After I blew the engine at Mosport in 2003 my fellow Texas racers rewarded me
with a decal for my race car door with my name and â??Fireballâ?? in the
middle. It stayed there until I sold the car. I can promise you this, if
â??Oily Bobâ?? finds it way to my door it wonâ??t stay there! What a painful
experience.
We drove to Connecticut after the weekend and visited family so I just got home
last night. I had a lot of time behind the wheel to theorize what caused the
second oil drop and even with all that time I got it wrong.
The borrowed oil filter adapter to replace the one that is in the weeds at turn
5c was given to me with the qualifier that he didnâ??t know if it had the right
o-rings. It was also a newer edition of the adapter than the one that broke and
I saw that it had a longer threaded section to screw on the filter. Both of
those things went caused me trouble. At home, with the benefit of the Moss
instructions I now know that the kit has 2 sizes of the larger filter head
o-rings. The thinner one wasnâ??t thick enough to hold oil pressure at full
tilt and it was making a mess. The leak was easy to see with the car on the
lift and the engine reved up. . Itâ??s got the thicker one in there now and
all is good.
The bigger problem is that I didnâ??t fully tighten the oil filter. Mind you I
tightened it as much as I dared with the pliers style oil filter wrench I had
with me, but at home, with a ring style wrench I found that it needed more than
another full turn after what I thought was fully tight. So itâ??s no longer a
surprise that the filter came loose on track and caused the second oil dump.
So the events were unrelated in causation. The first oil dump was caused by
failed threads inside the Purolater filter head, nothing else. I guess itâ??s
time was up. The WIX 51516 filters were not hitting anything and turn out to be
the same length as the FL400â??s. Sorry WIX for blaming you.
The left side bottoms of the car is cleaner than it has been in a long time and
has a nice shine to it. I donâ??t recommend the process.
Anyhow, I hated that I cost led everyone racing laps and felt owed you all an
explanation or maybe a confession.
And thatâ??s all folks.
Bob
BTW, even with all my troubles I still had fun. Itâ??s a great track.
You only get one chance at life, make it a TRIUMPH.
> On Jun 25, 2026, at 10:39â?¯PM, Chuck Gee <chasgee22@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Nice reporting Henry! I had nothing for you, you are truly the master at
> Mosport.
>
> Chuck
>
>> On Jun 25, 2026, at 3:18â?¯PM, yellow04@tr4racer.com wrote:
>>
>> Thanks to everyone who made the trip to Mosport, it was my pleasure to
>> share my favorite event of the year. It was pretty amazing on so many
>> levels, the track, the Canadian hospitality, having all our friends together
>> again to race for the Cup.
>>
>> Our neighbors to the north always put on a great event, and this year was no
>> different. Being the featured marque, we had no less than 10 sessions
>> available to us, but I was only able to do 9. By the time that last race of
>> the weekend came around, I was spent. The car seemed ready and able, my mind
>> was all in, but it was my body that that convinced me I was done! I was
>> literally sore from tossing the car around all those laps at speed!
>>
>> I wish I could have been more effective setting the schedule a little
>> better, I did push back but we got what we got. One of the problems when we
>> get so much track time having cars that run in 4 different groups is getting
>> that track time spread out enough to be comfortable.
>>
>> I feel our racers who were seeing the track for the first time at speed did
>> a wonderful job. Congrats to all first timers for surviving turns 1, 2 and
>> 8, plus figuring out how to get around 5B. It takes a very special person to
>> be able to grow that third testicle on their first visit to Mosport, it took
>> me years to be able to go all out in 1 and 2. I know there is still more
>> speed for me in turn 8, but that risk to reward buzzer in my head goes off
>> every time I try to find it!
>>
>> A heartfelt thanks to Keith Files who came over from the UK to be our Grand
>> Marshal, job well done Keith. It was a privilege to meet the lovely Louisa
>> as well!
>>
>> Kudos to Kallie Sukey, what a great job she did with only a handful of races
>> under her belt. The former Bill Rampe Spit was looking great out there, I
>> have no doubt Kallie will be mixing it up with the best of us soon!
>>
>> The Darrow brothers came with that incredibly fast pair of matching Spits
>> and put on quite a show. They Triumphed over adversity all weekend, great
>> fun to watch.
>>
>> Then there was Fireball Bob Kramer. Surviving the epic tow from Texas, he
>> came trying to break the jinx of Mosport. He was unsuccessful, I am afraid.
>> He just earned another nickname, Oily Bob! Sorry Bob, hopefully your next
>> event goes better!
>>
>> Then we have the luckiest person at the track, our most recent Kastner Cup
>> winner Dave Gott. In one of the group races, we are circling the track under
>> double yellow for an unrelated incident when I come around and see Dave's
>> TR4 beached in a very peculiar place. I think nobody would pull off there if
>> they had a choice. Next time around, the flatbed was there pulling the car
>> backwards and I could see the left front wheel flopping down, it looked like
>> he broke a ball joint! I shuddered thinking how the heck did that happen
>> under yellow in the ONLY slow corner on the whole track when only moments
>> before I know he was running right hand corners at full chat where that
>> failure would be catastrophic. I suggested he buy a lottery ticket... Of
>> course I have no clue if Canada even does the lottery thing! Turns out it
>> was a snapped upright, it broke just above the threads that screw into the
>> trunnion. Unfortunately, Dave was done for the weekend.
>>
>> We had our share of mechanical issues on top of Dave's near calamity, I saw
>> at least 3 head gasket replacements, a diff failure, a gearbox shredded some
>> gears, and a blown out bespoke shock just to name a few. Most persevered to
>> get things fixed, some became spectators not by choice but by necessity. A
>> pretty typical showing for our group, as we know attrition is part of the
>> sport.
>>
>> Thanks to all the non-racers who showed up, we had no less than 10 of our
>> Western Pennsylvania Triumph buds, plus our friends Irv Korey and Jay
>> Holecamp came from Illinois. Dave Amys and his wife drove their beautiful
>> TR6 all the way from Minnesota to be with us! Plus more I can't think of at
>> the moment, sorry about that folks!
>>
>> I'll post a couple of race reports shortly, and call it a wrap on my time as
>> your race chair. I am thrilled that Jason and Brian are back on the task for
>> Grattan next year, it's on my calendar for the middle of August, 2027!
>>
>> Cheers
>>
>> Henry Frye
>> #29 TR250
>> _______________________________________________
>> fot@autox.team.net
>>
>> http://www.fot-racing.com
>>
>> Donate: http://www.team.net/donate.html
>> Archive: http://autox.team.net/archive http://www.team.net/pipermail/fot
>> Unsubscribe/Manage:
>> http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/fot/chasgee22@gmail.com
>>
>>
> _______________________________________________
> fot@autox.team.net
>
> http://www.fot-racing.com
>
> Donate: http://www.team.net/donate.html
> Archive: http://autox.team.net/archive http://www.team.net/pipermail/fot
> Unsubscribe/Manage:
> http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/fot/rkramer56@gmail.com
>
>
_______________________________________________
fot@autox.team.net
http://www.fot-racing.com
Donate: http://www.team.net/donate.html
Archive: http://autox.team.net/archive http://www.team.net/pipermail/fot
Unsubscribe/Manage:
http://autox.team.net/mailman/options/fot/mharc@autox.team.net
|