3 Doors Down - Let me be myself

3 Doors Down's latest video - Let me be myself.

Video link.

Minicars Distribution on the move

In a couple of weeks Minicars Distributing AB (where I work) is moving 45 km to completely new facilities in Enköping. We have been in Uppsala since the 70's but since a few years back we have out grown the existing building quiet a lot. Now its time for a new chapter at Minicars in a completely new building! :)

Since last fall we have had a build-blogg where we have published the latest pics of the build (from when it was just a big hole in the ground) and we will continue with that at least one more year I think. You'll find it HERE.

Next year we will also build an off-road track for RC cars just outside the building on location!

Below is a first drawing of how the track could look like. You can find more info HERE.

TT Bandit II is here now

The new TT Bandit Two RTR tunnel boat seems to have landed in Scandinavia now - it was tested this past weekend in Eksjö anyways. Hope to see it live at the next nats in Norrköping in August! :)

Source: Nilac Adolfsson/Munter boat pics

Stefan Verdi in action

This is a low-profile Swedish guy you most likely have never heard of. But his company makes some of the best (if not THE best) full scale oil pumps and con rods for racing engines. I think they are one of very few manufacurers that makes their own con-rods (in Sweden) and not like most of the others that have them made in China... Their customers are some of the best in NASCAR, NHRA, off-shore racing & other high performance racing classes around the world. His company is called Auto Verdi and Stefan Verdi likes to go fast on water (and land) but he's no racer himself - according to Stefan he has no racing nerves...

Stefan's boat is an Eagle with a Mac 45 that runs pretty darn fast. :)

Auto Verdi link.

O'Donnell Super Sport .21

Here are some shots I took of the Super Sport .21 O'Donnell engine earlier this week. Enjoy! :)






Super Sport .21 - Off-road motor
Finally the new O'Donnell Super Sport .21 off-road engine has arrived to Scandinavia!

Steve O'DonnelL has worked long and hard to be able to put out a quality high-performance racing engine at a good prise - I think he has succeeded at least by the looks and feel of it!

The engine is designed by Steve O'Donnell in the USA and manufactured in Taiwan by and non-RC related factory its said.

Features:

• Its a square-stroke engine, that means the bore and stroke are the same (16.45x16.45 mm)
• ABC piston and liner with three ports
• The crank case carb mount is sealed with 2+2 orings (in the case + the carb lock)
• 14 mm crank shaft
• Japanese EZO grade-5 ball bearings (14x25x6 mm & 7x19x6 mm)
• Two needle slide carb with adjustable spraybar
• "Thermo insulating" carb sleeve
• A BIG 60 mm cooling head with the classic O'Donnell brick-top design
• 7 & 8 mm venturis in plastic is included
• Combustion head-buttons for turbo & standard threaded plugs are included
• O'Donnell #97T medium turbo glowplug is included
  

#ODOG5010 – retail price in Sweden : 2636:- SEK (juli 09) including 25% VAT

Link to SS21 info

SS21 PDF manual

Distributed in Scandinavia by Minicars.

Wanna see it in parts? Klick HERE.

O'Donnell SS .21 pics

The new and highly awaited 3.5 cc off-road engine from O'Donnell has finally hit the European shores this week! Here's some pics of its internal parts and in an hour or so I will publish some newly taken shots of it assembled also. :)




The cooling head is 60 mm in diameter...!

The SS .21 engine comes with a combustion head-button for turbo plugs. There is also a O'Donnell #97T plug included. Also included are a button for normal threaded plugs. As standard are two 0.15 mm brass shims installed for a total of 0.55 mm squish height with the turbo head-button and 0.7 mm with the same shims and the std head-button.

On booth head-buttons the outermost squish is flat (about 50% of the width) and the inner most is slightly angled. The total volume is about 0.18-0.185 cc measured with a O'Donnell plug installed.

The brass sleeve is hard-chromed and has a simple and effective designed port layout with three intake ports and nicely (not huge = nice) exhaust port. There is no signs of any chrome burrs - very good. :)

The transfer ports are quite wide...

The booster port.

Piston and liner. It looks like the piston is not cast but billet type.

The con-rod is bushed at booth ends of course. Two oil-grooves on the piston. BTW, the piston has a completely flat top.

The crankshaft is 14 mm in diameter at the thick end and it looks cleanly designed. No silicone-ramp in sight that can come loose - nicers. :)

The crankshafts outlet so called "turbo-scoop" has a slightly different flow design then what most engines use.

Crankcase from above. Booster and one of the transfer channels are seen. The head is fastened with std M3.5x16 mm socket head (hex) screws.

The exhaust gasket in silicone seems to be of the std size. Thats good as all normal headers like fron Sirio, Nova & Hong Nor etc will fit. The crankshaft bearing fit was really nice on this motor - nice and just the right amount of looseness. Std socket head M2.5x8 mm screws are used at the backplate.

