Bentley drivers club race meeting Silverstone

Hi all, just a quick note, I will hopefully be competing in my Lotus at Silverstone on 8th August at the Bentley drivers clubs 60th annaversary of racing at Silverstone, Should be a good event and I believe that there will be demonstration laps done by the 2003 Le Mans winning Bentley. This will be my first race in two years in the car so I have booked to go testing at Silverstone the day before the race, doesn't leave much time to iron out any problems but I have my fingers crossed.

Regards Dan ( Eclat22)

Good luck Dan, hope it all goes well, lets hope a few LDC members are able to go along and cheer you on.
All the best,
Tim.

Thanks for the best wishes Tim, The race I have entered is a 10lap handicap and I gather that it starts in the pit lane with the cars being sent out slowest first, I have yet to receive the final instructions so I shall know more then, should be a lot more overtaking that F1.

Regards Dan

I now have the final instructions and race entry for the 10 lap race at Silverstone on Saturday, looks very entertaining, the grid is made up of car ranging from 1920s Austin 7 Ulster and Bentley 3/8 a couple of 1950s Allard j2s various specials some ginettas the usual e types, MGs a couple of Bentley Turbo Rs a thundering Lola T160 Can Am car a Lotus 23B and my Lotus Eclat to name but a few, in total there are 36 starters listed. The race is the last one of the day so it will be a lazy day for me as I do not have to sign on to 10.30 and Qualify at 11.45. Hopefully after testing on Friday I can sign on and get the car scrutineered to enable me to watch most of the other quallifing sessions and races. As I said the cars are sent off slowest first so there should be lots of overtaking.

Regards Dan

Good luck Dan, let us know how you get on.

eclat22 wrote:I now have the final instructions and race entry for the 10 lap race at Silverstone on Saturday, looks very entertaining, the grid is made up of car ranging from 1920s Austin 7 Ulster and Bentley 3/8 a couple of 1950s Allard j2s various specials some ginettas the usual e types, MGs a couple of Bentley Turbo Rs a thundering Lola T160 Can Am car a Lotus 23B and my Lotus Eclat to name but a few, in total there are 36 starters listed. The race is the last one of the day so it will be a lazy day for me as I do not have to sign on to 10.30 and Qualify at 11.45. Hopefully after testing on Friday I can sign on and get the car scrutineered to enable me to watch most of the other quallifing sessions and races. As I said the cars are sent off slowest first so there should be lots of overtaking.

Regards Dan

Hope it goes well Dan, I would love to come along, sounds great but I'm at a wedding that day (I'd rather be at Silverstone but can't get out of it).
Cheers, Tim.

Well, it all went horribly wrong!!! after a day of testing with only a few teething problems ie not tightening the oil filler cap fully and having to relocate cam breathers I had initial problems in quallifing and only did 5 laps finishing 16th fastest out of 36 with a lap 4 seconds of of my best time on the circuit, the problem was a serious vibration which seemed to occur above 5000 rpm which appeared to be a loose rear caliper on the disc conversion so the afternoon was spent trying to locate bolts to raplace damaged ones to allow the rebuild of the back of the car initial testing with little time left till the race showed that I still had vibration but not as bad and I considered that it would be tollerable until further investigation could be carried out. How wrong was I whilst running at 7500 rpm down the Club straight towards Brooklands there was an almighty bang and then a loud rumbling and no drive, I had snapped the prop shaft at the flange with the diff. This has resulted in chassis damage but this should be repairable. So the back of the car is once again in many bits with further modifications to be done and a new stronger propshft to be sourced.
Allthough the day finished bad and I did not see any of the races other than the little bit from my drivers seat, the atmosphere at the meeting was excellent and I shall definatly look to do the same race next year.