fintray hillclimb, I went into 'Ruin' a bit quick and bottomed out the chassis under braking (the track has a distinct crown and reduces ground clearance). In consequence the car did not slow down quite enough and the tail came round and the car climbed the banking backwards. The right rear suspension took the initial impact and required all the rod ends and bolts replaced. When the car landed it damaged the front left top rocker arm - I had to manufacture a new one but I still managed to get the car out for the following weekend.
I used the backup Hawke DL22 for the second day at Fintray and was pleased to get within 0.5 second of my times in the DL17.
Fintray seemed to have it in for the DL17 as I snapped a driveshaft at the September meeting. This time I was offered a drive in Keith Week's Image Yamaha. His car is unusual in that it uses a solid rear end (no differential). This tends to promote power on understeer. The other problem I had with the Image is that Keith is a lot slimmer and taller than me. I had great difficulty getting strapped in and then I had to use my toes on the brake pedal. His brakes felt very heavy and I was having trouble stopping! I manage to get up the hill OK but my times were not too great. It is always nice to find out how other cars feel and the hillclimbers are usually only too pleased to offer a drive to a fellow competitor.
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