The booster channel in the middle flanked by booth transfer channels.

Double o-rings in the front box for sealing the carb.

The carb lock (6.9 mm in diameter) is sealed at booth ends with o-rings and is of a "double-squeeze" type.

Tip, if you want to remove it from the case - dont pull/push it out in one piece - you will break the o-rings. Unthread the screw and pull booth parts out at booth ends so to speak - you will save the o-rings.

The aluminium carb has a 15 mm throat diameter and an "thermo insolating" sleeve pressed on. As standard there is a 7 mm plastic venturi installed and a separate 8 mm venturi is also included.


The rear cover with its two funny loocking channel/grooves thaty match the transfer channels in the crankcase.

O'Donnell Racing Products

Distributed in Scandinavia by Minicars.

You wanna see how the engine looks assembled? Klick HERE.

Results Ludvika FSR-H & OTA

Here's the results from the second Swedish nats in heatracing and outboard tunnels run last weekend in Ludvika.



OTA (Stock .21 Tunnel)
1. Christer Burström / HTB290 / OS
2. Mattias Bengtsson / TT / TT
3. Niklas Eriksson / TS2 / OS
4. Pontus Laakkonen / TS2 / TT
5. Kim Nyhlèn / TT / TT
6. Bo Sandström / VS1 / K&B
7. Niklas Edlund / VS1 / OS
8. Mikael Sundgren / VS1 / K&B
9. Fredrik Karlsson / TT / TT
10. Torbjörn Karlsson
11. Anders Enblom / HTB290 / OS
12. Fredrik Lundahl / TT / TT
13. Thomas Ljungström / HTB260 / OS
14. Christer Sjögren / TS2 / OS
15. Sune Persson / TT / TT


FSR-H 3.5
1. Mikael Sundgren / 1600 p
2. Anders Martinelle / 1400 p
3. Fred Brihagen / 1225 p
4. Torbjörn Karlsson / 1150 p
5. Christer Gustafsson / 1050 p
6. Bo Sandström / 850 p
7. Niklas Edlund / 663 p
8. Pontus Laakkonen / 465 p
9. Bengt Björkhage / 419 p


FSR-H 7.5
1. Anders Martinelle / 1600 p
2. Fredrik Lundahl / 1225 p
3. Bengt Björkhage / 1200 p
4. Mikael Sundgren / 1075 p
5. Fred Brihagen / 419 p
6. Andre Westerberg / 400 p
7. Ellert Ohlzon / 225 p


FSR-H 15
1. Anders Martinelle / 1600 p
2. Torbjörn Karlsson / 1300 p
3. Niklas Eriksson / 475 p
4. Ellert Ohlzon / 350 p
5. Bengt Björkhage / 250 p
6. Mats Aldell / 50 p

SMBF website.

Pics from Ludvika

Here's some pics from last weekend's Swedish Nats (round #2) in heatracing and OTA stock tunnels race in beautiful Ludvika. The results will come in the next blog... :)

My VS1 had a rough time in the "rough" waters...

Airborne - not for the first time on race day.

Racing to the top buoy.

If it only could fly this good all the time... ;)

It's me holding Christer Burströms HTB290 before a q-heat start.

And off we (he) go... ;)

Even the trusted "all weather" TS2's where digging hard into the water.

Mattias Bandit tunnel was not too shabby... He managed to finish top-3.

It's one of my q-heats, I'm the dude with the white Odo shirt belly... LOL. Christer is holding my VS1.

I'm second from left racing to the top buoy. Do note, there is five boats in the picture. :)

There is a hard righthander on the top buoy. It looks like this was one of few heats that had decent conditions (wind & waves I mean - the "weather" was excellent all weekend).


Pontus TS2 with TT motor.

Christer the "tunnel god" deciding what boat to use...

Fredrik Lundahl driving & Niklas co-driving.

Lundahl's Bandit looks 2 be blind...

Kim was fast but had no luck.

Anders HTB290 in the rough.

Bosse was TQ with his VS1/K&B tunnel. I was second in qualifying (VS1/OS)!

Christer's rides.

Fredrik was very close to go through from the B-final.

Anders HTB again.

Even though we dont race modified tunnels in Sweden, Anders had bought a cool Lynx with a CMB RS engine on a K&B lower unit. It looked mean.

On the evening before the race it was PERFECT weather for racing tunnels... On race day it was another set of rules... At least we could see how fast Christer's VS1 was when it was no wind.

Christer's VS1 showing off.

André's 11 year son testing his new VS1 for the first time. Maybe we'lls ee him racing later this season.

Bengt Björkhage finished 3:rd in H7.5.

André Westberg was fast in one heat in H7.5 - the rest he DNF'ed in...

Micke "Sunken" Sundgren's Kep's 21 won!

Micke on the back stretch.

Kep's 21 rules... ;)

Anders Martinelle's Taipan 21 finished in runner-up position.