Simons first ride

I arranged to meet Simon at Mallory park so he could have a ride on the Mono, the weather was not looking good so decided to put cut slicks in so if the worst came to the worst he could at least splash around for a few laps. I had also geared the bike for Snetterton so it may be a little to high, but will see how he gets on. As there wasn't too many bikes for the session they declared an open pit lane, so Simon headed out for his debut ride on the bike. His first few laps Simon was acclimatising himself to the characteristics of a Supermono, from about the 4Th lap you could see he was settling down and each lap he was going faster by at least 2 seconds! He came in after about 12 laps with his best time being 1'02", but he did say the it was still very damp around Gerrard's and was not really powering out of the corners in fear of a highside. The weather continued to improve and a few small adjustments were made to the Idle speed and gear shift position before Simon took to the circuit again. Even on the out lap you could see that he was more confident on the now dry track and on his first flying lap he got down to just over the minute mark, he could not improve as he hit traffic but after about 6 laps he came in as the session had been Red Flagged. When we were talking about the session Simon noticed that the belly pan had quite a lot of oil residue, and when the belly pan was removed we found the Crank locking hole bolt was weeping oil, I tried to tighten the bolt but it just kept turning. When I removed the bolt you could see that the thresd had been stripped, this had also happened to my other engine when Steve was rebuilding it so it must be a trait of Rotax! I tried to reseal it but with no thread to bite into it was fruitless. I was not happy letting Simon go out again as if the oil got onto the rear tyre it could have him off, Simon agreed but said he couldn't wait to get back out on it as it was "FUN". I will get the bike to Steve this week so he can drill and fit a Helicoil as he had done with my other engine, I have also asked Steve to help me set the carb as its still not idling correctly, more news soon I promise.

PS sorry no photos