Subj: Lime Rock 2001
Date: 6/5/2001

Well Folks:
This time I don't have the luxury of having Tony type for me. The only thing slower than me typing, is me typing when I'm tired.

Peter Mills, through a lot of personal effort, laid the foundation for another bigger and better get together at Lime Rock Park on 26 MAY 01. The showing increased from approximately 8 cars last year, to about 28 cars this year. The "Only" thing missing was the sun. But wait! Let's back the story up. Friday was an adventure too.

It all started earlier in the week when Miled called to say that his valve covers had arrived. The plan was to have them painted at a shop next to Pete's business and then install them (in a garage at Pete's business) when I came up on Friday to stay the night at the Mills'. I made a checklist of things to bring for the job and gathered parts, tools, and other necessities. Miled has most of the parts he orders from Tracy Townsend sent directly to me. Tony, planning to be in the area, also had Tracy ship parts to my address. Between what I ordered for myself, and the other orders, every few days I would find a package on my door from Gunn Acura. Because of my schedule, I was putting off labeling which parts went to what vehicle. This just isn't whose NSX; It's what car! (NSX, Accord, Civic, which year Civic, etc.) For instance, I have four packages (with different stock numbers) of brake bleeder valve covers. I was calling up my part sources to help identify the parts. I had the right idea. Put all parts relating to a specific vehicle on one slip. Problem was the Honda shop combined them on to one big one. My garage is starting to look like Gunn Acura's northeast division, Honda parts warehouse and Larry's NSX used parts emporium.
Well, I think you get my drift by now. Anyway, with stuff gathered to do Miled's NSX, stuff gathered to do Tony's NSX; Pete calls and asks if I can put some new pads in his NSX while I'm there. OK, one job has turned to three, but I know I will get some help on site.
I hate driving in New York traffic with a passion. I remember one time it took me over two hours longer to get to Pete's than normal. By the time I arrived, I was spitting and sputtering about how I hate traffic, stupid drivers, why did I ever go that direction, and carrying on to such a point; I thought Pete was going to throw a bucket of water on me to snap me out of it. The decision I face is do I do a repeat of the heavy traffic laden route on the Friday of Memorial Day weekend? Sure, why not! couldn't be that heavy again, could it?
I strike out and make remarkable time. To my surprise, (Miled requested this part be in the story) Miled is in the parking lot waiting for me to arrive. He walks to the shop to settle his bill, and Pete suggests I back his NSX part way into the garage. I can do this as you know, because our keys are blood brothers and work in either car. The reason I can't back the car all the way in out of the rain is because Pete has his car inside, nicely detailed, and will not take it out in the rain. "Come on Pete, it's only gonna get all wet and dirty tomorrow!" That's tomorrow not today.
Pete didn't receive his brake pads, so I'm down to two jobs. I hand Tony the parts he ordered and the tools necessary to complete the task. While he is working on his project, I go back to Miled's car. The engine's still hot but I can tuff it out. After removing all the peripherals, the nuts that hold the front valve cover, I am trying to lift it off when Pete offers to help. The cover is slightly stuck so with a coordinated to pull, we free it only to have the forward washers go Ka-tink, Ka-tank, Ka-tunk. Mmmm, one is on the floor; the other is nowhere to be seen. Pete wonders what my concern is, we have new washers? My concern stems from my aviation experience. There has been several accidents where a dropped nut got lodged next to a control surface, jamming it, which resulted in one destroyed aircraft and four dead people. I know this isn't flying, but it still could have gotten lodged near a mechanism. "Jack!" Pete gets out his trusty, light weight, few strokes and the vehicle is up jack, and tries to position it under Miled's lowered NSX. It won't fit. With a little lifting at the wheel wells, the jack slides under and in position of the center jack point. Pete starts jacking, and I catch all the tools on the trunk before they slide off and bounce to some unknown location. "Jack Stands!"... They look at me. "I'm not going under there without something to serve as a backup in case the hydraulic jack fails." Pete finds a couple and I place them under the jack points next to each wheel. Miled looks concerned because the edge of the jack stand is lightly touching the car (due to the large tilt angle), and not the jack point. I tell him it's just there to protect me and we will not lower the car on to them. I crawl underneath, with mirror in hand searching for the part. I can't find it anywhere. I crawl out and look all over the garage in case it hit and rolled, still nothing. Pete is looking from above with the mirror while I stick my fingers into small hidden crevices. After some time, Pete spies it. It is in one of those positions where you can see it with the mirror, but can't recognize where that area is on the car. I wiggle myself over to the lower edge of the car, fish my hand into a small area, then pull my hand out. This was done because I forgot my wristwatch was still on. (In my earlier years, I had gotten my hand into a tight hole, only to find I couldn't get it out because of my watch binding) With watch off, I wove my arm around parts and pushed hard to get to the area. Pete, trying to encourage me to get my arm/hand caught would say things like, "I can see your fingers!" "You're almost there!" Of course this gave me incentive to push harder which forced my arm into unusual placement which resulted in an arm cramp. So I'd back off a second, then give it the OLE college try once more. I started laughing for two reasons. First, I could feel me sliding the washer with my fingertips into a more obscure area. Second, I imagined the jack failing (I've had two fail before that were almost catastrophic) and being as tightly pressed under the car, I would here Miled say in a calm voice, "Larry, would you mind taking a deep breath to raise the car? The jack stands are cutting into the metal and I want to remove them." Collecting my thoughts and focusing on the task at hand, I did a Houdini and grew my fingers another 1/2 inch, grasped the washer with my finger tips, and removed it from its tomb. I slid out, stood up, and became slightly dizzy from the funny positions I was in and the strain it took to get there.

Sylvia had gone to get pizza and wine and had just returned. "Who wants to eat!" Sounds like a good deal to me, besides, wine always helps us work on Miled's car. After pizza time, we went to work installing the newly painted red valve covers. We put new gaskets and washers, PCV valve, and reassembled the engine. Miled started the car and we checked for oil leaks. We were about to secure the engine bay when Pete noticed the engine bay strut bar had not been installed. Four bolts, four torques, and we were done. From there we all went to the Mills' to look at some of Tony's pictures and finish the wine in celebration of the completed task and the coming Lime Rock event.

Saturday:
Pete, Tony & Sylvia, and I head to Pete's business to meet another member before we headed to the main staging area for the trip to LRP. As we pull into the parking lot, I see many familiar faces. One is Larry B, who only got my Watkins Glen story that morning due to an incorrect e-mail address, shook my hand with a big evil grin that let me know a rebuttal to my story was in the works. Another surprise was to find Miled waiting our arrival (Are we seeing a new Miled?) Sylvia swaps to Pete's car. I comment to Tony, "You drove her out, didn't you?" After handshakes with old friends and new members, we head out. Pete is leading the caravan with me close behind, followed by the others. Pete fearing I might pass him, I mean in concern for the others, wants me to become the caboose to insure the whole train of us do not get side-railed during movement through small towns. Larry B wants me to give him a point-by as he passes. Not having to utilize that maneuver very often, I fail to complete it before he passes (Sorry, Larry). Rich Hutte is already there and is securing our coral, I mean corral. I get my NSX parking sign in place and secure my piece of coral to it, in honor of the fine web site that Rich posted to announce the event. We start to head to the venders and watch the race when we are told that our "parade laps" on the track will be starting shortly. We go back to the cars and prepare for the line up. Many cars are in front of me and in order to get us all on the track, an official waves me by the other cars to start a new line. Of course no one knows what is happening, so I get dogged by members for passing all of them. The pace car is a slow moving Viper. It was a good idea to keep the laps slow, but with so many other cars on the track, it was like (as one member put it) driving on the Long Island Expressway. We returned to the corral, and proceeded to Speedvision's tent. With meal and conversation completed, I went to explore the venders.

There is a large gap in time as I went to find other members, but they were all hiding. I walked from the venders, to the race paddock, back to the tent, out to the hill to watch the race, then repeated the process. After it was about time to go home, I finally found a few members.
One of the main attractions of the day was to watch Peter Cunningham race his NSX. This was postponed till Monday. A few of us decided to go to REALTIME Racing to see if we could find Peter. We located him and he took us to view his car. Peter is very personable, and the conversation with him and his crewchief, Andrew, was interesting. I described to Peter the brake shuddering I was experiencing at Watkins Glen. His comment was, "Maybe you shouldn't use the brakes so much :-)" He continued by pointing out technical aspects of the car, such as the easily misidentified, "Windshield wiper motor." I talked a lot with Andrew, trying to get the edge that would allow me to beat Aaron Chung on the track. Aaron was considering removing performance mods from his NSX so that he could use the car to compete for points in EMRA time trials. Having his car more stock would allow me to compete with him on even ground. I heard he opted for a white S-2000. One can only wonder what prompted his decision :-)
Andrew talked of developing the Vortex supercharger at almost half the cost of a Comptech. I'm going to wait and see how this project develops.
It's getting late and it's still raining, so we decide to return home. Pete announces on the club radio that he is going to stop for gas and that we should continue. However, he will not give me a point-by :-) (Boy, people are awfully touchy about this subject) We all pull in and then continue.
Tony and I stay the night. Except for the rain, it was another enjoyable time.
Pete did another outstanding job organizing the event. His events remind me of Thanksgiving dinner. No matter how great it was the year before, the current one seems to out do the last.
Larry G.

NSX Corral
Parade Lap
Under cover
Race Start
Peter Cunningham NSX